Exodus · chapter 15 of 40
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Exodus 15 gathers the song of Moses and the Israelites, which celebrates the Lord as warrior, savior and king for the victory at the sea, and Miriam's song with her tambourine. Then the people travel three days without water; at Marah the Lord makes the bitter water sweet with a piece of wood and reveals himself as the one who heals, and at Elim they find twelve springs and seventy palm trees.
Exodus 14 ended with Israel free on the shore of the sea. Exodus 15 is the people's response: a song of praise, one of the oldest and most solemn in the Bible. The chapter thus moves from celebration to the trials of the wilderness, and shows from the first stage how quickly the people forget and how patiently God cares.
Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the Lord: they would sing to the Lord, for he had triumphed gloriously, throwing the horse and its rider into the sea. The Lord is their strength, their song and their salvation; he is their God and they will exalt him. He is a warrior. Pharaoh's chariots and his army were cast into the sea, and his best officers sank like a stone. The Lord's right hand is glorious in power, and at the blast of his nostrils the waters piled up.
The song asks who is like the Lord among the gods, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders. It declares that in his steadfast love he led the people he redeemed and would guide them to his holy abode. The peoples will tremble, those of Philistia, Edom, Moab and Canaan, until the people the Lord purchased pass by. It ends with the declaration that the Lord will reign forever and ever. Miriam the prophetess, Aaron's sister, took a tambourine, and all the women went out after her with tambourines and dancing, and she sang to them.
Moses led Israel on from the Red Sea into the wilderness of Shur. They went three days without finding water. They came to Marah, but could not drink because the water was bitter, and the people grumbled against Moses. Moses cried out to the Lord, who showed him a piece of wood; he threw it into the water and it became sweet. There God gave them a statute: if they listened to his voice and did what was right, he would put none of the diseases on them that he put on Egypt, for he is the Lord who heals them.
They came to Elim, where there were twelve springs of water and seventy palm trees, and they camped there by the water.
References follow ESV book names and verse numbers. Read each verse in your Bible before the explanation.
The people sing that the Lord is their strength, their song and their salvation, and that he is their God. It is a personal and communal confession: salvation is God's work, so the response is praise.
The song asks who among the gods is like the Lord, majestic in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders. It declares that no one compares with him, in Egypt or anywhere else.
The song ends with the declaration that the Lord will reign forever. The people celebrate not only a past victory but the King whose reign has no end.
God promises that if Israel listens to his voice and does what is right, the diseases he put on Egypt will not come on them, for he is the Lord who heals them. The promise is joined to obedience and reveals God's character as healer.
6 questions with answers and references, ready for Sunday school, small group or a Bible quiz night.
Answer: To the Lord, because he had triumphed gloriously at the sea. — Exodus 15:1
Answer: Their strength, their song and their salvation. — Exodus 15:2
Answer: Miriam, Aaron's sister. — Exodus 15:20
Answer: Because the water was bitter and they could not drink it. — Exodus 15:23
Answer: He threw into the water a piece of wood the Lord showed him. — Exodus 15:25
Answer: Twelve springs of water and seventy palm trees. — Exodus 15:27
Exodus 15 teaches us to turn salvation into song. The people do not stay silent but celebrate with words, music and dance what God did. In the church, praise should not be routine but a grateful response to concrete works of God.
The chapter also shows how fragile that memory is: a few days later the Israelites grumble at Marah. In a small group you can talk about how easy it is to forget what God has done when a need arrives, and how God answers the complaint with provision and a promise of healing, not with punishment.
Exodus 15 ends with Israel at Elim, beside twelve springs and seventy palm trees, and with the promise of the Lord who heals. Exodus 16 will tell how the people grumble again, this time over hunger, and God answers with manna.
It is a poem of praise that celebrates the Lord's victory over Egypt at the sea and looks ahead to the entry into the promised land. It is one of the oldest poems in the Bible, and it is cited later in the psalms and in Revelation, where the victorious sing the song of Moses.
In this passage God promises to preserve Israel from the plagues he sent on Egypt if they obey, and he has just healed the bitter water. Many readers see in it God's character as protector and healer of his people, without the text promising that a believer will never be sick.
The text says only that the Lord showed Moses a piece of wood, which he threw into the water. It does not identify the kind. What it stresses is that God showed what to do, and that he is the one who made the water sweet.