What do you see?

Every evening I watch an episode of a Latin-American Bible series with the title “Moses and the Ten Commandments.” In episode 180 the Israelites are being pursued by the Egyptian army with the Red Sea in front of them (Exodus 14). The moment they realise that the Egyptians are behind them, they are terrified and panic. They have been enslaved their whole life long. They have never experienced anything else, and at the sight of their former slave drivers they allow themselves to be reduced again to just that: slaves.

Moses doesn’t show anything of terror or panic. He looks over the whole scene into the distance. He has never been a slave but was in the highest ranks of the Egyptian court and army, so he doesn’t come under the threatening intimidation of their pursuers. He is able to connect with God and to receive His instructions about what to do.

God had taken an astounding path with Moses, and it had started in such a subtle way: “When she saw that he was a fine child, she hid him for three months” (Exodus 2:2b).

There are so many other different responses Jochebed could have shown when she gave birth to Moses. She could have turned her face away, trying to avoid the pain of knowing that her child was condemned to die, like all other Hebrew baby boys, due to a decree by Pharaoh who was afraid of being overpowered by the growing numbers of Israelites.

But she made a choice to not see death but life, potential instead of condemnation. She did not have a complete plan in place, but she took a first step and hid her child for three months. When that didn’t work anymore, she took a second step and placed her child in a basket and on the waters of the Nile where he would be found and adopted by Pharaoh’s daughter the next morning.

What an interesting dynamic between Moses’ parents and God! What did they actually perceive in their child when it says that he was “no ordinary child,” and that he was a “fine child”? Did they see that their child was destined to set Israel free? Or was it their perspective on their child which was calling forth the redemptive plan of God?

So, let’s keep in mind that something very small, a small step of faith, can set something way bigger into movement and that our way of looking at a situation can make room for God to come into it.