Moses was spared

Exodus 1: 8 – 2: 10, OT page 49 Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. He said to his people, “Look, the Israelite people are more numerous and more powerful than we. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, or they will increase and, in the event of war, join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.” Therefore they set taskmasters over them to oppress them with forced labor. They built supply cities, Pithom and Rameses, for Pharaoh. But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread, so that the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites. The Egyptians became ruthless in imposing tasks on the Israelites, and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and in every kind of field labor. They were ruthless in all the tasks that they imposed on them. The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, “When you act as midwives to the Hebrew women, and see them on the birthstool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, she shall live.” But the midwives feared God; they did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but they let the boys live. So the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and allowed the boys to live?” The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women; for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” So God dealt well with the midwives; and the people multiplied and became very strong. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every boy that is born to the Hebrews you shall throw into the Nile, but you shall let every girl live.” Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him three months. When she could hide him no longer she got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river. His sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him. The daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and she took pity on him, “This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,” she said. Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and get you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Yes.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and she took him as her son. She named him Moses, “because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.” Sermon The Israelite people came to live in Egypt; from the time Joseph saved his brothers and their families from the famine in the land Promised to Abraham and his descendants, they lived in Egypt and they died Egypt, many of their children were born there with no memory of any other land besides the fields and river banks nourished by the Nile River. It’s in a time and place like that when you can hear grandparents interrupt their grandchildren’s conversations concerning the fastest chariots or the best places to swim in the Nile with old stories about a homeland flowing with milk and honey. The grandparents wanted them to remember and prepare themselves to go back one day, but the grandchildren just wanted to fit in because that’s what grandchildren want to do. However, if a cat crawls into an oven to deliver her litter – they’re still kittens, not muffins. And in the same way just being born in Egypt doesn’t make one Egyptian any more than being born at Maury Regional makes you a local. In fact, just as the Israelites lived in Egypt you can live somewhere for years and years never quite belonging, though we all want to belong, whether in the place we were born or in the place we’ve adopted, so while my father-in-law who moved from Columbia, South America to Knoxville, Tennessee always planning on moving back home eventually, he did try to fit in at the University of Tennessee. He landed in Knoxville to study architecture while still just getting a grasp of the basics of the English language. Not yet grasping all the nuances, a couple nice church ladies asked him on the sidewalk if he’d been saved and he assumed they were asking him about his bank account. Then one of his first times through the cafeteria line at breakfast he asked for a biscuit with groovy instead of a biscuit with gravy. This was the 60’s so you can imagine how he’d make the mistake. Fortunately the cafeteria lady on the other side of the serving line laughed and so did he because he’s the kind of guy who can laugh at himself, but even still, fitting in is a serious business. Nobody wants to feel like the new guy forever. Sooner or later we all want to be one of the group laughing and talking in the cafeteria instead of the one on the outside sitting alone, just watching the others laughing and talking. From the outside looking in it seems like they’ve known each other forever, and to be one of them, if you’re lonely enough, you’ll do just about anything. That’s why these midwives are worth remembering. That’s why not even Pharaoh is named in our second Scripture lesson – he’s just called Pharaoh - but here in Exodus they are referred to not as two midwives but as Shiphrah and Puah. Remember their names because they had this chance to please the king of Egypt but they chose instead to honor their God. And they knew what pleasing him would have meant. They knew what disappointing him would have meant too. Already he had ordered the execution of babies, and just as he was capable of great evil so also in his words they may have heard an invitation to something good. A part of them must have been ready to do what he asked, as there is a part of all of us ready to walk down the easy path and away from who we are and who we should be. There’s a man at the County Fair who knows that well enough – so he tells you that a good father will pay three dollars to throw a shoe and knock over some cans to win his daughter a prize. Now you want to be a good father don’t you? The grocery store knows it too – so they don’t just sell food, it’s not just cereal in that box, the commercials say that it’s fuel for a school day, a ticket to academic excellence, or even worse – they’ll tell you that having this or providing that will make you a good mother. You want to be a good mother don’t you? It’s not just in High School where the one whose self-worth constantly hangs in the balance of what other people say walks a precarious line – every man and woman who seeks acceptance from the world faces the worst kind of danger day in and day out – it doesn’t matter how many hours you work, you could still work more, how many people you please, there will still be expectations unmet. Despite whatever Pharaoh threatened or promised, they chose to remain Shiphrah and Puah – remember their names and be like them, let the God who created you define who you are. They made the choice to save those Hebrew babies – they chose to listen to their heart rather than the voice of a sin sick world – and that same choice is yours today. The standards of our world will tell you how to act and speak – but the ways of this world must not be your ways. “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God – what is good and acceptable and perfect.” Do not be conformed to this world for you don’t belong to this world any more than Moses belonged to the Pharaoh’s palace. Do not be conformed to this world, but honor the God who created you, the one who will spare you as Moses was spared. Amen.