drawn out of the water

God's been really talking to me about the greater faith that is needed to live out these greater times in the Kingdom. Greater courage, greater trust, all to see a great God move in and rescue and free His people. I want to encourage you with what He's showing me.

We all have our things that God is speaking to us about, the things He is saying "Will you trust me with that? Will you walk blindly in faith not knowing the outcome? Will you be brave in the surrender?"

As I thought about this, I was drawn to the story of faith told in Exodus 2, as Jochebed, mother of Moses, Jochebed, trusted God with her child and left him by the riverside.

What kind of faith does it take to put your baby in a cradle of branches you made yourself and then leave him in it? What was going through her mind as she fashioned this ark, as her baby most likely laid on the ground next to her? Her tears must have flowed freely to the earth.

What kind of conversation was she having with God as she went to that place of complete trust, leading up to her actions? Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. Hebrews 11:1

As she made the ark watertight, was she then not able to bear putting him in the river? How long did she stand at the riverside and ask God for another way? Did she stand in the river, hand on her child and continue to plead with God for another way? I would have. Or was she determined, quick in her actions, resolved in her faith in her God? Everything in her must have resisted letting go of this beautiful child of God. She had to have been desperate, driven to see her child live.

When she finally let go of the ark he was placed in, did she go after it, the water swirling around her feet as she secured it in the reeds at bankside? Did the hand of God himself hold her back from picking him up one last time? Or did His hand hide them from any evil as she said goodbye to her precious baby? At what point did the great faith come in? Because I don't know that I could have gone there.

We don't know that God gave Jochebed any indication of what would happen next. I believe she knew nothing of her baby's fate other than trusting God would make a way. That the baby she gave over to God would be given back to her for several more years to raise as a Hebrew child.

Her courage, her faith, her confidence in God to surrender her child at the riverbank is one of the greatest stories of faith in God that we have. Her total determination and devotion saved not only her son, but was used by God to preserve a great nation!

Can we trust Him with the things we hold most precious? Can we be brave in the surrender? Can we let go of our own desires so that His story can be fulfilled? How can we not trust the Only One who can make it happen!

Deep calls unto deep at the noise of Your waterfalls;
All your waves and billows have gone over me.
The LORD will command His
lovingkindness in the daytime,
And in the night His song shall be
with me-
A prayer to the God of my life.
Psalm 42:7,8