It's time for the Robot Shuffle! As you see the choices, if you like "A" better, go touch the RIGHT wall of the room. If you like "B" better, go touch the LEFT wall. If you like them the SAME lay on the floor. For the last choice, choose the one you think is BETTER!

(Answer at bottom of page.)

The descendants of Jacob were called Hebrews, or Israelites. Over the years, their numbers greatly increased in Egypt. They were treated well until a new Pharaoh came to power who didn’t remember Joseph or anything he had done. This new Pharaoh felt he needed to do something about the Hebrews, since their population was growing, and they were becoming powerful. His first plan was to enslave the people and force them to make bricks and build cities. Still, the Israelites grew in numbers. So the Egyptians increased their workload and were very cruel to them. In spite of this, the Hebrew population continued to grow. Pharaoh thought of an idea of how to stop this. He told the midwives (the women who help ladies have babies), “When you help an Israelite woman deliver a child, kill all the baby boys as soon as they are born. Only the baby girls are allowed to live.” The midwives knew this was evil, so they didn’t obey Pharaoh. Instead, they feared God and allowed the boys to live as well as the girls. They told Pharaoh, “The Hebrew women are much stronger than Egyptian women. They deliver their own children before we get to them.” God blessed these women because they refused to kill the children. The Israelite population continued to increase in number, so Pharaoh issued a new law for the nation. “Every Hebrew boy-child is to be thrown into the Nile River.”

During this time of great persecution, a boy was born to one of the Hebrew families. His mother hid him for three months, but it became more difficult with each passing week. Finally, she realized she needed to do something different. So she made a waterproof basket, put the child inside, and placed it in the Nile River among the reeds near the banks. The boy’s sister was named Miriam. She hid nearby to see what would happen to her brother. Soon the Pharaoh’s daughter came down to the river to take a bath. She saw the basket floating among the reeds and sent her servants to get it. When she opened the basket, she saw the baby. When the little boy started to cry, she felt sorry for it. She said, “This must be one of the Hebrew children.”

Miriam came out of her hiding place and spoke up. “Do you want me to go find a Hebrew mother who can nurse this child?”

“Yes. I’d like that. Go get a nursing mother.” So the girl went and got her own mother – the mother of the baby.

Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Nurse this child for me and I’ll pay you.” When the boy was old enough, his mother brought him back to Pharaoh’s daughter and the boy became her son. She called him Moses (which means “pulled out”) saying, “I pulled him out of the water.”

Isn’t it amazing? Instead of being killed, Moses was adopted by a princess, who paid his own mom to care for him, and then raised him in the palace of the very Pharaoh who had ordered that he be killed! God is amazing!

What would become of this Hebrew baby who became a prince of Egypt?

To be continued next week...

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