p. 1 | MOSES by John Nevins Andrews

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 9, 1869

MOSES.

By John Nevins Andrews

THE BEAUTY OF THE CHILD MOSES.

Stephen tells us that Moses was in infancy “exceeding fair.” Acts vii, 20. We learn from Moses and from Paul that this was one thing which prompted his parents to attempt, at great risk to themselves, the preservation of his life. Ex. ii, 2; Heb. xi, 23. But the providence of God had something further in view in giving to this child such surpassing beauty. His life was to be saved by it. When his mother could no longer conceal him, she placed him in the frail ark by the river’s brink, exposed to the crocodiles of the river, and to the still more cruel Egyptians, in whose hands Israel then was. It was necessary that Moses should be educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians. Acts vii, 22. That he might have such instruction and advantage, it was the purpose of God that he should be brought up in the family of Pharaoh. The providence of God alone could bring this to pass. And so the anguish-stricken parents, with many prayers and tears, are at last obliged to expose this lovely child to his fate by the river’s brink.

But God had his eye also upon the child Moses. It was not the fierce monster of the river, nor the hard-hearted officers of Pharaoh, who were to find that ark of bulrushes with its helpless inmate. The daughter of Pharaoh, who had a woman’s tenderness, was the one to find this most expressive testimonial to the cruelty of her father, and the bitter servitude and cruel anguish of the Hebrews.

She opened the ark, and there lay the most beautiful babe that she had ever beheld. How expressive one sentence of that story: “Behold, the babe wept.” Ex. ii, 6. It was an appeal that she could not resist. The story was comprehended by her in a moment. “This is one of the Hebrew’s children.” The beauty, innocence, and cruel fate, of this tender infant plead so powerfully in his behalf that this princess determined to adopt him for her own child, and to confer on him all that the wisdom of Egypt, then the most advanced of any nation, could give. Behold with reverence the providence of God.

THE MOTHER OF MOSES.

The devout and honorable women of the Bible are not a few. Their memory is fragrant with deeds of piety, humility, and self-sacrifice. Among these ancient worthies, the mother of Moses must be assigned a conspicuous place. What she was able to accomplish for the cause of God, by a wise improvement of a brief, but precious, opportunity, can never be estimated by the human mind; never at least till the day of Judgment shall open everything to our view.

The sister of Moses was watching him from afar, when Pharaoh’s daughter took him from the ark. With admirable tact she responds to the remark of the princess, that this was a Hebrew child, by offering to find her a nurse of the Hebrew women. And so it came to pass that the mother of Moses received wages for the care of her own child. The mother heard those words, “Take this child away and nurse it FOR ME, and I will give thee thy wages,” not simply as the words of the princess, but as the voice of God addressed to her. How admirably she performed this work, let the life of the man whose character she thus formed, answer. How faithful to reward this labor of love shall He be, who, in his providence, assigned the task, the day of Judgment shall reveal.

It appears that little beyond the period of helpless infancy did Moses remain under the care of his mother. So soon as the child was of sufficient age to be a source of pleasure to his new mother, he was relinquished to her hands. She trained him in all the manners and customs of the Egyptian court. She educated him in the wisdom of the Egyptians. He lived in an atmosphere of wickedness. He was a member of the family of a heathen king. He was surrounded by everything calculated to make him only a man of the world, whose interest is in this life alone.

But in the midst of all this imminent peril, God preserved Moses. The ground of his heart had been preoccupied. The good seed had been sown by that faithful mother, and tended with such care that the thorns were not able afterward to choke it.

The mother of Moses taught him that he was a Hebrew child. Rather she taught him the knowledge of the God of the Hebrews. She taught him the vanity of all false gods. She instructed him in the principles of virtue and righteousness. She taught him the promises of future blessedness that were cherished by God’s afflicted and cruelly-enslaved people. She impressed on his tender mind the infinite value of eternal things, and the unsatisfactory and uncertain nature of the things of this life. She fixed in his mind the value of that reward that shall be given at the last day, and, under God, formed in his heart the purpose to secure it. She turned his youthful feet into the testimonies of the Lord. She laid the foundation of the noblest character, whose full-length portrait is drawn in the Old Testament. Her work was wrought in God. May we not say of her “Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all. Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her own works praise her in the gates.” Servant of God, well done.

THE CONDITION OF ISRAEL IN THEIR EGYPTIAN BONDAGE.

The providence of God led Israel into Egypt. Even to Abraham, God had announced the fact, that his posterity should be subjected to this cruel servitude. Gen. xv. The iniquity of the Amorites had to be filled up before God could drive them out before his people. The people of God must become numerous enough to fill the land when it should be given them. Each of these things required time. Where should God keep his people while this time was wearing away? He chose Egypt as their place in which to wait for the time of the promise. That they might be compelled to remove thither he suffered a terrible famine of seven years to come upon the land adjacent to Canaan. To prepare the way before the family of Jacob, he overruled the wickedness of his sons to send Joseph into Egypt. That he might be fitted to act as the honored ruler of Egypt, and by his wisdom preserve the nation from destruction, and provide an asylum for his father’s family, he was sold as a slave, and, on a false accusation, he was cast into prison, and his limbs shackled with iron. Ps. cv, 17–22. God wrought a mighty deliverance by his hand. Israel was honored in Egypt with great honors. But God’s people cannot bear very much prosperity. This is not their rest. When they are in danger of forgetting that fact, he kindly sends them affliction. So he did for Israel in Egypt. Otherwise they would have clung to Egypt in preference to Canaan. So a king arose that knew not Joseph. A generation of Egyptians arose that forgot the immense debt of gratitude the nation owed to the Hebrews. The spirit of jealousy and intense cruelty filled the Egyptian people. They ground the Hebrews into the dust. They attempted to destroy every male child. They made their lives bitter with cruel bondage. The Hebrews had no rights left them which an Egyptian was bound to respect. Thus Israel was made willing to leave that cruel land.

THE EDUCATION OF MOSES IN THE COURT OF PHARAOH.

Moses had a work to perform greater than had ever fallen to the task of mortal man. The most extraordinary endowment of miraculous powers was requisite for the accomplishment of the work which Providence

designed that he should perform. But it is worthy of the most thoughtful observation that this man who was to receive the richest possible manifestation of spiritual gifts, was first to be trained in all the knowledge and wisdom of which men were in that age possessed. His case was in this respect an exact parallel of St. Paul’s, as also in the greatness of the work performed by Paul and the miraculous powers bestowed on him for its execution.

“Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in words and in deeds,” Acts vii, 22. We ought to honor that noble lady who thus unselfishly bestowed on Moses all that Egypt could give of wisdom and instruction. No pains were spared to render his instruction perfect. Whatever was known to the wisest men of Egypt was poured out to Moses. And it was not something bestowed in vain, or upon a mind incapable of benefit. He became mighty in words and in deeds.

What he thus received was far enough indeed from qualifying Moses to lead forth the people of God. He needed another and a higher kind of training, where patience, humility, self-denial, and communion with God, should be learned. But let those who despise the knowledge of human science consider that the greatest men of the Old and New Testaments, respectively, Moses and Paul, were each of them, in the providence of God, prepared for their work by the most complete instruction that their times could bestow.

THE DESTRUCTION OF THE HEBREW CHILDREN.

How cruel is Satan! How bloody and how awful the conduct of his most faithful servants. How vast the distance that an angel, the highest in all the heavenly host, must fall to become the instigator of such deeds of wickedness as fill the history of man! Sin wrought this infinite change in that exalted being who once walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire. Eze. xxviii. Beware of this terrible evil. What has ruined Satan will also ruin others who are guilty of it.

When Jacob went down into Egypt it seemed to have been the turning point in his captivity. That is to say, his long-continued afflictions, which may be traced directly to his sin in the case of Esau, were closed up forever. The chastisement of his sin had wrought in him repentance so deep and thorough that the rod of God was now withdrawn. His sojourn in Egypt was the period assigned by Providence for his ripening for the kingdom of God. His sun set in heavenly brightness. It was some time after this before the prosperity of the Hebrew people ceased. But the change came at last, and a terrible change it was. Joseph and his services were all forgotten. And not only this, but even rigorous cruelty was added to the wicked ingratitude of the Egyptians. See Ex. i.

The king of Egypt made slaves of the Hebrews, lest, by-and-by, they “get them up out of the land.” What made him think of such a movement on their part? Beyond all doubt he had heard that Israel expected, by-and-by, to return again to Canaan. He was determined that they should not. So by one edict, he reduced them to debasing servitude. Yet how short-sighted was all this! Had the Hebrew people continued to enjoy prosperity in Egypt, it is difficult to see how that God himself could have induced them to leave it with all its good things, and to undertake a tedious journey, at best, through a terrible wilderness to reach Canaan, and by force of arms drive out the well-armed hosts of the Canaanites. They certainly would have shrunk from such an undertaking. So God caused the wrath of man to praise him. He suffered a wicked king to stir up their nest so that they could no longer remain in it.

The king of Egypt, finding that the people increased even more rapidly in their bitter servitude than before, next ordered the destruction of all the male children of the Hebrews. Every one of them, he enacted, should be thrown into the river.

The king of Egypt thought by this means to blend the Hebrew people with the Egyptians, and to prevent their existence as a separate people. But Satan, who stirred up his mind to this cruel project, had something else in view. He knew that the time of deliverance to the Hebrews was at hand. He had no doubt that God was about to raise up their deliverer. Satan hoped to destroy this deliverer as soon as he should be born. What he attempted in the case of the child Jesus, he had tried before in the case of the child Moses. Thank God it failed each time. And now, see how impotent is Satan’s malice. It was needful that Moses should be educated in Pharaoh’s court. This very edict, which Satan undoubtedly instigated, especially to destroy Moses, was the very means whereby Moses was raised to the place he needed first in the king’s court, and whereby the utmost advantage of earthly wisdom would be secured to this noble child. Let us have stronger faith in God.

JOSEPH AND MOSES.

It is a great error to suppose that God’s providence has only one form in which to manifest itself. This is very far from being true. Not only do the providential manifestations of the Almighty take great variety of form, but it is even true that some of them are almost the opposite of others. Joseph, called of God virtually to the throne of Egypt, and Moses, called of God to forsake it, when it was within his reach, are illustrious examples of this. Each had a work to do, and each did that work wisely and well. That Joseph might rule over Egypt with humility and in the fear of God, he was reduced to slavery, and next cast into a dungeon, with iron fetters on his limbs. Ps. cv. When patience, humility, and submission, had been learned, he was called from that prison to rule over Egypt. It does not appear that he ever forgot the lesson he thus received, but that with humility and singleness of heart, he ruled in the fear of God, and exercised the high trust which Providence assigned him.

Moses was called of God to spend his early life, even to mature manhood, in the royal court, and probably as heir-presumptive to the throne of Egypt. But God did not call him to ascend that throne. He called him to cast his lot with the most oppressed and degraded people in the land. The sacrifice was as great a one as it is ever possible for man to make. Nobly did Moses make it, and never does there once appear a sign of regret that he had made so great a change. His life presents as noble an example of disinterested benevolence as it is possible to find. It is God’s prerogative to call men to his work. It is folly in men to think some other duty besides that assigned them of God, would be better for them. It is folly also to measure ourselves by others, or others by ourselves. Let every man fulfill with faithfulness the work assigned him by Providence, and leave the rest to God. The day of Judgment will reward every man according to his works.

J. N. ANDREWS.

(To be concluded in two weeks.)