Lesson plans.
Lesson 8: Moses sees the glory of God.
Exodus 33:12-23 - Sometime after God gives the Ten Commandments to the people of Israel from Mount Sinai, Moses has an honest discussion with God about his concerns for leading the people to the Promised Land. Moses wants to know who God will send with him to help him lead the people, and God says that God’s very own presence will go with him. Moses wants to be certain of this and so he declares that if God’s presence does not go with him, then he will not go. Moses also asks to be able to see God’s glory, and God agrees to pass by Moses and allow him to get a glimpse of God’s back, but not God’s face.
Lesson 7: The ten commandments.
Exodus 19:1-20:21 - The Israelites came to Mount Sinai, which Moses climbed to meet with God. There, God gave Moses the Law of the Covenant to give to the Israelites, which was a reminder of how God had rescued them from slavery in Egypt and chosen them to be God’s people, as well as a guideline for how they were to live as God’s people in the Promised Land. God gave the Israelites Ten Commandments to follow, which Jesus later summarizes as “loving God and loving others.”
Lesson 6: Wilderness wanderings.
Exodus 16 - After the Israelites escaped from Egypt and crossed the Red Sea, they wandered through the wilderness to get to the land that God promised to bring them to. Eventually, the Israelites started grumbling against Moses and Aaron, saying that they wished they had stayed in Egypt as slaves because there they had meat to eat and all the food they wanted. God heard the grumbling of the people and sent them bread from heaven, which they called manna, and quail to eat. God instructed them to collect as much manna as needed but not to save any for the next day, because God would provide for them each day. On the night before the Sabbath, they were to collect enough for two days. The people didn’t always listen to God’s instructions, but God continued to take care of them throughout their forty years of wandering in the wilderness.
Lesson 5: Crossing the sea.
Exodus 12:31-42; 13:17-14:31 - After the tenth plague that God sent on Egypt, Pharaoh finally agreed to let the people go. So the Israelites made preparations and started on their journey. However, after the Israelites had left Egypt, Pharaoh changed his mind and sent an army of Egyptians to chase after the Israelites and bring them back. When the Israelites were camped next to the Red Sea, they saw the Egyptian army approaching and were terrified, but Moses told them not to be afraid and to trust God to deliver them. So God told Moses to stretch his hand out over the sea, and God sent a strong wind to blow the waters, causing it to split in two and a path of dry ground to form down the middle. The Israelites were able to cross over on dry ground to the other side, but when the Egyptians tried to follow, God caused the water to come back down, preventing them from getting across.
Lesson 4: The ten plagues.
Exodus 7:1-11:10 - When Pharaoh refuses to listen to Moses and Aaron, who told him to let the Israelite people go free, God begins to send plagues on Egypt, ten in total. First, God turns the Nile river into blood, then God sends frogs, followed by gnats, flies, livestock pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, and darkness. The final plague is the death of all the firstborn sons in Egypt, both humans and animals.
Lesson 3: Moses returns to Egypt.
Exodus 4:18-6:12 - Moses returns to Egypt and meets his brother Aaron whom God has sent to help him speak to the Israelites and to Pharaoh. The two of them speak to the Israelites and tell them that God has sent them to rescue them from slavery. The Israelites, however, don’t believe them, so Moses performs two signs that God gave him to prove that God really sent him. Then, Moses and Aaron go to Pharaoh and demand that he let the people go and take a journey into the wilderness to worship God. Pharaoh is angry and refuses to let the Israelites go, instead making their lives even more miserable by forcing them to meet the same quota of bricks built each day without being given the straw needed to build them. The Israelites are angry at Moses and Aaron, but God promises the Israelites that God will deliver them from Egypt and from their slavery.
Lesson 2: Moses and the burning bush.
Exodus 2:11-4:17 - Moses grew up in the palace of Pharaoh, and one day he went out and saw an Egyptian beating an Israelite, one of his own people. When he thought no one was looking, Moses killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand. But word got out about what he’d done, and Pharaoh became angry and wanted to kill him. So Moses ran away to a place called Midian, where he met seven daughters of a priest named Jethro. He helped them draw water from a well for their flocks and was invited to their home. Moses married one of the daughters, whose name was Zipporah, and lived with them for many years. One day, when Moses was tending to the flocks in the wilderness, he saw a bush that was caught on fire but didn’t burn up. When he came closer, he heard God speaking to him from the bush. God told Moses that God had not forgotten about the Israelites’ misery and was now sending Moses to go back and rescue them. Moses was afraid and reluctant to go, but God gave him two signs so that the people would listen to him - a staff that turned into a snake and back again, and his hand becoming leprous when placed in his cloak and then healing again.
Lesson 1: The birth of Moses.
Exodus 1:1-2:10 - When the Israelites had lived in Egypt for many years, they prospered and grew in number. The Egyptian Pharaoh was afraid of them, and so he turned them into slaves and oppressed them terribly. Yet the Israelites continued to grow in number, so Pharaoh ordered that all of the Israelite baby boys were to be killed. One Israelite woman, however, took her baby boy and placed him in a basket among the reeds in the Nile River. He was found by the Pharaoh’s daughter, who took pity on him. Meanwhile, the baby’s sister, Miriam, approached Pharaoh’s daughter to ask if she should find a Hebrew woman to nurse the baby. She agreed and the baby was given back to his mother to be nursed. When the baby grew up, he was brought to the Pharaoh’s daughter and became her son, and she named him Moses.