The_Mother_who_Saved_a_Nation[1]
M. Clugston
May 06/08
THE MOTHER WHO SAVED A NATION
Exodus 2:1-10
Intro: The life of a nation can often be traced back to the lap of a mother. There is no place that comes through more clearly than in Exodus 2. The nation is Israel… the baby is Moses… and the mother is Jochebed. We discover her name in Exodus 6:20 but you will notice no names are mentioned in this passage because it is a passage about God.
Israel is trapped in Egypt. They are entering into a time of oppression and they needed deliverance… and tucked away in this story is the story of a mother.
I want to look at 3 brief truths this Mother’s Day to encourage not only mothers, but fathers as well, as we look at parenting in particular plus children who have been kept alive and are being kept alive through the love and prayers of a godly mom.
I. The Problem vs. 1-2
“Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman, and she became pregnant and give birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months.”
Pg. 2
Now the reason she had to hid her baby was because the world in which she lived had gone crazy. You find that in chapter 1:8 “Then a new king, who did not know about Joseph, came to power in Egypt.”
You remember the story of Joseph when he came down to Egypt with 70 others. Because he was 2nd in command, he brought righteousness and life and hope to this historical evil nation. When Joseph went to Egypt, there was blessing that went to Egypt because God blessed Joseph and blessed his rule. In fact, Joseph saved thousands of lives in the midst of a famine because the blessing of God was on Joseph. But there was a problem.
A king arose who had no commitment to the blessing from God that Joseph brought to Egypt and the result was that oppression and hatred and death came to this nation in which Jochebed had her baby. In fact let me read it to you from vs. 9-11:
“Look,” he said to his people. “The Israelites have become much too numerous for us. Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, they will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country. So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labor…”
Pg. 3
So Pharaoh oppressed the Israelites who were going on 2 million strong because he was insecure about the growth of this religious population in his midst. It was in that culture that Jochbed gave birth to Moses. It was a time when she had become a slave of Egypt… it was a time when all hell broke loose and there was great chaos in the society.
In other words, let’s get rid of the men. This was a nation in crises. It was a culture where the society no longer respected its men… no longer had value for the boys of Hebrew mothers.
Much like our day: gangs… drugs… etc. Reminds me that our culture no longer remembers Joseph or his God. The more a culture drifts from God… the more the people are in trouble. When a culture departs from God, it departs from hope.
So this is the environment Jochebed had her baby.
The 2nd truth I want you to see is:
II. The Person vs. 2
“When she saw that he was a find child, she hid him for three months.”
Pg. 4
Now every mother thinks her baby is beautiful… even if it is ugly as all get out. This does not mean that she thought that he was just a pretty baby. The Bible tells us a little bit more about his prettiness that was part of Moses’ life. Acts 7:20 says, “At the time Moses was born, he was no ordinary child.” Now when Jochebed looked down on her baby boy, she didn’t just see goo goo… she saw a baby who had the hand of God on his life. She didn’t just see a 8 pounds 5 ounce baby… she saw the goodness and grace of God that gave life. She looked at her baby through the eyes of God and beyond his physical beauty.
Mom… if you are going to be a mother that is a mother of honor, then you must be a mother of faith. This woman looked at her baby through the eyes of God even though she was living in a culture where the religious people no longer worshiped God.
The reason the culture was falling apart was not only that the king no longer remembered Joseph, but the Jews no longer remember Joseph either. It was a secularized culture even among those who reportedly knew God. So what was the result? The culture was falling apart… the boys were in trouble… the people were becoming slaves… but in the middle of the mess, you have a mother who still believes God and for 3 months she hides her boy because she is a woman of faith.
Pg. 5
I want to talk about this mother’s faith. I want to talk to you mothers who have children who haven’t grown up yet to encourage you to not let the culture discourage you. I want to talk to you teenagers to let you know that God is bigger than your world. I want to let you know that the God of Jochebed can be your God too.
What I learn about this woman, the mother of Moses, was a mother who leaned on the strength of other women, who were also women of faith. You see chapter 2 comes on the heel of chapter 1, (du) and you can’t appreciate chapter 2... what Jochabed did until you understand chapter 1... what the midwives did.
Pharaoh said, “When you help the Hebrew women in childbirth and observe them on the delivery stool, if it is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live. The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live. Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, ‘Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?’” (vs. 16-18).
Please notice that they lied through their teeth: “The midwives answered Pharaoh, ‘Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive” (vs. 19)… shows you how ignorant Pharaoh was to believe it.
Pg. 6
The midwives did not obey the culture… they didn’t do what society said they ought to do… they preserved the children. When the society was aborting the future, the midwives were keeping the baby boys. When the society was throwing away and making life look meaningless, they were holding life as sacred unto God… because they feared God. Baby boys were saved who otherwise would have been killed and they feared God. And what does God do? “So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous. And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own” (vs. 20-21).
So when you take away the beginning of vs.1 and pretend there is no chapter division, this is one continues saga. Or let me put it another way: the midwives trusted God and would not throw away the kids to the culture. There was another woman who picked up that same sentiment, Jochebed, a daughter of Levi, who had a baby boy, took care of him 3 months because she, like the midwives wasn’t going to throw her baby to the culture either.
In other words, she picked up on the faith of women who had gone before her. Moms: the best thing you can do if you are having trouble being a mom… hang out with another godly mother who knows how to go through the hard times and stick it out and not throw in the towel.
Pg. 7
We are living in a day when more mothers are physically walking away from their kids or emotionally leaving and adopting careers. They have left their home because the culture has made it too tough to raise kids in this kind of world. But there was a woman of faith like the midwives, who had gone before her and she was part of a group of people who hung in there when the going got tough. Her faith was encouraging to others. That’s why Titus 2:3-6 says, “Older women…they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God.”
One thing that should happen in the church is that those who have already gone through their child rearing years should encourage this next generation to maintain a godly faith in a wicked society.
Look at Hebrews 11:23, “By faith Moses’ parents hid him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary child, and they were not afraid of the king’s edict.” Now that’s very important. Faith removed fear. They were not afraid of the culture because they had their focus on the Lord.
Friends, things are bad in this world, but God is bigger than the bad. This is a tough time to raise kids, so the question is not “how bad is the culture.” The question is “does God have your baby?”
Pg. 8
When our kids were born, they were offered to the Lord. We have dedicated babies on this stage as parents offer them to the Lord. Do you know what that means? It is not some nice ditty that you do to be spiritual, parents are saying, “Lord, it is rough out here, but we believe you are bigger than the bad. That if your hand is on our child, then no matter how bad things get out in the culture, you can still take care of my baby.” Don’t be afraid of the culture. Why? No matter how bad the Pharaohs gets, God is greater!
III. The Plan
She didn’t sit back… she had faith enough to product a plan. What was the plan?
She had secretly hid Moses for the first 3 months of his life and that had been a lot of work. Can you imagine what it must have been like? Every time he whimpered, she had to jump up and make sure he didn’t cry for long. Why? Because if Pharaoh’s soldiers heard his cry they would come in and kill the baby and throw him into the Nile. So for 3 months they had to have a 24 hour watch between husband and wife. Can you imagine if he had colic?
What is so significant about 3 months? It is the time that you set the foundation for your kids.
Pg. 9
We live in a world today where the world is after our kids through TV… video games…movies… humanism. It is your job mothers and fathers to hid your children while they are young. When they are young, they don’t have enough sense to make decisions on their own. Your job is hid them from the evil of the culture so that the culture can’t rip them and throw them into the spiritual Nile which produces death before they’ve ever had a chance to live.
Many of our children are being abused by parents… abused by relatives because they are not been hidden by men and women of faith.
So what does Moses’ mother do? “When she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile” (vs. 3). In other words… the baby is getting more active and she couldn’t keep him quiet any more and that meant he was going to be subject to death. But she had a plan!
1)… She put baby Moses, who didn’t have a name yet, into a basket and put him in the Nile. What kind of a plan is that? A perfect plan. Do you know why? What was happening in the Nile? Pharaoh had ordered that “Every boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live” (1:22). So any boy baby in the Nile was a dead baby.
Pg. 10
So what does she do? She put her baby in a place where it would be the least likely to run across a hostile environment. In other words, soldiers are only coming to the Nile to kill them… not to look for living babies. So she puts him in the place where it was least likely to face death because it was a place where death already existed.
2)…Not only that… she put him in a place where he would be most likely discovered. This mother had seen where Pharaoh’s daughter went to take a bath and knew where he would be found. But she also put him in the reeds so he couldn’t drift off because the reeds were designed to hold the wicker basket in place.
If you’ve got to put your kids somewhere because for right now you can’t hid them any longer, put them in a place where they are safe.
Let me tell you what else she did? “His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him” (vs. 4).
She had a plan. She said, “Miriam, you are the big sister, I want you to keep an eye out.”
Now look what happens! God takes over because there are certain things only God can do.
Pg. 11
“Then Pharaoh’s daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the river bank. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her slave girl to get it. She opened it and saw the baby. He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. ‘This is one of the Hebrew babies,’ she said.” “Then his sister asked Pharaoh’s daughter, ‘Shall I go and get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you?’ Yes, go. And the girl went and got the baby’s mother” (vs. 5-8).
Listen friends… when you honor God with faith, He won’t forget you!
Miriam runs to Pharaoh’s daughter and says, “Don’t you need a nurse to raise that baby?” “Yes, why don’t you find me a nurse.” Oh, does she have a nurse. She goes and gets Moses’ mother and Moses’ mother becomes Moses’ nurse.
“Pharoah’s daughter said to her, ‘Take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you’” (vs. 9). WOW! Moses’ mother gets to nurse her own baby and gets paid for it! Why? Because of God. God brought the woman at the right time… had her turn her eyes in the right direction… made Moses make some noise at the right time… and at the very same moment the sister was right at the spot to offer Moses’ mother to raise her own son and receive a salary from the very government that was trying to kill him.
Pg. 12
When you put God first, you would be amazed how He can provide income for you to do your job.
“So the woman took the baby and nursed him” (vs. 9b). She took Moses home and nursed him… she clothed him… and she trained him.
Now when Moses got big, he went to Egypt were he was educated at the University of Egypt, a secular school with no divine view of God. He became a distinguished in communication… in athletics… and became a military leader. He was the top of the top. However, when he became grown, he said, “I will no longer be known as Pharaoh’s daughter. I’d rather suffer with the people of God than to enjoy Egypt and the pleasures of sin for a temporary season” Hebrews 11:24-26).
I simply have one question for the text? Where did he get that information that these slaves were his people? Where did he get the information from that their god was different than his God? Where did he hear this information? He didn’t get it from Pharaoh’s daughter… he didn’t get it from Pharaoh who was trying to kill him as a baby… he didn’t get it from the University of Egypt. I’ll tell you where he got it from. He got it from his mother!
Pg. 13
When Jocebed was raising him, she’d be combing his hair and putting his clothes on… she would tell him who created the heavens and the earth. She told him about the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph. She told him not to compromise the truth when he got to the big university. Don’t forget where you came from. Don’t forget that you are first of all a Hebrew, then you can be a big shot in the seculiar world. That’s why you bring your kids to church… that’s why you have devotions with them at home… so when they go to IU or Prudue or wherever… they won’t forget where they came from.
That’s why you have to do it when they are young so they don’t forget who they are. You make sure you drum in the truth of God in your kids in those first 11 years of their lives, so when they branch out, God has been embedded in their lives and they can’t wash it off.
Some of you are here today because of what your mother did when you were small. She made you go to church but you said, “I’m tired of this stuff. Can’t wait till I get out of this house and I don’t have to go to church anymore. I’m never going to church again.” You went off to college where they didn’t require you to go to church. You never picked up your Bible and you run with the crowd and tried this and that, but somehow you couldn’t shake it, but you didn’t know why. You see Mama was still praying for you. She was still taking you to God and you couldn’t shake it.
Pg. 14
And guess what… you are in the house of the Lord today because God instilled it during those earlier years. Bombard your children with God NOW so that Egypt doesn’t own them later.
She gave Moses what every mother should give her child…that is a long term view. He refused the joys of Egypt and the pleasure of sin for the reproach of Christ. He was educated but he was not going to let his education become his faith. He was rich but he wasn’t going to let his riches come before his faith.
Your faith must come first in the long term view.
Let me give you some lessons from this story:
1)… Nothing you do in a child’s life is more important than laying for them a spiritual foundation. Because of what this mother did in those early days, God saved his life and his life saved the lives of many.
2)… Children provide the greatest opportunity even to see the power of provision from God. If you have a straying teenager, know there is a place to go on your face everyday for him or her and ask God to turn them around. Are you praying for your kids every day? If your kids are at home, go by their bed and kneel with them in prayer.
Pg. 15
Satan wants your boys… he wants your daughters. He wants to destroy them… get on your knees and fight for them in prayer. Focus on the character of God and not on the contamination of the culture.
The problem in our marriages… in our parenting is we have to weak a view of God. We have this itsy bitsy thimble view of God. So we have a God that can do nothing and when you have that kind of God that’s what He gives you… nothing. Because He wants to be honored as GOD… it says… by faith they saved Moses.
*In 1984, a young lady named Linda Downs was in the New York Marathon. It normally takes a fast runner a couple of hours to do the NY marathon… a casual runner maybe 4 hours. It took Linda 11 hours to finish and the reason she did is because Linda had cerebal palsy. So with crutches on, she walked the NewYork marathon.
Of course all the news media was there… 11 hours… everybody else had finished the race and here comes Linda Downs. She crosses the finish line and collapses and the news reporters began asking her questions. One of the questions was, “Linda, why did you do this?” She said, “because I wanted every hurting person to know that you can even with limitation still achieve a great victory.”
Pg. 16
But the news reporter said, “But how did you make it?” She said, “I only made it by an act of God.” He said, “what do you mean an act of God?”
She said, “When I had 11 miles to go, I had no strength left. All my strength was gone. So I had to borrow power from someone else.” This is Linda’s quote: “I didn’t have any power, I’ve got cerebral palsy… all my limbs were hurting, so I had to borrow some power and I looked up to heaven and said, ‘Lord, give me power on loan I can’t make this last 11 miles unless you give me energy I don’t have the power. I don’t possess it.’” So Linda told the news media, “the reason I finished this race is that I borrowed some power from God.”
Perhaps you are wondering… how can I manage these kids? The answer is “Power on Loan.” That God will loan you the power to make the distance.
Find out what the grace of God can do in the life of a mother because who knows maybe the baby that you raise will be the baby that saves a nation.