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answered, “What if they do not believe me or listen to me but say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you’?”
2 So the Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?”
“A staff,” he replied.
3 The Lord said, “Throw it on the ground.”
Moses threw it on the ground and it became a snake, and he ran from it.
4 Then the Lord said to him, “Reach out your hand and take hold of it by the tail.” So he reached out his hand and took hold of it, and the snake turned back into a staff in his hand.
5 The Lord said, “This is so they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.”
6 Again, the Lord said to him, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out, his hand was leprous, like snow.
7 Then He said, “Now put your hand back inside your cloak.” So Moses put his hand back inside his cloak, and when he took it out, it was restored, and had become like the rest of his flesh.
8 Then the Lord said, “If they will not believe you or take notice of the first miraculous sign, they may believe the second sign. 9 But if they will not even believe these two signs or listen to you, take some water from the Nile and pour it on the dry ground. The water you take from the river will become blood on the ground.”
10 But Moses replied to the Lord, “O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor even now that You have spoken to Your servant. I am slow of speech and of tongue.”
11 The Lord said to him, “Who made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? 12 Now go! I will help you speak, and teach you what to say.”
13 But Moses said, “O Lord, please send someone else.”
14 Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses, and He said, “Isn’t Aaron the Levite your brother? I know he can speak well. And behold, he is already on his way to meet you, and his heart will be glad when he sees you. 15 You shall speak to him and put the words in his mouth. So I will be with your mouth and with his mouth and teach you both what to do. 16 He will speak to the people for you, and it will be as if he is your mouth, and you will be like God to him. 17 And take this staff in your hand that you will perform the miraculous signs with.”
18 Then Moses went back to his father-in-law Jethro and said to him, “Please let me go back to my own people in Egypt and see whether they are still alive.”
Jethro said to Moses, “Go in peace.”
19 Now the Lord had said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all the men who wanted to kill you are dead.” 20 So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey, and set out for the land of Egypt. And Moses carried the staff of God in his hand.
21 The Lord said to Moses, “When you go back to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders that I have put within your power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. 22 Then you will say to Pharaoh: ‘This is what the Lord says: “Israel is My son, My firstborn, 23 and I told you: ‘Let My son go, so he may worship Me’. But you refused to let him go, so now I will kill your firstborn son!” ’ ”
24 Now it happened that at a lodging place on the way where they were about to spend the night, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him. 25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. Then she said, “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me!”. 26 So the Lord let him alone. At that time she said, “You are a bridegroom of blood,” referring to the circumcision.
27 The Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the wilderness to meet Moses.” So he went and met Moses on the mountain of God and kissed him. 28 Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to speak, and also about the miraculous signs He had commanded him to do.
29 Then Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, 30 and Aaron repeated everything the Lord had told Moses, and also performed the signs before the people. 31 The people believed, and when they heard that the Lord was concerned for the Israelites and that He had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshipped.