Moses was the son of slaves, adopted son of a pagan king, murderer, fugitive, forgotten shepherd in a forsaken desert. God had a dynamic vision for his life but Moses was entirely unqualified when his journey began. There was much failure to overcome. Yet how marvelous the outcome — God’s grace and mercy prevailed.
A Man With No Future
Moses was the son of Hebrew slaves. His mother loved him dearly, would have given him any gift she could give. But she was a slave and there were many gifts she did not possess. One of those gifts was a future. The terrible effect of slavery is that it destroys the future, destroys any hope for a new or better tomorrow. This was expressed by Pharaoh's order to kill all the Hebrew male children. Male children carry the seed of the future, literally and figuratively. In giving the execution order, Pharaoh was saying, “You have no tomorrow.”
The first area of failure in Moses’ life was that he was born into a family that had no future to give him. This wasn’t his fault, wasn’t his parent’s fault. That’s just the way it was.
When the order came to destroy the male children, God in His grace inspired Moses’ mother to hide him in a basket and place the basket in the river near where Pharaoh’s daughter came to bathe (Exodus 2:1-6). God graciously preserved Moses and gave a future to a child who had none.
Educated By a World Separated From God
Pharaoh's daughter found Moses in the river and she adopted him into the royal family (Exodus 2:7-10). For forty years he received his education in the court of Pharaoh. Egypt was one of the educational centers of the world at that time and Moses was no doubt trained in mathematics, architecture and all the sciences, diplomacy and the exercise of authority. Moses was being groomed for leadership, but it was leadership in Egypt, a nation of pagan idols.
Moses was trained and conformed to the patterns of a world separated from God, opposed to God. It was entirely a secular, humanist education which excluded the wisdom or even the existence of the true and living God. Trained by the value system of a world that enslaves people, how could God use him to deliver people from slavery?
This was the second area of failure in Moses’ life: the failure of the world to educate Moses for service to God. He was the Prince of Egypt but he was not qualified to be the Shepherd of Israel. God in His grace had another school for Moses. First, though, another failure.
Working in His Own Strength
As Moses grew older there was a stirring in his heart. He saw the oppression of his people — an Egyptian was beating a Hebrew and Moses felt a genuine urge to do something. Maybe he was sensing the call of God on his life but he acted in an ungodly way. Sometimes the stirring of God gets tangled up in flesh (unredeemed human nature exercising self-effort apart from God). Moses killed the Egyptian in cold blood (Ex. 2:11,12).
This was the third great failure in Moses’ life. He tried to accomplish God’s purpose by his own strength. Only God can truly strike down oppression. Liberation movements operating in the flesh, whether religious flesh or political flesh, only increase the level of violence. No one is ultimately set free. It just intensifies the cycle of violence.
On the following day, Moses encountered two Hebrew men fighting. He tried to break up the fight and one of the men responded, Who made you a ruler or a judge over us? Are you intending to kill me as you killed the Egyptian? (Ex. 2:13,14).
They were right in rejecting Moses. He was acting in his own authority. Hebrew concepts of justice and authority were related to the justice and authority of God. No one could exercise true authority or establish true justice unless they were truly related to God. Moses was not yet commissioned by God and was acting in his own strength.
Only God can destroy oppression and set people free. When we move without God we only compound the problem. God could not use Moses for the following reasons:
1. Moses was self centered. He struck down the Egyptian (Ex 2:12). Who? Moses did, as if he was saying: “I will do it. I will break the power of the world system, I will free this man.”
2. Moses was self empowered. His mission was based on his own power, his own fire. This always results in burn out. You will be consumed by your own fire if your own fire is all you have.
3. His mission was too small. He was only trying to deliver one man. God wanted to deliver the entire nation.
At this point in his life, Moses was a failure. His sin and failure threatened to over-rule the purpose of God in his life. And now Pharaoh wanted to kill Moses (Ex. 2:15) so the man of God fled into the wilderness and for forty years he worked as a fugitive sheep herder.
I wonder if in the night Moses heard a voice whispering, “Forget it Mo. You’re not the Great Deliverer. You’re just another sinner who missed the vision of God for your life."
Moses the Fugitive
Forty years in the desert. What was that like?
1. It was an insecure life, hiding from the law. Every time a caravan appeared on the horizon, every time strangers rode up, there was a tightening in his chest as he wondered, “Are they coming for me? Are they wearing a badge?”
2. It was an uncomfortable life, harsh. The desert is hot as fire during the day, freezing cold at night. It’s a difficult place to find a comfort level.
3. It was a thirsty life. You have to walk a long way to find water in a barren wilderness.
4. It was a dangerous life. The desert is crawling with scorpions, venomous snakes, marauding bands of thieves. If a well dried up unexpectedly, you could die of thirst. Without shelter you could die of heat stroke.
5. It was a lonely life. He married, had a family, was adopted by a tribe. But it wasn't his tribe. He was separated from his true family, his people, his blood relatives.
6. It was an alien life. This was not the culture he had grown up with. They spoke a different language, ate different food, obeyed different laws, followed different customs and worshipped different gods.
7. It was an unfulfilled life. Whatever he had sensed of the vision of God for his life, the grand design, that must have seemed impossibly broken. “The dream is over. Surely God can't use me now,” he might have thought.
Yet this is the wonder of our God, the God who dreams, the God who purposes and designs our lives. Even after all the failure Moses had inherited — born a slave with no future, educated in the values of a world separated from God; even after all his personal sin and failure — committing murder and fleeing for his life in a barren desert — God’s grace and mercy would still prevail.
Forty years in the desert was the result of Moses’ failure. But God did not impose that forty years as a form of punishment, rather, God used it as an instrument of discipline and preparation. The forty years of wilderness became Moses’ journey of transformation.
A Time of Preparation
God understood with perfect clarity the reality of Israelite slavery:
And the sons of Israel sighed because of their bondage and they cried out; and their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God (Ex. 2:23). God heard their sigh!
So God heard their groaning and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Ex. 2:24). God heard their groaning!
God saw the sons of Israel and God took notice of them (Ex. 2:25).
God sees and hears the cry of people enslaved by the world system. It may seem that history is falling into chaos and God is absent but God is present, aware and purposeful. What seems to be divine silence is God quietly moving history according to His providential design while he secretly prepares human instruments for the accomplishing of His purpose. Often, what God does on earth, He does with and through people who have been prepared to partner with Him, people who see and hear what He sees and hears.
God understood what was happening and He had a plan to deliver the Hebrew people who were crying out to Him. Moses was designed by God to be that human instrument of deliverance. But Moses needed preparation. The wilderness was not a prison for Moses, not forty years of nothing. It was the secret place of preparation — the quiet, private garden which God chose for Moses’ journey of transformation.
We don’t have any information on how God dealt with Moses during that forty year season but we can be sure that none of the time or opportunity was wasted. To be used in the kingdom of God, we must be trained in the ways of kingdom service. That means unlearning the value system of the world and learning a new way of seeing and measuring truth. And so, in the silent, secret school of the desert, God prepared His servant.
When the Lord knew that Moses was ready, He led him to his final appointment in the season of transformation.
The Fire of God’s Glory
Moses was shepherding his flock in the wilderness when he met the angel of the Lord standing in a blazing fire (Exodus 3:1,2). Even more startling was the fact that the fire was burning in the midst of a bush that was not consumed by the fire. That fire was the Shekinah glory of God. Moses encountered the visible, manifest glory of God.
This is Moses’ graduation ceremony from the wilderness school. It is a place of confrontation and consecration.
The bush was ablaze with the glory of God but not consumed. Not so with Moses or with us. In Hebrews 12:29 we read, For our God is a consuming fire. When we encounter the glory of God in His Word, in worship and in prayer, His glory consumes whatever is not His and consecrates whatever we surrender to Him.
Moses needed to stand in the presence of the glory of God, the fire that would confront and consume the self centered, self empowered man and consecrate all that remained.
We rejoice to know that, We are His workmanship (poeima, artwork), created in Christ Jesus for good works which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them (Eph. 2:10). We are God’s artwork and it is in the presence of His glory that He crafts and shapes us. If we will partner with God in those works which He prepared for us, we must allow Him to bring us into glory encounters that confront, consume and consecrate.
Be certain that God has purposed your life and mine but He cannot use us if we are self centered rather than God centered. He cannot use us if we are self empowered. The self centered and self empowered soul will always be working on a mission that is too small, resulting in outcomes that are insignificant. We need to stand in the presence of holy fire.
Why did it take forty years for Moses to arrive at the burning bush?
1. Moses needed forty years to develop eyes that could see the fire of God.
2. Moses needed forty years to develop ears that could hear the voice of God.
3. Moses needed forty years to develop a heart that was willing to turn aside and worship and obey God.
When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him (Ex. 3:4). God did not speak until He saw that Moses had turned aside to look. It took forty years of preparation in the wilderness for Moses to grow from a self dependent liberator into a man who would turn to the glory of God. This once proud, strong son of Pharaoh now is a humble shepherd who is sensitive enough to turn aside and listen and look.
Not everyone can see a burning bush. Not everyone turns aside when they do see one. We may have walked past some burning bushes during our life. Moses had come to the place where he could see and would take the time to turn aside.
Then He said, ‘Do not come near here; remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground’ (Ex. 3:5). Take off your shoes. That is a sign of reverence toward God, the true liberator of Israel. But more than this, it is God calling Moses into a new level of vulnerability. Working with God means I am no longer in charge, I am vulnerable in ways I never was before. What is more vulnerable than being barefoot on burning sand and jagged rocks?
God is saying, “Moses, I want you to partner with Me in the work of deliverance but you will have to walk in a different way. You will need Me far more than you need your sandals. You will not be your own provider or defender. I, the Lord your God, will provide and defend.” That’s vulnerable. Partnering with God is like walking barefoot through the desert.
No doubt Moses had places to go, things to do, but now he is willing to turn aside from his own agenda, from his own schedule. Now he has eyes to see the fire of God, ears to hear the voice of God and a heart to turn aside from his own chosen pathway and listen to God, obey God, reverence God.
Moses may have been sensing the call of God earlier in life but he did not understand the program of God. Yes, God wanted to set the people free. Yes, God wanted to work through Moses. But no, it would not be Moses setting them free. It will be God liberating through His servant, Moses.
So God confronted Moses at the burning bush. The self-existent, eternally glorious God manifested the Shekinah fire of His glory. It’s as if God is saying, “Look Moses, this is a different kind of fire, a fire that burns but does not destroy what it is burning.” God offers a fire that will not destroy us but will empower us. The issue is what will empower our ministry: the fire of God or the zeal of man?
When Moses acted in his own zeal, he destroyed the life of an Egyptian, destroyed his own position in Egypt and threatened to undermine the purpose of God. It took a life time of failure and forty years in the wilderness to convince Moses that the fire of God is better than the zeal of man. The burning bush is where we come to the truth about the inadequacy of our own resource and power.
Pharaoh was invested with the powers of darkness, he represents the world system holding the covenant people of God in slavery and with demonic anointing resisting the purpose of God in history. Moses is not going to step onto that scene and overthrow the powers of darkness in his own limited ability. The only way he will fulfill the purpose of God is with the power of God, the anointing of God and the fire of God.
God partners with people who have learned to see the glory and hear the voice speaking from the glory, people who have learned to set aside their shoes, their plans and their pride in the presence of glory, people who are willing to give up their lordship and risk the vulnerability of serving the true Lord.
The greatest example of servant leadership is Jesus Christ, Who, though He was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant (Phlp. 2:6,7). Jesus voluntarily laid aside the rights and privileges of Deity and humbled Himself as a servant to fulfill the redeeming purpose of His Father.
Moses, Prince of Egypt, wanted to be the great liberator and God could not use him. He became a servant and God used him to set the captives free. Being a partner with God means giving up our ambitions and our privileges, taking the form of a servant. “But I have my rights,” we protest. Yes, and until we give them up we will never be greatly used of God.
God has invited us into ministry partnership, not because of who we are but because of who He is. God can only use those who are convinced of their own lack, broken of all self sufficiency. Failure led to wilderness but wilderness did not prevent the purpose of God in Moses. It was an instrument of preparation, a journey of transformation.
What did Moses learn during those hidden years of wilderness?
1. He learned how to hear the voice of God, how to see holy things. He grew spiritual eyes and ears.
2. He learned how to turn aside to obey and reverence God.
3. He learned that Moses is unable to do anything apart from God but that God is able to do all that He purposes through men and women surrendered to His purpose.
God reveals His purpose:
1. I will deliver:
I am the God of your father ... I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt and have given heed to their cry ... I am aware of their sufferings ... So I have come down to deliver them (Ex. 3:6-8).
Four beautiful and powerful assurances:
I have surely seen the affliction of my people.
God sees humanity’s affliction. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His seeing. How much more does He see us and the world around us. Just as a father has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who reverence Him (Psalm 103:13).
(I) have given heed to their cry.
God hears every cry of despair. He hears your groaning and your prayer in the night. He hears even that prayer which has no words and no sound, the prayer formed of tears. This poor man cried and the Lord saved him out of all his troubles (Psalm 34:6).
I am aware of their sufferings.
We have a High Priest who understands our suffering (Hebr. 4:15). He understands us because He shared our humanity and because, Our griefs He Himself bore and our sorrows He carried (Isaiah 53:4).
I have come down to deliver them.
Who will deliver the people? God will.
God has never been absent from human history. Jesus said, The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He has anointed Me to preach Good News to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are downtrodden … (Luke 4:18). He is Immanuel, God with us, God present in our journey.
2. I will send you:
Therefore come now and I will send you to Pharaoh (Ex. 3:10).
Who will send Moses? God will. Moses is no longer a self-sent deliverer. He is God-sent.
3. I have come down to deliver … So that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt (Ex. 3:8,10).
God is the deliverer. Moses is the instrument: I have seen... I have heard... I am aware... I have come down to deliver … So that you may bring My people … out of Egypt.
But if we had been standing there with Moses listening to those promises, we might have looked around and asked, “Lord, you say you have come down to deliver us. Where are you? All I see is Moses.”
The unseen God who is present in history, He will wrap Himself in Moses.
God says, “I will deliver them and, Moses, you will bring them out. It will be My fire, not your fire; My power invested in you. I will deliver the people and you will be My instrument of deliverance.”
God reveals His name:
Moses questions his own identity:
Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh? (Ex. 3:11)
Forty years ago Moses would have told you who he is. Not anymore. He has been stripped of his former identity. He is no longer the Prince of Egypt. Who am I? he asks.
God did not answer the question:
Certainly I will be with you says the Lord (3:12).
It’s as if the Lord says, “It’s not about who you are, Moses. It’s about who I am.”
Who am I? misses the point. I will be with you, is the point.
God reveals who God is:
I Am Who I Am (Ex. 3:14)
The name I AM (Yahweh or Jehovah) expresses the eternity of the uncreated, Self-Existent God who was, who is, who evermore shall be and therefore is eternally present. I AM is able to forgive the past, deliver us in this present and create a new future because He encompasses all of time and eternity.
All of this is happening as Moses humbles himself before God (3:5,6). God reveals who He is as Moses turns aside to listen, removes his sandals and hides his face. This is about surrendered commitment. As Moses commits to follow and serve, God reveals who God is.
Now God reveals who Moses is: Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers ... has sent me to you’ (3:15). Who are you Moses? You are the sent one, sent by the God of your fathers.
It is only at this point of vulnerability and humility that Moses came to an unlocking of creativity and vocation and personal identity. It started when he was at a place of broken bewilderment, stammering, barefooted. He is no longer trusting in his own power, his own fire, gifts, resources. No longer sure of his own identity. Just a sheep herder in a dry desert.
At this time and place he sees the fire of God and hears the call of God. As he commits to worship and follow, God reveals who God is and in serving God, Moses will discover who he is and begin to exercise his true gifts and fulfill his destiny. He will deliver the nation of Israel from slavery. He will write the first five books of the Bible and Psalm 90. He will design the tabernacle. He will become the Law Giver to a nation and the most famous liberator of people in history. Moses learns who Moses is only as he learns who God is. This begins in a time and place of brokenness and humility.