God and Ordinary People

I have been reading through the Old Testament this year and my reading for this morning was really profound. Exodus, the story of God delivering his people from slavery in Egypt, starts with a couple of ordinary women honoring God with their obedience.

Shiphirah and Puah were the midwives for the people of Israel. Pharaoh, in an attempt to control the growing Israelite slave population, commanded the women to kill any boy babies that were born. In courageous civil disobedience, and radical obedience to God, these ordinary women defied the orders of an extraordinary world ruler and let the boys live, telling the pharaoh that Hebrew women gave birth to quickly for them to follow his orders.

The obedience of these ordinary women resulted in the birth and survival of Aaron and Moses, two boy babies who God eventually used to free his people from Egypt. As Eugene Peterson notes, "World leaders are minor players in the biblical way of writing and participating in history. People like Shiprah and Puah played decisive roles."

Everyday working with Kingdom Causes, I get to witness this. I get to work with ordinary people of God, like Sam (pictured below) one of our volunteers who helps make breakfast for our homeless neighbors. Ordinary people playing decisive roles in transforming lives and neighborhoods in Bellflower. God is using ordinary people working together to proclaim freedom to our neighbors who are enslaved to the "Egypts" of homelessness, poverty, hopelessness, and isolation.