The Six Who Saved, Part 4: Pharaoh's Daughter

The Six Who Saved: Pharaoh’s Daughter

[*1] What do the following statements illustrate? [*2] A traffic cop gets caught speeding. [*3] A mortgage broker defaults on his loan. [*4] A 24/7 diner is closed. [*5] A butcher who enjoys a vegan diet. And this statement is unfortunately true [*6], “The Bible is America’s all time most shoplifted book.” What do these statements illustrate? They all illustrate [*7] irony.

Irony for many is hard to define, but you-know-it-when-you-see-it. The easiest way to explain irony is that it really [*8] is the opposite of what you expect to happen—expectations versus reality. Irony is used in storytelling to keep our interest and build drama. And irony is loaded in the first ten verses of Exodus chapter 2, where we’ve been these last three weeks.

The whole story expresses the irony of [*9] the all-powerful Pharaoh, a man who is worshipped as god, the leader of the most powerful and advanced civilization of his time, the great architect and builder, the commander of armies, powerful Pharaoh gets thwarted at every turn, often by powerless women. And as the ironic of the powerful getting thwarted by the powerless is told, there are other little ironies that appear.

After Pharaoh’ initial plans of conscripting the Hebrew labor force and then adding additional oppression upon their slavery – after those plans fail to make a dent in the Hebrew reproduction rates – Pharaoh commands the midwives to commit infanticide against all newborn boys. But these ladies practice civil disobedience and the Hebrew birth rate continues to rise. Thwarted again. When Pharaoh calls out the midwives for their disobedience, he seems to buy into their excuse, “Hebrew women are different from Egyptian women. They just have babies too fast.” And some commentators have noted the irony, how the midwives take Pharaoh’s racism against the Hebrews, and use that racism against Pharaoh. Pharaoh doesn’t second guess the explanation the women give. Another little irony in the story are the midwives themselves, whose career is to help deliver babies, they work with mothers. And yet these midwives have never given birth, they aren’t moms. That’s like a butcher who is a vegan. But the irony ends, as God gives children because the midwives resisted evil.

Thwarted again, Pharaoh creates a death decree upon all newborn males – throw them in the Nile. And note the irony, as babies are taken to the Nile to be killed, Jochebed brings her son to the Nile to be saved. That as ironic as the Bible being the most shoplifted book in America.

When Moses is discovered, his sister who has been watching from a distance, asks Pharaoh’s daughter if she can find a Hebrew nurse for the child. And when given the green light Miriam gets Jochebed, her mother, Moses’ mother, who is hired, who gets paid, to take care of her own baby. Are you kidding? Didn’t see that coming. Irony makes a story interesting.

And today the story of powerful Pharaoh getting thwarted by powerless women comes full circle with the biggest little irony of them all. As Pharaoh’s daughter adopts Moses, as she brings Moses into the palace, Pharaoh’s house which decreed Hebrew destruction becomes a school for the Hebrew deliverer. [*10] Don’t miss the irony in this statement speaking of the adoption of Moses, “Satan had been defeated in his purpose [Satan? I thought we were talking about Pharaoh? Yes, but Satan was behind Pharaoh. Satan wanted to kill the deliverer before he appeared just as Satan used Herod to try to kill Jesus before Mary delivered the word’s Deliverer. Satan attempts to thwart God’s plans, yet they still succeed at thriving. And if you don’t believe that to be true just read Revelation chapter 12. The devil creates a war in heaven but Satan does not prevail and is cast to this earth. Thwarted. A woman about to give birth before a hungry dragon, but heaven snatches up the Child. Thwarted. A woman hunted by a dragon but the earth provides sanctuary for her. Thwarted. A dragon seeking to destroy the remnant of that woman’s seed, those who keep God’s commandments and have the testimony of Jesus. Do you want to be in that number? Then don’t give in to that dragon. God will provide words to say and a way of escape, as he did for these women and for Moses. There is no secret what God can do, what He’s done for others, He’ll do for you. Oh look at me, I got to preaching. [*11] Let’s get back to the irony. Here it is]. The very decree condemning the Hebrew children to death had been overruled by God for the training and education of the future leader of His people.” The irony, Pharaoh’s house decreed death only to become a school for the deliverer.

These first 10 verses of Exodus 2 are loaded with irony, including God using the heroism of a pagan princess to teach God’s people about an essential character trait we must have – [*12] compassion. How ironic, the Lord includes in Scripture someone from the world to instruct those of us in the church about Christ’s calling card, compassion. How ironic.

Jesus’ ministry was marked with compassion. And compassion marks those who Jesus takes with Him in the End Time Exodus to the His Promised Land. How many of you want to be in the number? Well if you do, then pay close attention to this study and what the pagan princess has to teach us because in Matthew chapter 25 Jesus describes a compassionate people who Jesus takes to the Promised Land. They are not described, this is troubling, they are not described according to their correct theology, commandment keeping, or soul winning efforts. They are described as being compassionate to the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, and the incarcerated. “Pastor are you describing salvation by works?” No the redeem follow Jesus, they are disciples of Jesus, and compassion was Christ’s calling card. Jesus’ compassion was so unique, so extraordinary, it is believed the gospel writers coined a new word to describe it because the Greek vocabulary had no word adequate for Jesus’ compassion.

Oh if you leave understanding this today it would have been worth the price of admission. When the gospels record Jesus’ showing compassion [*13] that English word means “to suffer with.” But the Greek word behind what is translated “compassion,” splank-niz-o-mai, is a little more descriptive giving us a sense of how Christ uniquely suffers with us. [*14] Splank-niz-o-mai literally means “to be moved in one’s bowels” or we might say “to have one’s guts stirred.” But I am going to take my own unique twist on it, “Getting sick.”

We describe compassion differently when we suffer with someone. We say things like “broken hearted.” I’ve used then when praying here, “Lord break our hearts with what breaks yours.” That’s a prayer for us to be filled with the same compassion as God is.

The difference between the lingo we use for compassion and this unique Greek word is in the time of Christ the heart was not viewed as the seat of emotion, of love or pity, the bowels were. So when we read of Jesus’ compassion yes His eyes welled up with tears, His heart broke in the sight of suffering, but also picture His stomach turning, guts wrenching, of Jesus getting sick not in revulsion to your plight but because Jesus is suffering so much with you. Jesus gets sick, his stomach turns, as your cancer treatments make you nauseous. He cries with you as you cry the loss of your spouse. His heart breaks in your loneliness as a single person or as a married person. We do not suffer alone. Our Jesus doesn’t condemn our tears, our struggles, our pain. His eyes swell, His heart breaks, His stomach turns, He gets sick at our suffering.

Compassion was Christ’s calling card. And based upon Jesus description of those who leave earth for the Promised Land in the End Time Exodus – the redeem share Jesus’ unique compassion. God’s people get sick at the sight of suffering, so much, that like Christ, they act.

So let me ask you a question I’ve wrestled with this week myself – What makes you sick? What suffering turns your stomach? I ask that because the secular world, the godless world, the pagan world, which the Egyptian princess was a part of, they can be a compassionate bunch of people. And if the secular, unbelieving world who Jesus wants us to reach, when they do not see us excelling at or exceeding their compassion, or being compassionate as Christ, well why should we lament that they are not open to our faith if we aren’t being like Jesus.

Maybe that is why a God who has a sense of humor ironically, puts this powerless, yet privileged, pagan princess in Scripture to teach God’s people about compassion. [*15] The legacy lesson she offers us from the greatest achievement of her life – compassion takes guts.

Heroic compassion takes guts [*16] because it requires living with eyes wide opened so your heart breaks at the sight of suffering that makes you sick. In this story we are made aware that the princess sees Jochebed’s ark, but have you ever considered what she might have seen before this day at the Nile. I had not until I read these words which I hope stir your stomach as it did mine. [*17] “Born into privilege, Pharaoh’s daughter was nursed on narratives of Egyptian greatness. She grew up among the elite, watching them parade through the palace with curried favor and attendants. She never lifted a finger and never knew any different. Life was good alongside the Nile River, which seemed to wind and bend on her father’s command.

[*18] She’d often visit the various balconies of his household and observe the slow rise of the mighty pyramids and storehouses. She marveled at his capacity to erect such feats of architecture. Everything around her father, from the palace pillars that seemed to hold up the sky to the mountain-shaped monuments emerging from the sands, communicated his massive strength and sweeping significance.

[*19] When the sun began to descend into the river and the world turned burnt orange with threads of pink, Pharaoh’s daughter sometimes walked the shoreline. She’d slip off her sandals to feel the warm sand and cool water in turn. While she was privileged, she wasn’t powerful, so she soaked in simple pleasures afforded her along the river.

[*20] One afternoon amid such a walk, a baby washed up, nearly touching her bare feet. A Hebrew boy, mere days old it appeared, drowned and now within arm’s reach. The servants ran to grab the child, as if to erase the incident altogether. Royal women weren’t supposed to witness the underside of life in the empire.

[*21] But they were too late. The waterlogged infant was the evidence she could not deny. As the serpentine river swallowed the sun whole, she came to know that all the rumors were true. Her father had turned the Nile into a watery grave.”

Never had I considered the possibility, that baby Moses was not the first infant this princess came in contact with at the Nile. Though Moses was the first Hebrew child she found alive there. How many times might she had seen, and had her stomach turned, as her ritual baths at the Nile were interrupted with drowned children or little dismembered limbs floating by – unconsumed remnants of a crocodile feeding frenzy.

Exodus 2:6 NKJV

And when she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby wept. So she had compassion on him, and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.”

It may sound like I am speculating, but look at verse 6, when the attendants retrieve Jochebed’s ark, [*22] and discover a baby inside. What does the princess say? “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.” Does she recognize the ethnicity because of the nature the boy’s anatomy that was circumcised on the eight day, something Egyptians did not do? Or does she know this is a Hebrew child, because she has been living with eyes wide open, and is well aware of the atrocities her father has laid upon the Hebrews. Only a Hebrew child would be placed in the Nile this way. The princess had the guts to live with her eyes wide open.

She could have conveniently turned a blind eye, simply asked her attendant to take care of this problem, she could have refused Miriam’s offer to find a nurse. But the princess, has the guts to live with her eyes wide open instead of turning a blind eye, instead of closing her eyes.

Why is that important? Because compassion begins with the guts to look, without turning away, without closing your eyes, to look at another’s plight, problem, and oppression.

Look it up this afternoon in the gospels, before Jesus is described as having compassion, before Christ gets so sick at the sight of someone’s suffering that He moves into action, before

that the Bible says, “He saw.” He saw and had compassionate.

Luke 15:20 NKJV

“And he arose and came to his father. But when he was still a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion, and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him.

Luke 10:33 NKJV

But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. And when he saw him, he had compassion.

In Jesus’ two most popular parables, compassion follows sight, compassion flows from sight. When the younger brother who spent his inheritance foolishly and who finds himself in a pig pen, when he decides to go home to his father to live as a servant, the text [*23] says when the father saw his son “and had compassion.” When two devout religious men exercise their privilege to look the other way and ignore the plight of a naked carcass that robbers had left half dead, ironically Jesus says a false religion, half bread Samaritan, passes by with eyes wide open, [*24] and sees the victim, and had compassion. Compassion follows what we see. Compassion flows from what we see. If we will have the guts to live with eyes wide open.

William Wilberforce, a Christian abolitionist who helped end the legal slave trade in the British Empire, he realized how compassion follows what people see, and flows from what people see. At the time, the British population was not motivated to end slavery because they along with members of Parliament could not see what was taking place 3,000 miles away. And so Wilberforce had to help is people visualize the horror of slavery.

In movie about his life, “Amazing Grace,” Wilberforce cleverly traps a sailing excursion of the privileged members of Parliament, along with their families who are enjoying fine music and eating sumptuously. He causes their boat to be stopped in the bay next to the slave ship Madagascar, which had recently delivered 200 slaves to the West Indies although it began its journey with 600. Standing on the Madagascar, Wilberforce admonishes his audience offended by the foul stench to remove the handkerchiefs from their noses, saying, “That is the smell of death – slow, painful death. Breath it in; breath it deeply … Remember that smell. Remember the Madgascar. Remember that God made men equal.” At the end of that scene, the privileged are crying as compassion is generated because even if they closed their eyes they couldn’t ignore the smell. Compassion follows our senses, first with the eyes. And while those depicted on the Madagascar could not escape, those of us who enjoy some privileged of some kind, we can turn the other way, or close our eyes. Wilberforce knew that, ending an antislavery speech at [*25] Parliament saying, “Having heard all this you may choose to look the other way, but you can never again say you did not know.”

Are you living with the guts to have your eyes wide open to suffering so compassion may flow? Most of us do whatever we can do to avoid looking at suffering, being around suffering, having our hearts broken, our consciousness stirred, to become so sick about something that we act to alleviate, remedy, help, aid. I mean when we have some precious free time, do we use it at the soup kitchen, at the nursing home, or in the prison? I’m preaching to myself too you know.

The Egyptian princess had the guts to live with eyes wide open, to not turn away, to not turn a blind eye, and though she is powerless to put an end to her father’s atrocity, his violence has stirred her guts with enough sickness to be curious about what was in the basket. To not fear at looking at what was inside. And then to make a decision to act – to adopt this child.

Do you live with the guts to have your eyes wide open? What is getting the attention of your eyeballs? You may want to perform an audit to see if you are like the average American who spends over 11 hours a day (almost half a day) consuming media – that’s social media, radio, television, on demand streaming services like Netflix. Half of American spend one to four hours daily watching television.

Why do we often give our eyeballs so much screen time? Is it for the sake of being curious about our neighbor’s suffering? Are your favorite programs about helping find solutions to hunger, injustice, or orphans? Don’t our eyes look at screens to be entertained because we want a story and beautiful cinematography to escape from our own stress, our own problems, or the overwhelming world’s problems we just watched on the news? Oh isn’t watching the news the worst, you just feel so powerless afterward don’t you? There are so many problems in this world, you just want to throw your hands up and say, “Jesus come quickly!” And yes, we may be powerless to solve the problem, as the Egyptian princess was, but if our eyes are closed off to the sufferings of others, if our eyes are given so much to escape how will our compassion flow and how will our compassion grow? And worse, certain forms of media, not all media, but the hours our eyes are riveted to social media, studies have shown that will lower our capacity for empathy, our ability to feel what others are feeling, including their suffering, so we don’t get sick over the suffering of others.

Media consumption can be a powerful trap for God’s people in the last days. Not because it will rot your brain as you mother warned but because it can captivate your eyes, which can keep you from being the compassionate hero God has called you to be. The compassionate hero which the Devil fears. Because compassion grows, compassion flows from what we see. So be curious and read a book that opens your eyes to suffering and ways God can use you to alleviate it. Mark your calendar for time to serve the hungry and homeless at a soup kitchen. To sing on a Sabbath afternoon to the forgotten elderly at a nursing home. Have the guts to live with eyes wide opened so compassion may flow, compassion may grow. Having the guts to live with eyes wide open is the first lesson this pagan princess has for God’s people.

Sick over Pharaoh’s atrocity, Egypt’s princess is powerless to stop her father, powerless to stop the execution of every Hebrew boy, but here is the second lesion she teaches us, she has the guts to leverage her privilege to do what she can – even if all she can do is save one baby.

We all experience privilege, certain advantages, that others are not so blessed with. And privilege must be leveraged wisely. To whom much is given, much is required. There are those who are not privileged with much free time, they work three jobs just to make ends meet, and sometimes only get one day off from work. There are others who are blessed with a two day weekend where they don’t have to work for money. There are others blessed to not have to go to work at all and be the masters of their own time in a season called retirement. With the privilege of the time you have that is free, that is within your control, how are you leveraging it?

Some have the privilege of hobbies. That is a privilege, not a universal right. The last time I had a hobby was the summer my daughter was born when I had my first successful bumper crop of tomatoes. Now on Sunday’s I go to a farmer and buy tomatoes that I know I can grow but have no time to do so. But others here, may have a hobby, you can grow food, you enjoy cooking, you sew or quilt, you work with wood – is there a way you can leverage your hobby to address the suffering you see that makes you sick?

One of our newest members has taken her talents and time – that’s often how hobbies are born, at the intersection of time and talent, Jan Denton makes Bags of Love that she donates to Social Services. And these bags are given to children, whose life situation is so bad, that they have to be taken out of their homes and from their parents. And with these bags, the kids can collect their possessions before they are removed from their homes, their parents, and put into foster care. Their only possessions in a bag. God bless you Jan. You’ve leveraged your privilege to address situations that make our stomach turn.

We all are privileged economically. Yes, I said all. And if you don’t believe me, spend some time this afternoon going to howrichami.com. There you can put in how many people are in your household and how much annual income you make and it will tell you how rich you are compared to the rest of the world. In the United States a five person household, two adults, and three kids, making $28,000, which is the poverty line – that family is richer than 77% of the rest of the world. I know, that’s got you wondering just how rich you are doesn’t it?

When it comes to finances, most people don’t see themselves rich or privileged, it’s always those who are making more than we do – they are privileged financially. We never take the time to really consider how rich we truly are and that we can leverage our (dare I say it?) our wealth to show compassion and alleviate suffering. The pagan Egyptian princess certainly had economic privilege that came with being a member of the royal household. And she leveraged it to pay someone to raise her adopted son. Oh if I could only be so blessed where I could financially compensate my wife for what she does as a stay at home mom. I could be wrong but I don’t think any of us in this church are that wealthy.

But with the margin I have or that you have, how much compassion could be shown, how much suffering could be alleviated if we leveraged a little each month or over the year. Little is much when God is in it. Think of the orphans around the world that could be sponsored at our Adventist mission schools where the little you leverage can go such a long way. We can’t save the world but we can change the trajectory of one child’s future in this life and the next.

What would happen if God’s people, learned lessons from a pagan princess?

What if we lived with guts – with eyes wide open willing to see and get sick at the sight of suffering that we’d leverage our privilege to show compassion? Though doing so won’t save the world, Jesus already did that, but compassion can be our resistance, our civil disobedience to the laws of evil by the ruler of tis age. When Egypt’s princess adopts the baby at the Nile, she is resisting her father Pharaoh. The entire story we’ve looked at now for four weeks has book ends of civil disobedience to the laws of evil – the midwives and Pharaoh’s daughter. And all these ladies are blessed by God with children for their civil disobedience to evil.

You’ve heard it said that the only thing for evil to triumph in the world is for good men to do nothing. Well when God’s people respond to suffering with compassion, we join the legacy of these heroic women who said, “Not today Pharaoh. Not today Satan.”

What would happen if we lived with guts – with eyes wide open willing to see and get sick at the sight of suffering that we’d leverage our privilege to show compassion? Though doing so won’t save the world, Jesus already did that, compassion will change it for the better. After Jochebed turns her son over to palace, look at what the princess does in verse 10, “So she called his name Moses, saying, “I drew him out of the water.” Look at this irony, she gives a name to Moses based on past events not realizing that this is God’s prophecy for Moses’ future. She drew him out of the Nile, but because of her compassion, eighty years later, God will draw Moses and a nation out of the waters of the Red Sea and the world is better for it.

Exodus 2:10 NKJV

And the child grew, and she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. So she called his name Moses, saying, “Because I drew him out of the water.”

What would happen if we lived with guts – with eyes wide open willing to see and get sick at the sight of suffering that we’d leverage our privilege to show compassion? We’d be more like Jesus. Jesus who did not turn a blind eye or the other way when our first parents sinned, but in compassion came to the fallen first Adam with a promise of leveraging the privilege of God’s Son to become the Second Adam, the Son of Man. We’d be more like Jesus who leveraged all the power He had to address our suffering with compassion ultimately demonstrated on a cross. We’d be like Jesus, who today as our High Priest intercedes for us and helps us in our suffering. We’d be like Jesus. Is that your desire today? Then stand as we sing.