Forever Faithful 10-Day DevotionalSmakprov

Hopes and Fears Out of Egypt I called my son. - Matthew 2:15 In 2022, during a conference at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, Black youth reflected on “the talk” their parents gave to protect from contentious, deadly encounters with police. They gathered in the face of recent violence, remembered the four girls murdered in the 1963 bombing at that church, the horrific lynching of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till in 1955, and more. The Black youth candidly revealed how the talk meant to protect them against violence and injustice actually instilled panic and doubt. Jesus’ parents guarded His life. Jesus was the target of genocide during King Herod’s reign of terror (Matthew 2). Herod, infuriated that he was unable to find the Christ child, “gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under” (v. 16). Jesus was safe in Egypt because “an angel of the Lord” gave His earthly father Joseph a “talk” about how to circumvent danger: “Get up, take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt” (v. 13). Joseph obeyed, staying in Egypt with his family until Herod’s death (v. 14). We live in a world where our lives, including children’s, are not always cherished and protected. Yet we can tell them that Jesus truly empathizes with our consternation and fear. He too was martyred. His birth, death, and resurrection ushered in eternal hope, peace, and salvation like none other the world has ever seen or known. Tondra L. Loder-Jackson How do you find solace in the hope you have in Christ amid the fears you have in life? Faithful Father, God with us, help us to hope, and to instill more hope in our children.