Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had done their job in faith, raising their family believing God's promises – that He was preparing a nation from one family. Jacob's new name was Israel (Genesis 32:28), and so the children of Israel were his sons and their descendants. After almost 400 years in Egypt, they had become a huge nation of 2-3 million people including over 600,000 soldiers over the age of 20 (Numbers 1:45-46). But Egypt was not to be their home. God would lead them out miraculously and take them to His Promised Land. For that job He needed a man of faith, born into a family who trusted Him, and raised to trust Him for himself. That man was Moses.

Despite Pharoah ordering the death of all new-born males born to Israelites, Moses' parents saw that he was unusually beautiful (Acts 7:20) and believed that God had a better purpose for him than immediate death. The true story of that first year, starting in a pitch-lined ark of reeds, then discovered by Pharaoh's daughter, then brought up by his own mother before being educated in the palace – is found in Exodus 2:1-10. It is a fresh delight to each generation: an account of human faith and divine intervention. But for years, even Moses did not know God's plan.

Although Moses was an Egyptian prince, he knew that he was first an Israelite belonging to God. He so identified with his people that he was very angry at the way the Egyptian slave-masters treated them. One day, that anger turned into violence with murderous effect. By the next night he knew that his own life was at risk and he fled into the desert (Exodus 2:11-18) where he remained a shepherd for 40 years. But God used that to prepare him for the next 40 years, leading God's people through the same terrain. God used his faith and covered his sin - to get Moses to the right place at the right time.

Moses and his family could have had no knowledge of the remarkable exodus from Egypt. They did not need to know. They were not in charge of the operation to release 2-3 million people. But God used each act of faith to create a masterly miracle even though all the human participants were unaware of what would happen or their part in it before they needed to know. So it is with God and us. All He wants is for us to trust Him as each day dawns and each crossroads looms. When we cannot see any good in the path ahead, He knows where He is leading and with each turn of the path He supplies fresh grace to keep on trusting. We may, or may not, have the joy of seeing God's plans come together. That does not matter. What does matter is that we remain faithful to our faithful God and let Him use us His way.