BE BOLD

When we are faced with hard tasks, it isn’t always easy to accept the challenge is it?

Today we are going to look at someone who had a really tough assignment.

Moses was very reluctant and afraid to do what God told him to do. But God didn’t just cross his arms and wait for Moses to muddle through the job alone.

He gave Moses the help he promised, and Moses was able to complete the work.

In our own lives, each of us may have to face hard tasks. But we aren’t on our own - we have God’s help, even when we think we can’t do the work.

Let’s take a closer look.

BIBLE READING

Exodus 3

1-6 Moses was shepherding the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the west end of the wilderness and came to the mountain of God, Horeb. The angel of God appeared to him in flames of fire blazing out of the middle of a bush. He looked. The bush was blazing away but it didn’t burn up.

Moses said, “What’s going on here? I can’t believe this! Amazing! Why doesn’t the bush burn up?”

God saw that he had stopped to look. God called to him from out of the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

He said, “Yes? I’m right here!”

God said, “Don’t come any closer. Remove your sandals from your feet. You’re standing on holy ground.”

Then he said, “I am the God of your father: The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob.”

Moses hid his face, afraid to look at God.

9-15 “The Israelite cry for help has come to me, and I’ve seen for myself how cruelly they’re being treated by the Egyptians. It’s time for you to go back: I’m sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the People of Israel, out of Egypt.”

Moses answered God, “But why me? What makes you think that I could ever go to Pharaoh and lead the children of Israel out of Egypt?”

“I’ll be with you,” God said. “And this will be the proof that I am the one who sent you: When you have brought my people out of Egypt, you will worship God right here at this very mountain.” Then Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the People of Israel and I tell them, ‘The God of your fathers sent me to you’; and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ What do I tell them?”

God said to Moses, “I-AM-WHO-I-AM. Tell the People of Israel, ‘I-AM sent me to you.’”

God continued with Moses: “This is what you’re to say to the Israelites: ‘God, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob sent me to you.’ This has always been my name, and this is how I always will be known.

18-21”Believe me, they will listen to you. Then you and the leaders of Israel will go to the king of Egypt and say to him: ‘God, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us. Let us take a three-day journey into the wilderness where we will worship God—our God.’

“I know that the king of Egypt won’t let you go unless forced to, so I’ll intervene and hit Egypt where it hurts—oh, my miracles will send them reeling!—after which they’ll be glad to send you off.

SOME THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

Moses, you may remember was found as a baby in a basket on the river Nile. He was then raised in Pharaoh’s palace. This made him an outsider in the eyes of the Hebrews. Then in a botched attempt to defend some Hebrew slaves, he was accused of murder, and, in his disgrace, escaped to the wilderness to live as a shepherd.

It is here – in the middle of his mess – that God calls Moses to much greater things. (To go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt).

*  God called Moses while he was herding sheep. What could it look like if God were to call you in your everyday life? What might you be doing (eg, sitting an exam, taking out the bins etc)

*  God doesn’t always wait for us to ‘get our act together’ before he calls us to service. This is an important thing to take note of. He doesn’t want us to be perfect or to be the most organised person; he just wants us to respond to his call on our lives. Although the idea of following God into the unknown might fill us with fear, we shouldn’t be afraid as long as we live in God’s strength rather than our own.

FINAL THOUGHT

I think we all feel like Moses when we’re asked to do something that we don’t think we can do. Or when God calls us to do something for him.

But does God promise to be with us? Yes, always! So we can trust him for all these tasks and know that he will equip us for the work he gives us to do.

We can be bold and strong, because the Lord our God is always with us.