Reading 17 • September 30
Today's Scripture
Exodus 2:1–10
And a man of the house of Levi went and took as wife a daughter of Levi. So the woman conceived and bore a son. And when she saw that he was a beautiful child, she hid him three months. But when she could no longer hide him, she took an ark of bulrushes for him, daubed it with asphalt and pitch, put the child in it, and laid it in the reeds by the river’s bank. And his sister stood afar off, to know what would be done to him.
Then the daughter of Pharaoh came down to bathe at the river. And her maidens walked along the riverside; and when she saw the ark among the reeds, she sent her maid to get it. And when she opened it, she saw the child, and behold, the baby wept. So she had compassion on him, and said, “This is one of the Hebrews’ children.”
Then his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, “Shall I go and call a nurse for you from the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for you?”
And Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Go.” So the maiden went and called the child’s mother. Then Pharaoh’s daughter said to her, “Take this child away and nurse him for me, and I will give you your wages.” So the woman took the child and nursed him. And the child grew, and she brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter, and he became her son. So she called his name Moses, saying, “Because I drew him out of the water.” (NKJV)
Reflection
Early in September, about forty of us gathered to honor the life of a childhood friend. She had bounded into our lives at summer camp as Ingrid White — genuine, jovial, brimming with kindness, and alive with laughter. She was from Chicago, where she attended Catholic school.
We were still young the year she returned to camp with a new name: Ingrid Washinawatok. Her family name. The Menominee name she had urged her parents to reclaim. It was one of her first important acts as an advocate for Indigenous People’s rights — a calling she followed for the rest of her life. She also taught us, gently and honestly, about the hard work of staying alive in a society that marginalizes “the other.”
Such was the lot of Moses, born into the family of Levi and condemned to death at birth. The other. Not quite human in the eyes of Pharaoh. “Every [Hebrew] son who is born you shall cast into the river,” Pharaoh commanded. And so the mother of Moses, Jochebed, followed that decree, albeit with the help of a papyrus ark. Moses’ sister Miriam stood nearby, asserting herself precisely when Pharaoh’s daughter spotted the baby and felt that deep tug of human compassion.
Imagine if, instead of compassion, there had been compliance with a fatal command. Imagine religious history without Moses.
Compassion changes things, doesn’t it? It can redirect the course of history. It can right a wrong. It led Pharaoh’s daughter, in an instant, to raise the child Moses as her own. It can change us.
“Jesus, thou art all compassion,” goes the hymn, “Pure unbounded love thou art.”
Prayer
Create in us a clean heart, O God, and renew a compassionate spirit within us, not for ourselves alone, but for all the children, all the people, all the creatures, all the miracles of thy creation. Amen.
Written by Sarah Forbes Orwig, Member of Fourth Presbyterian Church
Reflection and Prayer © Fourth Presbyterian Church
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