Letting Go of the Basket

“Whatever God may be asking you to release– whatever God may ask you to place in the Nile– trust Him. You can loosen your grip and watch the basket drift away.”

 “She put the child in [the basket] and placed it among the reeds by the river bank.” (Exodus 2:3b)

When I had my first child, I grasped at schedules and books on sleep training to feel some semblance of control. I couldn’t control a lot of things, but surely I could control when my child ate and slept. Moms out there– you know how this went. I quickly found out that all my planning would often fail. I know I clung to these things in an attempt to squash the anxiety I felt about becoming a mom. The anxiety was overwhelming for a while. Until I finally let go. I finally let go of the need for control, and I chose to just enjoy my new baby. I released my grip on the schedules and the books (which by this time, my baby was sleeping through the night). I learned to trust my instinct, and when I did, the anxiety began to dissipate. This way was so much better.

In the beginning of Exodus, the Israelites were slaves to the Egyptian Pharoah. To control their growing population, the Pharoah decreed that every male Israelite infant be thrown into the Nile upon birth. Moses’s mother defied the Pharoah’s order and hid him for a time, but eventually, something would have to be done. 

My heart has always ached a little as I imagine Moses’s mama on the morning she placed her baby boy in the basket. Is this what motherhood would look like– placing her three-month-old boy in a woven basket only to release him into the Nile? Did her hands tremble as she laid him there in the water? Did she hesitate, grasping for another way to protect him? How long did she stand there, straining to watch over him as he floated away? It must have felt like her heart drifted away as well. I think I would have hesitated. Surely there was a better way.

Now in my head, I have always debated what I would’ve done in her position. My first instinct would have been to run far away somehow. Just get out of Egypt. But this wasn’t possible for the enslaved woman. We aren’t told how she comes up with this plan to place him in the basket. Did she fabricate it in her own mind? Did God reveal it to her? I like to believe He did. Regardless, God certainly used it in ways she couldn’t have known on that life-altering morning by the riverbank. 

Most of us know the rest of the story and who Moses became, which will be the focus of the rest of this series. Pharoah’s daughter discovers him crying in the river. Moses’s older sister, watching nearby, cleverly offers to fetch a nurse for the child. She brings their mother, who will now even be paid to nurse Moses on behalf of the Pharoah’s daughter until he is older. It is likely that Moses’s mother was allowed to keep him and nurse him for a few years until he was weaned. What a sweet gift! At that point, she brings him to the palace, to the Pharoah’s daughter– the son of a slave elevated to a position in the Pharoah’s family. Moses’s mother was a part of God’s plan to free His people in a spectacular way. Her act of faith and obedience altered everything. 

Moses’s mother chose the better way, even though she couldn’t foresee the outcome. When she peeled her fingers from the basket that day, a door opened wide for God to work His plan. And God used her baby boy to lead His people, to guide them through the wilderness toward a better land– the Promised Land. The Lord ultimately used Moses to foreshadow the One who would lead us all out of our wilderness and draw us out of our wandering– Jesus. Whatever God may be asking you to release– whatever God may ask you to place in the Nile– trust Him. You can loosen your grip and watch the basket drift away. Because His way is better than any control you think you may have over a situation. The release may just lead to your freedom.

I can’t wait for next week. Because the miraculous exodus of God’s people is coming