Tawa Baptist

Bricks Without Straw

Scripture: Exodus 5:1-6:1

 

Title: Bricks without Straw

 

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Being & having
  • Pharaoh’s having
  • God (& Moses’) Being
  • Conclusion

 

Introduction:

Please turn with me to Exodus 5, page 63 near the beginning of your pew Bibles

  • Today we continue our series on Moses
  • Moses & Aaron have managed to convince the leaders of Israel that God means to deliver the people from their slavery in Egypt
  • Now they confront Pharaoh
  • From verse 1 of Exodus 5 we read…

 

Read Exodus 5:1-6:1

 

May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate this reading for us

 

Being and having:

In 1970 Richard Bach published his classic novella Jonathan Livingston Seagull about a seagull who rejects the routine of daily squabbles over food in search of freedom in flight

  • While the rest of the flock compete for scraps of food, Jonathan finds joy in being a bird and simply flying
  • Eventually Jonathan’s unwillingness to conform results in his expulsion by the elders

 

There is a quote in the book which says…

 

“You will begin to touch heaven, Jonathan, in the moment that you touch perfect speed. And that isn’t flying a thousand miles an hour, or a million, or flying at the speed of light. Because any number is a limit, and perfection doesn’t have limits. Perfect speed, my son, is being there.”

 

Unlike his peers Jonathan the Seagull is more interested in being than in having

  • I suppose Richard Bach’s story isn’t so much about seagulls as it is about humankind
  • In competing for resources – in trying to have more than our neighbour – we have somehow lost meaning in life

Being and having – they are two different things

 

To have something is to possess it, to own it, to consume it

  • Some things can’t be had though – or were never designed to be had
  • For example, you can have a car but you can’t have a marriage
  • You can only be in a marriage – you can’t own a husband or a wife
  • Marriage is a relationship and a relationship is a state of being
  • This means a perfect marriage (or a perfect relationship) is not about having all your expectations met
  • A perfect marriage is about being there – with and for one another

 

Or to use another example, you may have money or the ability to sing or something else to offer God but you can’t have worship

  • Worship is not a possession – worship is a state of being
  • This means perfect worship is not about hitting all the right notes or experiencing some magical feeling or giving just the right amount of money
  • Perfect worship is about being there – with and for God
  • Perfect worship could happen here on a Sunday morning or it could happen out in the world during the week

 

This dichotomy between being and having is an ancient tension

  • It goes right back to Adam & Eve in the garden

 

Before eating the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge Adam & Eve were able to be with God

  • But they couldn’t resist the temptation of having knowledge and so they ate the fruit God warned them against
  • They chose having over being (as we all have) and they suffered the consequences

 

Having is about power & control

  • Being is about truth & freedom
  • God is all about being
  • While Pharaoh is all about having
  • God wants to be in right relationship with his people – the Hebrews
  • Pharaoh, on the other hand, just wants to have the Hebrews – to possess and control them as slaves, as human tools

 

The problem with making having our goal is that we never really have enough

  • But when being is the goal, God finds a way to throw having in
  • Being is a two for one deal

 

Pharaoh’s having:

Pharaoh is used to having things his own way

  • The ancient Egyptians believed their Pharaoh was the son of a god and it seems Pharaoh himself believed this too

 

Despite Pharaoh’s elevated status Moses & Aaron were quite blunt in their approach to the king of Egypt

  • They simply said, “The Lord, the God of Israel, says, ‘Let my people go, so that they can hold a festival in the desert to honour me.’ ”
  • The Lord God had instructed Moses & Aaron to take the leaders of Israel with them when they confronted Pharaoh, but for whatever reason it appears Israel’s leaders didn’t come
  • It makes little difference though because Pharaoh is all about having and he doesn’t know this God of Israel who is about being
  • Just as God predicted, Pharaoh refused to let Israel go

 

So Moses & Aaron ask again saying, “Allow us to travel for three days into the desert to offer sacrifices to the Lord our God. If we don’t do so, he will kill us with disease or by war”

  • Now that last part about God killing Israel by disease or war – God didn’t actually tell Moses & Aaron to say that
  • Moses & Aaron made that up – perhaps as a way of trying to persuade Pharaoh
  • Maybe they thought Pharaoh would be more inclined to let the people go temporarily if he thought he might lose his free labour permanently
  • But Pharaoh was unmoved – he is not inclined to let go
  • Having and letting go are opposites
  • Pharaoh won’t forgive – he would rather accumulate

 

That same day the king commanded the Egyptian slave drivers and the Israelite foremen:

  • “Stop giving people straw to make bricks. Make them go and find the straw themselves. But still require them to make the same number of bricks as before… Make these men work harder and keep them busy, so they won’t have time to listen…”

 

Straw was used to reinforce the mud bricks – to hold the bricks together and give them strength

  • Without the straw the mud bricks were more brittle, more likely to fall apart from lack of integrity

 

Pharaoh is a pretty smart dictator – in a variety of ways he takes the straw out of the bricks of Hebrew resistance

 

As Terence Fretheim points out…

  • Pharaoh is running a pyramid scheme whereby the few benefit from the labour of the many
  • By depleting the energy of the oppressed, the threat of organised resistance is lessened
  • One of Pharaoh’s strategies is to keep the people so busy they don’t have the time for complaints or rebellious thoughts
  • By making the work harder Pharaoh is getting the people to think their well-being depends on his goodwill – so don’t mess with the system [1]

 

Another part of Pharaoh’s strategy is to use the Hebrew foremen to create internal divisions among the people

  • Some say the Hebrew foremen were essentially collaborators
  • They served as walking examples of the opportunity to improve your standard of living by supporting Egypt’s system of exploitation [2]
  • Oppressors of every age and culture do this in one way or another
  • The Romans of Jesus’ day used Jews to collect taxes from fellow Jews

Pharaoh also tries to turn the people against Moses & Aaron

  • After being beaten for not meeting their quotas the foremen say to Moses & Aaron, ‘God is going to punish you for making the king hate us’

 

Martin Luther King, Jr. made the observation that…

  • The Pharaoh’s had a favourite and effective strategy to keep their slaves in bondage: keep them fighting among themselves. The divide-and-conquer technique has been a potent weapon in the arsenal of oppression. But when slaves unite, the Red Seas of history open and the Egypt’s of slavery crumble [3]

 

The other thing Pharaoh does, to take the straw out of the bricks of Hebrew resistance, is to blame the Israelites

  • When the Hebrew foremen complain to Pharaoh that they can’t meet their quotas because he has taken away their straw Pharaoh says…
  • ‘No – it’s not my fault. It’s your fault because you are lazy’
  • Of course it is not true that the Israelites are lazy and the Israelites themselves know it’s not true but the Egyptian people will believe Pharaoh’s lie because it serves their purpose
  • It enables them to have the moral high ground (at least in their own imagination)
  • We call this ‘scapegoating’ – blaming the Jews for the problem – getting the Egyptians united around the lie that the Hebrew people deserve what is happening to them because they are lazy & dishonest
  • Scapegoating is quite convenient for dictators really – just blame other people for your mistakes
  • Hitler did this with the Jews just last century

Tiring the people out with busy-ness

  • Creating internal divisions among the people
  • And blaming the Hebrews for their own misfortune
  • These are the three main ways that cunning old Pharaoh tries to undermine the Hebrew resistance
  • These are the strategies for having and keeping what you have

 

God (and Moses’) Being:

It’s interesting isn’t it – that we are not called ‘human havings’, we are called ‘human beings’

  • Being is somehow integral to our humanity

 

Being real, being honest

  • Being loyal, being a friend, being an enemy
  • Being alone, being in community
  • Being in prayer, being pregnant
  • Being on holiday, being wise
  • Being present
  • Being hungry, being warm, being cold
  • Being tired, being sick, being well, being happy, being angry
  • Being alive

 

Being puts us in touch with life – with what is real and true

  • Consequently, being comes with feeling
  • Not superficial feelings (like infatuation or adrenalin) but deep down feelings (like rage and fear and joy and the will to be free), which are always there like tectonic plates of the soul moving underneath to change the landscape on the surface

 

Moses is certainly in touch with some deeper emotion in verse 22 of Exodus 5 where he says to God…

  • “Lord, why do you ill-treat your people? Why did you send me here? Ever since I went to the king to speak for you, he has treated them cruelly. And you have done nothing to help them”

 

Now some people might criticise Moses at this point for complaining to God

  • After all, God did tell Moses more than once that Pharaoh would be stubborn and refuse to let the Israelites go
  • Well, in Moses’ defence, Pharaoh hasn’t just refused to let the people go – Pharaoh has actually made things considerably worse for the people, which I’m not sure Moses was told about

 

In any case, I don’t think we should be too hard on Moses

  • It is one thing to be told you are in for some rough weather
  • But another thing entirely to actually go through the storm

 

The words of the foremen to Moses & Aaron would have really hurt – salt in the wound of failure

  • Just as Pharaoh had blamed the foremen for failing to meet the quotas, so too the foremen pass the blame onto Moses & Aaron
  • It would not have been easy for Moses to hear criticism from the lips of men who collaborated with the Egyptians
  • But Moses allows it – he doesn’t defend himself to them, even though their words are unkind and unfair
  • Leadership can be a pretty lonely experience, especially when things go wrong

 

Another thing to say, to Moses’ credit, is that (unlike Pharaoh and the Hebrew foremen) Moses does not take his frustrations out on other people

  • Moses takes his complaint to God who is big enough to handle it
  • And that in itself is interesting isn’t it
  • Who we complain to says something about who we believe is in charge
  • By taking their complaint to Pharaoh the foremen seem to be acknowledging on some level that Pharaoh is in charge
  • But Moses takes his complaint to God, which tells us that Moses believes God is in charge

 

God is not at all like Pharaoh – and we can see that quite clearly in the contrasting ways in which God & Pharaoh respond to complaints

 

As we’ve already heard, Pharaoh does not want to accept responsibility for the complaint

  • When the Hebrew foremen criticise his policy of withholding straw Pharaoh puts the blame back on them by saying they are lazy
  • The message is: No criticism is allowed under Pharaoh and so you are not free to express how you truly feel
  • If you live under Pharaoh then you must meet certain expectations and behave in a certain way in order to be accepted (or at least not abused)
  • The problem with this is that it creates a kind of false reality because no one feels able to be honest with you

 

Unlike Pharaoh, God is into being and that includes being honest – allowing others to criticise him (even if their criticism isn’t entirely accurate or fair)

  • When Moses complains to God, God allows it
  • God does not disagree with Moses
  • He lets Moses express what he is feeling
  • After all, feeling goes hand in hand with being
  • By the same token God doesn’t give Moses an explanation either
  • Just like he didn’t give Job an explanation for his suffering
  • God doesn’t normally explain our suffering – but he does share it
  • He allows himself to be in the situation with us – he feels our pain

So I reckon Moses is on the right track here

  • By making his complaint to God, Moses is acknowledging that God is in charge
  • And by being honest with God, Moses is relating to God on a being level – not a having level

 

As painful as it was, the foremen’s criticism of Moses & Aaron actually had a positive affect

  • Their rebuke revealed the truth of Moses’ motivation
  • No one could say Moses was in this for public adulation or the glory of it
  • Those foremen did Moses a favour in a way – they took the ego trip out of it for Moses
  • And in so doing they inducted Moses into a deeper dependence on God

 

This is often how God uses failure & disappointment in our life – to purify our motives and strengthen our integrity

  • If things come too easy – then we might think we did it ourselves
  • And if all we hear is praise – then we should be concerned – it could mean we are behaving like Pharaoh and not allowing criticism

 

In verse 1 of Exodus 6, after listening to Moses’ complaint, the Lord responds by saying…

  • “Now you are going to see what I will do to the king. I will force him to let my people go. In fact, I will force him to drive them out of his land”

 

This translation is unfortunate I think

  • It’s not accurate to say that God forces people to do things
  • God doesn’t trample over freewill.
  • A better translation might read…

 

“…Because of my mighty hand [Pharaoh] will let them go; because of my mighty hand he will drive them out of his country.”

  • Which means God isn’t forcing Pharaoh to do something – rather he is creating a situation in which Pharaoh will choose to let the people go
  • God will bring Pharaoh to the point of wanting to be rid of the Israelites

Now, God’s personal message to Moses, in all of this, is quite surprising

  • Traditional wisdom says, ‘lower your expectations’
  • Don’t get your hopes up because then you risk being disappointed
  • But God effectively tells Moses to risk hope and raise his expectations

 

What an incredible thing to say to someone who has just tasted failure and disappointment

  • But that’s God for you – God dares us to risk it all, not when we are feeling confident, but when we have lost confidence

 

Returning to Jonathan Livingston Seagull for a moment – it’s like God is saying to Moses…

  • “Don’t believe what your eyes tell you. All they show is limitation. Look with your understanding. Find out what you already know and you’ll see the way to fly.”
  • There is a wisdom in all of us – if only we could unlock it
  • What does Moses already know?
  • That with God nothing is impossible.

 

Conclusion:

Jesus is all about being

  • He wasn’t into having so much

 

In the first instance he was about being human – fully human and all that entails, including being vulnerable

 

When Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness – he tempted Jesus with having

  • Turn these stones into bread so that you will have something to eat
  • Jump from the roof of the temple so you will have fame
  • Bow down in worship to me so you will have power
  • But Jesus wasn’t interested in having
  • Jesus was satisfied with being God’s Son

 

Much of Jesus’ ministry was about setting people free from having

 

Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us

  • That’s about not having to be right – not having the moral high ground
  • That’s about letting go of our hurt and our hate and simply being

 

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

  • That’s about not having to perform – not having to meet Pharaoh’s quota
  • That’s about learning how to be in a relationship with God – finding our fit in his will

 

In Luke 10 when Martha was complaining to Jesus about all the work she was having to do, demanding that Mary help her, Jesus responded…

  • Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better and it will not be taken away from her.
  • Mary chose being over having and Jesus supported her in that choice

 

We could go on but you get the point…

  • God is about being and Pharaoh [the Satan] is about having
  • Jesus invites us into being with God
  • So choose being – choose the way of Christ

 

[1] Terence Fretheim, Exodus, page 84

[2] Ibid, page 85.

[3] Martin Luther King, Jr. ‘Where do we go from here? Chaos or Community’, page 124.

Tawa Baptist

Moses Returns

Scripture: Exodus 4:18-31

 

Title: Moses Returns

 

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Assurance
  • Briefing
  • Correction
  • Deployment
  • Conclusion

 

Introduction:

Make peace with your past so it won’t mess up your present

 

Please turn with me to Exodus chapter 4, verse 18 – page 63 toward the front of your pew Bibles

  • Today we continue our series on Moses
  • A couple of weeks ago we heard how God spoke to Moses through a flame in a bush, calling him to confront Pharaoh and lead the Israelites out of slavery
  • This morning Moses returns to Egypt in obedience to God
  • By returning to Egypt Moses is facing his past

 

From verse 18 of Exodus 4 we read…

 

[Read Exodus 4:18-31]

 

May the Lord meet us in this reading

 

Please turn with me to the back of your newsletter

  • We could think of Moses’ return to Egypt in four parts – A B C D
  • Assurance, briefing, correction & deployment
  • First let us consider how God gives Moses assurance in verses 18-20…

 

Assurance:

When Robyn and I were in our last year at Carey College training for ministry Tawa Baptist called us

  • Robyn & I are not from Wellington – most of our family live in the Waikato & Bay of Plenty
  • We were leaning toward coming to Tawa but hadn’t fully decided – there was still a significant element of faith involved both for us and the church
  • I remember driving along the southern motorway into Auckland around that time and the car in front of us had a personalised number plate which read, ‘2tawa’
  • What are the chances of seeing that on the Auckland motorway?
  • Now we didn’t base our decision to come to Tawa solely on that number plate but it was one thing that gave us assurance to proceed
  • God does things like that at certain crossroads in our lives
  • We might feel like we’ve heard from him but we doubt ourselves a bit and so he (in his grace) gives us assurance – he guides us in the direction we should go

Assurance is different from insurance

  • Assurance is something we can rely on – it will definitely happen
  • By contrast, insurance covers something that may or may not happen
  • So we have car insurance just in case we have an accident and need to replace the car
  • But we have life assurance, because it is certain that we will die one day and when we do our loved ones will get a pay out

 

In verse 18, after Moses has talked with God, he goes back to Jethro, his father-in-law, & asks permission to return to Egypt to see if his relatives are still alive

  • Jethro is Moses’ insurance
  • God is asking Moses to do a big thing here and Moses doesn’t know how the future will pan out
  • He needs to keep his relationship with Jethro good because if everything turns to custard Moses will need a home base to return to
  • So Moses takes care of the relationship by asking Jethro’s permission
  • Moses doesn’t burn his bridges

 

In verse 19, while Moses was still in Midian, the Lord spoke to him again saying: Go back to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead

  • God gives Moses assurance
  • You will remember how Moses had left Egypt in a hurry, after killing an Egyptian slave driver
  • God knew that Moses was a bit anxious about returning to Egypt because of this – Moses was concerned his past might catch up with him
  • So God effectively says to Moses, ‘Now is a good time to return to Egypt, you are no longer an outlaw – no longer a wanted man’

 

Sometimes making peace with our past is simply a matter of time

  • Sometimes we just have to be patient and wait – time has a way of washing away ill feeling

 

With God’s assurance, Moses packs up his family and returns to Egypt on a donkey

  • This reminds us of another holy family travelling by donkey in the opposite direction, from Egypt back to Israel (Jesus, Joseph and Mary)
  • In that story God gave Joseph assurance by sending an angel in a dream to say Herod was dead and it was okay to go back home.

 

Returning to Exodus 4. At the end of verse 20 we are told Moses was carrying the stick God had told him to take

  • This stick is a tangible reminder of God’s assurance to Moses
  • It’s an assurance that Moses can literally hold on to
  • We also have these little tokens of assurance, don’t we
  • Perhaps a favourite Bible that we take with us everywhere
  • Or a cross on a necklace, or prayer beads, or some other physical reminder that we don’t travel alone – God goes with us

 

Briefing:

Every day around the world 11 or 12 people are either killed or injured because of land mines or other explosives left behind after war [1]

  • There are literally hundreds of millions of unexploded mines and bombs, in the world, left over after past wars, just waiting to be disturbed
  • The work of de-miners is a very practical way of making peace with the past so it doesn’t mess up the present

 

Sometimes making peace with our past is simply a matter of time

  • Time heals some wounds but not all wounds
  • There are some things which need special attention
  • Some things which don’t go away with time but in fact become more dangerous – like unexploded bombs
  • Part of the problem is that people don’t always remember where these ordnances are buried
  • If we forget our past then we may find ourselves walking through a mine field in the present
  • Pharaoh forgot Egypt’s past and consequently he led his people into danger

 

After giving Moses assurance to return to Egypt, God then briefs Moses, in verses 21-23

  • In this briefing God tells Moses the plan and what to expect
  • Unfortunately the briefing doesn’t make a lot of sense

 

God says to Moses, you do all the miracles

  • And I will make Pharaoh stubborn so that he won’t let the people go

 

Now, I imagine Moses scratching his head at this point thinking

  • Isn’t the whole idea to get Israel out of Egypt safely?
  • Why is God going to make Pharaoh stubborn so that he won’t let the people go? Hmmmm?

 

Well, it’s like St. Augustine said in the fifth century:

  • “If you understand it, then it is not God”

 

We will explore what it means for God to make Pharaoh stubborn when that comes up again in a few weeks

  • For now it is enough to know that God is giving Moses a heads up that things are not going to flow smoothly
  • He is in for a trying time with Pharaoh
  • God is giving Moses fair warning so he doesn’t become discouraged at the first hurdle

 

God goes on to say to Moses…

  • When the Pharaoh digs his toes in and refuses to let my people go I want you to say from me, ‘Israel is my first born son. I told you to let my son go, so that he might worship me, but you refused. Now I am going to kill your first born son.’

 

That doesn’t sound very nice – why does God want to kill Egypt’s first born?

  • Well, I don’t think God wants to kill anyone
  • The problem is Pharaoh has made some decisions which have limited God’s options

 

Pharaoh isn’t able to make peace with his past because he has forgotten the past

  • He has forgotten how Joseph (a Hebrew) saved Egypt from starvation and made the country rich during a famine
  • For Pharaoh to make peace with his past he would have to admit the injustices of his regime and make reparation
  • Pharaoh’s injustices lie scattered over the land like unexploded mines
  • But Pharaoh doesn’t want to face his own failure as a leader which means God doesn’t have much choice
  • God’s only option is to remind Pharaoh of Egypt’s injustice by visiting on Pharaoh the same treatment he has dealt out to Israel
  • The only way that Pharaoh is going to get the message is if God explodes some of the mines

To make peace with the past we must first remember the past – not as we would have liked it to have been, but as it actually was

 

Two aspects of good news we shouldn’t lose sight of here…

 

Firstly, Israel is God’s son – not Pharaoh’s son

  • Israel belongs to God – not to Pharaoh
  • Pharaoh has no right to hold Israel prisoner

 

Secondly, Israel is not an only child

  • Israel is God’s first born
  • Other nations will (and actually have) become God’s children too, through Christ

 

So the question for us is, ‘whose son, whose daughter, are we?’

  • Do we belong to Pharaoh or do we belong to God?
  • I believe we belong to God – although not everyone realises it
  • You are not the property of the bank or the company or the government
  • You are not a slave to market forces or technology or the opinion of others
  • You belong to God, as his child, and God wants you to be free of Pharaoh
  • (Whatever form Pharaoh may take)

 

Having given Moses assurance to proceed to Egypt

  • And having briefed Moses on what to do and what to expect in Egypt
  • God then corrects Moses in quite an alarming way

 

Correction:

What do you reckon – is one person by themselves better at remembering or are all of us together better at remembering?

 

[Wait for people to respond]

 

Yes – I agree with you – all of us together are better at remembering

  • We remember better together

 

In verse 24 of Exodus 4 we read how the Lord met Moses [on his way to Egypt] and tried to kill him

  • Whaaat? God tried to kill Moses?
  • Why would God do that when he has gone to so much trouble in sending Moses to Egypt to set Israel free?

 

 

Well, Moses’ wife Zipporah seemed to understand

  • Before Moses can face the future he must first make peace with his past
  • Moses needs to get his own house in order before he tries to sort out Pharaoh’s house because it seems Moses has forgotten his past too
  • Fortunately for Moses, Zipporah remembers

 

In Genesis 17 God made some promises to Abraham saying…

  • “You also must agree to keep the covenant with me, both you and your descendants in future generations. You and your descendants must all agree to circumcise every male among you. From now on you must circumcise every baby boy when he is eight days old…”

 

Apparently Moses had not circumcised his own sons as God had instructed the descendants of Abraham

  • Circumcision was the sign of the covenant
  • A covenant is a sacred agreement – it is more than a contract
  • You put your signature on a contract but you cut a covenant
  • Hence the cutting of the foreskin as a sign of the covenant

 

Perhaps another reason God chose circumcision as a sign of the covenant is that the men at least would be regularly reminded of the covenant – every time they went to the toilet or had a bath

  • Perhaps the women didn’t need such regular reminders

 

In any case, God’s covenant with Abraham was incredibly important

  • And, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, God doesn’t like it when we mistreat or ignore or forget what he considers sacred and important
  • By not circumcising his sons Moses had forgotten God’s covenant and God was not pleased – he tried to kill Moses

 

We don’t know exactly what this means – perhaps Moses became really sick and was close to dying

  • The fact that God didn’t kill Moses instantly shows us God’s grace
  • “God leaves room for mediation, [he] allows time for Zipporah to act,” [2] to save Moses – which she does
  • Zipporah cut off the foreskin of her son and touched Moses’ feet with it
  • In this way Zipporah made peace with the past by keeping the covenant
  • And so the Lord spared Moses’ life
  • This is not the first time Moses has been saved by the quick witted courage of a woman

 

Terence Fretheim makes the following observation of Moses’ near death experience…

  • This is a divine demonstration of the seriousness of the matter upon which God & Moses are about to embark: a life-and-death struggle in which Israel’s very life will be imperilled. That Israel or Moses will emerge unscathed is not a foregone conclusion. Israel will be dependent upon God’s decision and action on its behalf, yet Moses’ own obedience is integral to the divine mission. [3]

 

In other words our salvation is a serious matter and we can’t afford to take God for granted

  • Yes, he loves us, but that doesn’t mean anything goes
  • We are dependent on God to save us but at the same time the choices we make matter

 

As Christians we are under a different covenant

  • Ours is not the covenant of Abraham, so we don’t have to be circumcised
  • Ours is the new covenant established by Jesus
  • Later in the service we will share communion and you will hear me talk about the cup of the new covenant
  • We take communion to remember the new covenant with God made possible by Christ’s sacrifice
  • Or said another way, communion reminds us how Jesus enables us to make peace with our past and peace with God – so that we can have hope for the future

 

One of the cool things about communion is that we take it together, or more accurately we remember together – memory is more reliable that way

 

We don’t take communion lightly – it is a serious matter and God is not pleased if we misuse it. As the apostle Paul writes in his letter to the Corinthians…

  • It follows that if anyone eats the Lord’s bread or drinks from his cup in a way that dishonours him, he is guilty of sin against the Lord’s body & blood. So then, everyone should examine himself first, and then eat the bread and drink from the cup. For if he does not recognise the meaning of the Lord’s body when he eats the bread and drinks from the cup, he brings judgement on himself as he eats and drinks. [4]

 

God has assured Moses it is okay to return to Egypt

  • God has briefed Moses on what to expect when he confronts Pharaoh
  • And God has corrected Moses on his way to Egypt
  • Now God deploys Aaron to go with Moses to Egypt
  • A B C D

 

Deployment:

Verse 27 of Exodus 4 reads…

  • Meanwhile the Lord had said to Aaron, “Go into the desert to meet Moses.” So he went to meet him at the holy mountain; and when he met him he kissed him.

 

Sometimes making peace with our past is a difficult thing – like defusing an unexploded bomb or some other life & death struggle

  • Other times it is a joyful thing – as it was when Aaron and Moses were finally reunited after probably about 40 years apart

 

Making peace with your past can also mean re-doing things again – only this time properly

  • The first time Moses had tried to save his people he had acted alone – without God and without the people themselves
  • This time though Moses goes with the Lord and with Aaron
  • And he involves all the leaders of Israel – he takes the people with him

 

Aaron does the talking and Moses performs the miracles

  • The people believe and bow down in worship to the Lord for he has come to them and seen how cruelly they are being treated
  • It’ a beautiful thing when God lets us know that he understands our pain
  • Knowing that God understands goes a long way in helping us to make peace with our past

 

 

Conclusion:

This morning we’ve heard that making peace with our past can mean different things

 

Sometimes it means simply letting go – not chasing after the past but allowing time to do the work of healing

  • Waiting for the enemies of bitterness and revenge to die

 

But time won’t fix everything

  • There are some things which need special attention
  • Some things which don’t go away with time but in fact become more dangerous – like unexploded bombs
  • In those cases, to make peace with the past we must first remember the past – not as we would have liked it to have been, but as it actually was
  • If we forget our past (as Pharaoh did) then we may find ourselves walking through a mine field

 

The other thing to keep in mind when it comes to making peace with our past is, we don’t have to do it alone

  • Moses had help to face his past
  • Zipporah helped him to remember the covenant and put things right with God
  • And Aaron helped Moses to approach the task in a proper way, involving the leaders of Israel
  • Moses & Aaron & the Lord worked together to restore hope to the people

 

 

 

 

[1] http://www.maginternational.org/the-problems/landmines-and-unexploded-ordnance/#.VZcQ3xHAKM8

[2] Terence Fretheim, ‘Exodus’, page 79.

[3] Fretheim, page 81.

[4] 1 Corinthians 11:27-29

Tawa Baptist

Reluctant Moses

Scripture: Exodus 3:1-14 & 4:1-17

Title: Reluctant Moses

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Back-bone
  • The dialogue
  • Conclusion

 

 

Introduction:

True perfection is the ability to include imperfection [1]

 

The teacher who perseveres with a difficult student

  • The wife who goes on loving her husband even though he doesn’t trim his nose hairs and keeps leaving the toilet seat up
  • The father who welcomes home the prodigal son or daughter
  • The mother who patiently stays up all night nursing her sick child
  • The humble who can laugh at their own mistakes
  • The leader who allows criticism even when it is unfair
  • Anyone really who is able to forgive others and most especially able to forgive themselves

 

Please turn with me to Exodus 3, verse 10, page 61 in your pew Bibles

  • Today we continue our series on Moses
  • Last week we heard how God spoke to Moses as a flame in a bush, calling him to confront Pharaoh and lead the Israelites out of slavery
  • This week we hear how a very reluctant Moses tries to evade God’s call
  • Moses is all too aware of his own inadequacy
  • But God, who is true perfection, wants to include Moses in all his glorious imperfection

 

Our reading is in two parts this morning – the first part from the middle of chapter 3 and the second part from the first half of chapter 4

  • From verse 10 of chapter 3, God says to Moses…

 

[Read Exodus 3:10-14]

 

Now we will skip to the beginning of chapter 4 on page 62 of your pew Bibles

  • From verse 1 we read…

 

[Read Exodus 4:1-17]

 

May the Spirit of Jesus help us to accept the imperfection in ourselves

 

Back-bone:

Most of you would have heard of the three classic parenting styles…

  • Brick wall
  • Jellyfish, and
  • Back-bone

 

The brick wall parent doesn’t give an inch

  • It’s my way or the highway
  • There is no flexibility, no grace, no understanding with the brick wall parent – they come off as hard and unloving
  • The demanding (sometimes brutal) discipline of the brick wall style often leaves the child angry, resentful and alienated
  • Brick wall relationships are brittle – they don’t cope well with earthquakes or other crises because they have no give

 

Jellyfish parents are the opposite to this

  • They don’t know how to say ‘No’ to their kids – they are too soft and give in all the time
  • Jellyfish relationships tend to lack integrity or substance
  • You can’t really trust a jellyfish – they won’t support you when the chips are down and they may even sting you

 

Then we have the back-bone parenting style

  • As the name suggests, backbone parents combine strength & support with flexibility
  • A back-bone relationship is one you can rely on – it has integrity and substance, but it also has grace & understanding
  • Therefore you can trust the other person

 

Now when I first heard this brick wall, jellyfish, backbone thing, like most parents, I felt guilty for not always being a backbone parent

  • In reality though there are no perfect parents – we are all a bit of a mixture of the three
  • And that’s okay – the world is not a perfect place and so children need imperfect parents in order to prepare them for an imperfect world
  • True perfection is the ability to include imperfection

 

 

If you turn to the back page of your newsletter you will see a table there

  • This table basically summarises God’s dialogue with Moses
  • On one side of the table we have Moses’ objections to God’s call
  • And on the other side we have God’s response

 

Verses Moses’ objections God’s response Verses
3:11 Who am I? (I am nobody)  I will be with you 3:12
3:13 Who are you?(What’s your name) “I am who I am” Or,“I will be who I will be” 3:14
4:1 What if Israel doesn’t believe me? Here are 3 signs to help them believe you 4:2-9
4:10 I’m not a good speaker  I will help you to speak 4:11-12
4:13 Send someone else(or – send whoever you want) I will give you Aaron as your spokesman 4:14-17

 

When God calls Moses to confront Pharaoh and lead the people of Israel out of Egypt, Moses tries to talk God out of it

  • Five times he resists God’s call on his life

 

Moses comes across as a bit insecure

  • He appears full of self-doubt and lacking confidence
  • But in a paradoxical kind of way Moses’ questions and objections are actually a good thing
  • It is helpful and necessary to deal with our doubts in God’s presence before going out to face the enemy

 

Not only that but Moses’ questioning of God allows a meaningful dialogue to take place

  • If Moses had simply said ‘yes’ to God without offering any resistance then the conversation would have ended
  • Moses might not have heard God’s name nor been properly equipped to face Israel and Pharaoh – he would have no answer for his doubts

 

The other good thing here, about Moses’ resistance, is that it reveals back-bone

  • The fact that Moses is able to stand up to God bodes well for when he will have to stand up to Pharaoh
  • Leaders need a certain amount of stubbornness
  • Pharaoh was a brick wall, against which a jellyfish would make no impression
  • If you want to shift a brick wall you need backbone – strength combined with flexibility

 

God responds to Moses’ reluctance with some backbone of his own

  • He doesn’t give Moses what he wants or let him off the hook
  • God could have done the job himself but he doesn’t
  • God is resolute in his plan to work with the imperfect Moses
  • By the same token he doesn’t bulldoze Moses either
  • God gives Moses support with flexibility
  • He dialogues with Moses

 

The Dialogue:

A dialogue is a two way conversation, sort of like tennis – one player hits the ball over the net and the other player responds by hitting it back

 

God serves a rip snorter to Moses saying, ‘I am sending you to the king of Egypt so that you can lead my people out of his country’

  • And Moses sends God’s serve right back over the net with, ‘I am nobody’
  • Or more literally, ‘Who am I to go the king of Egypt?’

 

Interestingly, God takes Moses’ concerns seriously

  • God doesn’t deny what Moses is feeling
  • And he doesn’t disagree with Moses’ assessment of himself
  • God simply says, ‘I will be with you’
  • Which is sort of like saying, ‘Yea, I agree with you Moses. You’re not adequate by yourself. But I’m more than adequate, so don’t worry’
  • God is inviting Moses to trust him

 

Moses isn’t entirely sure if he is ready to trust the Lord just yet, so he fires the ball back over the net to God with another question

  • ‘In case someone asks me, what’s your name?’
  • First Moses had asked, ‘Who am I?’
  • Now he asks, ‘Who are you?’

 

Names in Biblical times were significant

  • The Lord’s name is his story
  • It sums up who he is and what he wants to make known about himself [2]

 

In verse 14 of Exodus 3, God famously replies, “I am who I am” which can also be translated, “I will be who I will be”

 

God’s name doesn’t reveal everything about him but it does show us some things

  • Firstly, that we don’t define God – he defines himself
  • There is a certain divine freedom in this

 

‘I am who I am’ is quite open ended

  • It means, if we are going to be in relationship with God, then we must be prepared to cope with mystery
  • with not knowing
  • with loose ends and unresolved questions,
  • For God won’t be tied down or dissected

 

‘I will be who I will be’ indicates that God’s story is being told in human history and so it is unfolding even as history continues to unfold

 

In Tolkien’s book, The Lord of the Rings, the character Treebeard speaks of his name in this way…

  • “My name is growing all the time and I’ve lived a very long, long time; so my name is like a story. Real names tell you the story of the things they belong to” [3]

 

The people of Israel would come to know the meaning of God’s name through the history of his presence with them and salvation of them

  • We come to know the meaning of God’s name through Christ

 

Reluctant Moses tries to get the ball out of his court a third time by saying, in verse 1 of Exodus 4, ‘But suppose the Israelites do not believe me and will not listen to what I say…?’

  • At which point God gives Moses power to perform three signs
  • Turning a stick into a snake and back into a stick again
  • Turning a hand leprous and back into a healthy hand again
  • And turning water into blood

 

These might seem like pretty random things but I suspect they were freighted with meaning

 

The Pharaohs wore a crown on their head and on the front of that crown was a cobra snake, raised and ready to strike as a threat to Egypt’s enemies

  • By giving Moses the power to change his stick into a snake and back again I reckon God was saying, ‘Egypt is no threat to me, so you don’t need to feel threatened by them either’
  • Interestingly God told Moses to pick up the snake by the tail
  • This is the most dangerous way to pick up a snake for it can whip it’s head around and bite you
  • Just as God protected Moses from the snake, so too he would protect Moses (and Israel) from Pharaoh

 

With the second sign God tells Moses to put his hand inside his robe and when Moses does it turns leprous

  • Then when Moses repeats the movement his hand is made healthy again
  • This sign is different from the other two in that it was a sign which was done to Moses’ person – his own body

 

Lepers were considered unclean and were excluded from society

  • Moses had lived like a leper for a long time, in the sense that he had been excluded from Hebrew & Egyptian society
  • Moses also felt unfit or unworthy for the task God was calling him to
  • But God has the power to declare things clean
  • He has the power to open doors so those standing on the outside looking in may be included
  • God, who is true perfection, is able to include Moses’ imperfection – to declare Moses clean

 

The third sign, turning the water of the river Nile into blood, shows us that God has power over life and death and he is putting that power into Moses’ hands

  • Water & blood are both symbols of life and potentially death
  • Egypt relied on the Nile for its livelihood
  • Turning the river into blood would destroy the economy

 

These three signs prefigure the 10 plagues that will come on Egypt

 

Moses is becoming a bit desperate now – God just doesn’t seem to be getting the hint, so he says…

  • Lord… I have never been a good speaker and I haven’t become one since you began speaking to me. I am a poor speaker, slow and hesitant.

 

Perhaps Moses thinks he’s got God here, because a leader needs to be able to communicate effectively

 

There was a king who lived during the Second World War who struggled with a speech impediment – can anyone tell me his name? [Wait]

  • Yes, that’s right, King George the sixth, also known as Bertie
  • He was the father of our current Monarch, Queen Elizabeth the second

 

A movie came out recently called the King’s Speech, which tells King George’s story

  • After his brother abdicated, Bertie reluctantly assumes the throne
  • He doesn’t want to be king because that requires public speaking – the one thing he can’t do well
  • Every time he opens his mouth in public he is vulnerable – for his greatest weakness is exposed for the whole world to see
  • Bertie engages the help of an unorthodox speech therapist named Lionel Logue who helps him find his voice and lead the country through the war

 

Hitler was articulate and charismatic, some might say a gifted speaker – kind of the opposite of King George and yet, who won the war?

  • God does not call perfect individuals to leadership – he chooses what is weak in the eyes of the world to shame the strong
  • God did not miraculously heal Moses’ slowness of speech and he didn’t heal King George’s stammer either
  • But he does help Moses, as he helped King George
  • God works in and through real human impediments to further his purpose
  • True perfection is the ability to include imperfection

 

 

In verse 13 of Exodus 4, Moses says, No Lord, send someone else

  • This translation is something of a paraphrase
  • The original Hebrew is far more vague – it literally reads…
  • Send by whose hand you will send– which could mean…
  • Have it your own way [God] – do what you want – send whoever [4]

 

Either way it is clear that Moses is not happy to be chosen for the task

 

Verse 14 tells us God became angry with Moses at this

 

I don’t think God’s anger here is the anger of impatience

  • God is eternal – he literally has all the time in the world – he is the very definition of patience and long suffering
  • So why is God angry?

 

Well, it seems to me that often when God gets angry in the Bible it is because someone has mistreated what God values

  • For example, God values the poor & the oppressed – so if we mistreat them God will be angry with us
  • Likewise if God gives us something sacred or holy and we treat his gift cheaply or in an unholy way, then he is not happy

 

God has just given Moses a sacred call – a special job to do – and that job involves helping the poor & oppressed

  • But Moses has turned his back on the poor by rejecting God’s call – he has treated them cheaply as though they were nothing
  • So we can understand why God is angry – Moses has been careless with people God cares about

 

And yet God still has the strength and the flexibility to accommodate Moses

  • He says, ‘Okay then, I’ll send Aaron with you as your spokesman’
  • As it turns out Moses ends up doing most of the talking anyway

 

Conclusion:

True perfection is the ability to include imperfection

 

When we look at the ministry of Jesus we see quite clearly that he included imperfection

  • Jesus called very ordinary people to be his witnesses and disciples
  • Not only that but he had a reputation for hanging out with imperfect people – lepers, tax collectors, prostitutes and so on

 

In Matthew 5 Jesus says to his disciples…

  • Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you…
  • You must be perfect just as your Father in heaven is perfect
  • And what does it mean to love your enemy?
  • It means to include them – include them in your prayers, include them in sharing good things – even though they are not perfect

 

The ones Jesus had the biggest problem with were the Pharisees. Why?

  • Because they had no tolerance for imperfection
  • They wouldn’t admit the imperfection in themselves and consequently they gave everybody else a hard time for being imperfect

 

It is one thing to include other people’s imperfection but it is another thing entirely to accept our own imperfection

  • Somehow imperfection is more tolerable in other people
  • In fact someone else’s imperfection can make us feel positively wonderful about ourselves – unless of course their failings remind us of our own, and then we are likely to give them a hard time

 

We do such violence to our own soul when we judge and condemn those parts of ourselves that we find unacceptable

  • We can be that brick wall parent to the child in us

 

  • We can be so hard on ourselves – so unforgiving of our own weaknesses and mistakes
  • We do well to remember that we are sacred to God
  • You are sacred to God – so be careful with yourself
  • The things you detest may be the very things God values the most

 

True perfection is the ability to include imperfection

 

[1] From Richard Rohr’s daily meditation for Tuesday 16 June 2015

[2] Motyer, BST Exodus, page 68

[3] J.R.R. Tolkien, Lord of the Rings, page 454.

[4] Alec Motyer, BST Exodus, page 81

Tawa Baptist

Close Encounters

Scripture: Exodus 3:1-12

Title: Close Encounters

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • God’s humility – vv. 1-6
  • God’s love – vv. 7-10
  • Moses’ honesty – vv. 11-12
  • Conclusion

Introduction:

The Franciscan scholar Ilia Delio observes…

  • ‘Before encounter, God is perceived as omnipotent power; after encounter, God is perceived as humble love.’

Omnipotent power is unlimited power, supreme power, power which cannot be trumped by any other

  • Omnipotent power is overwhelming and fills us with fear
  • In contrast, humble love is down to earth, accessible love, love which empties us of all pretence and invites an honest response

Please turn with me to Exodus chapter 3, page 61 near the beginning of your pew Bibles

  • In this reading we see God’s humility in the very down to earth way he speaks to Moses out of a bush.
  • And we see God’s love through his attention and concern for Israel, his oppressed people
  • We also see Moses’ honesty in objecting to God’s call

From verse 1 of Exodus 3 we read…

[Read Exodus 3:1-12]

 

May we encounter the Spirit of Jesus in this Scripture reading

God’s humility:

Aslan is the Lion in CS Lewis’ Narnia series

  • Aslan represents God

I suppose Lewis chose a Lion to represent God because of the particular images lions raise in the human imagination

  • We associate lions with power, strength & royalty (they are considered the king of the jungle)
  • Lions are also normally thought of as wild or untameable – something we can’t control and therefore something to be feared

Lucy may have been afraid of Aslan at first (before actually meeting him) – as we are all afraid of omnipotent power, but after actually encountering Aslan Lucy came to know this lion as humble love

  • The movement from perceiving God as omnipotent power to perceiving him as humble love is a movement from fear to faith – from terror to trust
  • It is a movement from hiding from God to being honest with God
  • This appears to be Moses’ experience in our reading this morning

Exodus 3 begins by telling us how Moses was going about his regular job – shepherding sheep & goats

  • Moses is quite a bit older by this stage – it has been many years since he ran away from Egypt
  • He arrives at Mt Sinai in the Horeb wilderness
  • Horeb basically means ‘wasteland’
  • This is a lonely place

Verse 2 tells us that, there (at Sinai) the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses as a flame coming from the middle of a bush

  • Moses saw that the bush was on fire but that it was not burning up
  • So he went closer to investigate
  • He doesn’t yet realise that the angel of the Lord is in the bush

Many Christians believe the angel of the Lord in the Old Testament is a cloaked reference to Jesus – before he became human

  • An angel is basically a heavenly messenger and Jesus is the Word of God
  • Hence the angel of the Lord is God’s Word – Jesus in a different form

I’m not sure we should try to tie it down too much for there is a certain mystery here which we can’t explain

  • The point seems to be, God presents himself to Moses, on this occasion, as a talking flame inside a bush

There is significant symbolism in this

  • Fire is powerful and dangerous – it is not safe to get too close to fire but, at just the right distance, fire can warm us, comfort us and give us light

Furthermore, as Alec Motyer points out, the fact that the fire does not consume the bush shows us that Yahweh is ‘a self-maintaining, self-sufficient reality [who] does not need to draw vitality from the outside’ [1]

  • In other words, God is not like fire in every respect
  • Fire needs oxygen and fuel to survive – but God doesn’t need anything to survive – he is entirely independent and without needs
  • Creation depends on God but God does not depend on creation

It’s also interesting that God should be found in a bush

  • You can’t get more down to earth, more grounded, more humble, more non-threatening than a bush

God (who is bigger than we can imagine) is basically making himself small so that Moses can cope with the conversation

  • If God were to reveal himself to Moses (or any of us) in all his glory we couldn’t handle it – we would be completely overwhelmed
  • So God very graciously speaks out of a bush – he dresses down and makes himself small so that Moses won’t feel so threatened

Having said that, Moses is still pretty frightened by the whole experience

  • When he realises God is in the bush he covers his face because he is afraid to look at God
  • Before encounter, God is perceived to be omnipotent power – and therefore terrifying
  • Moses won’t always be so afraid though – and nor will God always seem so small
  • Moses’ perception of God is like Lucy’s perception of Aslan
  • Returning to Narnia for a moment, in the book Prince Caspian Lucy says…

 “Aslan”, you’re bigger”.

  • “That’s because you are older little one…
  • every year you grow, you will find me bigger”

God starts small with Moses, but as Moses grows in faith he finds that God gets bigger too, until eventually the Lord is represented as a pillar of fire by night and pillar of cloud by day

  • The beauty of it is we can never out-grow God nor be too small for him

Interestingly God introduces himself by saying…

  • I am the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
  • To me this says that God is known through relationship
  • It also indicates a continuity or connection between Moses and his forebears – it’s sort of a way of establishing common ground
  • A way of saying – I know your roots Moses, I understand where you come from – your family and me have got history, we go way back

But the part that is most interesting to me is God’s humility in identifying with Abraham, Isaac & Jacob

  • God could have introduced himself in a quite a big deal kind of way
  • He could have said, ‘I am the God of the universe – the God of the Milky Way, the God of infinite might, the God of eternity and time, bow before me mortal’ – but he doesn’t
  • God doesn’t give a list of his achievements
  • Instead in a rather humble and far more personal way he identifies himself with three imperfect human beings
  • That’s quite cool really

 

God’s love:

The Hunger Games movies have been quite popular the past 2 or 3 years

  • The Hunger Games is a variation on the ‘Exodus story with the ‘Capital’ parallel to Egypt and the oppressed ‘Districts’ parallel to Israel
  • President ‘Snow’ is like Pharaoh and Katniss is sort of like Moses
  • The story line and characters in the Hunger Games don’t match the Exodus account exactly but certainly they share similar themes

Returning to Exodus 3…

  • You might be thinking, ‘I get what you’re saying about God being humble, but where does the love part come in?’

Well, God reveals his love in verses 7-10, where he says…

I have seen how cruelly my people are being treated…

  • I have heard them cry out to be rescued…
  • I know all about their sufferings…
  • I have come down to rescue them…
  • I have indeed heard the cry of my people…
  • I see how the Egyptians are oppressing them…
  • Now I am sending you [Moses] to lead my people out of Egypt

I have seen

I have heard

I know

I have come down

I have heard

I see

I am sending you

Here we have seven statements of God’s love

  • The key to understanding is found in the middle of the list where the Lord says, I have come down

God’s seeing isn’t from a distance – up on a cloud somewhere

  • His seeing is up close and personal, for he has come down
  • Nor is his hearing detached or unfeeling, for God hears the cry of his people like a parent hears the unique cry of their child in distress
  • It tears at his heart
  • Likewise, God’s knowing isn’t just an intellectual head knowledge
  • God’s knowing is the understanding which comes from first-hand experience – for God has been present amongst his people throughout their suffering and has in fact suffered with them

Although God sees, hears and knows (first hand) the sufferings of his people in Egypt, Moses doesn’t – at least not to the same extent

  • Moses has been living away from his people for a long time and even when he did live in Egypt he was in the sheltered environment of the palace – so why does God want to send Moses to lead the people out?

Well, Moses may not have suffered in exactly the same way as his fellow Israelites, but he had suffered – exile is no picnic

  • Perhaps Moses’ exile was one of the things that qualified him for this particular task. As Richard Rohr says…

“It seems until you are excluded from any system, you are not able to recognise the idolatries, lies or shadow side of that system… There seems to be a ‘structural blindness’ for people who are content and satisfied on the inside…

It is always the forgotten one… who understands things more deeply and breaks through to enlightenment.”  [2]

Perhaps it was necessary for Moses to be excluded and forgotten for a time in order for him to recognise what was wrong with the Egyptian system

  • That way he wouldn’t make the same mistakes with Israel

Moses’ honesty:

‘Before encounter, God is perceived as omnipotent power; after encounter, God is perceived as humble love.’

  • The movement from perceiving God as omnipotent power to perceiving him as humble love is a movement from fear to faith – from terror to trust
  • It is a movement from hiding from God to being honest with God

Moses has gone from being too afraid to look at God, to feeling comfortable enough to talk back to God

  • This is what an encounter with the God of humble love does – it makes honest dialogue possible
  • Moses responds to God’s request by saying, “I am nobody. How can I go to the king and bring the Israelites out of Egypt”
  • To us this might appear like humility – but actually it’s not

 

As our friend C.S. Lewis reminds us…

  • Humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less
  • In other words, humility is not the same thing as poor self-esteem
  • It’s not the same as doubting your value

God is humble in the sense of thinking of himself less

  • When we look at God’s words to Moses so far, we notice they are largely about other people – God says hardly anything about himself
  • Moses on the other hand is quite self-focused at this point
  • Thinking less of yourself (as Moses does here) is still thinking of yourself

God answers Moses, “I will be with you…”

  • In other words, think of yourself less and think of me more – you’re not alone

God also gives Moses a sign or a proof

  • “When you bring the people out of Egypt you will worship me on this mountain”

I think God is saying more than one thing at once here

  • At a surface level God is saying…
  • ‘The proof that I have sent you is that you will be successful – you will bring the people out of Egypt and worship me on this mountain’

The flip side (or the unspoken part of this) is…

  • ‘You won’t argue with me (as you are now Moses) you will praise me’

Going a little deeper – God is inviting Moses to trust him, for the sign requires faith, it won’t be fulfilled until after Moses has done what God asks

 

But at an even deeper level I think God is also saying to Moses…

  • ‘You doubt your value, don’t run from who you are’ [3]

In other words,

  • ‘I believe in you Moses – you are a leader – you were born to do this’

Conclusion:

Before encounter, God is perceived as omnipotent power; after encounter, God is perceived as humble love.

 

Soren Kierkegaard tells a parable of a king and a maiden which helps to illustrate the humble love of God. [4]

Once there was a rich and powerful king who fell in love with a beautiful woman

  • This king was no ordinary king
  • Every statesman trembled before his power and might
  • World leaders brought him tributes and showered him with the best of everything their lands had to offer
  • People were so afraid of him that no one dared breath a word against himOne day, while out walking, this most mighty of men was stopped in his tracks by the sight of a beautiful woman
  • The king had his intelligence service investigate the woman
  • And they found that she was not rich and powerful like him
  • She was simply a regular person with an ordinary job, paying her bills like everyone elseAt first the king tried to ignore his feelings but unexpressed love turns into pain
  • The more he tried to ignore what he felt the more he couldn’t help thinking about her until eventually the king could stand it no more
  • There was nothing for it but to declare his love for the beautiful maiden
  • And to find out if she held love in her heart for him
  • Perhaps that way he might find some peaceBut the king was no sooner on his way to her house than he realized something
  • How would he know whether she really loved him or not – whether she would be truly happy at his side?The king knew he could impress the woman with his power and wealth
  • He could visit her in his helicopter with all his body guards
  • He could fly her to Paris for dinner and shower her with jewellery, but grand gestures like that might only deceive them both
  • For then the maiden would never truly know whether she loved the giver or just his gifts
  • Elevating the maiden would only alienate her from him further In an ironic kind of way the king’s very power and wealth made it difficult for people to get close to him
  • The king didn’t want a cringing fearful subject for a wife
  • He wanted someone who would be honest with him
  • He wanted someone he could trust
  • He wanted a friend and a loverFor this is the nature of love, that it desires genuine equality with the beloved So, motivated by love for the maiden, the king humbled himself
  • Putting aside his claim to the throne he took on a new identity to win her hand
  • He rented a place in her neighbourhood, became a carpenter and suffered much – for this was the only way she could know him and relate with him on equal terms Humble love you see
  • God doesn’t want to force or manipulate or control people
  • God wants people to relate with him freely, willingly, because we trust him and because we love him

The goal with God is not following orders

  • The goal is mutual friendship
  • The goal is not grudging service
  • The goal is joyful worship
  • Not duty – but delight
  • With the goal of right relationship in mind God does not overwhelm us with his power – He descends to us in humble love

It’s shocking really that God Almighty would seek equality of relationship with humanity

  • But that is exactly what he did with Moses
  • And what he has done with each one of us through Christ

[1] Alec Motyer, BST Commentary on Exodus, page 56

[2] Richard Rohr, ‘Things Hidden’, pages 92-93.

[3] I think Aslan may have said this to Edmund in one of the Narnia books

[4] This is not Kierkegaard’s original parable, just a paraphrase of it

Tawa Baptist

Just Moses

Scripture: Exodus 2:11-22

Title: Just Moses

Structure:

  • Introduction
  • Punitive justice
  • Restorative justice
  • Social justice
  • Conclusion

Introduction:

“Peace without justice is tyranny”  [1]

Please turn with me to Exodus chapter 2, verse 11, page 60, near the beginning of your pew Bibles

  • Today we continue our series on Moses in the book of Exodus
  • I’ve given this morning’s sermon the title ‘Just Moses’
  • Partly because we see Moses on his own quite a bit in this reading
  • But also because, in this passage, Moses realises that the peace Egypt enjoys is a false peace – it is in fact tyranny for it is peace without justice
  • From verse 11 of chapter 2 we read…

 Read Exodus 2:11-22

 

May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate this Scripture for us

In this reading Moses demonstrates three kinds of justice…

  • Punitive justice, restorative justice and social justice

Punitive justice:

Scales of Justice

On the wall here is a picture of a woman (a virgin actually) holding a sword in one hand and set of scales in the other

  • Who can tell me what this symbolises? [Wait]
  • Yes, that’s right – it is a symbol of justice

The virgin woman represents purity and innocence

  • While the scales represent even handedness or fairness – the idea of weighing the evidence equitably so that justice is served
  • But also the idea of making sure the punishment measured out is in balance with the crime committed
  • The sword represents not only the power to punish but also the precision to clearly separate the issues in dispute

 

This image finds resonance with the Bible in a number of respects…

Quite often in the Bible wisdom is personified as a woman

  • And wisdom is what is needed for rulers to exercise justice
  • Hence it is a woman (the symbol of wisdom) holding the scales of justice

The Bible also talks about the importance of using honest scales and in not going overboard with punishment

  • In Matthew’s gospel Jesus indicated that God’s justice fits the crime, when he said…
  • The measure you use for others is the measure God will use for you  [2]

Likewise, in the book of Hebrews, God’s word is described as a double edged sword separating the thoughts and attitudes of the heart, [3] so an accurate and fair judgment can be made

  • And of course, the sword is also a metaphor of punishment
  • In his letter to the Romans, Paul talks about the government having a God given role in executing punitive justice…
  • For he does not bear the sword for nothing. He [the government] is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrong doer.

In Exodus 2 we read how an adult Moses went out to visit his people

  • Moses you will remember had been raised with the royal Egyptian family after Pharaoh’s daughter took him under her wing to protect him
  • Moses’ upbringing had been a relatively privileged one
  • He received the best education available and never wanted for a thing
  • So he wasn’t treated like a slave as his Hebrew kin were
  • And this was probably necessary for God’s purpose
  • To be effective in leading Israel out of slavery Moses needed to think like a freeman – not like a slave

It is quite significant really that Moses sent himself

  • He could have stayed in the comfort of the palace
  • He could have sent a servant to check things out and bring back a report
  • He could have given money
  • But he didn’t – Moses gave himself and that takes courage

This reminds us of Jesus who left heaven and came to earth to give himself

When Moses saw the suffering of his own people

  • And when he saw an Egyptian kill a Hebrew he felt compelled to act
  • In quite a deliberate & premeditated way Moses looked around to see no one was watching & then killed the offender, hiding his body in the sand

Some people are a bit hard on Moses at this point – they say he was an angry young man or that he was impetuous and lacked self-control

  • I don’t think we should be too quick to judge Moses though
  • The text doesn’t actually say Moses was angry – although it is reasonable to infer that he was
  • It takes a lot to kill a man and it is hard to imagine Moses not feeling anything here
  • Whatever he may have felt I don’t think Moses had a problem with anger
  • I think he had a problem with injustice – he had no tolerance for it
  • And that is actually a good thing. As Benjamin Franklin said…

Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.”

Many of us were brought up with this idea that anger is always bad and we must never get angry because that suggests we are bad

  • And to be fair, anger is bad when it’s misplaced – when we take our rage out on some innocent third party
  • But outrage is not wrong in itself – it can be an appropriate response to injustice
  • If you cut yourself you bleed, if you see injustice you feel angry
  • I think God made us like himself, to be disturbed by injustice
  • So that we will be motivated to do something about it

It appears Moses was affected by the injustice he saw

  • He wanted to restore some balance to the scales of justice
  • So he killed the Egyptian as a punishment
  • We might call this punitive justice – justice which makes things even by taking something away

The Law of Moses would later include elements of punitive justice

  • An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth
  • The idea here is not so much to enforce a punishment as it is to limit the extent of the punishment
  • To ensure that people don’t go overboard in carry out their vengeance

Punitive justice is not ideal in that it takes something away

  • It’s a lose / lose scenario – no one wins
  • ‘An eye for eye will make the whole world blind’ [4] – as they say

Having said that, punitive justice will probably always be necessary, at least until Christ returns

  • It can be a deterrent for many people
  • And it may placate people’s anger for a time
  • But it doesn’t have the power to transform people
  • Punitive justice, by its very nature, influences people by external force
  • Genuine transformation comes from the inside, not from the outside

By killing the Egyptian Moses didn’t really achieve much – there would be plenty more task masters just as brutal to replace the one Moses eliminated

  • And the result for Moses was a loss of freedom
  • Moses was forced into exile and obscurity by his actions

Restorative justice:

Earlier we showed a classic image of justice – a woman carrying balanced scales in one hand and a sword in the other

  • Here’s another image of justice…

Or a couple of images actually

  • One of two people shaking hands
  • And the other of a group of people sitting in a circle talking
  • These are images of restorative justice

The image of a woman carrying scales and a sword is quite impersonal

  • Justice isn’t merely a mechanism – like scales or a sword
  • Nor is it an end in itself
  • Justice is an inter-personal relationship – justice must serve relationship

The next day, after killing the Egyptian, Moses returned and saw two Hebrew men fighting

  • Once again Moses is confronted with an injustice and finds himself unable to resist getting involved – he says to the one in the wrong,
  • “Why are you beating up a fellow Hebrew?”

What we notice here is that Moses takes a different approach from the day before – Moses doesn’t resort to violence, instead he uses his words

  • He tries to restore the relationship by talking about it

Punitive justice takes something away – Restorative justice puts it back

So for example, if someone steals your car and crashes it, then punitive justice takes something away from the offender without giving anything to the victim

  • Neither the offender nor the victim get a say in the matter – it’s lose / lose
  • Restorative justice though, gives the victim a voice and the offender the opportunity to make it right – it’s potentially win / win

On the wall here is a table comparing & contrasting punitive justice & restorative justice…

 

Punitive Justice Restorative Justice [5]

What rule has been broken?

What happened?

Who is to blame?

Who has been affected and how?

What will the punishment be?

What needs to be done to put things right?

There is no redemption in punitive justice but there is opportunity for redemption with restorative justice

The Law of Moses would later include elements of restorative justice

  • Leviticus 6, for example: If anyone cheats his neighbour out of his stuff then he must return what was lost or stolen and add 20% to it

Later Jesus would give strong emphasis to a restorative approach

  • When Peter came to him and asked, ‘Lord, how many times should I forgive my brother? Seven times?’
  • Jesus replied, ‘No, not seven times, but seventy times seven’ – meaning as often as it takes

Moses may have had the right idea in acting as a peace-maker and trying to restore the relationship between the two Hebrew men, but his input wasn’t appreciated

  • The man in the wrong answered, “Who made you our ruler and judge? Are you going to kill me just as you killed that Egyptian?”
  • Moses was only trying to help but he was rejected by his own people
  • I think this would have hurt Moses – it would have left its mark on him

This was Jesus’ experience too

  • When Jesus challenged the religious leaders by asking…
  • Why are you laying heavy burdens on your own people,
  • Why are you beating them up with unnecessary shame & guilt,
  • Why are you making their lives harder?
  • They crucified him

After Moses learned that Pharaoh was trying to have him killed, he fled for his life to the land of Midian

Social justice:

So far we have looked at two different kinds of justice: punitive & restorative

  • God is interested in a third kind also – what we might call social justice

Justice

‘Equality does not mean justice’

  • Giving everyone the same box to stand on doesn’t make it fair because not everyone is the same height
  • The tall guy doesn’t need a box to see over the fence
  • The short guy needs two boxes
  • Distributing resources & opportunities so everyone has what they need to see over the fence is social justice

One day, after running away from Egypt, Moses finds himself sitting by a well when seven young women come along to draw water for their flocks

  • As they do this some other (male) shepherds drive the women away
  • Once again Moses is confronted with an injustice

You’ve probably heard the saying,

  • ‘Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime’
  • Well that’s okay but what if the man doesn’t have fair access to fishing equipment or to the fish pond itself?
  • Then we have a social justice issue

Driving the women away from the well so they couldn’t water their flocks was a social justice issue

  • And as one who can’t stand to see people abusing power Moses takes action to help correct the imbalance
  • This time though he doesn’t use violence or diplomacy
  • He doesn’t try to punish the shepherds nor does he try to restore the broken relationship
  • This time Moses simply waters the flocks for the women

Now there may be some who would say, ‘That’s a poor solution because it doesn’t empower the women to do it themselves – and it reinforces unhelpful stereotypes about women not being able to cope without men’

Well, that’s not how I see it

  • If the goal is to bring about social change, so that women shepherds are allowed fair access to the well for watering their flocks, then the change needs to come from inside the male shepherds
  • I’m talking about changing attitudes and values and mind-sets
  • Internal change comes about by being with someone who embodies that change – experiencing someone who is a living example of the change

Just outside the Wellington railway station there is a statue of Mahatma Ghandi with the quote, “Be the change you want to see in the world”

  • I wonder if this is what Moses was aiming for when he watered the women’s flock
  • Yea he was doing it for them – but perhaps he was also making a statement to the other male shepherds
  • Perhaps his act of chivalry would have made them stop and think about their actions so they felt a little ashamed for how they had behaved
  • Maybe next time they would remember Moses’ example and allow the women access to the well – who knows?

What we do know is that Moses found acceptance and a family for his efforts

Whether Moses was able to change attitudes by his example or not the Law of Moses would later include elements of social justice

  • In the book of Numbers (chapter 27) the five daughters of Zelophehad asked for an inheritance in the Promised Land because their father had no sons and Moses granted it to them
  • Social justice you see – giving everyone fair access to the fish pond, giving everyone the means to see over the fence.

Conclusion:

This morning we’ve considered three different kinds of justice…

  • Punitive justice – where people are punished by having something taken away from them
  • Restorative justice – where the loss (and hopefully the relationship) are restored
  • And social justice – where everyone gets fair access to the fish pond, or the watering well

There is a true story which illustrates all of these kinds of justice at once

  • Many of you would have heard it already but it’s worth retelling

Fiorello LaGuardia was mayor of New York City during the worst days of the Great Depression and all of WWII

  • He was a colourful character who used to ride the New York City fire trucks, take entire orphanages to baseball games, and whenever the New York newspapers were on strike, he would go on the radio and read the Sunday funnies to the kids.

One bitterly cold evening in January of 1935, the mayor turned up at a night court that served the poorest ward of the city

  • LaGuardia dismissed the judge for the evening and took over the bench himself
  • Within a few minutes, a tattered old woman was brought before him, charged with stealing a loaf of bread
  • She told LaGuardia that her daughter’s husband had deserted her, her daughter was sick, and her two grandchildren were starving

But the shopkeeper, from whom the bread was stolen, refused to drop the charges

  • “It’s a real bad neighbourhood, your Honour.” the man told the mayor. “She’s got to be punished to teach other people around here a lesson.”

LaGuardia sighed. He turned to the woman and said “I’ve got to punish you. The law makes no exceptions—ten dollars or ten days in jail.”

  • But even as he pronounced sentence, the mayor was already reaching into his pocket. He extracted a bill and tossed it into his famous sombrero saying: “Here is the ten dollar fine which I now remit; and furthermore I am going to fine everyone in this courtroom fifty cents for living in a town where a person has to steal bread so that her grandchildren can eat. Mr. Baliff, collect the fines and give them to the defendant.”

Everyone in the court room gave the mayor a standing ovation [6]

Mayor LaGuardia made sure the requirements of punitive justice were met and at the same time attempted some social justice

  • The woman was also restored in that she now had money in her pocket with which to pay the grocer for the bread she had stolen

There was someone else of course who managed to satisfy the requirements of punitive, restorative and social justice all at once & that was Jesus, on the cross

  • He took our punishment
  • He made it possible for us to be restored to right relationship with God
  • And he provided access for everyone to drink from the well of life
  • For [in Christ] there is no difference between Jew and Gentile – the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’ [7]  

[1] Attributed to William Allen White

[2] Matthew 7:1-2

[3] Hebrews 4:12

[4] This is often attributed to Mahatma Ghandi although it is unclear if he actually said it

[5] http://www.restorativeschools.org.nz/restorative-practice

[6] Brennan Manning, The Ragamuffin Gospel, pages 91-2

[7] Romans 10:12

Tawa Baptist

Miniature Moses

Scripture: Exodus 1:22 – 2:10

Title: Miniature Moses

 

Structure:

  • Introduction – Exodus means leaving
  • Moses infancy tells the story of Israel’s deliverance
  • When God is silent we wait in hope
  • Conclusion – Moses points to Jesus

Introduction:

On the wall here is a picture of an Exit sign

  • It’s one of the new ones with a stylised person running out of a door
  • I guess many of our signs are in picture format now to overcome any language barriers in our increasingly global environment

Please turn with me to Exodus chapter 2, page 60 near the beginning of your pew Bibles

  • Today we begin a new sermon series on Moses in the book of Exodus
  • Exodus basically means to leave or to exit
  • Moses is sort of like Israel’s exit sign
  • He is the one God chose to lead Israel out of Egypt

 

We will begin our reading from verse 22 of Exodus chapter 1 and continue to verse 10 of Exodus chapter 2…

Read Exodus 1:22 – 2:10

 

May the Spirit of Jesus illuminate this reading for us

 

Moses’ infancy tells the story of Israel’s deliverance:

On the wall here is a picture of a Russian doll – also known as a nested doll, because the little dolls nest inside the larger dolls

  • There is a technique sometimes used in story telling where the writer nests a smaller story inside a larger story as a way of reinforcing or explaining the larger story
  • If people aren’t able to grasp the bigger picture then the same story on a smaller scale helps them to access the meaning of the larger story
  • Exodus 2 is a nested story – a smaller story inside a larger history
  • In this passage three daughters deliver one son who, in turn, grows up to deliver a whole nation

 

The King of Egypt (also known as Pharaoh) was afraid of the Israelites

  • They had grown in number and he was concerned they might take over the country so he oppressed them with slave labour
  • This strategy didn’t really work so he ordered the Jewish midwives to kill the male babies when they were born
  • The midwives managed to avoid doing this so Pharaoh issued a command to throw every new born  Hebrew boy into the River Nile
  • Pharaoh was basically instigating a policy of genocide or ‘ethnic cleansing’ against the Israelites

It is in this context that Moses’ mum took a basket made of reeds, covered it with tar to make it watertight and set it out on the waters of the Nile with her baby in it

  • She was obeying the letter of Pharaoh’s law, but not the spirit
  • She couldn’t hide her baby any longer – his growing and his crying would soon give him away and some Egyptian soldier might kill the boy
  • But nor could she simply throw her precious child into the river to drown
  • So she found a way to keep hope alive
  • She gave her son a chance to live and she gave God an opportunity to act
  • This is what faith does – it leaves room for God

It’s interesting that the Hebrew word used for basket in verse 3 is the same as the word used for Noah’s ark

  • Moses is parallel to Noah [1]
  • A little story nested within a larger story
  • Just as God used Noah to save a remnant of creation from drowning in the chaos of the great flood
  • So too God would use Moses to save the people of Israel from being overwhelmed by the chaos of Pharaoh
  • Moses is the new Noah
  • And baby Moses is also a miniature Israel

 

On the wall here we have three pictures

  • One of a model train set
  • Another of a dolls house
  • And a third of a miniature dentist’s surgery made out of a shoe box

What seven letter word could we use to describe all of these things?

  • Wait for people to respond
  • Do you need a clue? It begins with ‘D’ – Wait
  • Yes – that’s right, ‘Diorama’

A diorama is a miniature (or a model) of something

  • Like a smaller story nested inside a bigger story

 

Moses’ life is a diorama of Israel

The name ‘Moses’ is actually an Egyptian name probably meaning ‘son’

  • But it sounds like the Hebrew word, ‘to draw out’
  • Just as Pharaoh’s daughter drew Moses out of the Nile, so too God will draw Israel out of Egypt
  • The smaller story of Moses helps people to grasp the bigger story of God

It’s interesting that in the story of baby Moses, God is parallel to Pharaoh’s daughter – an Egyptian princess

  • Now I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t naturally associate God Almighty with a princess – much less a princess who’s Dad is a homicidal maniac
  • And yet this is exactly what the book of Exodus does

Verse 6 tells us that when the princess opened the basket (or the miniature ark) and saw the baby crying, she felt sorry for him

  • This ‘feeling sorry for him’ goes deeper than superficial sentimentality
  • There is a depth to this princess’ feelings
  • Her feelings are actually grounded in compassion, justice and courage
  • For she takes the risk of going against her father’s command and makes a long term commitment to care for Moses
  • Not all the Egyptians were as bad as Pharaoh

At the end of Exodus 2 we read how the Israelites cried out to God under their slavery and the Lord heard their cry and was concerned for them

  • Just as the princess was moved with compassion by the cry of the Hebrew baby so too God is moved with compassion by the cry of his people
  • And just as Pharaoh’s daughter was faithful in protecting & providing for Moses as he grew up, so too God will protect and provide for Israel
  • Baby Moses’ deliverance by the hand of Pharaoh’s daughter is nested in the larger history of Israel’s deliverance by the hand of Yahweh

Of course, it isn’t just Pharaoh’s daughter who delivers Moses – his mother and his sister also had a hand in saving him

  • And so we actually have two women and a girl standing in parallel with God Almighty

So often in history ‘The courage of women is the beginning of liberation’ [2]

On the wall here is a picture of Harriet Tubman

  • Born a slave in the 19th Century in the southern states of America, she endured the harsh existence of a field hand, including brutal beatings.
  • In 1849 she fled slavery, leaving her husband and family behind in order to escape.
  • Despite a bounty on her head, she returned to the South at least 19 times to lead her family and hundreds of other slaves to freedom via the Underground Railroad.
  • People nicknamed her ‘Moses’  [3]

The courage of women is the beginning of liberation

Who can tell me the name of this first lady?      [Wait]

  • Yes – that’s right. Eleanor Roosevelt – wife of U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt
  • Eleanor was vocal in her support of the African-American civil rights movement
  • She opposed her husband on this issue by becoming one of the only voices in the Roosevelt administration insisting that benefits be equally extended to Americans of all races.
  • She also broke with precedent by inviting hundreds of African American guests to the White House.

 

God’s deliverance often comes from unexpected quarters

  • And, from a human perspective at least, God’s deliverance is often a slow train coming

 

When God is silent, we wait in hope:

There are times when God is silent

  • Evil seems to have the upper hand and God appears to be doing nothing
  • This was Israel’s experience in ancient Egypt
  • We can’t be sure how many baby boys were killed but whatever the number it is awful stuff – Pharaoh’s policy was genocide
  • But it wasn’t quick and clean – it is was slow and agonising

By killing the sons, Pharaoh was crushing the people’s hope

  • With no Hebrew boys to marry, the Hebrew daughters would be assimilated into Egyptian culture
  • Pharaoh was taking away Israel’s ability to imagine any future for themselves
  • He was making their lives so miserable they would prefer death to life

We might ask, ‘why did God allow this to happen in the first place?’

  • Wouldn’t it have been easier if God had arranged for someone to throw Pharaoh in the Nile as a baby?

Well, Yahweh doesn’t give the Israelites any explanation for their suffering

  • Like Job they suffer without knowing why
  • As Alex Motyer puts it, “Experience without explanation, adversity without purpose, hostility without protection – that is how life will always appear for the earthly people of God” [4]     

After the death of his wife, C.S. Lewis wrote a book called, ‘A Grief Observed’ in which he says…

 

“Talk to me about the truth of religion and I’ll listen gladly. Talk to me about the duty of religion and I’ll listen submissively. But don’t come talking to me about the consolations of religion or I shall suspect that you don’t understand.”

When it feels like God is absent – when we really want to hear from God but all we get is silence, our faith is not a consolation – it is a burden (something we feel we must prop up – something we feel obliged to carry)

  • It is extremely difficult to maintain a belief in the goodness of God when bad things are happening to you and God doesn’t appear to be doing anything about it

This feeling that God is absent or has abandoned us is actually common for most Christians

  • It won’t happen all the time but it will probably happen at some point
  • We need to accept (without blame or guilt) that a feeling of God’s absence is part of the journey

As Eugene Peterson puts it…

  • …this seemingly unending stretch of the experience of the absence of God is reproduced in most of our lives, and most of us don’t know what to make of it. We need this ‘Exodus’ validation – that a sense of the absence of God is part of the story, and that it is neither exceptional nor preventable nor a judgment on the way we are living our lives.  [5]

In other words, if you feel like God is absent or silent then it’s not necessarily a reflection on you

  • God doesn’t give people the silent treatment as a punishment

Sometimes we suffer without explanation

  • Not everything in this life gets resolved
  • Not everything has an answer
  • God is not obligated to explain himself
  • Sometimes we must simply wait in hope – without answers

To wait in hope means to remain faithful to God – not to give up on Him, even if it feels like he has given up on us

  • When he was on the cross Jesus cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me”
  • In doing this he was not only describing his own personal experience but also giving voice to the collective experience of God’s people through the ages

Waiting in hope is not the same as sitting in depressed silence

  • Waiting in hope may well involve crying out to God in anger
  • Letting God know how we feel – showing him our anguish
  • That’s what many of the psalms are about
  • If God is not speaking then he must be listening
  • And if God is listening then we should pour out our heart to Him – even if the contents of our heart aren’t all that pretty

Quite often God’s deliverance is only recognisable in hindsight

  • This was Israel’s experience
  • Although they had not heard from God, Yahweh was actually very present and very active, quietly sowing the seeds of their salvation
  • Seeds which (in Israel’s case) grew and bore fruit at just the right time

Many wild plants have seeds that can remain dormant for years before birthing a plant

  • For example a 2000 year old date palm seed, found in Israel, actually sprouted when it was planted back in 2005  [6]

 

As for why some seeds can lie dormant before sprouting, scientists reckon it’s mainly a survival technique

  • If a plant’s seeds sprout as soon as there is a little rain and warm weather, then a late frost or subsequent lack of rain will kill it
  • You sometimes hear farmers complaining about this – they get a bit of rain (enough to germinate the grass seed) but then there is no follow up rain so the grass dies before it gets established
  • Plants whose seeds lie in wait until conditions are more stable have a better chance of surviving and of colonizing new territory

Perhaps this is what God was doing with Israel – waiting for the time to be right before drawing his people out of Egypt and planting them in the Promised Land

  • Perhaps this is also what God is doing in your life when He seems absent

The Lord begins his work of redemption quietly, unobtrusively, under the radar, often through the courage of those we least expect

  • In Israel’s case, God sowed his seeds of salvation through women
  • I guess this proves God has a sense of humour for there is considerable irony in Pharaoh’s policy of killing the sons and preserving the daughters
  • As it turned out the daughters were more dangerous than the sons

For those who can’t see, this is a picture of irony – a crocodile eating a pair of crocs (the shoes)

What about this one – a picture of people using an elevator (and not the stairs) to go to the gym

 

And then we have the ultimate irony – a fire hydrant on fire

There is quite a bit of cosmic irony in the book of Exodus, the seeds of which are sown in chapter 2

  • Cosmic irony feeds on the notion that people cannot see the effects of their actions, and sometimes the outcome of a person’s actions may be out of their control

A classic example of cosmic irony is the Titanic, which was promoted as being 100% unsinkable; but, in 1912 the ship sank on its maiden voyage.

  • Or at a ceremony celebrating the rehabilitation of seals after the Exxon Valdez oil spill in Alaska, two seals were released back into the wild only to be eaten within a minute by an orca whale

Pharaoh is the butt of cosmic irony in Exodus

  • As Terence Fretheim points out, although Pharaoh had ordered the Hebrew sons to be thrown into the Nile, “the river provides the very setting for the rescue of the baby Moses. Again Pharaoh provides for the defeat of his own policy in its formulation. He ends up becoming an instrument for God’s saving purposes [when he didn’t intend to]…
  • The policy is ironic in that it [predicts] the way in which Pharaoh’s successor and his armies will meet their end, namely by drowning
  • Pharaoh’s own decree sets a chain of events in motion that, in effect, have him signing his own family’s death warrant.” [7]

It’s like Jesus said, ‘The measure you use for others is the measure God will use for you’

  • Cosmic irony, a smaller story nested inside the bigger story of God’s justice

Conclusion:

This morning we have heard how Moses’ story of deliverance anticipates Israel’s deliverance

  • Moses’ story also anticipates the Jesus story – the biggest story of all
  • Like Moses, Jesus was born to save God’s people
  • And just as Pharaoh tried to destroy all the Hebrew sons
  • So too Herod slaughtered Hebrew babies in a vain attempt to kill the Christ
  • But neither Pharaoh nor Herod succeeded – you can’t win in a fight against God

After Jesus’ death and resurrection he ascended to heaven with the promise of returning in glory one day

  • Like the Israelites, we Christians sometimes suffer without explanation
  • And when God is silent, we wait in hope for Christ to return, at just the right moment, to complete our deliverance

Let us pray…

[1] Refer Terence Fretheim, Interpretation Commentary on Exodus, page 38.

[2] Refer J.C. Exum, “You Shall Let Every Daughter Live: A Study f Ex. 1:8-2:10” Semeia 28:63-82 (1983).

[3] http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/harriet-tubman

[4] Alex Motyer, BST Exodus, page 28.

[5] From Eugene Peterson’s book, ‘Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places’, page 153.

[6] http://indianapublicmedia.org/amomentofscience/dormant-seeds/

[7] Quoted in Fretheim’s Interpretation commentary on Exodus, page 35.