Forty years before, Moses acted for his people in his own strength; now he looks at himself, and says to God, “But, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice.” How much better it would have been if he had simply trusted God. Still God was very patient; first he gave Moses the sign of the serpent; his rod that he carried changed to a real living snake when he threw it on the ground, but changed back to a rod when he took it by the tail.
Next, the changing of his hand to be covered with leprosy, that dreadful disease of some hot countries, and then cleansed again.
Then a third sign, the water of the river —Egypt has only one river, the Nile, and from it they get all their water,—the river should be changed to blood.
Twice again, Moses objects to going when God wishes to send him, and so at last He is displeased with him, and tells him that Aaron, his older brother, should do the speaking part. That was a loss in honor to Moses, that his brother should have to share with him, what God would have given to him alone, and Moses must have felt it afterwards.
Moses now went to his father-in-law to tell him he was going back to see his relatives in Egypt, and then directed by God to go, as all the men were dead who wanted to kill him, he set out with his wife and his sons, and the rod in his hand. But Moses had never circumcised his boy, as God had directed Abraham, in the seventeenth chapter of Genesis, and clearly Zipporah had been the cause. For some reason it has not exactly been explained to us, but God spoke to Moses about his ways, and he obeys, and so does his wife.
Then they go on, and meet Aaron. whom God had told to go out to meet his brother, and so together they go back to Egypt, and gathering the elders of the people of Israel together, they tell them the grand news that God is just going to set them all free.