Exodus 2:1-10, Romans 12:1-8
Have you ever seen something that needed to be done? Some sort of action that need to be
taken that you know would enable another person’s situation and life to be just
a bit better? But, for some
reason, you hesitated because you didn’t know if they really wanted the help,
or your didn’t want to offend them, maybe you just didn’t want to stick your
neck out or maybe it just wasn’t clear to you if it was the right thing to
do. Probably we all have at some
point in time passed up that momentary opportunity. And, if you’re like me you spend the rest of the day kicking
yourself for not taking action.
But sometimes you just have to take action and do the right
thing risking vulnerability, without second-guessing yourself or asking
permission. Because it is the
right action to take at the time, and you have used your best judgment
considering all of the facts and given the circumstances.
I could have very easily entitled this sermon ‘Five Mothers
and a Baby’ since there are five prominent women who take the opening two
chapters of the Book of Exodus by storm.
Prior in Exodus there are the two midwives, Shiphrah and Puah and then
three unnamed women of which we will hear more about in a minute. All heroin’s in her own right. All chose and took a course of action
that would change the events and the lives of the people around them. May their vision and hearts be blessed
for their trust and courage.
The Book of Exodus opens with a new King arising over
Egypt. He could care less about
Joseph, the favored of Jacob’s twelve sons. In fact Joseph and his whole generation were long gone. This was bad for the Israelites who, by
now, were tipping the population charts in their favor. And this population explosion did not
make for a happy Pharaoh so he made their lives miserable, more miserable than
usual. Forced labor, imposing menial and backbreaking tasks, Pharaoh was
ruthless.
So he orders the midwives of the Hebrew people, Shiphrah and
Puah, to murder all of their male children right after birth. But they did not. They loved God, they feared God and
they let the little boy babies live.
Pharaoh yelled at them, “Why did you do this?”. They pleaded, “The Hebrew women are not
like the Egyptian women”. “The
Hebrew women give birth too fast before any respecting midwife can get to
them.” Sneaky? Yes! The truth?
No! Did they save
lives? Most definitely!
Shiphrah and Puah stood up to the mighty Pharaoh with their
civil disobedience, and then blessed by God they had families of their own and
the Hebrew people became even more prolific and strong. They exercised sober judgment and
upheld what was right and good for their people no matter the cost to
them. They didn’t look back; they
acted quickly and saved lives.
But as we see Pharaoh continued on his murderous rampage
even with what Shiphrah and Puah did and life dragged on for the Hebrew people
and the baby boys were still in danger.
Let’s pick up Exodus the 2nd chapter and back to the Hebrew
people.
Now
a man from the house of Levi went and married a Levite woman. The woman conceived and bore a son; and
when she saw that he was a fine baby, she hid him for three months. When she could hide him no longer she
got a papyrus basket for him, and plastered it with bitumen and pitch; she put
the child in it and placed it among the reeds on the bank of the river.
His
sister stood at a distance, to see what would happen to him. The daughter of Pharaoh came down to
bathe at the river, while her attendants walked beside the river. She saw the
basket among the reeds and sent her maid to bring it. When she opened it, she saw the child. He was crying, and
she took pity on him. ‘This must be one of the Hebrews’ children,’ she said.
Then
his sister said to Pharaoh’s daughter, ‘Shall I go and get you a nurse from the
Hebrew women to nurse the child for you?’ Pharaoh’s daughter said to her,
‘Yes.’ So the girl went and called the child’s mother. Pharaoh’s daughter said
to her, ‘Take this child and nurse it for me, and I will give you your wages.’
So the woman took the child and nursed it. When the child grew up, she brought him to Pharaoh’s
daughter, and she took him as her son. She named him Moses, ‘because’, she said, ‘I drew him out of
the water.’
Here now enters three more
women, all unnamed. There was the
mother of Moses who, later in chapter 6 is named as Yocheved. There was Pharaoh’s daughter who was
the Princess and then there was Moses’ sister whom we later know to be
Miriam. But for now, we don’t know
anything of these women. All we
know about is their motherly acts toward this little baby boy. It doesn’t matter whether one was the
birth mother and the others adoptive mothers, all, in some way acted as a
loving mother to Moses and secured, unknowingly, the future of the Hebrew
people, the Israelites.
God had a very large stake in
our story from Exodus. God’s
providential handprints are all over this story of mothers – birth mothers,
adoptive mothers and siblings who chose to seize the moment, to do the right
thing, and act in a ‘Godly’ manner. They are the ones who will love and nurture
Moses, the eventual leader of the Israelites who will bring them out of slavery
to the Promised Land. These women were open to promoting goodness and love and
they too, like Shiphrah and Puah exercised sober judgment for this future
leader. I don’t think their
actions were just willy-nilly.
They were carefully, well thought out actions that allowed for this
transformation from possible death to life.
It was Moses birth mother
Yocheved who unselfishly let him float away in that little basket so that he
could have a chance at life. This was a decision made with compassionate love
and sobering judgment for the good of her child.
It was his sister Miriam who so
lovingly protected him and watched out for him when his own mother couldn’t be
there. She left the familiar, the
comforts of her home and family to be with little Moses – a big decision for someone so young.
It was Pharaoh’s daughter who
was able to nurture him and provide for him, and who was kindhearted towards
him, who took him in as her own.
Through these women God’s compassionate and maternal nature is
shown. It is through their
decisive and mindful actions, their willingness to do the right thing that God
could grow and solidify the eventual covenantal relationship between a people
and an ethical, monotheistic God.
They sacrificed much and gained
so much more that affirms the creative presence of God in this world. Oh that we all could make decent
decisions that uplift God’s truth and love and that God’s presence may be experienced
and understood.
But sometimes we just don’t, do
we? For whatever reason we fail to
take some action because our minds just have gone a little dull or we’ve become
complacent with the world as it is thinking someone else will step up to that
proverbial plate. That’s the way
it is sometimes but it doesn’t have to be. I am reminded of a quote in part by the Jewish scholar
Hillel, “If not now, when?” If you
don’t take action now, when will you?
I think the apostle Paul could
have had this in mind when he wrote his Epistle to the Romans, after all he was
of the school of Hillel in Jerusalem.
Sound judgment and a renewal of the mind is what he urges those early
Christ followers in his Epistle which reads:
I
appeal to you therefore, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, to
present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is
your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed
by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of
God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.
For
by the grace given to me I say to everyone among you not to think of yourself
more highly than you ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, each
according to the measure of faith that God has assigned. Romans 12: 1-3
He then punctuates this passage noting that the body of
Christ has many members with many gifts all functioning as one.
What Paul is saying is to not do or think what most of the
world would do, or think, or say but let God be the one to guide you and change
the way you think and act. Let the
precepts of God be your guide when making decisions in how you will conduct
your life. Sober judgment doesn’t
mean thinking to the extreme right or left because we know that can build up
tight barriers that are impermeable.
Sober judgment is to make judgments that are well thought out and well
reasoned even though you have considered all of the facts. It is to be transformed by the renewal
of your mind. We know ‘a mind is a
terrible thing to waste’, as the moniker of the United Negro College Fund
reminded us in 1972. So we are
urged to renew our minds in God’s love and God’s law.
For Paul there was a lot gone wrong in his Greco-Roman
world, which is why he is always rather outspoken in scripture. There was a lot that took up space in
his mind just as there is much that takes up our minds today. All you have to do is read the paper or
watch the news to know that racism, anti-Semitism, hatred and fear are not things
of the past but are forces that threaten us still. But we can’t give in or give up. A renewal of the mind as Paul talks about summons us to
discern carefully God’s intentions, what is good and acceptable, what is
equitable and loving and to act accordingly, doing the right thing.
If we say we are a part of the body of Christ then we have a
stake in the welfare of each of our brothers and sisters, then we must do our
utmost to carry out God’s commandment to love our neighbor as ourselves, which
includes slow, deliberate, and sober judgment in all of our actions.
In the book, Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed, we find
the true story of a protestant pastor, Rev Andre Trocme, and his congregation
and town of Le Chambon, France.
During World War II when the Germans occupied Southern France, Trocme
led this town to peacefully resist the Germans and to give refuge to thousands
of Jews who were seeking shelter for their lives and others who resisted the
forces of fascism.
But this type of response wouldn’t have just happened
overnight for Le Chambon. It
happened over time because Trocme built an ethic within the congregation – a
very firm foundation. It was an
ethic that took to heart the teachings of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount – to
thirst for justice, to be merciful to all, to be pure in heart, that is to have
hearts whose moral intentions are unpolluted from worldly temptations and
always focused on God.
It was their natural response to God’s involvement in this
world. This ethic was not just a
sprinkling of benevolent goodness all over town…. it was pervasive, in the
ethos of how they ordered their lives. They said: "Things had to be done
and we happened to be there to do them. It was the most natural thing in the
world to help these people."
In essence, like Shiphrah, like Puah, like Yocheved, like Miriam, like Pharaoh’s
daughter they did the right thing.
Having renewed minds was the moral meaning and existence of
Trocme’s parish, and ultimately this towns life. Trocme laid a very firm and functional foundation – and
their actions were part and parcel of this foundation based on the teachings of
Jesus. They heard and they acted
the message of the gospel. Their minds were transformed and renewed.
Let us today pray for peace and transformation in our hearts
and minds so that we might show some degree of understanding and love. And let us pray for peace and
transformation in the hearts of others also so that shalom, wholeness and
healing may begin. So that when
the time comes, we may do the right thing.
Amen.
