During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.
– Exodus 2:23–25
What a picture of God when his people are hurting. If I could just summarize this picture… When God’s people are hurting, God hears them. God sees them. And God knows them. And none of this is passive. God is not just sitting back, listening, watching, or knowing what they’re going through. What happens right after this is one of the greatest revelations of who God is in all of the Bible. In Exodus 3, when God reveals himself to Moses as the “I am”… The One who was, is, and always will be. The One with all authority in all the universe, the Creator of all, the everlasting God… He is not just watching what’s happening in Egypt as his people are in slavery. But he is working, and he’s about to deliver them from slavery.
Exodus 2:23–25 reveals God’s care for his people in their suffering.
And I just want to encourage you with this picture of God today. Obviously, I don’t know all that you’re walking through. But that’s the beauty, God does. God hears your cries. God sees your hurts. And God knows better than you even know yourself. The situation you’re walking through, God sees, he hears, he knows. And not just passively. God works actively… Is working actively right now, all things together. Things that you know and multitudes of things you don’t know. He’s working them all together for your good. For the good of his people, and not just your good, but for others’ good.
This is how the book of Genesis ended. How God was working, even in Joseph’s suffering. Not just for Joseph’s good. But for the good of his entire family. For the good of the entire people of God that are forming here in the Old Testament. And ultimately for the glory of his name. Oh, there is an adversary who wants you to think that God doesn’t hear your cries, that God doesn’t see your suffering, that God doesn’t know, or that God is not working. Do not believe him.
Believe the truth of God’s Word expressed here in Exodus 2. And pray according to it. Oh, God, we praise you as the God who hears us. God, we praise you that you hear our every cry, that every morning when I come before you and pour out my heart to you, you are listening to me, you the God of the universe, and not just to me, but to all who know you, whose way has been open to you through the blood of Jesus.
Exodus 2:23–25 encourages us to cry out to God in trust and hope.
We praise you for hearing our cries, our hurts, our pain, and for seeing us. For not being unaware of what we’re walking through, for being intimately aware of all we’re walking through in ways we don’t even know. God, we praise you for your knowledge, for your perfect intimate knowledge, and God, we praise you for working in all things for our good. Help us to trust this today. Help us to trust that you hear us as we cry to you, so we should cry to you.
God, help us to trust that you see us, that there’s nothing hidden from your sight, and that you know what we’re walking through. You count our tossings like the Psalmist says, hold our tears in a bottle. You know us deeply, more than anyone else. Oh God, we praise you for hearing us, seeing us, knowing us, and working in everything, every single thing for our good, for others’ good, for the good of your people, and ultimately for the glory of your name.
Oh God, we praise you for the personal relationship we have with you as we walk through suffering, and we pray for people who are experiencing life in this fallen world apart from our relationship with you.
Prayer for the Iyer Brahmin People
God, we pray specifically today for the Iyer Brahmin people of India, for 324,000 Hindu men, women, and children who are looking to all different little “g” gods for comfort or strength or hope, when you alone are the source of all hope, of all comfort, of all strength.
God, we pray that the gospel would reach the Iyer Brahmin people that they might be saved. Lord, help us to lead other people to you, the God who sees, hears, and knows us, and works in all things in this fallen world, of hurt and pain and suffering, for our good. Oh God, all glory be to your name for this reality, what you were to your people in Exodus 2, and what you are to each of us today. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.