https://odb.org/2026/09/14/the-god-who-helps
Exodus 2:23–25 (NIV): 23 During that long period, the king of Egypt died. The Israelites groaned in their slavery and cried out, and their cry for help because of their slavery went up to God. 24 God heard their groaning and he remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac and with Jacob. 25 So God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them.
The Israelites desperately cried out to God for help because they were being severely mistreated by the Egyptians, who had enslaved them (Exodus 1:11-12). Working them ruthlessly, “they made their lives bitter with harsh labor” (vv. 13-14). The Israelites must have wondered if they’d even survive the cruelty. But God heard their cries and raised up Moses to deliver them (3:4-10). Eventually God used him to rescue them and lead them out of Egypt (see Exodus 14-15). (Anne Cetas, Our Daily Bread 14th September 2026)
God worked through Joseph to preserve His people, who at the time of their migration to Egypt four hundred years earlier had been seventy in number (Exodus 1:5). Now, as the King James Version so poetically renders it, “There arose up a new king over Egypt, which knew not Joseph” (v. 8). This pharaoh enslaved the Hebrews, who were now numerous, and he began to commit infanticide against them (v. 22). But Pharaoh’s murderous net failed to get the baby Moses (2:1-10). As God had used Joseph to establish His people, He’d now use Moses to deliver them. But it would take time. Forty years would pass before Moses futilely tried to help his own people (Acts 7:23), and forty more would go by until God called him out of the desert (v. 30). Still another forty years would transpire as God corrected and instructed His disobedient people (v. 36; Deuteronomy 2:7; Joshua 5:6). (Tim Gustafson, Insight, Our Daily Bread 14th September 2026)
There is no doubt God will help us through our perils and troubles. He demonstrated that clearly when He raised up Moses to deliver the Israelites from Egypt. Joseph saved them when they were only a 70-strong Jacob’s clan. They resettled in Egypt from Canaan to escape the long famine where God used Joseph to save the Hebrews as well as the Egyptians when Egypt as a superpower kept 7 years worth of wheat in anticipation of 7 years of famine. No one would prepare so much excess for an entire nation without divine knowledge. After 430 years, they had become slaves to the Egyptians for around 200 years and they cried out to God to deliver them from their severe mistreatment by the Egyptians.
On Saturday night at our Young Adults life group, we dwelled into this question – why is it difficult for us to put our hope in His unfailing love (Psalm 147:11)? We know His love will not fail and He will come through for us, yet it remains challenging to trust Him completely. One of the reasons is because we cannot be sure of His timing. The Lord will make all things beautiful in His time (Ecclesiastes 3:21), and we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose (Romans 8:28). Trusting Him fully also means accepting His timing and also the manner of His intervention. Trusting Him also means we accept He knows what’s best for us.
The Israelites in Egypt had to wait altogether for eighty years before God spoke to Moses from the burning bush. Moses was forty when he left the palace to see for himself the condition of his people and as a result of him killing an Egyptian to protect his own people, he had to flee Egypt. He fled to a place called Midian, married Jethro the Priest’s daughter Zipporah and lived as a shepherd for 40 years before he received His calling at the burning bush.
God’s intervention is based on His timing and it takes time. For example, I received a prophesy in 2017 and although I’ve seen part of it coming to pass, I’m still waiting for the rest to be a reality in my life. The Lord has His reasons for His timing. It is thus best for us to leave everything to Him and prepare ourselves in the meantime. Sanctify our lives, serve Him and faithfully fulfil His plans and purposes for our lives.
Have a good week ahead, everyone!
Ronnie's Thoughts 