Today's Verse
She gave birth to a son, and he called his name Gershom, for he said, 'I have been a sojourner in a foreign land.'
Exodus 2:22
Historical Context
Exodus was written by Moses to Israel after the exodus from Egypt, as the nation prepared to enter the promised land. This scene sits at a hinge point. Moses, raised in Pharaoh's household, has killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew slave and tried to arbitrate between two quarreling Hebrews. His attempt at self-appointed deliverance has failed. Word reaches Pharaoh, and Moses runs for his life.
Midian was the territory east and southeast of the Gulf of Aqaba, populated by descendants of Abraham through Keturah (Genesis 25:1-4). Midianites were not Israelites, but they were not strangers to the God of Abraham either. Reuel, also called Jethro (Exodus 3:1), is called a priest, likely meaning he served as tribal spiritual head. That Moses meets his future wife at a well would have resonated deeply with Moses' first readers: Isaac's servant found Rebekah at a well (Genesis 24), and Jacob met Rachel at a well (Genesis 29). This is covenant patterning.
The shepherds who drove the women off were likely stronger clans muscling in on watering rights, a common flashpoint in arid country. Moses, still carrying Egyptian bearing and training, intervenes and is mistaken for an Egyptian by the daughters.
What Moses does not know as he names his son Gershom (sounding like the Hebrew ger sham, 'a sojourner there') is that he will remain in Midian for forty years. He left Egypt at forty and returned at eighty (Acts 7:23, 30). The prince has become a shepherd. The man of action has become a man who waits. Israel groans under the whip, and God is not idle: He is making the deliverer He intends to send.
Reflection
Moses names his son Gershom because he feels the ache of not belonging. He is a Hebrew raised as an Egyptian now living among Midianites. He has walked away from a palace and cannot walk back. His grand plans to deliver his people have collapsed into the daily rhythm of watering someone else's sheep. If he had known this would last forty years, he might have despaired.
Most of us know something of this ache. The season you did not choose. The job that was supposed to be a stepping stone and has become the whole staircase. The singleness or the marriage or the small town or the small paycheck that was never in the plan. The prayer that has gone unanswered so long you have stopped expecting an answer.
Here is what Exodus quietly insists: God was not wasting those forty years. The man who tried to deliver Israel by killing one Egyptian in the sand was not ready to lead a nation through the wilderness. Midian was not exile from God's purpose. Midian was the making of the man God's purpose required. The shepherd's staff Moses carries in Midian is the very staff he will lift over the Red Sea.
You may feel like a sojourner in a foreign land. You may feel that your real life has been postponed. But if you belong to Christ, there is no wasted season. The Father who did not waste forty years of Moses' life is not wasting yours. Peter reminds us we are 'sojourners and exiles' (1 Peter 2:11) precisely because our citizenship is elsewhere. The ache of not belonging here is not a malfunction. It is a compass.
For Reflection
What season of your life have you been tempted to call wasted, and what might God be forming in you there that could not be formed anywhere else?
Prayer
Father, You are never idle, even when we cannot see You working. Forgive us for calling wasted what You are using to shape us. Give us grace to trust that no year, no season, no ordinary day in Your hand is lost. Make us content to dwell where You have placed us, faithful in small things, ready when You call. Keep our hearts fixed on the country that is truly ours in Christ. In Jesus' name, Amen.
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