By Faith Moses' Parents

This is the eleventh post in a series from Hebrews 11. You’ll find all the posts done so far in this series listed here.

After he shows us the faith of the patriarchs, the author of Hebrews moves on to Moses, beginning with the faith of Moses’ parents.

By faith, when Moses was born, his parents hid him for three months, because they saw the child was beautiful and they were not afraid of the king’s edict. (Hebrews 11:23 NET)

Do you remember the circumstances surrounding the birth of Moses? The king of Egypt had become afraid of the potential power of the Israelite people and had ordered that all Israelite sons born be thrown into the river (Exodus 1:22). When Moses was born, instead of obeying the king’s command, his parents hid him for three months (Exodus 2:1-2). When you read the Exodus account, you’ll notice it’s his mother who is singled out—she saw that he was a fine child, so she hid him—but the writer of Hebrews attributes this to both parents. It may be that it was primarily his mother who kept little Moses hidden, but it would have required nothing less than consent from her husband. Moses could not have been concealed in the house without his father knowing and approving of it.

Why did Moses’ parents decide to disobey the king’s edict and hide him? Because they saw he was a beautiful child. Those are mysterious words and I’m not sure exactly all that they mean, but at the very least, they saw that this little one had value. Perhaps they had some inkling of God”s special purpose for him.

We can assume that there were severe consequences for anyone who defied the edict of the king, but because of their faith Moses’ parents were not afraid of them. They trusted God in the face of possible punishment and did what they believed was right, preserving the life of their young son. And for this they are included in the list of faithful people of old. They are two people we can look to as examples of faith that perseveres through difficulties.