Johan H. Bavinck, the Dutch missiologist and missionary to Indonesia, observed:  “At first sight the Old Testament appears to offer little basis for the idea of missions. . . . Yet, if we investigate the Old Testament more thoroughly, it becomes clear that the future of the nations is a point of the greatest concern.” [1] The Old Testament is replete with sending language that presents a picture of God as the divine sovereign Lord who sends in order to convey and accomplish his redemptive mission upon the earth. The Hebrew verb “to send,” salah is found over eight hundreds times in the Old Testament. While its usage is most often found in a variety of nontheological idioms and nuances, [2] it is employed more than two hundred times with God as the subject of the verb. [3] In other words, it is God who commissions and it is God who sends.

In the book of Genesis God sends Adam and Eve out of the Garden of Eden as an act of judgment (Gen. 3:23). In the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, God not only sends angels to destroy Sodom (Gen. 19:13), but he also sends Lot out of the city (Gen. 19:29). God sends an angel to help Abraham’s servant find a wife for Isaac (Gen. 24:7, 40). Later in the book of Genesis Joseph recognizes God’s providential care in sending him to Egypt to preserve God’s people. In Genesis 45:5 Joseph declares to his brothers, “And now, do not be distressed and do not be angry with yourselves for selling me here, because it was to save lives that God sent me ahead of you.”

“In the book of Exodus, there are some seventeen references to sending, all of them related in some way to the mighty salvation event of the Exodus.”[4] In the dialogue between Moses and God regarding who will stand against Pharaoh, there are five references to sending.

The Lord said. . . . “So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” And God said, “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.” Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name’ Then what shall I tell them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’” God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers – the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob – has sent me to you.’” (Exod. 3:10-15, emphasis added).

Moreover, the Book of Exodus is explicit in emphasizing that it is God who sends the plagues as an act of judgment against Pharaoh, “If you do not let my people go I will send swarms of flies on you and your officials” (8:21) and “This time I will send the full force of my plagues against you and your officials and your people” (9:14). It is also God who promises to send an angel to guard them and bring them to the promised land (23:20). In the final sending passage in the book of Exodus, Moses shares his concern over who God will send to assist him in leading the Israelites, “Moses said to the Lord, ‘You have been telling me, Lead these people, but you have not let me know whom you will send with me’” (33:12).

In the remaining books of the Pentateuch the language of sending persists. In Leviticus and Numbers God sends plagues and venomous snakes (Lev. 26:25; Num.21:6), and in the Book of Deuteronomy the Israelites are once again reminded of how the Lord sent them from Kadesh-barnea, “And when the Lord sent you out from Kadesh Barnea, he said, ‘Go up and take possession of the land I have given you’” (Deut. 9:23).

1. Johan H. Bavinck, An Introduction to the Science of Missions (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1960), 11.

2. Ferris L. McDaniel, “Mission in the Old Testament,” in Mission in the New Testament: An Evangelical Approach, ed. William J. Larkin, Jr. and Joel William (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1998), 12-15.

3. Walter C. Kaiser, Jr., Mission in the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2000), 11.

4. Francis M. DuBose, God Who Sends (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1983), 42.