Out of the Water

Out of the Water

Exodus 2:1-10

October 6, 2019 • Mount Pleasant UMC

He is the single-most significant and important person in all of the Hebrew Scriptures, and he is second only to Jesus in the whole Bible. One evidence of this, especially as it relates to popular culture, is that for many years at Easter time, it was his movie that was shown on network television rather than one about Jesus. His name and presence echoes throughout all of the Scriptures, and in fact throughout all of history. Bruce Feiler wrote a book a few years ago showing how his story and his presence is woven throughout our own history, how the American story is shaped by this man’s story. He is credited with writing most of the Torah, the most sacred Scripture for the Jews (the first five books of our Bible), and it is his story that dominates most of those books: Exodus through Deuteronomy. He is known by such diverse titles as Savior, Law-Giver, Shepherd, and Son of Egypt. We know him as Moses, and for the next few weeks, we’re going to explore his story. But we’re not just setting out to learn the facts of his life or the shape of his story, though we will do that. We’re going to walk with Moses through Egypt and the wilderness and see along the way what his story has to teach us about living out our faith today. Part of what fascinates me about Moses is his role as a “reluctant prophet.” He is not some superhero, super-human faithful religious person who did everything [/. No, Moses as often got it wrong as he got it right, and in that way, he’s a lot like us. He is “Reluctant.”

But I’m getting ahead of myself, because the text we read this morning, and the texts you’ve been reading this last week if you’ve kept up with the readings in the bulletin, are all about his birth, all about how he came to be. And in the midst of that story, we learn something about the power of names, and how names can give shape to everything that is to come. Think about your name. Do you know what it means, or why you were given it? I’m not sure why I was given the name I was given, but I have learned that it means “lover of wine.” Which so fits me! A lot of times, as parents we pick names for our children because it sounds good, or we knew someone with that name whom we liked. In past generations, not so much now, children were often named for grandparents or older relatives. Sometimes fathers pass their names down. And sometimes we give names that have meaning or significance to us. We tried to do that with our kids, giving them names we hoped they would grow into. “Christopher,” for instance, means “Christ-bearer,” and “Rachel” means “little lamb” or “lamb of God.” That was the ancient Hebrew practice as well. Children were given names that described who they hoped that child would become, or they were given names of a character trait they thought the child would grow into. “Abraham” means “father of many;” he was told he would become the father of many nations. “Jacob” means “heel-grabber,” because he was a twin, born grabbing onto his brother’s heel. “Joseph” means “he will add,” and Joseph in the Hebrew Scriptures, you may remember, was the eleventh child, finally born to Rachel, a woman who seemed to be barren for the longest time. Joseph was a welcome addition to the family. So names meant something. Names in ancient times were significant.

Sometimes, though, even today a nickname might tell you more about a person than their actual name. Several years ago, I had a funeral for a man named “Weed.” Not quite for why you think, though close. When he was a kid, he had decided to smoke some weeds from a tabasco tree under the porch, and when he got caught, the nickname stuck. His wife told me that when they started dating she didn’t even know his real name for a long time because everyone called him “Weed.” I also had a funeral for a man who had always been called “Bud.” It wasn’t until he had died that I learned his “real” name was James. Nicknames can be good or bad, helpful or harmful. “Son” or “Sister” or “Bubba” are pretty neutral. “Genius,” “Beautiful” or “Friend” are names that build up. We have a family friend who used to call Rachel “Tiny Dancer,” and it always made her smile because it recognized her talent. She also used to be called “Little Toes” by an older friend, and I’m not sure what that did for her. But our world is full of names that tear down. “Worthless.” “Jerk.” “Idiot.” And far worse words than I can say from the pulpit. The person who said “names will never hurt me” was wrong. The damage done by the wrong name can cause a lot more lasting hurt than sticks and stones ever will.

Names play a vital role in the early part of Moses’ life, so as we go through this first part of his story, let’s notice who is named and who is not. And, I think, in the midst of that noticing, we’re going to hear an important message from God this morning. The story begins many years and generations after Joseph lived. Joseph, you may remember, was a sort of prime minister to the Pharaoh and helped save the nation of Egypt during a severe famine. The Pharaoh at that time had given Joseph’s family some of the best land in Egypt to live on. Exodus says about seventy people, all of Joseph’s family, moved there at the end of the book of Genesis. But when Exodus opens, no one in the government remembers Joseph. No one remembers his importance to Egyptian history; most likely, there has been a regime change, but we don’t know that for sure because—notice this—the Pharaoh is not named. No one in the royal household has a name in the Exodus account. Keep that in mind as we move forward. Anyway, for whatever reason, the government doesn’t remember Joseph and on top of that, Joseph’s descendants, the Israelites have become numerous. They have been fruitful and multiplied, so much so that the Pharaoh is afraid they might rise up and overtake the Egyptians. So here is his incompetent plan: enslave the people and at the same time kill all the baby Israelite boys. Why do I say that’s an incompetent plan? Because he’s killing his future work force. If he kills all the boys, he will have no next generation workers and he will have no next-next generation workers. Who is he going to enslave when the Israelites die out? Who is going to do his building for him (cf. Goldingay, Exodus & Leviticus for Everyone, pg. 10)?

The Pharaoh gives specific instructions to the Hebrew midwives to kill the boys and let the girls live. It’s a horrific and tragic command—one that the midwives choose not to follow, by the way. I love what they tell the Pharaoh: “The Hebrew women are not like Egyptian woman; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive!” In one short sentence, they both defend their practice and they insult all Egyptian women! But an even more important detail is this: today, over 3,000 years after all this happened, we still know the names of the midwives…Shiphrah and Puah. The author takes time to identify them, but he does not identify the Pharaoh. The world would consider Pharaoh important and the midwives beneath notice. As one Biblical scholar puts it, “Pharaoh is someone the newspapers think is important and powerful, yet he can be defeated by three or four women” (Goldingay 10). But in God’s story, the Pharoah’s name is unimportant and the midwives are remembered for all time. I love that.

So the birth of Moses is set against the backdrop of genocide—a jealous king trying to get rid of a whole lot of people—an entire race, basically. And in that setting, the story zeroes in on two people: a husband and a wife, both of the tribe of Levi, whose names show up in chapter 6: Dad is named Amram and Mom is named Jochebed (6:20). They have a baby boy, and according to Exodus, he is “a fine child” (2:2). Based on that, she decides she’s going to protect him, hide him from the Egyptians, and keep the birth a secret. Now, here’s a bit of a challenge: what does “fine” mean? Some translations say “good” or even “handsome,” which brings up other issues. For one, what mother doesn’t think her baby is “handsome” or “beautiful”? And would him being good-looking be enough to make her decide to keep him? Should we assume that if he was ugly, she would not have protected him? Of course not! It’s not quite clear what is happening here, but one thing that seems to be happening is that Exodus is echoing Genesis. The same word is used in Genesis when God wants to describe his creation: “It is good. It is fine. It is beautiful.” I think we’re meant to see in this child a new beginning, a new start. Something in the birth of this baby gave his mother hope that their people were going to be able to start over (cf. Enns, NIV Application Commentary: Exodus, pgs. 61-62).

There’s another parallel with Genesis in what happens next. We’re told the baby is set afloat on the Nile River. Literally, the text says he was put in an “ark.” It’s the same word used to describe the boat Noah built, and that word is only used twice in the whole Bible: once in Noah’s story, and then here. Just as Noah saved people by floating on the water, Israel’s hope of being rescued is now resting in a much smaller “ark” floating on the water (Enns 62). From the very beginning, this baby has a purpose. He is set apart. His life is going to be something special.

So we read the rest of the story, and many of us know it—or at least we’ve seen the movie! The baby basket floats down the river to the palace, where it is found by the daughter of the Pharaoh (also not named), who decides to rescue the baby. Now, she knows it is a Hebrew baby, so she’s intentionally going against her father’s plan (cf. 2:6). And then, I think, she plays a game with the baby’s sister. Miriam (we know her name from chapter 15) has apparently been following the basket along the river because she’s right there, offering her mother’s services as a wet nurse when the daughter of the Pharaoh decides to rescue him. Here’s the game I think they are playing: I’m betting Pharaoh’s daughter knows this is a family member. I’m wiling to bet Pharaoh’s daughter also knows she’s going to take the baby to his actual mother. It would make sense; a woman who recently gave birth would be able to nurse him. I’m fairly certain Pharaoh’s daughter doesn’t think Miriam just happened by there. But, whatever the game, Miriam takes the baby back to his mother, and she raises him until he is “older.” We’re not told at what age she brings him back to the palace, but at some point, he is brought back and Pharaoh’s daughter officially makes the young boy her son. And that, according to the text, is when she gives him his name—which begs the question…what did they call him up until this point? “Hey You?” Or did his mother have another name for him that only they knew? We don’t know, but the name he is given at this point is significant as well.

The name the nameless princess gives this boy is Moses. She says it is because she drew him out of the water (2:10), but there’s more going on here than just that. The name “Moses” or Moshe is related to a rare Hebrew verb that means “to pull out” or “to draw” (cf. Goldingay 11; Enns 63). But here’s the challenge with that: what is the likelihood that an Egyptian princess would know Hebrew, the language of her slaves? And even if she did, or even if she knew a word or two, why would she give this child a name that would tell her father immediately who he was? She could have just put a sign on him that said, “Hebrew Child!” So I believe it’s possible she may have understood the Hebrew roots of the name, maybe Miriam told her, but it’s also true that the name Moses in Egyptian means “to bear” or “to give birth to.” It was often used to mean “son.” For instance, there is a famous Egyptian name, “Thutmose,” which means “Son of the god Tuth.” But Moses has no father’s name at the beginning. His name, in Egyptian, simply means, “Son” or even, more likely, “Son of No One” (Enns 63-64; Goldingay 11). One author puts it this way: “Moses is the Hebrew boy who carries an Egyptian name. He’s the child of hardship who’s raised in the greatest palace on earth. He’s the ‘son of’ nobody, a hole not filled until he finds his true calling and becomes what Deuteronomy calls ‘God’s man’” (Feiler, America’s Prophet, pg. 14).

So, I’d like to say a couple of things about this story, a couple of observations that will lead us into sharing holy communion on this World Communion Sunday. The first thing to remember is that Moses was adopted. To save his life, his mother gave him to someone else and, more than that, she entrusted him to God. Can you imagine what kind of faith it took for her to put him in the River? Even if Miriam was following along on the shore, she couldn’t have saved him had something gone wrong out on the River. But Jochebed believed that God wanted to use this baby boy in some significant way, and so she did what she could to make sure that could happen. Some of you have adopted children; others of you may have been adopted yourself. Both sides of that equation require great courage and great trust. Singer Mark Schultz, who was adopted himself, wrote these words for his birth mother:

You gave life to me

A chance to find my dreams

And a chance to fall in love

You should have seen her shining face

On our wedding day

Oh is this the dream you had in mind

When you gave me up

You gave everything to me

(“Everything to Me” by Mark Schultz & Cindy Morgan)

If adoption is part of your life, here is one of the messages you can hear from Moses’ life: sometimes that is the most courageous thing you can do. It can be a gift to everyone involved, and no matter how trying the circumstances, God is working in the midst of it all (cf. Hamilton, Moses, pgs. 34-35).

In fact, even though God is not mentioned in this passage at all, it’s very clear that God is at work in the midst of all of this. And that leads us to the second thing to notice this morning: God uses the most unlikely persons. As I mentioned earlier, the world points at the important people, the powerful people, the rulers and leaders and royalty. Tune into the news and you hear about the celebrity, the politician, even the well-known preacher or Christian author. The world knows their names—but, friends, God knows your name. You may feel like Amram or Jochebed, Shiphrah or Puah, Miriam or maybe even like a nameless infant floating in a basket toward an uncertain destiny. Even when he’s given a name, it’s not much of one. You may believe that no one knows your name and more than that, no one cares to know your name. But, friends, God does. God knows your name. And even better than that, God wants to use you. Even if you feel like you are “no one.” God knows your name and he wants to use you to touch the lives of others. The people who have made the most difference in my life, a lasting difference, would be considered nobodies by the world. No one outside of Rossville, really, has ever heard of Esther Beard or Amos McGinnis. Not very many people know about Sid Hollar or Ken Boyd. And David Need and LaVaugn Stong are not household names. But every one of them played a part in making me who I am, and God knows their names. You are not a nobody; you are someone whose name God knows and you are someone whom God can and will use to make a difference, just like he used Moses, the boy—the nobody—pulled out of the water. Take a listen to this song about nobodies.

Don’t you love those words? Let’s put that up on the screen and say it together: “I’m just a nobody trying to tell everybody all about Somebody who saved my soul.” Friends, that’s good news—and that could very well have been the chorus of those first disciples. They were a whole bunch on nobodies. In fact, they were less than nobodies. They were the ones that no other rabbi wanted to teach. They were the ones who had the dead-end jobs. They were the ones no one else chose—but Jesus did. He chose them. He loved them. He taught them. And he used them. And together, these nobodies turned the world upside down. When they gathered at the table with Jesus on that last night together, they knew they were nobodies, but in the bread and in the cup, Jesus reminded them that they were loved by Somebody. And on the cross the next day, he would show them what that love looked like. So as we come to the table this morning, as we gather with brothers and sisters around the world at Christ’s table, let’s embrace the truth that we, like Moses, like those first disciples, are somebody God can and will use. Will you join with me as we prepare our hearts for Holy Communion?