Exodus 2:1-10; Hebrews 11:23-26
Moses towers like a titan across the vast reaches of our Bible. He is mentioned in 261 verses in Exodus, 80 verses in Leviticus, 216 verses in Numbers, 35 verses in Deuteronomy, 51 verses in Joshua, and 47 verses in the other historical books. The book of Psalms and the Prophets also refer to him. He is mentioned in 37 verses in the Gospels, 19 verses in Acts, and 22 verses in the Epistles. The book of Revelation also refers to him. Altogether he is mentioned in 784 verses in the Bible: 705 in the Old Testament and 79 in the New Testament. Pity the people whose pastors don't believe in Moses. By the time such liberals tear him out of their mutilated Bibles, they don't have much Bible left.
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Moses is one of the greatest men God ever made. Known as the emancipator and lawgiver of Israel, he was also a scholar, soldier, statesman, and saint. He was one of the two men who were sent back from the otherworld to confer with Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration (Matt. 17:18). He wrote the first song in Scripture (Exod. 15:119), and in glory, they still sing the song of Moses. Only now it is muted as the great stanzas of that song awake the echoes of the everlasting hills in "The song of the Lamb"(Rev. 15:3). Much of the credit for what he became must be given to his mother, Jochebed.
Jochebed Had Him
Before Moses was born, Pharaoh of Egypt decided that every male child, born to a Hebrew woman, was to be thrown into the Nile. This decree, one of Satan's early efforts to prevent the birth of the Messiah by attacking the Jewish race, must have been a tremendous test of Amram and Jochebed's faith. Their little boy, who was destined to rule the Israelites, was born, like Christ, with a great red dragon waiting to devour him the moment he was born. The couple had two older children, but the Bible does not record their births. Perhaps they were born before the edict.
Few women have had to raise a family in more difficult circumstances. The fact that a Moses, a Miriam, and an Aaron could come from a slave hut on the Nile says much about Jochebed's influence.
Hebrews 11:23 links the faith of Moses to the faith of his mother and father: "By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he was a proper child; and they were not afraid of the king's commandment." The king's wrath was something to be reckoned with, but they discounted it because they feared the wrath of God far more. They made up their minds not to murder their child in cold blood just to comply with the tyrannical edict of a wicked king. God, in turn, honored their faith.
The hour had struck for the enslaved Hebrews to be emancipated from Egypt. The prophecy given to Abraham about four centuries earlier (Gen. 15:13-14) was about to be fulfilled. The nation that Satan wanted to stamp out of existence was about to rise up and trample the world. To accomplish His purpose, God sent a baby into the world.
