Lyrics · Exodus
A Child Drawn from the River
Exodus 1:1-2:10
Lyrics
About this song
About this song
This song belongs to the Exodus collection. 8 recordings are available to play here, with the complete lyrics below.
- Bible book
- Exodus
- Collection
- Exodus
[Lullaby Opening]
Sleep while the river is running,
Sleep while the watchmen pass by.
A basket of rushes is hidden
Under the reeds and the sky.
[Verse 1]
A new king remembered no Joseph or grace,
He measured the Hebrews and feared their increase.
Taskmasters hardened their mortar and clay;
Cities rose upward while bodies gave way.
Midwives feared God more than Pharaoh's command,
And sons still were born in the oppressed land.
[Refrain]
A child drawn out of the water,
A life Pharaoh ordered to die,
Was carried through danger by women of courage
While empire stood blind nearby.
[Verse 2]
His mother saw beauty and hid him three months,
Then sealed up the ark with the pitch and the rush.
His sister stood watching; the princess came down,
Heard the child crying beyond royal crown.
A Hebrew was summoned to nurse her own son;
The mother was paid for the mercy she'd done.
[Final Refrain]
A child drawn out of the water,
Raised under Egypt's own eye,
Would learn every hallway of power and splendor,
Yet hear an enslaved people's cry.
Sleep while the river is running;
The hidden deliverer lies
Safe in the house of the ruler
Who ordered the children to die.

