Stephen was a man full of God's grace and power. He performed amazing miracles and signs among the people. But one day, some men from the Synagogue of Freed Slaves, as it was called, started to debate with him. They were Jews from Cyrene, Alexandria, Cilicia, and the province of Asia. None of them could stand against the wisdom and the Spirit with which Stephen spoke. So they persuaded some men to lie about Stephen, saying, "We heard him blaspheme Moses and even God." Few people will admit if they are wrong. Even fewer will admit you were right or that something you said could have changed their minds. At best, if someone does change their thinking, they will act as if they had some epiphany or came to a new conclusion totally on their own. At worst, they will dig their heels in, refusing to change their minds in the presence of truth. People who are losing a debate and/or have a weaker position will often resort to attacking their opponent personally. You know you have won the argument when the person disagreeing with you makes the issue about you rather than the subject being discussed. That is what happened to Stephen here. They couldn't handle the heat he was throwing across the plate. So he became the target rather than his words.
Their accusations against Stephen roused the people, the elders, and the teachers of religious law. So they arrested Stephen and brought him before the high council. The lying witnesses said, "This man is always speaking against the holy Temple and against the law of Moses. We have heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will destroy the Temple and change the customs Moses handed down to us." Stephen speaks to an exclusively Jewish audience, who, in their zealousness to defend the Torah (the foundation of Judaism), was willing to violate it, breaking one of its foundational 10 laws by bearing false witness to build a case. It's like when George W. Bush said he had to abandon free-market principles to save the free-market system. Suppose you're trying to prove the superiority of what you believe. In that case, it's not a good idea to violate those very beliefs to reach that end.
At this point, something unusual happens. Everyone in the high council stared at Stephen because his face became as bright as an angel's. We're now playing on a different level. This is no longer your typical "day that ends in 'y'" encounter with a street preacher. God has gotten their attention. Then the high priest asked Stephen, "Are these accusations true?" Stephen's reply recounts to the Jews the summarization of the history of Israel, which we have looked at in great detail in our previous study on Genesis. He said, "Brothers and fathers, listen to me. Our glorious God appeared to our ancestor Abraham in Mesopotamia before he settled in Haran. God told him, 'Leave your native land and your relatives, and come into the land that I will show you.' So Abraham left the land of the Chaldeans and lived in Haran until his father died. Then God brought him here to the land where you now live. But God gave him no inheritance here, not even one square foot of land. However, God promised that eventually, the whole land would belong to Abraham and his descendants—even though he had no children yet. God also told him that his descendants would live in a foreign land, where they would be oppressed as slaves for 400 years. 'But I will punish the nation that enslaves them,' God said, 'and in the end, they will come out and worship me here in this place.' God also gave Abraham the covenant of circumcision at that time. So when Abraham became the father of Isaac, he circumcised him on the eighth day. And the practice was continued when Isaac became the father of Jacob and when Jacob became the father of the twelve patriarchs of the Israelite nation. These patriarchs were jealous of their brother Joseph, and they sold him to be a slave in Egypt. But God was with him and rescued him from all his troubles. And God gave him favor before Pharaoh, king of Egypt. God also gave Joseph unusual wisdom. Pharaoh appointed him governor over all of Egypt and put him in charge of the palace. But a famine came upon Egypt and Canaan. There was great misery, and our ancestors ran out of food. Jacob heard that there was still grain in Egypt, so he sent his sons—our ancestors—to buy some. The second time they went, Joseph revealed his identity to his brothers, and they were introduced to Pharaoh. Then Joseph sent for his father, Jacob, and all his relatives to come to Egypt, seventy-five persons in all. So Jacob went to Egypt. He died there, as did our ancestors. Their bodies were taken to Shechem and buried in the tomb Abraham had bought for a certain price from Hamor's sons in Shechem."
And now we get to the part in Stephen's sermon that focuses directly on what we are studying right now. Stephen continues, "As the time drew near when God would fulfill his promise to Abraham, the number of our people in Egypt greatly increased. But then a new king came to the throne of Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph. This king exploited our people and oppressed them, forcing parents to abandon their newborn babies so they would die. At that time, Moses was born—a beautiful child in God's eyes. His parents cared for him at home for three months. When they had to abandon him, Pharaoh's daughter adopted him and raised him as her own son. Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was powerful in both speech and action. One day when Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his relatives, the people of Israel. He saw an Egyptian mistreating an Israelite. So Moses came to the man's defense and avenged him, killing the Egyptian. Moses assumed his fellow Israelites would realize that God had sent him to rescue them, but they didn't. The next day he revisited them and saw two men of Israel fighting. Moses tried to be a peacemaker. 'Men,' he said, 'you are brothers. Why are you fighting each other?' But the man in the wrong pushed Moses aside. 'Who made you a ruler and judge over us?' he asked. 'Are you going to kill me as you killed that Egyptian yesterday?' When Moses heard that, he fled the country and lived as a foreigner in the land of Midian. There, his two sons were born. 40 years later, in the desert near Mount Sinai, an angel appeared to Moses in the flame of a burning bush. When Moses saw it, he was amazed at the sight. As he went to take a closer look, the voice of the Lord called out to him, 'I am the God of your ancestors—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.' Moses shook with terror and did not dare to look. Then Yahweh said to him, 'Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground. I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their groans and have come down to rescue them. Now go, for I am sending you back to Egypt.' So God sent back the same man his people had previously rejected when they demanded, 'Who made you a ruler and judge over us?' God sent Moses to be their ruler and savior through the angel who appeared to him in the burning bush. And utilizing many wonders and miraculous signs, he led them out of Egypt, through the Red Sea, and through the wilderness for 40 years. Moses himself told the people of Israel, 'God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from among your own people.' Moses was with our ancestors, the assembly of God's people in the wilderness, when the angel spoke to him at Mount Sinai. And there, Moses received life-giving words to pass on to us. But our ancestors refused to listen to Moses. They rejected him and wanted to return to Egypt."
That's not the end of Stephen's sermon, but that's where we will stop it for now because he continues on talking about even more stuff far beyond what we will discuss in this Exodus study. But the reason for starting here in Acts 7 is that cross-references in both the Old and New Testaments can give us details that the first accounts do not. We get even more information in Hebrews 11, which is called the Hall of Faith because it lists heroes of our faith and demonstrates how all the good they did in their lives was done through faith in God and not their own power and strength. It was by faith that Moses' parents hid him for three months when he was born. They saw that God had given them an unusual child, and they were not afraid to disobey the king's command. It was by faith that Moses when he grew up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. Moses chose to share the oppression of God's people instead of enjoying the fleeting pleasures of sin. He thought it was better to suffer for the sake of Christ than to own the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking ahead to his great reward. It was by faith that Moses left the land of Egypt, not fearing the king's anger. He kept right on going because he kept his eyes on the invisible one. By faith, Moses commanded the people of Israel to keep the Passover and sprinkle blood on the doorposts so that the angel of death would not kill their firstborn sons. By faith, the people of Israel went right through the Red Sea as though they were on dry ground. But when the Egyptians tried to follow, they were all drowned.
So when we look at these New Testament passages, what do we discover about Moses?
- Moses was a beautiful and unusual child, unusual in a good way.
- He was cared for a very short time by his family. Still, because of government policy, the only way to keep him safe was to surrender him, not knowing what would happen to him.
- In even more evidence of God's providence, Pharaoh's daughter adopted him and raised him as her own son. Moses had the best education, and he made the most of it in word and deed.
- Despite this, Moses knew who he was. He was adopted into the Egyptian royal family, but he never lost sight of who his people really were. He even refused to be known by his adopted title because of his commitment to God and eternal perspective.
- Moses' zeal to protect a people he belonged to but didn't grow up around highlights Moses' sense of right and wrong, his sense of justice.
- In Moses' anger toward his people's mistreatment, he kills an Egyptian. He thought this would make him a hero in the people's eyes, but instead, his act is used against him when he tries to stop another injustice. This shows that even the best of us can try to accomplish the right thing in the wrong way and that no one is safe from the consequences of our actions.
- Though Moses was not spared from all of the earthly consequences of his actions, God still had a plan for his life, and even something so egregious as killing another man was not enough to stop that plan.
- Moses ended up accepting God's will for his life and walked it out in strength and humility.
- By the time the Israelites left Egypt, Moses did not feel any fear toward Pharaoh. Perfect love casts out fear.
So far, here is what we know from the timeline of Moses' life:
Moses was born to Amram (the dad), a Levite, and Jochebed (the mother), a Levite. Moses had a brother, Aaron, 3 years older, and an older sister, Mariam. When Moses was born, Pharaoh decree that all male children were to be killed (Exodus 1). Still, Jochebed was able to hide Moses for about 3 months. At that time, Jochebed made a little floating basket that could hold Moses, and after asking God to protect him, she placed him in the Nile River. Mariam stayed with the basket until Pharaoh's daughter found it and opened it. Mariam came and asked her if she would like to have an Israelite woman look after the child for her. So Moses lived in his own home and was actually protected by Pharaoh until he was about 12 years old. In addition, because Moses was now a "son of Pharaoh's daughter," Jochebed would have been able to stay home and care for Moses rather than working as a slave every day. This training period with his real mother was crucial in the life of Moses.
Moses became the son of Pharaoh's daughter, and so when he was about 12 years old, he would have lived as a prince. He would have been schooled as if he would someday be the ruler of Egypt, and this would have given him many skills that God would use later to lead His people to the Promised Land. This was 28 years of training that none of the other slaves could ever hope to receive. When Moses was a full 40 years old, he came upon an Egyptian beating an Israelite slave. He looked around, and not seeing anyone else, he killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand. He later learned that what he had done was public knowledge, so he fled Egypt and went to Midian. Moses and his wife, Zipporah, had two sons. He was with Jethro for 40 years, where he became a shepherd until he was 80 years old when God told him to go back to Egypt.
What lessons can you learn from Moses' life?
SOURCES
- Precept Upon Precept: Exodus
- Acts 6:8-7:39
- Bush says sacrificed free-market principles to save economy by India Times, last updated on December 17, 2008.
- Hebrews 11:23-29
- Moses and the Exodus timeline by Bible timelines
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