…when Moses was grown…he went out to his brethren and looked at their burdens. —Exodus 2:11
Moses saw the oppression of his people and felt certain that he was the one to deliver them, and in the righteous indignation of his own spirit he started to right their wrongs. After he launched his first strike for God and for what was right, God allowed Moses to be driven into empty discouragement, sending him into the desert to feed sheep for forty years. At the end of that time, God appeared to Moses and said to him, “ ‘…bring My people…out of Egypt.’ But Moses said to God, ‘Who am I that I should go…?’ ” (Exodus 3:10-11). In the beginning Moses had realized that he was the one to deliver the people, but he had to be trained and disciplined by God first. He was right in his individual perspective, but he was not the person for the work until he had learned true fellowship and oneness with God.
We may have the vision of God and a very clear understanding of what God wants, and yet when we start to do it, there comes to us something equivalent to Moses’ forty years in the wilderness. It’s as if God had ignored the entire thing, and when we are thoroughly discouraged, God comes back and revives His call to us. And then we begin to tremble and say, “Who am I that I should go…?” We must learn that God’s great stride is summed up in these words— “I AM WHO I AM…has sent me to you” (Exodus 3:14). We must also learn that our individual effort for God shows nothing but disrespect for Him— our individuality is to be rendered radiant through a personal relationship with God, so that He may be “well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). We are focused on the right individual perspective of things; we have the vision and can say, “I know this is what God wants me to do.” But we have not yet learned to get into God’s stride. If you are going through a time of discouragement, there is a time of great personal growth ahead.
________________________________________________________________________
Journal DJR
Good morning Lord,
The first lesson here seems to be that we will see more wrongs than we can right, and have more opportunities to do good than we can possibly do … so identifying right ones from the multitude of options is the key. We aspire to be like you in John 5:19 where you “only did what you saw the Father doing and only said what you heard the Father saying” Easier said than done I must say…. With all the clamoring voices, both outside and especially inside my head, it’s so easy to wind up finding myself out herding sheep in a desert, having missed you and wasted a lot of time.
Well, I understand your desire to get it right the first time and all the time. But don’t be so quick to judge your failures, or Moses. What if my plan was to make Moses … “a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth?” Numbers 12:3 You can see that the 40 years of sheepherding got used to change Moses. I will use all the things that happen to you as well. Good things, Bad things, all things.
Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who[a] have been called according to his purpose.
It seems like you are saying not to strive to do good and fight evil etc.
Well, how has that worked out for you and how well did it work out for Moses? You can strive, but it will only work well when you are connected to me and following my lead. So if you want to strive… just strive to stay connected and be obedient to the nudges and cues from my Spirit. Then stop trying to work for me and stop “working” on your sins. Just live with me and we’ll have a good time together. As you live in me, those sins will just fall away. Pretty simple, don’t complicate it. A couple of non-striving things that won’t get you off track killing Egyptians are curiosity and gratitude. I recommend those two for you…
Click Image for John White's Original Vision For CO2's
