MANHOOD IN EXODUS (1)
[p. 98] MANHOOD IN EXODUS (1)
Exodus 1:20-22; Exodus 2:1-14: Exodus 3:11-14: Exodus 4:1-8
JT It is believed that the subject of manhood will prove helpful, under the Lord’s hand. In Exodus we see manhood, not as allowed to develop as it were without restraint, as in Genesis, but manhood under restraint. In view of what we are, and the influences around us, there is no way of developing what is of God, save as we are under restraint. It was thought this book would yield much. The beginning is to be noted: “And these are the names of the sons of Israel who had come into Egypt; with Jacob had they come, each with his household” (Exodus 1:1). The footnote in the New Translation indicates that literally it reads The man and his house. This is carried forward in the New Testament as Paul says, “Believe on the Lord Jesus and thou shalt be saved, thou and thy house” (Acts 16:31). The word son should be noted; “sons of Israel”, each had come with his father; not only each man and his house, but Jacob is seen as father of his sons and grandchildren, and then they are numbered.
The development of manhood involves suffering. It is said Pharaoh “set over them service-masters to oppress them with their burdens ... But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and spread; and they were distressed because of the children of Israel” (Exodus 1:11,12). These thoughts offer material to think over. Then there are the directions of the king of Egypt to destroy the male children and how it is frustrated by females. Five females are used for their salvation. Three of them are employed for salvation of one male child, Moses, who is saved and grows into manhood.
EGMcA Why do you bring in the female side?
JT It is to show how God can take up weak vessels to save the males alive, to build up [p. 99] His world.
AB In Genesis 32 Jacob comes with his family; in chapter 33 Esau comes with four hundred men, there is no mention of his family.
JT Jacob makes much of the household. He caused his family to pass before Esau in chapter 33. Jacob valued the family side; and when you come to Rachel, Joseph was put before his mother, showing the spiritual element on Jacob’s side in family matters. Christ is to be before all.
EGMcA In God saying to the serpent, the woman’s seed “shall crush thy head”, He is taking up for His own work what Satan thought he had spoiled.
JT Yes. Satan attacks through the most vulnerable side, he is attacking the young people now in that sense. God takes up some young people, not all, alas! and makes servants out of them. The seed of the woman is used, she was deceived for the moment, but her seed “shall crush thy head”, is triumph; it is Christ on man’s side.
GAT The male side is attacked through the female.
JT It was Satan; the male seed is in view from the outset; that authoritative and administrative element of the human race. Satan knew he could not directly attack Adam, but he employed Eve, because she was weaker. He will have the same difficulty in this new movement of God seen in Exodus. Thus the males must be out of the way, they are more difficult to overcome. It is a question of what the respective sexes represent. The male is the intelligent governing element; the female the subjective, and hence extending to the general state among the saints. This may be reversed literally through divine formation in the sisters. Scripture furnishes many examples of this, as Hannah, Abigail and Manoah’s wife.
Ques God created male and female; is it to bring out the balance there is in creation, they are to [p. 100] have dominion?
JT We have the word “Man” in Genesis 1:27, but chapter 2 brings out the detail; that he was made, formed of material already existing. The woman is not created out of the dust, like Adam, she is builded out of the rib. The position is perfectly poised. And God had brought the lower creatures to man to see what he would call them; what he called each, that was its name. In effect, God said of man, There is no one like him; it is not good that he should be alone. He caused a deep sleep to fall upon man, and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its stead. He built this rib that He had taken from man, into a woman and brought her to man, without saying anything as to where she came from; it is to bring out what man was, his intelligence. God just brought her to him, “And Man said, This time it is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh: this shall be called Woman”; this was a new word in his vocabulary. It is the beginning of man as relative to his wife; he called her by name. The name he gave her evidences his intelligence, because he did not see how she had been made; he could see she was himself over again. God says, “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife”. The conversation that would go on between Adam and his wife would be delightful to God; there was perfect balance, because he was her origin.
JD Piety would always have the maintenance of the male line in view.
JT Therefore the salvation of the male children was not a matter of philanthropy; God’s rights were involved. The two midwives point to the assembly as caring for the male element in view of the testimony. Pharaoh’s edict would cause the Israelites to decrease; besides this the women would be affected by their sufferings. They feared God and He made them houses. There is a standing testimony to what God thinks of such feelings and service.
GAT They were not afraid of the [p. 101] king.
JT That is an element of faith, that you do not fear the enemy. The Lord Jesus says, “Fear not them which kill the body” (Matthew 10:28). These women had the fear of God, which is a great feature. Human life is very cheap now in certain parts of the world, but they can do no more than kill you. God can do more than that, the Lord says; He can destroy body and soul in hell, so we must fear Him. The king of Egypt, “who did not know Joseph” is Satan in type; rulers who do not know Christ are ruthless. The world depends on males. The Lord says, “I am not come to destroy men’s lives but to save them”. A follower of Jesus cannot take the sword to kill a man. The christian says, “For thy sake we are killed all the day long” (Romans 8:36); we are killed, not we shall kill others.
AEH There are young men who do not go into active service in the army, but into munition works of various kinds; would that be damaging?
JT Of course people have to work with their hands. Government is good and must have a sword. If the government want you to do work of that kind, you cannot refuse as a christian. If you have to work overtime, God can come in and give you relief. It is wonderful what the Lord’s people are able to do in spite of exacting employment. If needing employment I would rather work for the government than anyone else, but not to take life. “All who take the sword shall perish by the sword” (Matthew 26:52). The christian cannot take the sword.
The word “Man” in Genesis 1:27, viewed spiritually, covers sisters as well as brothers; but the feature expressed there is that which in the males is specially to represent God, and these midwives typify an element that has that in mind all the time. The fear of God is brought into it. It is very striking.
These names have come down the centuries to us, and their houses. You could not get a better style of house than what God would make for them, and they [p. 102] would pass that down to the young people. A young man might say, One of these women saved my life. That element comes down and is an accumulative thought. He would have respect for that sister and her house, and perhaps would like to pattern his own house after hers. This divine strain was to go right down through Israel in the testimony.
GAT It would exercise me as to what I have in my house.
JT What is your motive in building a house? This is a challenge to us; God takes into account that He is considered in such a matter — that a God-fearing person built that house.
EGMcA There would be no houses in Egypt like those of these women.
JT Pharaoh’s house would be nothing compared to them morally.
WGT There is the cry of the man of Macedonia, and then Lydia says, “If ye have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come into my house and abide there” (Acts 16:15). The man of God cannot come into my house if it is worldly.
WB-w In the book of Genesis there was more latitude than in this book.
JT Yes; take the history of Reuben, Simeon, and Levi; the first represented natural corruption; and Simeon and Levi slew men; their rage was cruel. There was want of restraint, but now God is going to pass them through suffering, placing them under restraint. There was a great want of restraint in Jacob’s house.
EC With the incoming of the law, restraint takes place. Romans says sin is not put to account until the law (Romans 5:13).
JT The service the law renders should be well understood. By it is knowledge of sin (Romans 3:20); it came in, in order that the offence might abound (Romans 5:20); and “in order that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful” (Romans 7:13).
SP Would Ephesians develop manhood, as seen in the exhortations in chapter 5 to husbands and wives, and in chapter 6 to children and servants?
JT Yes. Wives come first, then husbands, children and servants. Satan attacks at the weakest point, and this is in persons specially in the place of subjection, such as wives, children and servants. Those under restraint are apt to be irritable and resentful. You can see throughout Scripture how God resents the want of control in households.
WGS Would the family Bible readings help in the way of restraint?
JT Very much; you could get up a little earlier to extend it. Making it fit into a minute or two is not much for God; five or ten minutes earlier means sacrifice. God speaks of Himself getting up early to send prophets, and we surely should get up early to hear what the prophets have to say.
HB Pharaoh ordered the males to be cast into the river; Moses’ mother laid him in the sedge.
JT Yes, she hid him first, then laid him in the sedge on the bank of the river. Moses’ mother did not cast him in; the casting is Satan’s work, that was destruction. In chapter 15 wood is found and cast into the bitter waters. Christ was cast in; He died at the will of another; they “killed the Prince of life”. It was positive murder to cast the children in. Moses was laid in the sedge on the bank of the river. It was death as expressed in baptism. As living on here the believer must experience death. That is the thing to see.
JD Exodus 1:22 is Pharaoh’s charge to all his people, every son is to be cast into the river. Evidently Moses’ mother disobeyed that.
JT She “did not fear the injunction of the king” (Hebrews 11:23). Still she put the child in the river. She [p. 104] did it in this way so that he did not drown; he was taken out again by other hands.
GAT There is affection in the exercise gone through in making the “ark of reeds”.
JT The New Testament comments on this; but what her feelings must have been! There is the gentleness of affection, but the child must go that way — through death.
JTJr There is no cruelty in Levi here; there is in Genesis; this is the feeling side, and intelligence in the home.
JT Evidently that had been judged before God. We may rightly connect this passage with what is said of Levi in Deuteronomy 33. In Exodus 1 they are “the sons of Israel”; it is a spiritual thought.
Rem In verse 2 Moses is called “a son”, in verse 3 “the child” and in verse 6 “the boy”.
JT Sonship is family dignity. The first use of the word son in Scripture is in relation to Cain; he called his city after the name of his son. Family dignity in the world is seen in this, but God has taken up the word son to indicate dignity that is opposite to the world. The sons of Israel came each with his household, we are told. In verse 6 Pharaoh’s daughter opened the ark “and saw the child, and behold, the boy wept”. Child is a general term, it may mean one of either sex. Boy is development — what Pharaoh’s daughter saw would suggest development; he wept; he is going to be a man of feeling, and that for others.
SP Herod slew all the boys in Bethlehem.
JT Then we have “Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not” (Matthew 2:16-18).
Ques. What is the river?
JT It is a figure of death in an active sense. “Death reigned from Adam to Moses” (Romans 5:14). His mother put him in the river; it is baptism. The eunuch asked “What hinders my being baptised?” No one can question it, the believer accepts death for his child.
EGMcA There is much developed in the background here — this man of the tribe of Levi and a daughter of Levi deliberately setting up a home. It says in Malachi 2:5 “and he feared me, and trembled before my name”.
JT This ought to enter into all marriages of believers; they should be sons and daughters of Levi. It is a very good thought that is worked out by the Spirit of God in the couple, and the result — Moses and Aaron — the great product in the history of Levi. Phinehas shines in the testimony in Numbers 25:6-9. He deals ruthlessly with wickedness and God gives to him the covenant of an everlasting priesthood. We must deal ruthlessly with positive wickedness. We have five women here looking after the male children. Some are risking their lives with no personal consideration in the matter. In the early verses of chapter 2 there are two, Moses’ mother and sister, they are serving God and He is honouring them. It is a standing testimony of what women’s service may be in this matter.
JST The boy wept; his later features are indicated in that. Moses was to shine in feelings for God and His people.
JT No one felt more in this sense in his day. Because of the killing of the boys by Herod (Matthew 2), we have a wail coming down from Genesis, through Jeremiah, to Matthew — Rachel weeping.
HB The boy indicates his identity: “This is one of the Hebrews’ children”.
JT Yes, it is the reproach of Christ. Moses esteemed the reproach of Christ; as grown, he identified himself with the Hebrews.
JST With regard to trade unions, there is much suffering to many who cannot join them because of the truth; they are suffering for righteousness. This [p. 106] should draw out from us all, feelings of sympathy. The Lord said to the Jews, “That all righteous blood shed upon the earth should come upon you, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar” (Matthew 23:35).
JT Righteous blood from Abel to Zacharias, it is very touching. God said to Cain, “The voice of thy brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground” (Genesis 4:10). All that is done against God’s people comes unfailingly into His reckoning.
CT What is the thought of God using Pharaoh’s daughter as His servant?
JT We have to pay attention to any divine trait that we see. Here Pharaoh’s daughter is used as Moses’ saviour; she names him Moses, meaning drawn out. She is an example of how God uses persons outwardly in the enemy’s camp to defeat him. There was an element of good there; she was not cruel like her father. We may always look for something of this. Pilate’s wife is an example.
JTJr Would this chapter lead us to think that a sister might take the lead in the thought of baptism?
JT I think so. It is remarkable that Lydia’s is the first household said to have been baptised. The mother is nearest to the children, and thus normally would have a peculiar interest in this important matter. Moses’ mother did not put him out in the main stream; she put him where he would be preserved from its power; it is the thoughtfulness of affection in her.
JTJr The child is weeping, being in different circumstances. He was accustomed to being in his mother’s arms; this would bring out the great place a mother’s affections have.
JT Little children having been brought to the Lord that He might touch them, it is said, “having taken them in his arms, having laid his hands on them, he blessed them” (Mark 10:16). In Matthew 19:15,
it is said, “having laid his hands upon them, he departed thence”, as much as to say, You must look after them now; putting it on the parents. Moses’ mother and father are models for us as to what we see potentially in our children, and show how we are to use every effort to save them. The first thing is to have them baptised. In this we bring them formally and openly to the Lord and own that His death is the only ground of their salvation.
GAT God says of Abraham, “I know him that he will command his children and his household after him” (Genesis 18:19).
SP There is a fine touch in Acts 21:5. Luke writes of leaving Tyre with Paul and others and says, “All of them accompanying us, with wives and children, till we were out of the city. And kneeling down upon the shore we prayed”. They brought their children under the influence of Paul. That is a very beautiful scene.
AEH Putting him in the sedge shows love’s influence thrown around the children, and this, combined with the practical side in making the ark, saved Moses from being carried down the river.
JT The force of the current is broken by the sedge; it was something living. It is the life that surrounds the children which holds them. The ark in the river would be death in its application, but in the sense of which we have spoken.
AB She bore a son and saw that he was fair; fair to God (Acts 7).
JT Son is potential; of course son is a male child, but it involves more; the full thought of God is in mind, and Moses is on the way to it. At the outset God made a man and a woman; “sons of men” (Proverbs 8:31), would mean manhood in the freshness and energy of life in sonship.
Rem Had Moses’ mother not put the child in the ark, the servants of Pharaoh might have discovered [p. 108] him and cast him into the river; it is moral death for the child that is not baptised.
JT The ark represents the element of protection entering into baptism. Death is accepted, but overcome: “In which ye have been also raised with him through faith of the working of God who raised him from among the dead” (Colossians 2:12). The ark was secure against the force of the water. The truth is that while the water of baptism is death, it is robbed of its power, Christ having come out of it. Faith understands this, hence in Colossians baptism implies resurrection: “through faith of the working of God who raised him from among the dead”.
JK His sister stood afar off to see what happened. Baptism is not enough, living interest must be maintained.
JT Yes. In a sister here.
EMcA A sister could be a resource; we owe a great deal to spiritual sisters.
JT She understood nursing; she speaks intelligently, saying, “Shall I go and call thee a wet-nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee?” (Exodus 2:7). She is one of the group of three saving this boy; she would take note of the weeping. She was his sister and knew what to say.
WB-w When he was grown he came into fellowship.
JT The word grown is to be noted, and the growth accompanied by right feelings. Baptism is not a mere religious rite; that is, not from God’s point of view. The mother took the child and nursed it, and she gets wages. Another idea of growth is that when he became great, as the New Testament says, he went out and looked on his brethren. We ought to see that growth implies interest in the brethren. I want to see what my brethren are suffering, and I am with them in it. Of Moses it is said, “choosing rather to suffer affliction along with the people of God” (Hebrews 11:25).
[p. 109] Rem Full dignity in the royal household would be his position in Egypt.
JT Yes. He was evidently brought up as a prince.
Ques Would the mother nursing the child for Pharaoh’s daughter bring in right influence?
JT She is now a servant and gets wages. She had him until a certain age; it was to his advantage; he came under his mother’s influence in time of nursing. This was clearly of God.
JD The discipline that God puts Moses through in Midian is in keeping with what is before us.
JT Yes. And this results in a change in Moses; a complete change in his humanity. Jehovah enquires of him, “What is that in thy hand?” A staff; no doubt what he had been using in tending the sheep; it was in his hand. God says to him, “Cast it on the ground”. It is to demonstrate that humanity had got completely out of hand. Man came under satanic power. The staff became a serpent; that is, what I am capable of. “Take it by the tail”, God said, and it became a staff; in that we see humanity brought under control again. The word in Romans 6:11 deals with the matter, “reckon yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus”. Man is taken under control through and in Christ — in a new order of manhood. We are baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus, and to the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit; it is a question of light, privilege and power. We reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus; I am alive in Christ. I believe that is meant here. Man is taken back — the divine idea resumed in Christ.
JTJr There was no restraint when Moses slew the Egyptian, but in his second forty years he sat down by the well. He would say, I slew that Egyptian in my own strength; but now I see I am to use the power of God — the Spirit. It is man taken up in a new way; God now finding His delight in him.
JST Paul speaks of “admonishing every man, and teaching every man, in all wisdom, to the end that we may present every man perfect in Christ” (Colossians 1:28).
JT Every man perfect in Christ — what a great thought!
WB-w Moses has power over the serpent as he gets hold of it by the tail.
JT Yes. There is an immediate change to the primary thoughts. Look at Levi, he was a man marked by evil; instruments of cruelty were in his hand, but now he is another man; the victory is complete in Phinehas as he uses, by his hand, a javelin in ruthlessly dealing with sin (Numbers 25:7,8).
AEH Is it not touching that God gives Moses at the beginning an intimation of what the end of his service would be — complete deliverance of Israel out of Egypt? “I will be with thee; and this shall be the sign to thee that I have sent thee: when thou hast brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain” (Exodus 3:12).
JT The sign there is that they should “serve God upon this mountain”. The signs in chapter 4 refer to the way God has brought about a change in man, answering to His own thought.
WB-w Moses comes into humble circumstances. Is this a reminder to the young men who would serve to be willing to accept reduction?
JT Yes. This thought works out in a remarkable way. There was a great disparity in Moses’ circumstances in Midian to what he was used to in Egypt. It is said, “Moses consented to remain with the man”, not wishing to have something greater. He is serving as a shepherd, and learning all the time, able to take in the divine instruction. He is developing in manhood, and in due time God will take him on. Continuing in the spirit in which he slew the Egyptian, Moses would have damaged the testimony, but he is subdued, and suitable for God’s service. God is asserting Himself [p. 111] and Moses recognised it, and would be in accord with God’s way. God would have him experience forty years in humble life; then He takes him up and uses him. Paul was a wild man doing anything he liked against the people of God, but he became like a little child.
The next thing in Moses’ experience refers to his bosom — his affections (Exodus 4:6,7). “Put now thy hand into thy bosom.” It became leprous. Man’s state had become corrupted. Moses is directed to put his hand in the second time, and it was turned again as his flesh. Paul says, “Put on the new man, which according to God is created in truthful righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24).
WB-w He acquires ability to handle the enemy as he seeks to attack God’s people. Paul shakes off the viper in Acts 28:5.
JT That refers to the first sign; the staff turned into a serpent. The most advanced of us are liable to come under dark influences. The incident in Acts 28 is remarkable, as showing the power over the enemy which the Lord gives to His servants. He says, “These signs shall follow those that have believed: in my name they shall cast out demons: ... they shall take up serpents; and if they should drink any deadly thing it shall not injure them” (Mark 16:17,18).
And then, as remarked, we have the second sign, which refers to man’s inward state. The believer is purified by the gracious work of God through redemption. “But ye have been washed, but ye have been sanctified, but ye have been justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God” (1 Corinthians 6:11). This is included in the new man, as remarked above.