The Two Mothers of Moses

In an ideal world filled with sunshine and buttercups, rainbows and butterflies, lemonade and candy, one nice, happy, cookie-cutter family raises children who go on to marry people from other nice, happy, cookie-cutter families, and this story just keeps going. But thanks to sin, this has never been the case.

We’re all fruit growing on the branches of family trees with roots infested by sin. What’s more, our family trees are growing in a treacherous and hostile world. It’s a jungle out there, not the Garden of Eden.

So what are we to do? Refuse to marry and refrain from having children? Are our sinful nature and hostile world reasons not to do what God made us to do in the first place, to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28)? Has God’s plan changed?

Though God gave these instructions before sin and death entered the world, he didn’t change his intentions afterward. In fact, he blessed his chosen, special people – the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – with a growing population. Over four centuries, the increased from 70 people to more 2-3 million (Exo 1:7).

This growth was not without challenges. The Hebrew people lived in a foreign nation that was hostile to their values. They worked tirelessly under oppressive conditions and lived in a densely populated community. They even faced a government program designed to kill their baby boys at birth. Despite all this, they still fulfilled God’s purpose.

To fulfill God’s purpose in a sinful world, we need to believe that God intends to bless us despite adversity. Our cookie cutter broke in the Garden of Eden, but that didn’t stop God from baking. He’s been blessing and guiding broken people like you and me for centuries.

Let’s consider how he did this for a boy named Moses. He was born in Egypt centuries ago. From infancy to adulthood, he experienced many challenges in a hostile world. What’s more, he experienced a challenging family arrangement, one that may even resemble your own experience today – he had two mothers.

You might assume that having two mothers, one of whom was likely a nonbeliever, would have derailed God’s purpose for his life. But would you be surprised to learn that the opposite was true? Through these two mothers, God prepared Moses for his ultimate mission in life – to deliver the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt. Together, these mothers of Moses were crucial influences for the nation of Israel and therefore the world.

Before we contemplate the mothers of Moses, it is important to recognize the primary purpose for Exodus giving us these details about his birth and early childhood. They are given to verify how God prepared Moses to be the rightful leader of Israel and the prophet who would write the Torah.

In doing so, however, it provides encouraging insights that should encourage us today. It demonstrates how God can accomplish his purposes in the world and in families despite (and even through) adverse and hostile circumstances that would seem to threaten or derail his plan instead.

God blessed Moses with a biological mother.

The name of Moses’ biological mother was Jochebed, but we don’t learn this until later in the book of Exodus (Exo 6:20; Num 26:59). Instead, we learn that both her and her husband were descendants of Levi (Exo 2:1).

Having Levi as your great, great grandfather was not an honor. His father, Jacob, described him as a cruel, dishonorable, angry, self-centered, and impulsive man (Gen 49:5-6). For this reason, Jacob offered him a curse and not a blessing (Gen 49:7).

As with any family, the roots of family problems seem to run throughout later generations. Perhaps that’s why Moses, later in life, displayed some similar traits when he killed an Egyptian leader in an angry, impulsive, and violent way. This act of vengeance resembled the way that Levi had wrongly responded to the men of the city who had mistreated his sister, Dinah (Gen 34:25-31).

Whatever the case, Moses inherited undesirable tendencies from his ancestors through his biological mother, as we all do. Even so, God blesses us with mothers, nonetheless.

The name Jochebed means “Jehovah is her glory.” Though she inevitably contributed to her son’s fallen tendencies, she also influenced him heavily for God. By doing so, she also influenced the entire nation of Israel for centuries to come. What’s more, she even influences people today, like you and me, who hear about Moses and are influenced by his biblical teaching.

God blessed Moses with an adopted mother.

Though God influenced Moses (and us) significantly through his biological mother, he also influenced him (and us) greatly through his adopted mother as well. Whereas Jochebed was a daughter of Levi (Exo 2:1), this woman was a daughter of Pharaoh (2:5).

Unlike Jochebed, she was descended from a pagan family who worshipped false gods and rejected the one, true Creator God whom the Israelites worshipped.

This woman was likely not as powerful as you may first assume. To be pharaoh’s daughter (or princess) meant that she was born due to relations between Pharaoh and one of the many women in his harem. Though she enjoyed a lavish lifestyle, she was not necessarily an influential or powerful person.

She was an Egyptian princess, meaning that she was one of many women in Pharaoh’s extended royal family. The odds were small that she would ever have a child of her own.

Both mothers took risks to raise Moses.

Jochebed risked disobeying Pharaoh’s executive order to kill every Hebrew boy at birth. Rather than comply, she nursed him for three months, at which point it would have become increasingly difficult to keep the baby quiet and undetected.

To solve this problem, she waterproofed a storage container and placed it among the reeds of the Nile (Exo 2:3). (Moses describes this floating container using words similar to the words that described the ark that Noah built.) She didn’t push the basket down the river, as some suppose; nor did she abandon it to fate. Instead, this floating basket served as a safe place for Moses to stay when she wasn’t nursing him. The lid of the basket would muffle his crying, and so would the reeds and the sound of the water around him.

Imagine how Jochebed must have felt throughout the day, wondering how Moses was doing in his basket on the Nile. Was he safe? Would the basket leak water and drown? Would a crocodile or some other creature break through and harm her child? Would the Egyptian guards discover him when they made their rounds? That’s probably why her daughter, Miriam, watched the basket from a distance, to keep an eye on anything that might happen to him (Exo 2:4).

Pharaoh’s daughter also risked disobeying Pharaoh’s executive order to kill the Hebrew baby boys. When she and her servant went to the Nile river for a bath, she discovered the basket (Exo 2:5). She would have bathed in the Nile out of customary respect for the river as a sacred place associated with fertility and Hapi, the Egyptian god of the Nile.

When she raised the lid to look inside, Moses cried, and she felt compassion for him (Exo 2:6). Though she knew he should be killed, she disregarded her father’s orders. This is most astounding and unexpected because not only was she disobeying her father, who was also the supreme ruler of the nation, but she was also disobeying him even though he was revered as a god in Egypt.

On the front end of Moses’ childhood, Pharaoh’s daughter relinquished her influence over Moses in his earliest years of life. (Exo 2:9) Jochebed relinquished her influence and withdrew her presence after Moses finished nursing and did not enjoy the privilege of naming her child; Pharaoh’s daughter named him (Exo 2:10).

On the later end of Moses’ growth and development, both mothers suffered the heartbreak of saying goodbye. When he was grown, he abandoned Egypt to live in the remote land of Midian (Exo 2:11-15).

When this happened, his adopted mother experienced the heartbreak of rejection because he refused to be called her son (Heb 11:24). Imagine her sorrow. The boy she into whom she had invested so much love, care, and training turned his back on all that she had given him.

When this happened, his biological mother also experienced the pain of separation. Rather than return to his original home, he went far away to Midian and stayed away for forty years (Acts 7:30). We have no idea whether she ever saw her son again. The lifespan of Moses’ father and his listing in the outbound census at the exodus indicates that he saw Moses again (Exo 6:20; Num 3:20). But whether Jochebed also saw him again, we cannot know for sure.

Personal Application

Mothers play a vital role in working out God’s plan.

It’s said for good reason that, “The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.” No matter her spiritual condition, her motives in raising you, or the way she became your mother, you should thank God for your mother(s). From God’s perspective, the influence of the mother in your life is more significant than you may realize. The same is true for the way that God intends for her influence to influence the world through your life.

Even complex mother situations reveal God’s providence.

Even if your mother is a nonbeliever with ungodly motives and an ungodly lifestyle, God can still use her influence in your life in strategic ways. The same is true even when you have multiple mothers (i.e., a stepmother, an adopted mother, etc.).

We should still raise children, even in a hostile world.

An antichristian culture and a wicked society is no reason to cease having children. If anything, it is even more of a reason to have children and to raise them for God.

Mothering requires risk-taking and sacrifice.

There’s no easy way to be a mother (or father). Bringing a child into the world is risky on so many levels, and these risks multiply with every child you raise. These risks include:

decreased privacy

increased financial pressures coupled with unstable employment trends

a bewildering array of psychological disorders, dietary problems, and allergy conditions

complex educational options

intensified marriage challenges

effects on the mother’s health

harmful outside influences

the unpredictable nature of the child’s personal choices

the potential for disappointment and a broken heart

To navigate these risks, you’ll need to make gutsy, costly decisions along the way (as both of Moses’ mothers did) to minimize and overcome the challenges you face.

So, even if you have a unique mother situation or an unbelieving mother, you should thank God for the risks and sacrifices that your mother(s) made to provide you with care and guidance. What’s more, you should accept the challenges that being a mother brings knowing that the challenges are both inescapable and worthwhile.

Mothers should learn to accept their limitations.

To be sure, parents should not abdicate their responsibility to govern and guide their children’s development and to nurture their relationship with God. Even so, God sometimes allows challenging circumstances beyond your control.

In neither case did either mother of Moses enjoy full control over his life. Pharaoh’s daughter had no control for the first 3-4 years (formative years!) and Jochebed had no control throughout his schooling years. Despite this limiting scenario, God still accomplished his plan.

So, when circumstances beyond your control prevent you from exercising full control over your child(ren), you must trust the LORD as Jochebed did.

Mothers should nurture their children’s faith even in the earliest (preschool) years.

Which is why – of all years – Christian parents (esp. mothers) should guard the kind of influences and education that children receive at this stage of development. Most importantly, they should do whatever they can to nurture their child’s faith in personal, and deliberate ways. Don’t waste these years or view them as inconsequential. In fact, Paul indicates that Scripture has transformative effects on children as young as infants (2 Tim 3:14-15).

You can trust God with your schooling options.

There’s no one right and universal way to educate your children. Homeschool, charter school, public school, boarding school, or public school (did I miss any options) all have their place in the world. What’s more, these options all have their own set of strengths and weaknesses in every case. God used the public education of Egypt (at the elementary, junior high, high school, collegiate, and graduate school levels) to prepare Moses for his special calling. In fact, this experience underscored his fitness for his role and prepared him for effective leadership and service.

Older children should help their mothers however they can.

That’s what Miriam, Moses’ older sister, did – and thankfully so (Exo 2:4, 7-8). If you’re an older sibling in your family, then follow your mother’s instructions, find ways to help her out, and act with your younger siblings’ best interest in mind. Your assistance can have world-changing effects.

Thank God for godly healthcare personnel (Exo 20:15-20).

What would Christian parents do without good medical personnel, and what would our world be like with no believing nurses and doctors coming alongside parents raising children. These women and men take the Hypocritic Oath and uphold God as their ultimate guide, which is not always easy to do in a complex, secular environment. It is always easy to make wise choices as believers in this field.

Thank God for godly, supportive fathers, too!

According to Hebrews 11:23, Amram (his father) and Jochebed both conspired to hide Moses for three months rather than kill him. Exodus likely doesn’t mention him because he would have been away from the home a lot doing heavy, burdensome labor for the Egyptian taskmasters who were requiring inordinate demands. As such, Jochebed would have carried the primary burden of keeping Moses quiet twenty-four hours a day for three months and of finding a way to hide him after that. Even so, his father, Amram (Exo 6:20), equally supported her decision and was not afraid to do the right thing.

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