16Aaron will speak to the people for you. He will be your spokesman, and you will be like God.
17Take that shepherd's staff with you, and use it to do the miraculous signs."
18Then Moses went back to his father-in-law Jethro. Moses said to him, "Please let me go back to my own people in Egypt. I would like to see if they're still alive." Jethro said to Moses, "You may go." 19Now, the LORD had said to Moses in Midian, "Go back to Egypt, because all the men who wanted to kill you are dead." 20So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey, and started out for Egypt. He also brought with him the staff God had told him to take.
21The LORD said to Moses, "When you get back to Egypt, see that you show Pharaoh all the amazing things that I have given you the power to do. But I will make him stubborn so that he will not let the people go. 22Then tell Pharaoh, 'This is what the LORD says: Israel is my firstborn son. 23I told you to let my son go so that he may worship me. But you refused to let him go. So now I'm going to kill your firstborn son.'"
24Along the way they stopped for the night. The LORD met Moses and tried to kill him. 25Then Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son's foreskin, and touched Moses' feet [with it]. She said, "You are a bridegroom of blood to me!" 26So the LORD let him alone. It was because of the circumcision that she said at that time, "You are a bridegroom of blood!"
27Meanwhile, the LORD had told Aaron to meet Moses in the desert. When Aaron met Moses at the mountain of God, he kissed him. 28Moses told Aaron everything the LORD had sent him to say and all the miraculous signs the LORD had commanded him to do. 29Then Moses and Aaron went [to Egypt] and assembled all the leaders of the people of Israel. 30Aaron told them everything the LORD had said to Moses. He also did the miraculous signs for the people, 31and the people believed them. When they heard that the LORD was concerned about the people of Israel and that he had seen their misery, they knelt, bowing with their faces touching the ground.
