Inn Confusion - Exodus 4:24-27

Inn Confusion 

Exodus 4:24-27 At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met Moses and was about to kill him. ²⁵ But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched Moses' feet with it. "Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me," she said. ²⁶ So the LORD let him alone. (At that time she said "bridegroom of blood," referring to circumcision.)

Today I would like to look at this very strange story in the book of Exodus. At first, you may think, why??, is their any food here, but afterwards I hope we will have had a feast! We will be doing some detective work, I hope you find it fun, and I pray it is a blessing. These 3 verses occur just after Moses has seen the burning bush and been commissioned by God to rescue his people. They dramatically highlight two lethal dangers to all Christian ministry. Moses highlights one, Zipporah the other.

OK, who has seen the movie “Prince of Egypt”? Who remembers Moses wife in the movie? Moses rescues her then together they rescue the Children of Israel. In many ways, that is the way the story could have been, and should have been, but it is not the story in the Bible.

In the New Testament, we find out some useful things about Moses;

Acts 7:22-25 Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in speech and action. ²³ "When Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his fellow Israelites. ²⁴ He saw one of them being mistreated by an Egyptian, so he went to his defense and avenged him by killing the Egyptian. ²⁵ Moses thought that his own people would realize that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not.

Hebrews 11:24-27 By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh's daughter. ²⁵ He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time. ²⁶ He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward. ²⁷ By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king's anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible.

So, Moses was mighty in speech and word (Josephus says he was a great general of Pharaoh’s army and conquered Ethiopia.). He knew that God wanted to rescue the Israelites through him, and he chose to renounce all the privileges as Pharaoh’s daughter’s son to identify with God’s people. Possibly, also, as a prince and a mighty man, he figured that God had made a pretty good choice of him as leader, because he was already trained and experienced, and was really very good at this sort of thing. Other people might give up or find it difficult, but not him!

The first attempt didn’t go so well, however. An Egyptian is killed, the Israelites, the people he wants to rescue and has given up everything for, reject him. Pharaoh tries to kill him and he flees into the desert. If we were going to give him a report card on his first effort, we would probably give him 0/10, but Hebrews reminds us that we would be wrong, for he did not lose his faith, but rather it was only his faith in God which enabled him to endure this failure. In this he is an example to us. It is perhaps easy to renounce everything and decide to go and serve God, be a great pastor or missionary and write cool letters home and everyone will admire and respect you.

It is only as he flees Egypt with nothing, no adoring grateful Israelites, no palace comforts, no earthly future or divine ministry that the real cost of following God becomes apparent. And it is here that his faith sustains him. Faith in what? His own abilities? His own "powerful speech and action"? In the adoration of the huddled masses, yearning to breathe free? No. Faith in him who is invisible. When the lights went out, when he could see no reason for anything but despair and self-pity, Moses endured through the grace of God.

If your faith is in your own abilities, or in the reception you imagine others will give you, you are in for a fall. If you go as a missionary to a foreign land, crowds of Moslems will not mob you at the airport when you arrive, grateful you have come, desperate to be saved. No. “By faith … he persevered because he saw him who is invisible.” Moses has a good heart and is trying, but he needs to realize that being a prince in Egypt does not actually qualify him to lead God's people. In fact it is a massive negative, because God does not lead us like an Egyptian Pharaoh leads. We see this much later in Numbers;

Numbers 12:3 Now Moses was a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth.

Humility was not something he learnt in the court of Pharaoh. Likewise, in the work God leads you into, you will endure only as you look to Jesus. Christian ministry is not sustained by the praises of the crowd! Indeed, if we need the crowd’s approval, we are in for a fall! 2Timothy 4:2-5 Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage--with great patience and careful instruction. ³ For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. ⁴ They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. ⁵ But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.

Again Jesus said, "Simon son of John, do you truly love me?" he answered, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you." Jesus said, "Take care of my sheep." If we rely on the gratitude of others, we will not endure. We feed the sheep because we love the shepherd.

And so, the time, decades and decades, in the desert was needed, as Moses lost all respect in his own abilities, and became humble to the point where God could indeed use him to free his people. Humility is one thing, but we must never let it mutate to become lack of faith in God's ability to use us. That is an entirely different thing.

Exodus 4:10-17 Moses said to the LORD, "O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue." The LORD said to him, "Who gave man his mouth? Who makes him deaf or mute? Who gives him sight or makes him blind? Is it not I, the LORD? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say." But Moses said, "O Lord, please send someone else to do it."

Then the LORD's anger burned against Moses and he said, "What about your brother, Aaron the Levite? I know he can speak well. He is already on his way to meet you, and his heart will be glad when he sees you. You shall speak to him and put words in his mouth; I will help both of you speak and will teach you what to do. He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he were your mouth and as if you were God to him. But take this staff in your hand so you can perform miraculous signs with it."

So God is both angry and gracious. He rebukes Moses lack of faith, yet also extends himself in his compassion, and helps Moses in his weakness, providing human help to encourage and aid him. There is a blessing when it is just you and God, and yet there is also a very real blessing when we encourage one another, help one another and support one another. So, all is sorted out between God and Moses; say bye to the in-laws, load up the wife and kids and we are out of here!

Exodus 4:18-20 Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, "Let me go back to my own people in Egypt to see if any of them are still alive." Jethro said, "Go, and I wish you well." … So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt.

All is going great, then this!

At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met Moses and sought to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched Moses' feet with it. "Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me," she said. So the LORD let him alone [or loosened him]. (At that time she said "bridegroom of blood," referring to circumcision.)

Woah! Who saw that coming? What was that all about? What on earth just happened!!!??

Hadn't God and Moses just reached an agreement, and Moses had set off to do God's will? Hasn’t God just commissioned Moses to rescue his people? Why is He now trying to kill him?? The passage doesn't seem to have any background or internal explanation, and there is all that yucky stuff about blood and foreskins. How does this Scripture help train us in righteousness and equip us for every good work (2 Timothy 3 16-17)?

OK, take a deep breath, lets call time out and look at this more carefully. So, how many people do we know about in the inn?

God,

Moses,

Zipporah, their two sons

Eliezer (the younger son), and

Gershom

What are each doing?

God — trying to kill Moses

Moses — getting throttled in a death-lock

Zipporah — circumcising one son, and as for the boys, well,

Eliezer — getting circumcised. and

Gershom – probably wishing he lived when i-phones could take videos, because it is all happening!

Now, looking more closely at the text, two translation points immerge.

Firstly, there are two personal pronouns which are unfortunately incorrectly translated as "Moses" in the NIV. This may be significant. At a lodging place on the way, the LORD met Moses and sought to kill him. But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched Moses' feet with it. The first one is fine, the pronoun clearly is referring to Moses, but the second one is much more problematic. Stay tuned!

Secondly, the word translated as "Bridegroom" chatan can equally mean "father-in-law" or "son-in-law" – anyone who becomes related to you who was not previously related to you, usually through marriage. It is also connected with pagan circumcision as a puberty rite. 1Samuel 18:18 “But David said to Saul, ‘Who am I, that I should become the king's son-in-law?’ That I should become related to the king?” It is translated bridegroom here because it is assumed that it was Moses to whom she was talking [yes, the pronoun mistranslation is metastasising!].

Looking more broadly at the passage, Moses offence against God is immediately understood by Zipporah, who knows precisely what to do – there was no discussion as to what is happening or why. That offense concerns the fact that one of their sons was not circumcised. Equally, while she knows what to do, she is also visibly enraged by it. Now we are starting to get somewhere. The issues behind this incident therefore seem to involve Zipporah and circumcision.

After fleeing into the desert, Moses had married Zipporah, a Midianite. Furthermore, he had married her when a penniless fugitive, and had become a dependant of Jethro, which was why he had to ask Jethro's permission to go to Egypt; "Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, 'Let me go back to my own people in Egypt."'

Concerning circumcision, Genesis 17:14 is clear, anyone who was not circumcised was himself to be cut off from his people. In the New Testament, circumcision is related to baptism in that each were the means of entry into God's people.

The Midianites did not practice infant circumcision. A relative would however circumcise a boy before marriage. So, Moses would have presumably circumcised their first child on the 8^th day according to the Law, but Zipporah may well have been repulsed by this act. When their second son is born, she puts her foot down, "let me have the younger, you circumcised the elder," (even the phrase "her son" is suggestive of this) and she was possibly backed up by her father in this. Being a dependant of Jethro, Moses may have felt he had no choice in the matter, or acted out of deference to his wife's wishes, or simply to keep peace in the home (we have all been there!), but it had nevertheless been a source of friction. Zipporah immediately knew what the issue was when the Lord was seeking to kill Moses.

We need to watch carefully over our own hearts, lest love for any relation take precedence over our love for God and take us from our obedience to him. This was Eli’s sin; 1 Samuel 2:29 “Why do you scorn my sacrifice and offering that I prescribed for my dwelling? Why do you honor your sons more than me?” In Christian ministry we need to place God before family. That does not mean we ignore our family, but rather that we obey God even in that care, obey the God who told us to honour our parents and cherish our spouse. Jesus indeed rebukes those who use religion as an excuse not to care for their parents. Mark 7:11-13; “But you say that if a man says to his father or mother: 'Whatever help you might otherwise have received from me is Corban' (that is, a gift devoted to God),¹² then you no longer let him do anything for his father or mother. ¹³ Thus you nullify the word of God.” When we first went to Pakistan, it meant leaving my mum, and I felt really conflicted about that, yet the call of God was clear, and we obeyed it. Later, a friend wrote to us that mum was the happiest she had seen her in years. We need to follow God, trusting him with the outcome, but always trusting and obeying him first! Genesis 22:10-14 Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. ¹¹ But the angel of the LORD called out to him from heaven, "Abraham! Abraham!" "Here I am," he replied. ¹² "Do not lay a hand on the boy," he said. "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son." ¹³ Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. ¹⁴ So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, "On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided."

Remember, God’s initial call to Abraham contained a promise to bless his children, and here again, immediately after this we read; Genesis 22:15-18 The angel of the LORD called to Abraham from heaven a second time ¹⁶ and said, "I swear by myself, declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, ¹⁷ I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. … and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me." We obey God, and when he tells us to go, we go, and when he tells us to care for our families, we care for them. But always and in all things we obey and honor him first.

Now, back to Moses, and all continued along until God re-enters the picture. God now commissions Moses to free his people, the same task that Moses had initially believed God had called him to. Here we approach the sin of Moses which nearly destroyed his ministry. His youngest son is uncircumcised. He has not obeyed God within his own family.

How can Moses rescue and lead God's covenant people when he himself has not obeyed God's covenant within his own family, and one of his own sons is uncircumcised? Moses neglect of God's command in his family life nearly costs him his life, his ministry, and nearly forfeits 80 years of preparation and training! Paul said about the qualifications of a leader, 1Timothy 3:4-5 He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him with proper respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God's church?)

Here with Moses we see just how important this is to God. Remember, we have followed Moses from his birth, where he was a child, beautiful to God, seen him saved in the basket on the Nile, rescued by a princess of Egypt, raised in their wisdom, watched him forsake everything to rescue God’s people, and 40 years later, be visited by God in the burning bush, commissioned, given his staff, on the way back, and now, after all of that, God is going to kill him. That is how seriously God views this! How can Moses give commands to Israel on Mt Sinai if he is not obeying God’s existing commands within his family? Jesus shows how much God hates hypocrisy, when we tell others to obey God in public, but don’t obey him ourselves in private! Never let your spouse or wider family stop you obeying God! Take up your God given authority, and declare “as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord!”

So God meets him on the way, and seeks to kill him, not because he wants him dead, but because he will not use someone who had disobeyed and broken his covenant rule to establish his rule in Israel. Had God wanted to, he could have killed Moses in an instant. By not doing so immediately, but still showing his clear intent, God is giving Moses one last chance to stay alive. This is in fact an act of grace.

In verse 24, it is the personal name of God, Jehovah, which Moses has only just learnt in chapter 3, which is used. The God he encountered in the burning bush, the God of Abraham has suddenly become his enemy! Equally, the word "met" here is always used of a direct personal encounter. In the following passage the identical word is used of Aaron; "So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him." Here the encounter is less friendly, but no less direct! What is described is not an illness as some have suggested, but a theophany! It is the pre-incarnate Jesus who is wrestling with Moses! Just as he had wrestled with Jacob, and would be seen and worshipped by Samson's parents, was seen by Isaiah and spoke as a man speaks with a friend to both Abraham, and to Moses after this. The fifth person in the inn, the one seeking to kill in order not to kill, is Jesus Christ.

Now Moses, in the process of being throttled, Moses is unable to do anything, so it falls to Zipporah to do what she knows God demands, but which she has resisted and fought against. She does God's will in resentment and anger, and here the final piece of the puzzle is solved, as we ask, who is she angry against? Not against Moses, she performs the act to save his life, and certainly not against her sons — she is angry at the one who has demanded this action, contrary to the traditions and culture of all the peoples in the region, and who is presently killing her husband. She is angry at the God of Moses.

"But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin and touched his feet with it. "Surely you are a father-in-law of blood to me," she said. So the LORD released him."

It was God who had demanded it, so she says, you want it, here, have it, and in her society, it was the father-in who was the circumciser. In verse 26, Jesus then releases Moses, and the explanation is given. Zipporah says; "you are now a relative of blood by means of circumcision." As opposed to by means of marriage. By forcing her to perform this, God had assumed the role of a relative, has become related to her through this act. So she performs the operation and in anger puts the small drop of blood on the feet of Jesus, never realizing that one day those feet would be pierced through with a nail and bleed for her. Zipporah unknowingly speaks a profound truth, that in the Old Covenant, we became related to God through blood by circumcision, and today, through blood by baptism. Through the covenant we become God's children, that is why it was so important!

How does the story end? Unfortunately, not like in Prince of Egypt, where Zipporah goes with Moses and together they rescue the Israelis. In her anger and resentment of God, it seems Zipporah then takes the boys, leaves Moses and goes back to her father. She never sees the miracles of God in Egypt, or the deliverance of the slaves into freedom. She never sees the mercy and glory of God, or the highlight of her husband's ministry. Rather, Jethro later visits Moses in Exodus 18, bringing Zipporah and the boys with him. Jethro's attempt at reconciling the family however seems not to have worked.

Moses however learned from this experience. Its painful lesson proved vital in his own ministry and leadership. For the sake of domestic peace, Moses has tolerated sin in his family! But when the children of Israel are sinning with the golden calf, he cries out “who is on the Lord’s side?” and the Levites gather to him and drive out sin from the community with violence. Exodus 32:29 Then Moses said, "You have been set apart to the LORD today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day." Moses could not have done this without the incident at the inn. Either he would not have known how to oppose sin in the community, having not opposed it within his own family, or he would have been a hypocrite. That is why Paul says you must control your family, or you cannot lead the community. Without the incident at the inn, the children of Israel would have perished at the foot of Mt Sinai. We need to stand against sin and for God within our own families.

Zipporah’s problem; the second danger to Christian ministry

Now, if Moses problem was disobedience, that he is not obeying the commands of God in his family, what was Zipporah’s problem? Her problem was that she resented the cost to her family of following God’s commands. She resented the cost of being in ministry. This resentment will see her estranged from the people of God and distanced from the commonwealth of Israel. Her resentment is just as deadly as Moses disobedience. Are there times when we can resent and resist God's call on our life and on the life of our family, when we are tempted to say; "I have given enough, cant you just let me have this one thing for myself?!" For me, taking my youngest daughter to Pakistan was really difficult. I wanted to keep Naomi safe, and Pakistan was scary. Had I given in to strong temptation, and said to God, "NO, you cant have her as well," then I know full well my family life would have suffered, my faith would have shrivelled, I would have had no ministry and I would never have seen the blessings of God on my family that I have seen since we obeyed. Dont ever resent God's call on your family, don't ever resent God’s call on your time and your life. The God Zipporah was furious at was the God who loved her and would die for her. Let us learn to give without measure, without counting the cost, knowing that he loves us and is trustworthy. God is all loving and all powerful – we are right to trust him with those who are most precious to us. Don’t resent and be bitter towards God because he demands all, rather be grateful that he cares about all. God loves a cheerful giver.

I have always been blessed with parents who encouraged me to obey God, and have always been saddened when good Christians would stand in the way of their children going to the mission field. Then last year, my adult son, Nathan, who is studying and pastoring so that he can go to Pakistan in a few years time, rang up because he had worked out a way to go to Pakistan briefly in just 3 months time. He said this and suddenly my heart wanted to cry out, “don’t go, its too dangerous!!” Fortunately I just managed not to, but, after disparaging others who had done so, I clearly saw the same temptation in my own heart. Peter cries out when Jesus says being Messiah means he will be killed, Matthew 16:22-26 Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. "Never, Lord!" he said. "This shall never happen to you!" ²³ Jesus turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men." ²⁴ Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ²⁵ For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.

Peter cried out because he loved him and did not want him to die, understandable, and completely wrong. How many otherwise good Christian parents have been the very voice of Satan to their own children who want to follow Jesus in the difficult places? And not just in mission work but giving up a good job to help at church or being fired for refusing to do what was wrong, or, like Israel Falau, for sharing the Good News. Again, don’t resent and be bitter towards God because he demands all, rather be grateful that he cares about all.

Hebrews 12:15 See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.

We see the true cost of this resentment, this bitterness towards God when we look at Zipporah and her family. Her bitterness and resentment destroyed her family and left her estranged from her husband. This sin is lethal! We indeed hear no more about Zipporah, and in Numbers 12 we read that Moses had taken a Cushite wife. Had Zipporah died, or had the separation become permanent? We do not know. Fortunately, Gershom and Eliezer do remain within the people of God, and their descendants are given official duties in the Temple (1 Chronicles 26:24/5).

In any event, Moses choice for his next wife is interesting, and caused dissent within his family. Moses married a Cushite, or Ethiopian. She would have been a part of the mixed multitude of peoples from Egypt who joined themselves to the Israelites when they left Egypt, and which we read about in Exodus 12. They had seen the God of Israel freeing his people and wanted to join them and worship him. The very next passage in Exodus 12 continues that;

Exodus 12:48-51 "An alien living among you who wants to celebrate the LORD's Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. The same law applies to the native-born and to the alien living among you."

Having married a foreigner who did not wish to obey the law of God, and placed her culture above his God, Moses now marries another foreigner, one who has seen the glory of Israel's God, seen everything that Zipporah missed because of her resentment, and who of her own free will desires to be one of his people, just like Rahab and Ruth after her. One who would have rejoiced to circumcise any boys they may have had, thereby including them in God's gracious covenant. Moses next wife shows that the problem with Zipporah was not her non-Jewish ethnicity, but rather her resentment towards God.

In conclusion, what can we learn from the guests of the inn that day?

We will start with Moses. He let his wife stop him obeying God. Whether he felt powerless to stand against Jethro, or simply wanted peace at home, by refusing to insist on Godly behaviour, he made an enemy of God and very nearly rendered himself unfit for ministry. We need to be very careful that we obey God within our family.

Zipporah's is a sorry story. She placed the ways of her culture and her own desires above the commands of God. We must never let our culture trump obedience. All human cultures are deformed by sin, and when everyone else is doing something, that does not make it right. This is precisely what obeying God rather than man means! Never use your culture as a cover to sin! Are there times when we resent and resist God's call on our life and on the life of our family? Don’t resent and be bitter towards God because he demands all, rather be grateful that he cares about all.

Finally, what do we learn about Jesus? Curiously from this passage, we learn just how much we matter to him and how intensely he cares for us. God would have been perfectly within his rights just to kill Moses and call in Plan B. Moses had broken the central command to Abraham, a command which carried the death penalty. Instead, he goes in person to confront Moses, because he cared about him. Like in the Exodus, he did not send a messenger, an angel or a Seraph, he went himself. He didn’t simply kill Moses, for as it says elsewhere in Scripture;

Ezekiel 18:23, 32 Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live? … ³² For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone, declares the Sovereign LORD. Repent and live!

2Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.

Not only does he go himself, in love, to restore Moses, putting up with Zipporah’s anger and insult, but he himself will come again, this time to restore all of us (not to condemn) putting up with the insult and humiliation of the Cross. Blood will again mar the feet of the spotless Son of God, as it flows to reconcile us all. Through the blood on the Cross, he will become a blood relative to all who will receive him.