Theme of Exodus
Exodus is basically written in two parts. There is the exodus from Egypt in the front half of the book; then, there is a meeting with God in the second half of the book. First, there is rescue from Egypt. Second, there is communion with God.
This simple outline helps inform our theme for studying the book: Knowing God. This, after all, was God's aim. He did not want to set Israel free just so they could be free, but so they might serve him. Through Moses to Pharaoh, God often said, "Let my people go, that they may serve me" (Ex. 5:1, 7:16, 8:1, 9:1, etc.).
The pace I've planned for our journey through Exodus is brisk—I would like us to take under twenty weeks to get through these forty chapters. Especially in the latter half, Exodus is fairly repetitive. There are good reasons for this, but I want to help us keep the big picture in view, so I will move fairly rapidly through those repetitive sections. If you would like more in-depth teachings that take more time going through each line in Exodus, please see my previous studies at nateholdridge.com, podcast, or YouTube—this current study of Exodus will be about eleven hours total, but my online version is around thirty.
I will also say that while we were in the Psalms, one could miss a week here or there and pick up the next teaching just fine. Each psalm is fairly standalone in nature. This is not the case in Exodus (or most other Bible passages), so it would benefit you greatly to watch or listen to the YouTube or podcast of any teachings you miss while we're in this book.
Outline[^*]
For those interested, here is the proposed outline we will follow:
| Rescue/Egypt (ch. 1-18) | Commission/Mt. Sinai (ch. 19-24) | Communion/Tabernacle (ch. 25-40) |
|---|---|---|
| 1:1-2:10 God's Presence | 19 God Commissions | 25-27, 30-31 God's House |
| 2:11-3:12 God's Pionee | 20 God Commands | 28-29 God's Priests |
| 3:13-4:17 God's Preparation | 21-23:10 God's Societal Laws | 32-33 God's Competition |
| 4:18-6:28 God's Promise | 23:11-24:18 God's Religious Laws | 34 God's Name |
| 7-10 God's Power | 35-40 God's Construction | |
| 11-13 God's Passover | ||
| 14:1-15:21 God Saves | ||
| 15:22-18:27 God Leads |
Today, I would like us to think about what Israel would have learned about God's presence from these opening scenes. Each movement sets the stage for the battle between God and Pharaoh, the calling of Moses, and the deliverance of Israel. But what would they have learned—and what can we learn—about God's presence from this passage?
1. Geared Towards Exodus (1:1-7)
1 These are the names of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob, each with his household: 2 Reuben, Simeon, Levi, and Judah, 3 Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin, 4 Dan and Naphtali, Gad and Asher. 5 All the descendants of Jacob were seventy persons; Joseph was already in Egypt. 6 Then Joseph died, and all his brothers and all that generation. 7 But the people of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them. (Exodus 1:1-7, ESV)
In the first movement, we learn that God is always geared towards exodus. The book begins as if it sprouted from the soil of Genesis. Copied verbatim from Genesis 46:8, we get a recounting of the sons of Israel who came to Egypt with Jacob (1). This ties us into the final movement of Genesis when the great-grandson of Abraham, Jacob's son Joseph, was betrayed by his brothers and sold into Egyptian slavery. But God was with him, and, just as Israel did during their stay in Egypt, Joseph prospered. He eventually brought all seventy of his relatives to Egypt, and over a period of 400 years, they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong so that the land was filled with them (7).
This introduction helps us understand Genesis as Exodus' prologue. And Genesis shows God as our creator who made us in his image to be fruitful and multiply and enjoy him and his creation forever. But it also shows us how, through sin, humans were banished from God's presence and drifted forever eastward away from his original garden location and purpose.
God, however, would not settle for forever separation, so he conspired to bring us back to himself. First, he called a man named Abram—we just read about his family—and changed his name to Abraham (the father of many nations). The book of Exodus recounts Israel's exodus from Egypt through an event called the Passover; Abraham experienced his own exodus many years earlier when God called him out of his homeland in the east. And Abraham experienced his own Passover many years earlier when God passed over his son Isaac in place of an animal sacrifice—God passed over Isaac and promised a future lamb would take away the sin of the world. His exoduses and his experience watching God pass over Isaac set the stage for the exodus of his descendants. In a few generations, Joseph led his family to Egypt, and there they were fruitful and multiplied just as God had originally intended.
But as much as Genesis anticipated Exodus, Exodus also reverberates throughout the prophets, priests, and kings who followed it. Every subsequent generation of God's people rejoiced over the events of this book. And eventually, prophets like Isaiah began predicting that a servant of the Lord would arise who would produce a new exodus (Isa. 40:1-11). Even Moses himself told Israel years after the exodus that God would raise up a prophet like him in the future (Deut. 18:15). So the exodus is what most of the Old Testament pointed back to, but also what it began to hope for, and Jesus Christ fulfilled that hope when he brought the new exodus found in his death, burial, and resurrection.[^1]
Think about it, all throughout Scripture, God is shown as geared towards exodus. He pulled Abraham out of Ur to go to the promised land. He pulled Jacob out of Laban's tyrannical presence to go back to Canaan. He pulled Joseph out of a pit prison to seat him next to Pharaoh's throne. He pulled Israel out of the wilderness and brought them into the promised land. He pulled Rahab out of Jericho to bring her into God's family. He pulled Gideon out of a hidden threshing floor to make him a warrior for God. He pulled Hannah out of barrenness and despair and put a leader who would deliver his people in her womb. He pulled Ruth out of Moab to raise up the line of the Savior from her offspring. He pulled the people in Ezra and Nehemiah's day out of captivity and into God's land. Daniel and the lion's den. David and his caves. Hezekiah and his illness. Over and over again, God worked an exodus for his people.[^2]
So the focus of this book is on being set free in order to know God. God drew Israel out of Egypt and through the Red Sea out into the wilderness so they could build a tabernacle where they would meet with him. That is how God is revealed in Exodus—he wants to bring us out of addictions, tendencies, habits, relationships and more in order to bring us into him, a departure from sin to enter his holy presence.
And because God is the God of the repeated exodus, I want you to think of exodus as something God does once and then a million times during your Christian journey. At the beginning, he pulls you out so he can pull you in. But then he repeats this work over and over again. He always has his mind on exodus because he always wants to bring us in, closer to himself.
2. Behind the Scenes (1:8-22)
8 Now there arose a new king over Egypt, who did not know Joseph. 9 And he said to his people, “Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. 10 Come, let us deal shrewdly with them, lest they multiply, and, if war breaks out, they join our enemies and fight against us and escape from the land.” 11 Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with heavy burdens. They built for Pharaoh store cities, Pithom and Raamses. 12 But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and the more they spread abroad. And the Egyptians were in dread of the people of Israel. 13 So they ruthlessly made the people of Israel work as slaves 14 and made their lives bitter with hard service, in mortar and brick, and in all kinds of work in the field. In all their work they ruthlessly made them work as slaves.
15 Then the king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, one of whom was named Shiphrah and the other Puah, 16 “When you serve as midwife to the Hebrew women and see them on the birthstool, if it is a son, you shall kill him, but if it is a daughter, she shall live.” 17 But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them, but let the male children live. 18 So the king of Egypt called the midwives and said to them, “Why have you done this, and let the male children live?” 19 The midwives said to Pharaoh, “Because the Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women, for they are vigorous and give birth before the midwife comes to them.” 20 So God dealt well with the midwives. And the people multiplied and grew very strong. 21 And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families. 22 Then Pharaoh commanded all his people, “Every son that is born to the Hebrews you shall cast into the Nile, but you shall let every daughter live.” (Exodus 1:8-22, ESV)
In the second movement, we learn that God's presence is often behind the scenes. Israel's rapid growth disturbed the current king over Egypt and because he did not know and had no sense of duty to Joseph, he told his people to oppress Israel, using them as slave labor to build the cities of Pithom and Raamses (11). But his tactics had the opposite effect, and the more Israel was oppressed, the more they multiplied (12). This only enflamed the Egyptians' xenophobia, and they brutalized the Israelites further (13-14).
Eventually, the Pharaoh turned to genocide in an attempt to curb the rapid growth of the Hebrew people. He commanded the head midwives, Shiprah and Puah, to kill all the male babies born to the Hebrews (15-16). But these midwives feared God over the king and let the male children live (17). When Pharaoh interrogated them about the presence of all these Hebrew baby boys, they made up an excuse that pacified him, so God, because he hates injustice done to vulnerable babies in and out of the womb, dealt well with the midwives by giving them families of their own (18-21). Finally, his secret plans foiled, Pharaoh resorted to public policy and commanded all his people, "Every son that is born to the Hebrews you shall cast into the Nile" (22).
God is only mentioned in the passage about the Hebrew midwives, but it's obvious he's working behind the scenes all throughout the chapter. Many years earlier, God had told Abraham:
“Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. (Genesis 15:13–14, ESV)
God is now ready to judge Egypt and is the one who caused Israel to grow from a family of seventy to a nation of over two million while in Egypt. He is the one who reversed the impact of Pharaoh's persecution and caused Israel to grow. He is the one who honored the Hebrew midwives for their resistance to Pharaoh's edict and caused Israel to continue to grow. Despite all the pressures his people endured, the evidence was clear: God was working behind the scenes to prosper his people.
We are to know God this way as well. Just as he worked behind the scenes on that day, he worked behind the scenes of Roman dominance and Herod's madness to bring his Son into the world, and he works behind the scenes to expand his church today. Exodus 1 is a microcosm of much in our world today—city and economy building for the powerful on the backs of the powerless, millions of literal child slaves, sweatshop slaves, sex slaves, along with billions of figurative slaves to power, lust, screens, substances, and more.
Faithfully, however, God is behind the scenes, working by his Spirit through his people to seek and save. Despite all the persecution the church has endured, we are still expanding, reaching, and growing. We might have fallen on hard (or purifying) times here in the West, but all throughout the world, God is breaking into nations and setting people free with his gospel. And the affliction God allows us to witness—and even endure—is meant to increase our desire for exodus. Israel would've stayed in Egypt forever while under the favor of Pharaoh. But this new hostility birthed in them a desire to know and be rescued by God. God wanted them out, but now they wanted out, and that is always a necessary ingredient. As John wrote:
Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. (1 John 2:15, ESV)
This is who God is—he is present by working behind the scenes. When sold into Egyptian slavery by his own brothers, Joseph could have believed that God had forgotten him, but God was raising him up to become the second most powerful man in Egypt. When her husband died in Moab, Ruth could have stopped believing in the God of Israel, but he was working to bring her into the redemptive line of Christ. When Esther was taken as the captive queen of Ahasuerus, she could have despaired, but she soon realized God had placed her there for the deliverance of his people. When his close disciple secretly sold him to the religious elite, Jesus could have despaired, but his Father used Judas's insidious plan to deliver the salvation of the world. Time and time again, God shows us he is a God who works behind the scenes.
3. Working Out His Plans (2:1-10)
1 Now a man from the house of Levi went and took as his wife a Levite woman. 2 The woman conceived and bore a son, and when she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him three months. 3 When she could hide him no longer, she took for him a basket made of bulrushes and daubed it with bitumen and pitch. She put the child in it and placed it among the reeds by the river bank. 4 And his sister stood at a distance to know what would be done to him. 5 Now the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the River, while her young women walked beside the River. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her servant woman, and she took it. 6 When she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby was crying. She took pity on him and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.” 7 Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and call you a nurse from the Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?” 8 And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Go.” So the girl went and called the child’s mother. 9 And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child away and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed him. 10 When the child grew older, she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. She named him Moses, “Because,” she said, “I drew him out of the water.” (Exodus 2:1-10, ESV)
In the third movement, we learn that God is present, working out his plans. The story zeroes in on one husband and wife who, amid Pharaoh's threats, still tried to have a baby. We will learn later that Moses' parents were named Amram and Jochebed, but this passage is unconcerned with their names. What it does tell us is that when the woman conceived and bore a son, she saw that he was a fine child and hid him for three months (2). In the New Testament, Stephen said Moses "was no ordinary child," while Hebrews says he was "beautiful" (Acts 7:20, Heb. 11:23). Scholars fuss over what is meant by these phrases, but I think it means his mom thought he was amazing and destined for more than a quick death in the Nile.
This is when God worked his wonder. Jochebed made a little basket and turned it into a waterproof flotation device for her little baby boy, putting him among the reeds near where the daughter of Phraoah would wash in the River each morning (3-5). She saw the basket, sent her servant to retrieve it, and when she opened it, on cue, little Moses was crying (6). A good and maternal instinct was unlocked within this unbelieving woman, and quickly, the adoption was complete. With that, Moses' older sister appears for the first time—we will later learn her name is Miriam—and offers to find a Hebrew nurse to raise the child (7). The princess loved the plan and told Miriam that she would gladly pay for this service, so Miriam took Moses right back to his mom so she could be paid to be his mom (8-10).
This whole episode is an example of God's sovereign ability to work out his plans. God is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-wise, and all-good, and here he demonstrates his nature and power. Moses' birth and adoption by Pharaoh's daughter is the ultimate in the frustration of Pharaoh's plans. He is trying to kill all the Hebrew boys, and now he has one for a grandson! He had tried to bring death to Moses, but now he will bring life to Moses. And his household will even pay Moses' true mother to nurse her son.
The story shows God working out his plans in unexpected ways with unexpected people. In his sovereignty, he used a bunch of women—midwives, a mom, a sister, and a princess—to work his subterfuge against the man. Moses' mom could even say she obeyed Pharaoh's edict—I put him in the River, after all! But nothing could stop God from working out his plans.
And sometimes, like Moses' mother, we have to surrender and allow God to do what only he can do. For her to receive Moses back to herself, she had to let him go in that River.
This is who God is—he is present by working out his plans. When humanity gathered together in the ultimate rebellion against him at the tower of Babel, he came down and confused their language so they'd still have a chance at seeking him. When Balak, the king, hired Balaam, the sorcerer, to put a curse on God's people, three times, a blessing came out of his mouth. When Nebuchadnezzar built a statue and forced people to worship him by bowing to it, God stood with his three Hebrew followers who would not bow to his idol—and when they survived Nebuchadnezzar's fires, everyone stopped thinking about Nebuchadnezzar and started praising God! When Caesar Augustus flexed his muscles and commanded everyone to go to their hometown to be registered, God used the man to move pregnant Mary into Bethlehem, the prophesied birthplace of the Messiah. And when Satan and human leaders conspired to end Jesus' run with the cross, God started the greatest revolution and exodus in human history—the exodus all other biblical exoduses pointed to. God has his plans, and he works out those plans.
Conclusion
In these opening scenes of Exodus, God is not explicitly mentioned all that much, but he is ever-present. Even though his people are enslaved under a tyrant, God is behind the scenes blessing and expanding his people. Even though Pharaoh ordered all their firstborn sons to die, God worked out his plans and had one Hebrew boy raised by the king's daughter in the king's palace. And even though conditions were harsh, God was preparing Moses and all of Israel for the eventual exodus he had planned for them. God heard. God remembered. God saw. God knew. Even when they couldn't feel it, he was present.
And, despite all the bad press people ascribe to God, he is still ever-present. Behind the scenes, he instituted the ultimate exodus (through the cross) from the ultimate tyrant (sin). God worked out his plan by sending his own Son as a foreigner to be raised, not in a palace, but in poverty, so that he might suffer and die for us. And God prepares people for exodus, stirring in their hearts a deep dissatisfaction that causes them to look for his deliverance.
And he is ever present to continue that work. The God of history is always planning an exodus for us. He wants to pull us out of sin so that he can pull us into himself. That is what day one of Christianity looks like, but it is also what day 10,000 looks like and, I assume, what day 20,000 will look like. All these years later, God still has exodus on his mind. He is still pulling us out of Egypt so that he can pull us into himself. Whether we feel his presence or not, that is what he is faithfully, steadfastly up to. The question is, will we continue to go out to serve him?
Possible Study Questions
Head Questions:
- How does Exodus connect to and flow out of the book of Genesis? What themes or events are continued from Genesis into Exodus?
- What methods did Pharaoh try to reduce the Israelite population? How did God thwart each of Pharaoh's plans?
Heart Questions:
- When have you felt God working behind the scenes in your own life, even when you couldn't see what He was up to? How did realizing this later strengthen your faith?
- We see Moses' mother letting go of her son in faith, trusting God's larger plan. When have you had to let go of something/someone in trust that God would work it out for good? How did you feel in that moment?
Hands Questions:
- What "Egypts" do you need God to rescue you from right now, so you can move closer to Him? What practical steps can you take this week to cooperate with God's deliverance?
- How can you encourage someone who feels "stuck" right now, reminding them that God is at work behind the scenes? What specific truths about God's character could you share with them?
[^]: Bear with me; the titles and outline will inevitably change as we move through the book, but this is the basic plan. [^1]: Motyer, J. A. The Message of Exodus: The Days of Our Pilgrimage. Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2005. [^2]: Roberts, Alastair J., and Andrew Wilson. Echoes of Exodus: Tracing Themes of Redemption through Scripture*. Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2018.
Resources
Alec Motyer, The Message of Exodus: The Days of Our Pilgrimage.
Christopher J. H. Wright, Exodus, ed. Tremper Longman III, The Story of God Bible Commentary.
John D. Hannah, “Exodus,” in The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures.
John Sailhamer, The Pentateuch as Narrative: A Biblical-Theological Commentary.
Kenneth L. Barker and John R. Kohlenberger III, Expositor’s Bible Commentary.
Kevin D. Zuber, “Exodus,” in The Moody Bible Commentary.
Michael L. Morales and Benjamin L. Gladd, Exodus Old and New – A Biblical Theology of Redemption.
T. Desmond Alexander, “Exodus,” New Bible Commentary.