Men trapped under cruel taskmasters in the brickyards of Egypt and women losing still-swaddled sons to the watery grave of the Great River. Land, livestock and freedom taken from these families long ago, the Hebrews teetered on the edge of utter hopelessness. Anguish too deep for words—almost.
They cried out.
A primal scream directed at no one in particular cut through the mire of enslavement. Maybe the recurring nightmare, the nocturnal remembering of round-bellied cows and children prodding them with sticks as if they were herdsmen like their father, woke her one last time. Or perhaps the happy women meandering along the far shore of the Nile while she scrambled for more straw for the bricks with dried skin and bleeding cuticles cracked her silence. Maybe another drowned son unleashed the angry tongue of a mother. But I’m quite sure it was the women who cried out first.
The cacophony of tears punched the heavens. And God listened. Active listening set love in motion amid the women and their kin.
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