Exodus Chapter 5 recounts Pharaoh’s initial confrontation with Moses and the punishment he inflicted on the Jews in retaliation for Moses’ demands.

The themes of suffering are similar to the suffering described in Exodus Chapter 1. Both chapters reveal how God tests His people to sharpen and refine their faith. However, the focus of Chapter 5 deals more with the persecution believers should expect in response to their faith. Christ does not promise a trouble-free life when you accept Him. To the contrary, He promises persecution. While you cannot avoid this persecution when you are doing His will, you can control how you react to it.

From this chapter, God revealed seven lessons of faith for every believer when confronting persecution.

• First, Moses boldly told Pharaoh to let Jews go and worship God. From this, God revealed that true faith gives you the power to speak boldly for God and against evil.
• Second, from Pharaoh’s refusal to submit to the God he did not know, He revealed that faith trusts in the God who remains unseen.
• Third, from Moses’ warning that Egypt would face judgment if the Jews were not allowed to worship, He revealed that true faith seeks out worship before all else, even freedom.
• Fourth, although God could have stopped Pharaoh’s retaliation, He revealed He allows evil to happen to teach believers to put their trust in Him.
• Fifth, from the Jews’ pleas to Pharaoh to reverse his punishment, He revealed that He wants you to put your trust in Him, not the things of the world.
• Sixth, from the Jews’ angry reaction toward Moses and Aaron in response to Pharaoh’s retaliation, He revealed that He wants you to trust in His promises to deliver you from evil.
• Finally, from Moses’ doubts even after God had warned Moses what Pharaoh would do, He revealed that He wants believers to trust in His Word.

Exodus chapter 4 continues God’s dialogue with Moses at the burning bush and concludes with his initial meeting with the Jewish elders in Egypt.

This chapter also gives a prophetic summary of the deliverance of Israel before the events happened.

In Exodus 3, God dealt with two of Moses' objections:

• Who am I? and What is thy name?

And, here, we find three more objections that God also deals with. These being:

They will not believe in verse 1;

• I am not eloquent in verse 10 and
• Send ... by the hand of whom thou wilt send in verse 13.
• I have extensively explained these latter objections in the full episode. Please pick it up on our social media accounts if you haven’t already watched it.

Anyway after all the objections were dealt with; Moses asked and received Jethro's permission to return to Egypt; He was also assured by the LORD that the enemies who sought his life were dead; So he began the journey, taking along his wife Zipporah and their two sons Gershom and Eliezer. Now Moses had neglected to circumcise Eliezer. So on the way to Egypt, God taught him that His law was not merely for the people, but for their leaders also, smiting him with some kind of a fatal malady, which both Zipporah and Moses recognized as punishment for failure to circumcise Eliezer. So Zipporah circumcised Eliezer and God permitted the resumption of the journey. However, at this point, Moses decided to send Zipporah and the children back to Midian and continued the journey alone. Then God instructed Aaron to go and meet Moses.

These long-lost brothers eventually met and Moses gave Aaron a full account of all that had happened;, together, they went before the elders of Israel, who believed them, and thus the stage was set for the great series of miracles that would result in the deliverance of Israel from Egyptian slavery.

Now this goes without saying that …Moses’ first two objections represented a lack of faith in himself and by contrast, his three objections to service represented his lack of faith in God.

Furthermore;

Moses’ struggle with his faith should give hope to everyone.I mean; If God was willing to select Moses knowing the weakness of his faith, there is no reason He cannot forgive you when your faith falters.

From Moses’ failures, God reveals seven important lessons for every believer.

• First, from Moses’ doubt that others would accept him, He reveals that you must have faith in His promises for your life.
  
• Second, from the three miracles that He performed through Moses, He reveals He will either transform you through your faith, or you will face His judgment. This is symbolized by the fact that the first two miracles involved the transformation of evil things into good things while the third miracle only involved judgment.
• Third, from Moses’ refusal to serve based upon his allegedly poor speech, He reveals that you must have faith that He will speak for you when you serve Him.
• Fourth, through Moses’ plea for God to send someone else, He reveals that you must have faith to accept His calling in your life.
• Fifth, from Moses’ failure to tell his father-in-law his real reason for returning to Egypt, He reveals that you should never fear telling others the truth when you are serving Him.
• Sixth, from Moses’ failure to circumcise his son, He reveals that you must have faith in the Word and fear Him.

This includes practicing what you preach. As, His representative, He does not want you to turn people away by being a hypocrite.Finally, from the faith of the Jews in accepting God’s Word as true, He reveals that He also wants you to accept His recorded miracles as confirmation of the inerrancy of His Word.

This chapter provides one of Scripture's most famous encounters that being Moses and the burning bush. This chapter can be divided into four sections, as God calls Moses to a position of leadership and vows to bring judgment on Egypt for their treatment of Israel.

First, Moses served as a shepherd of his father-in-law's sheep. He was with the sheep on the west side of the Sinai wilderness at a place called Horeb, later associated with Mount Sinai, which would later be called the mountain of God in Exodus 24:13.While there, the Lord appeared to Moses in a burning bush (Exodus 3:1–8). The text notes "The angel of the LORD" appeared in the flames of a bush with fire that would not extinguish. Moses was curious about this fire so he turned to see it and the Lord spoke to Moses from the bush, and Moses answered.

Moses was told to remove his sandals because he was standing on holy ground and of course, out of fear, Moses hid his face from God. Now God revealed Himself as the same God as his father and of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and also expressed to Moses that He had seen the affliction of the Israelites in Egypt and came so that He could deliver them from Egypt and bring them to what later became known as the Promised Land.

The second section (Exodus 3:9–15) includes the first calling of Moses to deliver Israel from Egypt. God had heard the cry of the Israelites and called Moses for the task. Moses unfortunately, presented his first excuse to not be the one God sends, claiming,"Who am I…?" (Exodus 3:11). 

However, God promised to be with him and that he would serve the Lord at this same mountain.

Moses then makes another excuse, saying the people will ask about God's name. It is in God's response to Moses that we find the closest thing to a personal name used by God in the Bible (Exodus 3:13–14). Moses asks the name of God and is told, "I AM WHO I AM" (Exodus 3:14). He claims to be the self-existent one, as well as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Exodus 3:6, 15, 16).This same passage connects God's use of the "I AM" terminology to the Hebrew word YHWH, which is sometimes transliterated as Yahweh or Jehovah. Most often, this is seen in English translations using small capitals: "The LORD."

The third section (3:16–19) consists of God's message to the elders of Israel, including instructions for their appeal to Pharaoh. Moses was to appear to the elders of Israel, telling them they would leave slavery and travel to a new land. They would then tell Pharaoh to let them go but would be denied until God "compelled" him (Exodus 3:19).

The fourth section (Exodus 3:20–22) assures Moses of Israel's upcoming deliverance and the Lord promised to judge Egypt and perform signs. When, the people leave, they would plunder the Egyptians. In fact, God was specific regarding the taking of silver and gold jewelry and clothing. These items would then be placed on the Israelites' children as a sign of victory over the Egyptians. All of these predictions fortunately came true as promised in chapter 3. 

However, Moses continued to object, offering further doubts throughout chapter 4 until the Lord convinced him to obey His calling. Egyptian slavery ended through many signs and wonders, and the people left Egypt, with plunder from the Egyptians. They then worship God at Mount Sinai, and eventually entered a new land as their own nation.

In the first section, the text reveals Moses was born to parents from the tribe of Levi (Exodus 2:1). He was then hidden for three months to escape death under Pharaoh's command to murder all infant Hebrew boys (Exodus 1:22). When the mother of Moses could not hide him anymore, she placed him in a basket in the Nile River. Now the scene of the basket on the water serves a similar purpose as Noah's ark. The basket became the means through which God protected from death in an evil context. Moses' older sister, Miriam, remained with the basket until it stopped where Pharaoh's daughter was bathing in the river.

Then pharaoh's daughter discovered the baby (Exodus 2:6), and Moses' sister asked if she would like a Hebrew woman to nurse the child for her. Miraculously she accepted and as such Moses’ mother was brought to nurse him as her adopted son, plus she was well paid for this duty. This providential situation ended with the princess naming the boy Moses, a word that sounds like the Hebrew word "draw out."

Ironically, the Egyptian king's effort to subdue Israel through infanticide resulted in his household raising and educating the man who would free the slaves (Acts 7:21–22)!

The second section (Exodus 2:11–22) skips ahead to a time when Moses was an adult. Acts 7:23 says this took place when Moses was forty years old. So Moses saw an Egyptian taskmaster beating a Hebrew slave and got involved in an argument with the taskmaster, unfortunately, he killed him and hid the body in the sand (Exodus 2:12). The next day, again Moses tried to break up a fight between two Jews and one of the men answered, "Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?" (Exodus 2:14). It’s then that Moses realized his crime had become known.

So Pharaoh sought to punish him with death, but Moses flew to the land of Midian to escape (Exodus 2:15).

Contrary to the popular myth, especially movies and other portrayals, Moses was never presented as a man unaware of his heritage. The Bible does not record Moses "discovering" his Jewish ancestry. Nor does it claim that Moses was, somehow, considered to be a prince, an heir to the throne, or otherwise treated as a member of the royal family. In fact, Scripture's description of Moses strongly suggests that both he, his Egyptian benefactors, and his family, knew from the beginning who and what he was.

While in exile in Midian, Moses drives away shepherds who were preventing the seven daughters of Midian from feeding their sheep. Their father Reuel—also named Jethro—invited Moses to stay with them, eventually leading to a marriage between Moses and Reuel's daughter Zipporah. Moses & Zipporah had a son called Gershom which means a sojourner or exile (Exodus 2:22). The third section (Exodus 2:23–25) returns to the land of Egypt.

The Pharaoh who had sought to kill Moses had died, yet the people "groaned" due to their slavery. They cried out to the Lord for help and fortunately God "remembered" His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He "saw" the people and "knew."

This context prepares us for upcoming action in which the Lord will act to save His people from their situation.

Exodus 1 consists of four main sections.

The first section describes the context of the children of Israel after the death of Joseph. Now, the twelve sons of Jacob became the twelve tribes of Israel, expanding from seventy people and Joseph's family already in Egypt to becoming "fruitful and increased greatly" (Exodus 1:7).

The land was "filled" with the Jewish people. The Lord had blessed Abraham's line with many descendants just as He had promised (Genesis 12:1–3). This period is approximately 215 years after the events at the end of Genesis. During this time, Egypt would have been perhaps the most powerful world kingdom, especially in the area of Middle East and North Africa. Pharaoh and his people lived with great wealth, power, and military strength compared to the surrounding nations.

In the second section, covering verses 8 through 14, the new Pharaoh of Egypt sought to oppress the strengthening Jewish nation. This king of Egypt was contrasted with the earlier Pharaoh in Genesis who knew Joseph and had appointed him to leadership in Egypt. This new Pharaoh feared the large population of Jews would rebel against them in war, taking over the land of Egypt. And so he set taskmasters over them and treated them as chattel slaves. They were given "heavy burdens" (Exodus 1:11).

The Jews are noted as building the cities of Pithom and Raamses. Their work included brickmaking and all kinds of fieldwork (Exodus 1:14). Yet the more they are oppressed, the more the people multiply.

The third section consists of Exodus 1:15–21. Here, the Jewish midwives Shiphrah and Puah are commanded to throw every newborn Jewish son into the Nile. Pharaoh's goal was to stop the rapid population growth of the Jews that threatened the Egyptians. However, the midwives feared God and refused to obey his command. When Pharaoh confronted the two women, they lied, claiming the Jewish women gave birth to the children before their arrival. Therefore, they did not know about many of the males that had been born. God would bless their desire to protect the Jewish children and provide the midwives with families of their own (Exodus 1:20–21).

The final section of the chapter is only the last verse (Exodus 1:22). 

Pharaoh repeated his command, not only to the midwives but also to all of his people, to cast every newborn Jewish male into the Nile River. He no longer relied on the midwives to carry out his command but required all of his subjects to enforce this evil law. The entire Jewish nation was in turmoil. How would they survive this wicked ruler?

This fearsome context prepares the reader for the next chapter in which Moses will be born, facing death from the start of his life.