Yahweh’s Plan to Rescue the Israelites

3 And Moses was a shepherd with the flocka of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the west of the desert, and he came to the mountain of God, to Horeb. 2 And the angel of Yahweh appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush, and he looked, and there was the bush burning with fire, but the bush was not being consumed. 3 And Moses said, “Let me turn aside and see this great sight. Why does the bush not burn up?” 4 And Yahweh saw that he turned aside to see, and God called to him from the midst of the bush, and he said, “Moses, Moses.” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 And he said, “You must not come near to here. Take off your sandals from on your feet, because the place on which you are standing, it is holy ground.” 6 And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face because he was afraid of looking at God.

7 And Yahweh said, “Surely I have seen the misery of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry of distress because of their oppressors, for I know their sufferings. 8 And I have come down to deliver them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up from this land to a good and wide land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanitesb and the Hittitesc and the Amoritesd and the Perizzitese and the Hivitesf and the Jebusites.g 9 And now, look, the cry of distress of the ⌊Israelites⌋h has come to me, and also I see the oppression with which the Egyptians are oppressing them. 10 And now come, and I will send you to Pharaoh, and you must bring my people, the ⌊Israelites⌋,i out from Egypt.”

11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the ⌊Israelites⌋j out from Egypt?” 12 And he said, “Because I am with you, and this will be the sign for you that I myself have sent you: When you bring the people out from Egypt, you will serve God on this mountain.” 13 But Moses said to God, “Look, if I go to the ⌊Israelites⌋k and I say to them, ‘The God of your ancestorsl has sent me to you,’ and they say to me, ‘What is his name?’ then what shall I say to them?” 14 And God said to Moses, “I am that I am.” And he said, “So you must say to the ⌊Israelites⌋,m ‘I am sent me to you.’ ”

15 And God said again to Moses, “So you must say to the ⌊Israelites⌋,n ‘Yahweh, the God of your ancestors,o the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is my name forever, and this is my remembrance from generation to generation.’