Eternal One: Look, for I am now going to make a pact, a special covenant, with you and all your descendants.

Special Messenger: Hagar, Sarai’s servant girl? Where have you come from, and where are you planning to go? Hagar: I am running away from my mistress, Sarai!

The sign that you and your family keep My covenant is this: each male who lives among you shall be circumcised. The circumcised flesh of your foreskins constitutes a special “sign” of the covenant I made with you, a relationship bonded together by loyalty and love.

Eternal One: No, Abraham. I mean what I am telling you. Your wife Sarah will certainly become pregnant and bear a son. I want you to name him Isaac. I will continue to establish My covenant with him; through his line My covenant will last forever.

Hittites: Listen, my lord. We recognize you are a powerful prince among us, and God is certainly with you. Bury your dead in the best of our burial places. None of us will deny you any tomb so that you might properly bury your dead.

But he told me, “The Eternal One, with whom I walked all these years, will send His messenger with you to guide and help you along the way. I know you will find a wife for my son among my relatives, from my father’s family.

The night they arrived, the Eternal One appeared to him. Eternal One: I am the God of your father, Abraham. Don’t be afraid because I am there with you. I will bless you with many descendants according to the promise I made to My servant, Abraham.

Abimelech and His Advisors: It is not hard to see that the Eternal One is with you. So we agreed among ourselves that it is in our best interests for us to enter into a binding treaty with you. Let us make a covenant

Know I am with you, and I will watch over you no matter where you go. One day I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done all I have promised you.

Jacob became angry with Rachel. Jacob: Am I God? He’s the One responsible for you not getting pregnant, not me!

I know I am not worthy of even a little of all of the loyal love and faithfulness You have shown to me, Your servant. You have already blessed me because I left home and crossed the Jordan with nothing except my staff. Now I have grown into two large camps.

But Pharaoh had one more declaration. Pharaoh (to Joseph): I am Pharaoh, and I decree that no one may do anything in the land of Egypt without your consent.

Now when Jacob found out there was grain to be had in Egypt, he talked to his sons about it. Jacob: Why do you just keep sitting here looking at each other?

Three days later, Joseph had come up with a different plan. Joseph (to his brothers): Do what I am about to say and you will live, because I am a man who respects God.

Jacob (to Joseph): Look, I am about to die; but I know that God will be with you, and He will bring you back to the land of your ancestors someday.

I am going to hand down to you more land than I give to your brothers. You will inherit a mountain ridge that I seized from the Amorites with my sword and my bow.

Eternal One: Do not fear, Moses. I will be with you every step of the way, and this will be the sign to you that I am the One who has sent you: after you have led them out of Egypt, you will return to this mountain and worship God.

So I will rescue you from the oppression you have suffered in Egypt, and lead you to the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites—a rich and productive land flowing with milk and honey.’”

Eternal One: Throw your staff down on the ground. So Moses threw the staff on the ground, and it was transformed into a snake. Moses quickly jumped back in fear.

Moses: Please, Lord, I am not a talented speaker. I have never been good with words. I wasn’t when I was younger and I haven’t gotten any better since You revealed Yourself to me. I stutter and stammer. My words get all twisted.

Slave Drivers and Supervisors (to the people): Pharaoh has a message for you: “I am not going to supply you with any more straw.

go now and tell the people of Israel, “I am the Eternal, and I will rescue you from the heavy load the Egyptians have laid on you. I will liberate you from their oppression. I will stretch out my powerful arm and free you with amazing acts of judgment.

Still Pharaoh will ignore the message you give him. Then I will unleash the power of My hand against Egypt and liberate My vast armies—My people, the children of Israel—from Egypt with amazing acts of judgment.

You will know that I am the Eternal by the next miracle I am going to perform. I will strike the water of the Nile with this staff that is in my hand, and the water will be turned into blood.

I have done all these things so that you can tell your children and grandchildren stories of how I treated the cruel Egyptians with contempt and performed My signs among them. I have done all this so that you may believe I am the Eternal.