Page:A Brief Bible History (Boyd and Machen, 1922).djvu/22

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One of the things Israel had to wait for through those centuries in Egypt was a leader. When the time came God raised up such a leader for his people in Moses.

The story of how Moses' life was preserved in infancy, and of how he came to be brought up at the court of Pharaoh with all its advantages for culture, is one of the most fascinating tales of childhood. Ex. 2:1-10. But not many who know this familiar tale could go on with the biography of the man of forty who fled from Pharaoh's vengeance. Moses found by personal contact with his "brethren," the children of Israel, that they were not yet ready for common action, and would not easily acknowledge his right to lead them. After killing an Egyptian slave driver there was nothing for Moses to do but to flee. Vs. 11-15.

He spent the second forty years of his life, Acts 7:23, 30; Ex. 7:7, in the deserts about the eastern arm of the Red Sea — the region known to the Hebrews as Midian. There he married the daughter of the Midianite priest Reuel. (Jethro was probably Reuel's title, meaning "his excellency.") While herding his sheep in the mountains called Horeb (Sinai), Moses received at the burning bush that personal revelation of the God of his fathers, which lay at the base of all his future labors for God and his people. Ex. 3:1 to 4:17. It was a commission to lead Israel out of their bondage in Egypt into the land promised to their fathers.

Though very humble as to his fitness for such leadership, Moses was assured of Jehovah's presence and help. He was equipped with extraordinary powers for convincing the proud Pharaoh that his demands were God's demands; and he was given the aid of his brother Aaron, who had a readiness of speech which Moses at this time seems to have lacked.

How the two brothers achieved the seemingly impossible task of winning out of Egypt, and of uniting a spiritless and unorganized mass of slaves upon a desperate enterprise, is the narrative that fills the early chapters of Exodus. But with Israel safe across the Red