Israel's Migration Begins (MP 43)

Death ravaged Egypt that “Passover” night’
The death angel took ev’ry firstborn son;
He spared Israel, where lamb’s blood met his sight,
Hebrews having stained doors ere day was done!
Israelites left homes while darkness still reigned:
Six hundred thousand men, plus all the rest—
Flocks, plunder, and food to keep them sustained;
By freedom and God, may their trust be blest!
Two miles wide, and five times as many long,
The huge mass moved slowly to the unknown;
Moses herded the scattered rear of the throng,
Expecting Pharaoh his leave to disown!
Israel left Egypt, by God’s Master Plan,
Ready to nurture redemption for Man!

Scripture Quoted (NIV) [Brackets added)
Exodus 12:31-33—“During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, ‘Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the Lord as you have requested. Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.’ The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country, ‘For otherwise,’ they said, ‘we will all\ die.' "

Exodus 42:38 —“Many other [Egyptian] people went up with them, as well as large droves of livestock [camels, cattle, donkeys, sheep, and goats], both flocks and herds.”

Exodus 12:42---Because the Lord kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Iraelites are to keep vigil [remain awake] to honor the Lord for the generations to come.”

Commentary on: Israel’s Migration Begins
Though Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob lived about 500 years before Israel left Egypt, God’s promise to them that their descendants would own the land of Canaan was forty years from coming true. Israel lived in Egypt 430 years; God forced Pharaoh to free them the night Egypt’s firstborn sons died; now they were on their way back to Canaan, a nation of at least two million people. They intended to invade Canaan, the Promised Land, and with God’s help to conquer it. The date: 1500 B. C. Their trip would last forty years.

Their custom was to knead dough for bread the day before it was baked. After mixing the dough, yeast was ordinarily put in it so that it would rise during the night before baking. On this particular night, they failed to put yeast in the dough, for the hurry they were in, packing and preparing to leave their Egyptian homes forever. So the women wrapped cloth around the kneading troughs with unleavened dough inside and carried the uncooked dough on their shoulders. When they stopped the next night, there was not time enough to let the dough rise with yeast, so the Hebrews ate unleavened bread on their migration trek.

Plunder was a fact of life in these times. The Egyptian people were so anxious to hurry the Israelites off on the journey, that they gave them all their gold and silver, their herds and flocks, and anything else they wanted. Much of the wealth of Egypt migrated with the Hebrews to Canaan. Most of it ended up in Solomon’s temple 600 years later.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him will not die, but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)

“That if you confess with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord’, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9)