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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - Exodus 3:11 - 3:18
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The Emphatic Commission
v. 11. And Moses said unto God, Who am I that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt? Moses certainly had learned humility in. the school of Midian, not unmixed with dejection; all his youthful rashness was forgotten. "He who once would, when as yet he ought not, now will no longer when he ought. "
v. 12. And He said, Certainly I will be with thee, the presence, the power, and the wisdom of God was to accompany Moses; and this shall be a token unto thee that I have sent thee: When thou halt brought forth the people out of Egypt, ye shall serve God upon this mountain. This was literally fulfilled, for it was on almost the identical spot then occupied by Moses that the children of Israel were encamped when they entered into the formal relation of worshipers of Jehovah. But Moses had another objection.
v. 13. And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you, and they shall say unto me, What is His name? what shall I say unto them? The name God Almighty was too general to distinguish the true God from the idols of Egypt, and therefore the inquiry for the name has the purpose of obtaining some expression on the part of God which would indicate His essence and the actual manifestation of the divine essence toward His people, by which they might understand and apprehend Him.
v. 14. And God said unto Moses, I am that I am; and He said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you. It is a majestic declaration in which God reveals His essence to Moses as the unchangeable, eternally faithful covenant God. From past to future, from everlasting to everlasting, He is the same merciful Lord over all, without change or shadow of turning.
v. 15. And God said, moreover, unto Moses, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me unto you; this is My name forever and ever, and this is My memorial unto all generations. Forward into the endless future, and backward into the past without beginning: there is only that one true God as He should be accepted by all men.
v. 16. Go, and gather the elders of Israel together, and say unto them, The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, appeared unto me, saying, I have surely visited you, visiting I have visited you, and seen that which is done to you in Egypt;
v. 17. and I have said, I will bring you up out of the affliction, the burden, of Egypt unto the land of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, unto a land flowing with milk and honey. The apparently cumbersome repetition of the name of God and the long enumeration of the Canaanitish tribes all serve for emphasis to bring out the certainty of the fulfilment.
v. 18. And they shall hearken to thy voice; and thou shalt come, thou and the elders of Israel, unto the king of Egypt, and ye shall say unto him, The Lord God of the Hebrews hath met with us, for the present revelation of God to Moses concerned, and had significance for, all the people; and now let us go, we beseech thee, three days' journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord, our God. This request was not a deception, but agreed with the plan of God, for because the Lord knew the hard heart of Pharaoh, Moses and the elders were, at the beginning, not to ask more than a leave of absence, for Pharaoh's denial of this petition would then reveal the hardness of his heart. God intended to make Pharaoh an example for all time.