New Testament in a Year
22 and taught him all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he became a mighty prince and orator.
23 “One day as he was nearing his fortieth birthday, it came into his mind to visit his brothers, the people of Israel. 24 During this visit he saw an Egyptian mistreating a man of Israel. So Moses killed the Egyptian. 25 Moses supposed his brothers would realize that God had sent him to help them, but they didn’t.
26 “The next day he visited them again and saw two men of Israel fighting. He tried to be a peacemaker. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘you are brothers and shouldn’t be fighting like this! It is wrong!’
27 “But the man in the wrong told Moses to mind his own business. ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ he asked. 28 ‘Are you going to kill me as you killed that Egyptian yesterday?’
29 “At this, Moses fled the country and lived in the land of Midian, where his two sons were born.
30 “Forty years later, in the desert near Mount Sinai, an Angel appeared to him in a flame of fire in a bush. 31 Moses saw it and wondered what it was, and as he ran to see, the voice of the Lord called out to him, 32 ‘I am the God of your ancestors—of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.’ Moses shook with terror and dared not look.
33 “And the Lord said to him, ‘Take off your shoes, for you are standing on holy ground. 34 I have seen the anguish of my people in Egypt and have heard their cries. I have come down to deliver them. Come, I will send you to Egypt.’ 35 And so God sent back the same man his people had previously rejected by demanding, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us?’ Moses was sent to be their ruler and savior. 36 And by means of many remarkable miracles he led them out of Egypt and through the Red Sea, and back and forth through the wilderness for forty years.
37 “Moses himself told the people of Israel, ‘God will raise up a Prophet much like me[a] from among your brothers.’ 38 How true this proved to be, for in the wilderness, Moses was the go-between—the mediator between the people of Israel and the Angel who gave them the Law of God—the Living Word—on Mount Sinai.
39 “But our fathers rejected Moses and wanted to return to Egypt. 40 They told Aaron, ‘Make idols for us, so that we will have gods to lead us back; for we don’t know what has become of this Moses, who brought us out of Egypt.’ 41 So they made a calf idol and sacrificed to it, and rejoiced in this thing they had made.
42 “Then God turned away from them and gave them up, and let them serve the sun, moon, and stars as their gods! In the book of Amos’ prophecies the Lord God asks, ‘Was it to me you were sacrificing during those forty years in the desert, Israel? 43 No, your real interest was in your heathen gods—Sakkuth, and the star god Kaiway, and in all the images you made. So I will send you into captivity far away beyond Babylon.’
The Living Bible copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.