Hebrews 11: 24
By Faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
In this chapter we have a divine record, a famous catalogue of the worthies of the Lord, manifesting the power and life of that blessed grace of faith in the glorious effects of it; amongst whom Moses is one of the most choice and eminent, holding forth onto boards to glory and efficacy of his faith, in divers wonderful blessed fruits of it, both actively and passively, in what he did, and in what he suffered; he's a wonderful self-denial, his strange choice, his fixed eye upon heaven, he's undaunted courage, he is glorious constancy, his clear sight of the invisible God.
The first is he self-denial, which the Holy Ghost he records, as a high commendation, as a most famous testimony of the preciousness of his faith; and indeed so it is, faith above all graces fills the heart with the fullness of God, but most empties it of it self, raises the heart the highest in communion with God, but it keeps it down the lowest in self abasement. By Faith Moses, when he was come to years refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter.
[He refused] not a bare willingness, and contentedness to be without that honour, but, when he was put upon it, he denied it, so the word is: says Chrstome up on that place, he trembled he was astonished at such a thought, that he should embrace the honours of the court, rather than to own the people of God in their most afflicted, distressed condition: he abhorred, he detested the entertaining such a thought in his heart, and therefore turned away from it with disdain. We never read that he refused, all denied in words, that ever he said to Pharaoh's daughter, or any other to this effect, that he would not be her heir, or be called her son, but actions have as loud a voice as words. When Moses came down from the Mount, his face shined so gloriously, as the people were not to behold it; here his faith raised him higher than the Mount, and puts an unexpressible lustre and glory upon him. Here is a worthy of the Lord indeed, bright and glorious in the shining beauty of his faith, set out unto us in the full expressions of it by the Holy Ghost himself.
By Faith [Moses] man complete every way, for his parts admirable, the Holy Ghost weaknesses of him that he was learned it in all the learning of the Egyptians: so acts 7: 22 says that there were sent for learning men at exceeding great charge out of foreign parts, to instruct him in all the liberal arts, and out of Chaldea, such as might instruct him in astrology, besides the most learned of Egypt; and Eusebius cites another, affirming that Moses was not only learned in the learning of the Egyptians but that he taught the Egyptians the use of letters; and therefore was honoured of them by the name of Mecurins. And Clemens Alexandria's cites one, saying that Moses taught the Israelites letters, and from the Jews he says the Phoenicians had done, and them, and from the Phoenicians the Grecians.
For the beauty of his body it was incomparable, when he was born he was exceeding fair, so acts 7: 20. The words in the Greek have a greater emphasis with them than our English expression hath; fine, elegant, so as Citizen's are when they are trimmed up in their bravery, upon days of festivity, that is the property of the word, and this is said to be exceeding in the text it is fair to God, divinely beautiful, a kind of divine beauty was up on him, a beauty beyond human beauty, such beauty as in he is very face a divine lustre appeared. The Scripture uses this phrase to signify the highest degree of thing, as Jonah 3 a very great city, it is in the Hebrew Magna Deo: so here exceeding fair. Josephus reports of him that by the time he was three years old, God added an admirable grace to his countenance, so that there was none, but was amazed at the beauty of Moses, and would leave their serious business, to feed their eyes with Moses he's incomparable beauty, and there eyes were held with it, and they could not tell how to look enough upon him; and he says that they never went from him but unwillingly.
And for the sweet temper and disposition of his spirit, that was exceeding amiable: the Scripture says that he was the meekest man upon the earth, numbers 12:3. And Josephus in his fourth book and last chapter says he was so free from passion's, that he knew no such thing in his own soul; he only knew the names of such things, and saw them in others rather than in himself.
And fourthly, for honour in the world, he was very eminent, the adopted son of Pharaoh's daughter; the name of this Pharaoh's daughter, Josephus tells us, was Thermusis: he says likewise she was the only child Pharaoh had, Pharaoh had no son to inherit the kingdom and that his daughter Thermuthis had no child, and therefore having found Moses, she set her heart upon him, and feigned herself to be with child, and kept Moses hid, until such a time as it might be thought to be her own child, to that end that he might inherit her father's crown.
And further he tells us, that this daughter of Pharaoh was much beloved of her father, and that in respect to her, he loved Moses also, which appears in this relation that he hath. He says that when Moses was a little one, Pharaohs daughter brought him to her father, and put him into his arms, and he, to gratify his daughter, took off his own diadem, and set it up on Moses' head. There were likewise divers prognostications that Moses should hereafter do great things. Josephus says, that Amram, Moses' his father, had a special revelation concerning this child, that he should be delivered from the danger of being slain, and that he should be deliverer of his people. He tells us likewise, that when Pharaoh put he is diadem up on his head, he though but a little child, took it off, and stamped it under his feet; whereupon some of his magicians would have had him put to death, saying that it was a sign, that this child in time would cast down Pharaohs crown.
And one latter writer, writing of the life of Moses, hath this revelation: that's when Moses was three years old, Pharaoh made a great feast, and his queen holding him by the right-hand and his daughter together with Moses by the left, his nobles being bid to sit before him, Moses before them all took Pharaohs crown from his head, and set it up on his own, whereupon all being amazed, one Balaam a magician, puts Pharaoh in mind of a dream he had had, which was this: there stood before him an old man, having a pair of scales in his hand, and in one of the scales there appeared to him as if all Egypt, the children and women had been in it, in the other scale he saw only one child, which down-weighed the whole kingdom, and all that was in the other scale. This is Moses, whose faith, whose self-denial is set down unto us thus glorious in this scripture, one who might have lived a most brave life in the enjoyment of the highest honours, the sweetest pleasures, the choicest delights that heart could wish, and yet this Moses refuse to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. This Moses chooses rather to suffer afflictions with the people of God: this Moses is contented to be scorned and contemned for Christ, he ventures up on the wrath of the King and endures it all.
In this excellent argument of the self-denial of such a worthy of the Lord, we are to consider: first, what he refuses, namely, to be accounted the son of Pharaoh's daughter: for Moses was generally reputed to be her own son, and honoured as her own son, but he thought it a greater honour, to be a son of Abraham, to come of the promised seed, to have his pedigree from God's people, this he accounts more noble, and this he will rather glory in, though he doth prejudice himself in great preferments, dignities, and riches, and all kind of outward glory that otherwise he might have enjoyed: from whence the point is: that nobility of birth, and court honours, and all outward delights are to be denied for Christ.
Secondly we are to consider the time when this was, it was when he was full of years: the words in the original of, when he came to be great, and the observation from this is:
that it is then truly honourable indeed, to deny honours and pleasures, when we have opportunity to enjoy them to full, in the very time of our time.
Thirdly, we are to consider the principle which carried him on, which was faith, and from thence the point is:
that faith is the principal, that must carry through, and make honourable all a Christians suffering.
