God arranges everything so that He can establish His Glory, and we as modern Christians, have two thousand years of Biblical scholarship that point to this. Now imagine being an Israelite who knew God from stories passed down by family, having just escaped slavery, being told to “turn back” (Exodus 14:2).

When the Israelites came out of Egypt, God was preparing everything in an effort to establish His supremacy as God to His people. Looking through this story, God changed directions, not because He was frightened of the Philistines as He knows everyone is under His power, but instead He considered the fickle minds of humanity and decided to protect them from their own ignorance.

What a story! Hollywood writers should be envious. Only this is not just a story; all through this week’s Scripture we can see God’s hand moving ordinary people and kings to accomplish His will. It was not a coincidence that the baby’s mother chose that day to place him in the ark (basket) that she had prepared.

In today’s Scripture we again find a Hebrew woman who trusted in God over the edict of Pharaoh (see Hebrews 11:23). Any one who has had a three month old can understand the difficulty in trying to hide a baby; if a baby wants to cry, it will.

Yesterday we were introduced to Shiphrah and Puah, the heroes of this week’s Scripture. Today we find them faced with that question that they knew would come when they made the decision to save the baby boys: “Why have you done this? Why have you let the boys live?” (Exodus 1:18).