2:18-22
The women came home to their father and relayed what had happened. Reuel and Jethro are the same person, and he was surprised that they had arrived home so early. It seems that the shepherds were something of a perpetual hazard. Following middle eastern hospitality customs, Reuel wanted to give Moses some food. Moses went along, and also acquired a wife! Zipporah can be translated as “warbler” or even “twitterer” (no reference to today’s tweeting!). Zipporah gave birth to a son whom Moses called “Gershom”, which means “sojourner”.
2:23-25
The king of Egypt died. He was the one who had started imposing the heavy burdens on the Israelites, and the succeeding king apparently continued in the same vein. “The people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help”. So the first two chapters have been setting the scene for the great Exodus. The cry of the people came up to God and He remembered His covenant. Now this does not mean God had forgotten it and the cry of the people jogged His memory. It is more that this is how things looked from a human perspective. It can seem as if God had forgotten, God seems to allow injustices to continue for a significant length of time. But God is acting according to His covenant.
“God saw the people of Israel - and God knew”. This is an amazing verse. We may think that God has forgotten, but He has not. For all our individual circumstances God sees and God knows.
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