WHY it matters//
The expectation of God’s saving Messiah was first prophesied at the fall of Adam and Eve and then is spoken of throughout the Old Testament. In Exodus God speaks to Moses and gives him the charge to bring His people out of slavery so that they can worship him. We then see an epic series of events that leads to the deliverance of Israel from slavery to Pharaoh. Contained in the Exodus of Israel is the foreshadow of the final “exodus” of all people from slavery to sin through the salvation of Jesus.
WHAT it's talking about//
Exodus was written by Moses and is contained in the Torah, or the Five Books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Many scholars would date the writing to the 1400’s BC. In this passage Moses describes an experience where God speaks to him from a burning bush, telling him to go back to Egypt to deliver the Israelites from slavery. This encounter by the “Angel of the Lord” is considered to be an Old Testament Christophany by most Christian scholars, or a pre-incarnate encounter with Jesus Christ.
Exodus 3:1-10 NLT
1 One day Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the flock far into the wilderness and came to Sinai, the mountain of God.
2 There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the middle of a bush. Moses stared in amazement. Though the bush was engulfed in flames, it didn’t burn up.
3 “This is amazing,” Moses said to himself. “Why isn’t that bush burning up? I must go see it.”
4 When the Lord saw Moses coming to take a closer look, God called to him from the middle of the bush, “Moses! Moses!” “Here I am!” Moses replied.
5 “Do not come any closer,” the Lord warned. “Take off your sandals, for you are standing on holy ground.
6 I am the God of your father—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” When Moses heard this, he covered his face because he was afraid to look at God.
7 Then the Lord told him, “I have certainly seen the oppression of my people in Egypt. I have heard their cries of distress because of their harsh slave drivers. Yes, I am aware of their suffering.
8 So I have come down to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians and lead them out of Egypt into their own fertile and spacious land. It is a land flowing with milk and honey—the land where the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites now live.
9 Look! The cry of the people of Israel has reached me, and I have seen how harshly the Egyptians abuse them.
10 Now go, for I am sending you to Pharaoh. You must lead my people Israel out of Egypt.”