The Study of Exodus: Post Two
***Note – We have completed the book of Job and the book of Genesis! This is our second week in the book of Exodus!
Focus: Exodus Chapter Two
Tip: I highly recommend journaling your responses to the questions, prompts, and reflections. Writing them out can help you process more deeply and see how God is working in your life.
This week’s devotion includes:
Exodus Chapter Two– “Drawn Out of the Water”
Bible Memory:
Did you memorize last week’s Bible verse?
Hiding God’s Word in our hearts is such a valuable practice. Since I’ve been memorizing Scripture, I’ve experienced so many moments where God brings a specific verse to mind just when I need it most. It’s amazing how He uses His Word to speak into our lives right where we are.
This Week’s Memory Verse:
But 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.
Exodus 2:3 KJV
Exodus Chapter 2
“Drawn Out of the Water”
(Read Exodus Chapter 2 First)
Exodus chapter two introduces us to the birth and early life of Moses.
A man and woman from the house of Levi had a son during one of the darkest times for the Hebrew people. Pharaoh had ordered the Hebrew baby boys to be killed, but this mother looked at her child and knew she had to do everything she could to protect him. She hid him for three months, but eventually she could no longer keep him quiet or safely hidden. I imagine by then he had found his little voice and it was becoming impossible to keep him concealed.
Can you imagine the heartbreak she must have felt?
She carefully made a small ark out of bulrushes and she sealed it with slime and pitch so it would float. Then she placed her precious baby inside and set him in the reeds by the riverbank.
Interestingly, the word “ark” used here is the same word used for Noah’s ark in Scripture. In both stories, God used a small covered vessel to preserve life. Can you see how God is such a wonderful Deliverer and Protector!
The baby’s sister watched from a distance to see what would happen. The Bible does not tell us exactly what his mother was feeling in that moment, but I like to believe she trusted that God would somehow work things out according to His will. Her faith is evident in the fact that she was willing to build the basket and place him in the water.
This scene reminds me so much of the phrase, “letting go and letting God.”
Sometimes we reach places in life where we have done everything we know to do. We have prayed, planned, tried, worried, and exhausted every option we can think of. Moses’ mother hid him as long as she could, but eventually she had to place him into God’s hands completely.
And God was already working…
Proverbs 3:5–6 reminds us to “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”
Pharaoh’s daughter came to the river to bathe and spotted the little ark among the reeds. When she opened it and saw the crying baby, she was moved with compassion even though she immediately recognized he was a Hebrew child. At just the right moment, Moses’ sister stepped forward and offered to find a Hebrew woman to nurse the baby.
Isn’t God amazing?
The sister ran and brought back Moses’ own mother. Pharaoh’s daughter told her to take the child, nurse him, and she would even pay her for it. Only God could orchestrate something like that. A baby who was supposed to be killed was now protected inside Pharaoh’s own household, and his own mother was being paid to care for him.
God can make provision in places we would never expect.
When Moses was older, Pharaoh’s daughter took him as her own son and named him Moses, meaning “drawn out” or “rescued,” because she drew him out of the water. I couldn’t help but think that years later, the one who was drawn out of the water would become the man God used to draw His people out and rescue THEM from bondage. He was well-named!
As the chapter continues, we see Moses grown and aware of the suffering of his Hebrew brethren. One day he witnessed an Egyptian beating a Hebrew slave. In anger, Moses killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand. But sin has a way of coming to light. The next day, when Moses tried to settle an argument between two Hebrews, one of them asked if he planned to kill him too like he killed the Egyptian.
Moses immediately realized someone knew.
He clearly cared about the suffering of his people, but he acted impulsively and took matters into his own hands instead of seeking God’s direction. Sometimes we can have the right burden but handle it in the wrong way instead of waiting on God’s timing.
There is an important lesson here for all of us: do right even when nobody is watching. Sin may feel hidden in the moment, but eventually it comes to light and consequences can follow. Numbers 32:23 warns us, “be sure your sin will find you out.”
Pharaoh heard what Moses had done and sought to kill him, so Moses fled into the land of Midian.
When Moses arrived in Midian, he sat down by a well. He saw shepherds harassing the daughters of Reuel while they tried to water their father’s flock, and Moses stepped in to help them. Later, Reuel invited Moses into his home. Moses stayed there, married Reuel’s daughter Zipporah, and eventually had a son named Gershom, which means ‘foreigner’ because Moses felt like a stranger in a foreign land.
After reading about how he killed a man, fled from Pharoah, and started over in a foreign land, we can see that Moses’ failure didn’t change the plans God had for his life.
The chapter closes with one of the most comforting reminders in Scripture. The children of Israel were suffering deeply under bondage. They groaned, cried, and sighed because of their oppression, and the Bible says God heard them.
They were exhausted, hurting, and overwhelmed. Probably wondering if things would ever change. Yet God heard every cry. Psalm 34:17 says, “The righteous cry, and the Lord heareth, and delivereth them out of all their troubles.” What a comfort it is to know that God not only sees our suffering, but He hears every prayer and every cry for help.
Maybe you feel that way today. Maybe you are carrying burdens nobody else sees. Maybe you feel stuck in a hard season that seems impossible to escape. Exodus chapter two reminds us that God hears the cries of His people.
God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. His promises of blessing, protection, and a future. And while Israel could not yet see it, God was already raising up the man who would lead them out of bondage.
Things were about to change.
And sometimes, even when we cannot see it yet, God is already moving behind the scenes in our own lives too.
Real Life Application:
- Sometimes faith looks like releasing control and trusting God with what we cannot fix ourselves.
- God can provide in the most unexpected ways and through the most unlikely people.
- Hidden sin eventually comes to light, which is why integrity matters even when nobody else sees.
- Failure does not cancel God’s purpose for your life.
- God hears every prayer, every cry, every exhausted sigh.
Journaling Questions:
Is there a situation in my life where I need to stop striving and fully place it into God’s hands?
Have I been trusting God’s timing even when I cannot see what He is doing?
Are there areas in my life where I need to choose integrity even when nobody else is watching?
How has God provided for me in unexpected ways before?
What burden or hurt do I need to remember that God already hears?
The Georgia Nest 