February 03, 2025

Shiphrah and Puah

Devotion for the week...

I'm knee-deep in preparation to open registration for this year's Easter QAL and Devotional Journey (it opens on Wednesday!), so this week I've pulled a devotion from the 2023 Women of Wisdom devotional journey. I hope you enjoy it!

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Do you know Shiphrah and Puah? I wouldn’t be surprised if you don’t! I didn’t know their names, either, until I went back and reread their tiny little story. It may only be a few verses long, but it shows incredible courage!

Their story takes place in Egypt, in the time after Joseph. "Eventually, a new king came to power in Egypt who knew nothing about Joseph or what he had done. He said to his people, 'Look, the people of Israel now outnumber us and are stronger than we are. We must make a plan to keep them from growing even more. If we don’t, and if war breaks out, they will join our enemies and fight against us. Then they will escape from the country.' So the Egyptians made the Israelites their slaves" (Exodus 1:8-11). That wasn’t enough for this king, though, so eventually he “gave this order to the Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and Puah: 'When you help the Hebrew women as they give birth, watch as they deliver. If the baby is a boy, kill him; if it is a girl, let her live'" (vv. 15-16). Human cruelty certainly isn’t new, is it?

Shiphrah and Puah were amazing women, though. "Because the midwives feared God, they refused to obey the king’s orders. They allowed the boys to live, too" (v. 17).

Of course, Pharaoh had to notice when there were still baby boys among the Hebrew slaves, so he called for the midwives and asked, "Why have you done this?...Why have you allowed the boys to live?" (v. 18)

I imagine the two women were shaking in their sandals as they stood before Pharaoh, but they refused to back down. "'The Hebrew women are not like the Egyptian women,' the midwives replied. 'They are more vigorous and have their babies so quickly that we cannot get there in time'" (v. 19).

These two brave women remind me of everyone who worked in secret to save Jews during WWII. They knew their governments were giving orders that were contrary to God’s laws and so they disobeyed the earthly authorities in order to obey God.
I pray that, if needed, we’ll have the courage to disobey people in authority in order to obey God | DevotedQuilter.com
Though we will likely never be given orders to kill innocent babies, we may face situations where we’re being asked, or even ordered, to do things that go against God’s commands. In those moments, I pray that we, like Shiphrah and Puah, will recognize the higher authority and have the courage to disobey people in authority in order to obey God.

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