Welcome to Exodus, the migration of the Israelites (family and descendants of Jacob) from Egypt To Canaan. The Book of Exodus is famous for its story of Moses' Red Sea Crossing but it is important and rewarding to learn and be comforted by the entire journey: start to finish. Even the actions and thoughts of minor players are able to teach us massive life lessons.
1:1-5 Jacob's sons are listed: Reuben, Simeon, Levi and Judah; Issachar, Zebulun, and Benjamin; Dan Naphtali, Gad and Asher; Joseph. Between the twelve brothers and their family, there were seventy Israelites.
1:6-7 Much time has passed since the finish of Genesis and this beginning of Exodus; all of Joseph's immediate family have finished their journeys on Earth. Yet the descendants of Jacob are many. His children's children had children and so forth and the family multiplied as God has promised. After some time, their presence was abundant in Egypt.
1:8 The Pharaoh we grew to know and maybe even love in the previous book as also passed away. Throughout the succession of power, Joseph and his legacy have been forgotten. The new king is not even familiar with him and this is to cause trouble for the Israelites. Joseph's family was welcomed, respected and taken care of because Joseph, through his faith in God, was able to save and bless Egypt. That gratitude has been long forgotten.
1:9 The new king begins to worry that the Egyptians are or soon will be outnumbered by the children of Israel. He feels as though his power and prosperity is threatened by the multitude of them.
1:10 His fear is that if the children of Israel turn against them and join Egypt's enemies, they will never have a chance to triumph. Faith has been forgotten. God blessed Egypt with prosperity and endurance during a severe famine but through time, the gratitude for the miracle faded.
To consistently receive the benefits of our faith, we must always remember our God. We can never let out wonder for Him fade. We must remember the blessings, guidance and comfort He provides. If the Egyptians had been diligent with their faith and gratitude, perhaps this new king would realize that Egypt was safest under the care of the Israelites' God (of course He is everyone's God but was then only accepted by Jacob's family).
Yet even now we understand that people and kingdoms do not always do what they should do leaving others scrambling to deal with the consequences.
1:11 The king's solution to their "Israelite Problem" was to enslave them: to strip them of their dignity, freedom and power. The children of Israel were made to build for Pharaoh; he appointed masters over them and burdened them greatly with harsh conditions and disrespectful treatment.
1:12-14 And yet this was not enough to stifle the children of Israel who continued to increase. This caused further desperation in the king who began to create worse conditions for them to live and work in. We read of this occurrence as if it happened overnight but in reality, situations such as this evolve over time. The king's fears turned to discontent and from discontent to frustrated... until eventual he hated and disregarded the lives of Jacob's family and convinced everyone else to hate them as well. As children of God, we need to be cautious of circumstances such as these. We need to be vigilant because fear transforms into dangerous and unjust actions.
1:15-16 At this point the background information is over and now we delve into the depth of this Pharaoh's cruelty: he instructs the midwives to kill all of the male infants born to the children of Israel. His intention is the stunt and halt the growth of this family. Much (if not all) of the Bible takes place in patriarchal societies; only sons, fathers and husbands were acknowledged as official members of a family capable of carrying on the name.
1:17 The midwives rejected the order; the feared being participants in such an act as killing... killing innocents.
1:18-19 The Pharaoh reprimanded the midwives for ignoring his order. The midwives respond in a fib; they pretend that the mothers are so strong and fertile that they are giving birth even before the midwives can reach them.
1:20-21 Compassionate acts inevitably meet blessings and the midwives' kindness was noticed by God and he ensured that they were provided households (their job security was at risk for disobeying orders). Jacob's descendants continued to expand.
1:22 Undeterred, Pharaoh orders everyone to kill every male born to an Israelite.
