A Mother's Day Meditation

Exodus 1:22-2:3 Then Pharaoh gave this order to all his people; "Every boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live."  Now a man of the house of Levi married a Levite woman, and she became pregnant and gave birth to a son.  When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months.  But when she could hide him no longer, she got a papyrus basket for him and coated it with tar and pitch.  Then she placed the child in it and put it among the reeds along the bank of the Nile.


I can scarcely imagine the agony of being pregnant in Egypt during this time.  How could a mother bear to throw her newborn son into the Nile river?  On the other hand, how could she bear to do it later after bonding with him for three months?


Moses' mother was not the first or last mother to have to make an impossible choice.  Thankfully most of us aren't confronted with such a decision, but most mothers do have some difficult choices presented in the course of raising children.


When she could no longer hide him, Moses' mother took a step of faith.  She fulfilled the letter of the law....she did put her son into the Nile.  But, she did it so as to provide as much protection as she was able to create.  She could not have foreseen what would happen, but the God in whom she placed her faith foreknew exactly what would happen.  God used Pharaoh's wicked decree and the faith of Moses' mother to bring about the rescue of the Jews from Egypt.  


As mothers, we cannot know what the consequences of our choices will be.  Let us make them in faith, believing that God loves our children even more than we do.


Happy Mother's Day