Acts 7:17-19
“As the time drew near for the fulfillment of the promise God had made to Avraham, the number of our people in Egypt increased greatly, until there arose another king over Egypt who had no knowledge of Yosef. With cruel cunning this man forced our fathers to put their newborn babies outside their homes, so that they would not survive.
Before any great move of ADONAI there is a time of persecution. From the time of the nation growing from the patriarchs in Egypt, as Stephen quoted to the Sanhedrin to the persecution of the nation state of Israel, to the political attacks on trusting believers throughout the world, there is pain in the culling. Yet if we as believers stay true to our trust just as Yosef when he was falsely imprisoned, salvation will come. In fact, it was this very attack on Stephen that spread the believers out of Jerusalem and through all of Judea and Samaria and after that the world. Lord as we live in this time of wickedness and sin, as Your Word says like the days of Noah, please preserve Your people as You did Noah and his family. Let all who trust in You be lifted up into Your salvation forever. I ask this in Yeshua’s name, amen.