Exodus 6:7, commentary and pictures

God pledges to take Israel to himself as his own people and to be to them a God, so that by bringing them out from under the burdens and oppression of the Egyptians they will know that he is the LORD their God. That claiming of Israel and self-revelation as their God is accomplished through deliverance from bondage, making the rescue itself the means by which they come to know him. It is a covenant promise that increased oppression does not set aside, for even when burdens grow heavier God assures that it will be faithfully carried out.

The promise comes to a people whose faith and knowledge of God have been dimmed and obscured by long bondage and surrounding idolatry, though even then some among them remain righteous and steadfast. Within Israel responses divide, for some are content to remain in bondage while the faithful long to leave Egypt. The deliverance that answers that longing demonstrates that the LORD is the living, all-powerful God.

The mighty signs by which the deliverance is wrought reveal the Maker of heaven and earth as the living God, greater than the gods of Egypt. Those signs are intended to give Israel a clearer view of God, to lead them to fear him, and to move them to leave Egypt and serve him. In this way the rescue lifts Israel out of encompassing idolatry in order to turn them to serve the true God in pure worship. Bringing them out of slavery begins a continuing work of instruction, by which God seeks to impart knowledge of himself and to raise them to a higher moral level. The same word stands as the pattern that God's people in former times labored against opposition and hardship to warn others and bring about change, and so must do again.