God in the Details

Welcome to today's encouragement from Our Daily Bread.

Our reading, titled God and the Details, was written by Tim Gustafson. It had been an awful week for Kevin and Kimberly. Kevin's seizures had suddenly worsened and he'd been hospitalized. Amid the pandemic, their four young children, siblings adopted from foster care, were taking cabin fever to a new extreme. On top of that, Kimberly couldn't scrounge up a decent meal from the fridge. Oddly, at that moment, she craved carrots. An hour later, there was a knock at the door.

There stood their friends, Amanda and Andy, with an entire meal she'd prepared for the family, including carrots. They say the devil is in the details? No, an amazing story in the history of the Jewish people shows God is in the details. In Exodus chapter 1, Pharaoh had commanded, every Hebrew boy that is born, you must throw into the Nile. That genocidal development turned on a remarkable detail. Moses' mother did indeed throw her baby into the Nile, albeit with a strategy. And from the Nile, Pharaoh's own daughter would rescue the baby whom God used to rescue his people. She would even pay Moses' mother to nurse him. One day, from this fledgling Jewish nation, would come a promised baby boy. His story would abound with amazing details and divine ironies.

Most importantly, Jesus would provide an exodus out of our slavery to sin. Even, especially in the dark times, God is in the details. As Kimberly will tell you, God brought me carrots.

Today's Our Daily Bread devotional scripture reading is from Exodus chapter 2, verses 1 through 10. Now a man, of the tribe 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.

His sister stood at a distance to see what would happen to him. Then Pharaoh's daughter went down to the Nile to bathe, and her attendants were walking along the riverbank. She saw the basket among the reeds and sent her female slave to get it. She opened it and saw the baby.

He was crying, and she felt sorry for him. This is one of the Hebrew babies, she said. Then his sister asked Pharaoh's daughter, shall I go and get one of the Hebrew women to nurse the baby for you?

Yes, go, she answered. So the girl went and got the baby's mother. Pharaoh's daughter said to her, take this baby and nurse him for me and I will pay you. So the woman took the baby and nursed him. When the child grew older, she took him to Pharaoh's daughter and he became her son.

She named him Moses, saying, I drew him out of the water. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, that you show up in the little things as well as the big things. When we feel overwhelmed, please remind us that you are in the details and are working on our behalf to care for us and bring us to the other side. Thank you, Lord. It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Thanks for listening today. I'm Stephen and today's encouragement was provided by Our Daily Bread Ministries.