Exodus 2:23-3:8

International Standard Version

The Israelis Cry Out to God

²³ The king of Egypt eventually^[a] died, and the Israelis groaned because of the bondage. They cried out, and their cry for deliverance from slavery ascended to God. ²⁴ God heard their groaning and remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. ²⁵ God watched the Israelis and took notice of them.

God Calls Moses

3 Meanwhile, Moses continued tending the sheep that belonged to his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. He led the sheep to the western^[b] desert and came to Horeb,^[c] God’s mountain, where^{[d] 2} the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flaming fire from the center of a bush. As Moses^[e] continued to watch, amazingly the bush kept on burning, but was not consumed. ³ Then Moses told himself,^[f] “I’ll go over and see this remarkable^[g] sight. Why isn’t the bush burning up?”

⁴ When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from the center of the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

He said, “Here I am.”

⁵ “Do not come any closer,” God^[h] said. “Remove your sandals from your feet, because the place where you are standing is holy ground.” ⁶ Then he said, “I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

⁷ The Lord said, “I have certainly seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry caused by their slave masters. I really do understand their pain, ⁸ so I have come down to deliver them from their domination by^[i] the Egyptians and to bring them out of that land to a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the territory^[j] of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.