LHC Midday Word

Monday 3 January 2022

The Second Book of Moses called EXODUS - Chapter Three

Moses and the burning bush

1 Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. 3 So Moses thought, ‘I will go over and see this strange sight – why the bush does not burn up.’

4 When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, ‘Moses! Moses!’

And Moses said, ‘Here I am.’

5 ‘Do not come any closer,’ God said. ‘Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.’ 6 Then he said, ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.’ At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

7 The Lord said, ‘I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. 8 So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey – the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

9 And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.’

11 But Moses said to God, ‘Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?’

12 And God said, ‘I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.’

13 Moses said to God, ‘Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, “The God of your fathers has sent me to you,” and they ask me, “What is his name?” Then what shall I tell them?’

14 God said to Moses, ‘I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: “I am has sent me to you.”’

15 God also said to Moses, ‘Say to the Israelites, “The Lord, the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob – has sent me to you.”

‘This is my name for ever,

the name you shall call me

from generation to generation.

16 ‘Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, “The Lord, the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob – appeared to me and said: I have watched over you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt. 17 And I have promised to bring you up out of your misery in Egypt into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites – a land flowing with milk and honey.”

18 ‘The elders of Israel will listen to you. Then you and the elders are to go to the king of Egypt and say to him, “The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us. Let us take a three-day journey into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God.” 19 But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless a mighty hand compels him. 20 So I will stretch out my hand and strike the Egyptians with all the wonders that I will perform among them. After that, he will let you go.

21 ‘And I will make the Egyptians favourably disposed towards this people, so that when you leave you will not go empty-handed. 22 Every woman is to ask her neighbour and any woman living in her house for articles of silver and gold and for clothing, which you will put on your sons and daughters. And so you will plunder the Egyptians.’

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Word by Word Meditations

by Fred Ursell

Exodus 3: “strange” (v.3)

Moses was just occupied in a mundane task “tending the flock” (v.1), when he noticed something “strange” (v.3). Despite the “flames of fire” the bush “did not burn up” (v.2) .

God may break into your humdrum existence and get your attention through some unusual incident. Moses did not precipitate or expect it.Nor can we trigger a special encounter on demand, except by being open, willing and hungry.Though Moses was “no ordinary child” (Hebrews 11 v.23) he felt inadequate to lead the exodus (v.11).

If God’s got your acquiescence, He’ll grant the ability to act as He asks!

READING

EXODUS Chapter Three

Read by David Suchet

The Complete book of EXODUS

Read by David Suchet

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OVERVIEWS

Exodus : Overview

The Bible Project

Exodus : Overview

Torah Series -

The Bible Project

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STUDY - LINKS

EXODUS - Part 1

David Pawson

EXODUS - Part 2

David Pawson

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I AM who I AM - Exodus 3:13-15

John Piper

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Sunday 2 January 2022

The Second Book of Moses called EXODUS - Chapter Two

The birth of Moses

1 Now a man of the tribe of Levi married a Levite woman, 2 and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son. When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months. 3 But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch. Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile. 4 His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him.

5 Then Pharaoh’s daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the river-bank. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her female slave to get it. 6 She opened it and saw the baby. He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. ‘This is one of the Hebrew babies,’ she said.

7 Then his sister asked Pharaoh’s daughter, ‘Shall I go and get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you?’

8 ‘Yes, go,’ she answered. So the girl went and got the baby’s mother. 9 Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, ‘Take this baby and nurse him for me, and I will pay you.’ So the woman took the baby and nursed him. 10 When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh’s daughter and he became her son. She named him Moses, saying, ‘I drew him out of the water.’

Moses flees to Midian

11 One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labour. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. 12 Looking this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. 13 The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, ‘Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?’

14 The man said, ‘Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?’ Then Moses was afraid and thought, ‘What I did must have become known.’

15 When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well. 16 Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came to draw water and fill the troughs to water their father’s flock. 17 Some shepherds came along and drove them away, but Moses got up and came to their rescue and watered their flock.

18 When the girls returned to Reuel their father, he asked them, ‘Why have you returned so early today?’

19 They answered, ‘An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock.’

20 ‘And where is he?’ Reuel asked his daughters. ‘Why did you leave him? Invite him to have something to eat.’

21 Moses agreed to stay with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage. 22 Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, ‘I have become a foreigner in a foreign land.’

23 During that long period, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God. 24 God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob. 25 So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them.

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Word by Word Meditations

by Fred Ursell

Exodus 2: “fled” (v.15)

The early life of Moses is packed into this brief narrative. His precarious fate as a little baby. His ‘good fortune’ being fostered by a princess. Then his equivocation in identifying with the mistreated Hebrew worker, while still part of the Egyptian establishment. Later on his sudden personal exodus when he “fled from Pharaoh” (v.15) for his own safety.

How hard it is to have a foot in both camps! Sometimes events ultimately make up our minds for us, to do what we already knew full well was the right course of action.

Are you in a similar quandary yourself? What won’t you let go of?

READING

EXODUS Chapter Two

Read by David Suchet

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The Complete book of EXODUS

Read by David Suchet

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OVERVIEWS

Exodus : Overview

The Bible Project

Exodus : Overview

Torah Series -

The Bible Project

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STUDY - LINKS

EXODUS - Part 1

David Pawson

EXODUS - Part 2

David Pawson

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SERMON

Miriam: The Leading Lady of the Exodus

https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/80-389

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Saturday 1 January 2022

The Second Book of Moses called EXODUS - Chapter One

Exodus : Overview

The Bible Project

Exodus : Overview

Torah Series

The Bible Project

The Israelites oppressed

1 These are the names of the sons of Israel who went to Egypt with Jacob, each with his family: 2 Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah; 3 Issachar, Zebulun and Benjamin; 4 Dan and Naphtali; Gad and Asher. 5 The descendants of Jacob numbered seventy in all; Joseph was already in Egypt.

6 Now Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died, 7 but the Israelites were exceedingly fruitful; they multiplied greatly, increased in numbers and became so numerous that the land was filled with them.

8 Then a new king, to whom Joseph meant nothing, came to power in Egypt. 9 ‘Look,’ he said to his people, ‘the Israelites have become far too numerous for us. 10 Come, we must deal shrewdly with them or they will become even more numerous and, if war breaks out, will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country.’

11 So they put slave masters over them to oppress them with forced labour, and they built Pithom and Rameses as store cities for Pharaoh.

12 But the more they were oppressed, the more they multiplied and spread; so the Egyptians came to dread the Israelites 13 and worked them ruthlessly. 14 They made their lives bitter with harsh labour in brick and mortar and with all kinds of work in the fields; in all their harsh labour, the Egyptians worked them ruthlessly.

15 The king of Egypt said to the Hebrew midwives, whose names were Shiphrah and Puah, 16 ‘When you are helping the Hebrew women during childbirth on the delivery stool, if you see that the baby is a boy, kill him; but if it is a girl, let her live.’ 17 The midwives, however, feared God and did not do what the king of Egypt had told them to do; they let the boys live. 18 Then the king of Egypt summoned the midwives and asked them, ‘Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?’

19 The midwives answered Pharaoh, ‘Hebrew women are not like Egyptian women; they are vigorous and give birth before the midwives arrive.’

20 So God was kind to the midwives and the people increased and became even more numerous. 21 And because the midwives feared God, he gave them families of their own.

22 Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: ‘Every Hebrew boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.’

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Word by Word Meditations

by Fred Ursell

Exodus 1: “or” (v.10)

Fear causes fair-mindedness to flee. Egypt’s new ruler in a fresh generation watched with alarm as the Hebrew immigrants’ birth rate spiralled (“they will become much too numerous for us” v.9). He decided that pre-emptive action was needed: “we must deal shrewdly with them or they … will join our enemies, fight against us and leave the country” (v.10).

Jacob’s descendants had done no wrong, but imaginary future treachery poisoned attitudes towards them.

If you face unfounded suspicions, see how, in spite of it, they “multiplied” (v.7). Or, if distrust devours you, “deal” with it differently.

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STUDY - LINKS

Exodus part 1

David Pawson

Exodus part 1

David Pawson

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JANUARY - READINGS

JANUARY - READINGS

from the New International Version (UK)

Friday 31 December 2021

PSALM Seventy Two

Of Solomon.

Endow the king with your justice, O God,

the royal son with your righteousness.

May he judge your people in righteousness,

your afflicted ones with justice.

May the mountains bring prosperity to the people,

the hills the fruit of righteousness.

May he defend the afflicted among the people

and save the children of the needy;

may he crush the oppressor.

May he endure as long as the sun,

as long as the moon, through all generations.

May he be like rain falling on a mown field,

like showers watering the earth.

In his days may the righteous flourish

and prosperity abound till the moon is no more.

May he rule from sea to sea

and from the River to the ends of the earth.

May the desert tribes bow before him

and his enemies lick the dust.

May the kings of Tarshish and of distant shores

bring tribute to him.

May the kings of Sheba and Seba

present him with gifts.

May all kings bow down to him

and all nations serve him.

For he will deliver the needy who cry out,

the afflicted who have no one to help.

He will take pity on the weak and the needy

and save the needy from death.

He will rescue them from oppression and violence,

for precious is their blood in his sight.

Long may he live!

May gold from Sheba be given to him.

May people ever pray for him

and bless him all day long.

May corn abound throughout the land;

on the tops of the hills may it sway.

May the crops flourish like Lebanon

and thrive like the grass of the field.

May his name endure for ever;

may it continue as long as the sun.

Then all nations will be blessed through him,

and they will call him blessed.

Praise be to the Lord God, the God of Israel,

who alone does marvellous deeds.

Praise be to his glorious name for ever;

may the whole earth be filled with his glory.

Amen and Amen.

This concludes the prayers of David son of Jesse.

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Word by Word Meditations

by Fred Ursell

Psalm 72 : “through” (v.17)

In the heading (‘of Solomon’) the identity of the person prayed for (“endow the king with your justice” v.1) is given. It’s asking for a reign which will do good with God’s help.

All believers (not just leaders) need to receive the right qualities from above so that they “will be like … showers watering the earth” (v.6).

The Psalm looks ahead to King Jesus, a more distant but distinguished descendant of David, “all nations will be blessed through him, and they will call him blessed” (v.17). That’s how it works

– folk get “blessed through him”, then naturally “call him blessed”!

Be blessed yourself all next year too!

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READING

Psalm Seventy Two

Read by David Suchet