Making a Differencewith Pastor Phil Erickson

Jan 20th Back in His Mother’s Arms: The Miraculous Rescue of Baby Moses

Today’s Passage – Exodus 1 – 3 (Click on the references to listen to the audio – Click here to view the passage from Blue Letter Bible)

(Second Milers also read – Mark 11 – 12; Proverbs 20; Psalms 96 – 100)

Listen to this morning’s Scripture Song – Psalm 121

Read the “0120 Evening and Morning“ devotion for today, by the late Charles Haddon Spurgeon.

Read previous posts from this passage – “Growing Through Affliction,“ and “The Call of God.“

“1 And there went a man of the house of Levi, and took to wife a daughter of Levi. 2 And the woman conceived, and bare a son: and when she saw him that he was a goodly child, she hid him three months. 3 And when she could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein; and she laid it in the flags by the river’s brink. 4 And his sister stood afar off, to wit what would be done to him. 5 And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself at the river; and her maidens walked along by the river’s side; and when she saw the ark among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. 6 And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews’ children. 7 Then said his sister to Pharaoh’s daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee? 8 And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, Go. And the maid went and called the child’s mother. 9 And Pharaoh’s daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman took the child, and nursed it. 10 And the child grew, and she brought him unto Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. And she called his name Moses: and she said, Because I drew him out of the water.” (Exod 2:1–10)

Have you ever looked back on events in your life and realized that God was working in them to orchestrate His divine plan? Even those painful, scary, and troubling times were used by the Lord to bring you to where He has you now. The story of Moses’ early life in Exodus 2:1–10 is one of the clearest pictures in Scripture of God’s hidden, sovereign care over one of His children and ultimately over His entire plan of redemption from Israel’s bondage in Egypt.

A quick recap:

• A Levite couple has a son during the period when Pharaoh decreed to kill all Hebrew baby boys.
• The mother hides him for three months, then places him in a basket among the reeds of the Nile.
• Miriam, his sister, watches from a distance.
• Pharaoh’s own daughter comes to bathe, discovers the basket, recognizes the baby as a Hebrew, and yet takes pity on him.
• Miriam boldly offers to find a Hebrew nurse; the princess agrees, and the baby is returned to his own mother to nurse—paid wages by Pharaoh’s daughter—until he is old enough to be adopted into the palace.
• The child is named Moses (“drawn out”), because he was drawn out of the water.

God not only spares this child’s life but orchestrates circumstances so that Moses is protected, provided for, and—even more remarkably—raised for a season in the arms of his own mother.

Thoughts from the passage

1. God works behind the scenes, often through ordinary human actions. The mother’s act of faith—building the basket and placing her son in the Nile—was an act of both obedience and heartbreak. She could not have scripted what happened next. Yet God was already moving the heart of Pharaoh’s daughter, directing her steps to that exact spot at that exact time. Even the heart of a pagan princess is turned by God’s quiet providence.

“The king’s heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.” (Prov 21:1)

1. God preserves the deliverer in the very household of the oppressor. The irony is thick: the one who will one day lead Israel out of Egypt is raised in the court of the one trying to destroy Israel. God places Moses under the protection of the enemy’s own roof—and even has the enemy pay Moses’ mother to care for him. This is divine humor and divine sovereignty at work.
2. God honors a mother’s love and faith. Jochebed (named later in Exodus 6:20) gets her son back for the crucial early years. She is able to nurse him, teach him, sing to him, pray over him—all while being compensated through the Egyptian government’s payroll. Those formative years in a Hebrew home, not an Egyptian nursery, shaped Moses’ identity in ways that would later surface when he chose “rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season;” (Heb 11:25).
3. This small story points to the larger story of redemption. A helpless child is hidden from a wicked king’s murderous decree, and adopted into a royal family. Sound familiar? Centuries later, another wicked king (Herod) tries to kill Hebrew babies; another child is hidden and rescued; and the true Deliverer survives to save His people. Moses’ preservation foreshadows Christ’s.

Application:

• Where in your own life have you seen God’s protection in ways you didn’t recognize until later?
• When have you had to release something precious into God’s hands (like Jochebed releasing the basket), trusting Him to care for it better than you could?
• How does this story encourage us to trust that God is still watching over the vulnerable—children, the unborn, refugees, the persecuted—today?

Closing thought for prayer or reflection:

God is never hurried, never late, and never limited by the power of earthly rulers. The same God who watched over a helpless baby in a basket is watching over His people now, weaving even the darkest threads into a tapestry of deliverance.

This passage is a beautiful reminder that no child (and no situation) is ever outside His sovereign, loving care.