Category: Moses

Moses and Justice

amos 5 15a

After the Israelites reject Moses’ leadership and betray him to Pharaoh he flees to the land of Midian.

 

Exodus 2:15-17

15 When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well.

16 Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came to draw water and fill the troughs to water their father’s flock.

17 Some shepherds came along and drove them away, but Moses got up and came to their rescue and watered their flock.

18 When the girls returned to Reuel their father, he asked them, “Why have you returned so early today?”

19 They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. He even drew water for us and watered the flock.”

20 “And where is he?” Jethro asked his daughters. “Why did you leave him? Invite him to have something to eat.”

21 Moses agreed to stay with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage.

22 Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land.”

 

This is a very bold move by Moses.  He is no longer a prince, but a refugee in a foreign land.  He still has his zeal for justice, even though it just got him in trouble with the murdering of the Egyptian that was beating the Israelite.  We also see that he loves justice more than the social hangups that he was raised with, because we know that Egyptians detest shepherds. From this we see that Moses was perfectly suited to be the one who establishes God’s law in Israel and who will be the Judge over Israel.

 

Oftentimes in our lives we see things that are wrong, but we don’t want to stick out our necks for another person.  Maybe we don’t know them that well. Maybe it is just something that is normal in society. However we justify it in our minds, we let injustices happen around us all the time because we are afraid of the personal repercussions.  We have seen with Moses that sometimes it might go terribly wrong, and other times it might go incredibly well. We need to have faith to stand against injustice and trust that God will take care of the consequences. Stand up for the person being bullied or mocked.  Talk to your friend who is considering an abortion. Confront racial discrimination in your community. Help your friend who is in an abusive relationship.

 

Hate evil, love good, and establish justice.

-Chris Mattison

Moses’ Early Life

acts 7 25

So now we actually get to Moses in Exodus 2, but Acts 7:20-29 summarizes it very well so here it is.

 

20 “At that time Moses was born, and he was no ordinary child. For three months he was cared for by his family.

21 When he was placed outside, Pharaoh’s daughter took him and brought him up as her own son.

22 Moses was educated in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and was powerful in speech and action.

23 “When Moses was forty years old, he decided to visit his own people, the Israelites.

24 He saw one of them being mistreated by an Egyptian, so he went to his defense and avenged him by killing the Egyptian.

25 Moses thought that his own people would realize that God was using him to rescue them, but they did not.

26 The next day Moses came upon two Israelites who were fighting. He tried to reconcile them by saying, ‘Men, you are brothers; why do you want to hurt each other?’

27 “But the man who was mistreating the other pushed Moses aside and said, ‘Who made you ruler and judge over us?

28 Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian yesterday?’

29 When Moses heard this, he fled to Midian, where he settled as a foreigner and had two sons.

 

This is not about Israelites being afraid of a murderer, it is about them rejecting Moses/God.  The Israelites reject Moses as their leader, even though they already have Joseph as an example of how God can place one of their own in very high places in order to save them.  We do not know why they rejected him, but they did. And they must have reported Moses to Pharaoh, which not only was a rejection of Moses as their leader, but a rejection of God’s plan and leadership.

 

Because of this Moses flees to Midian to become a shepherd and does not return to lead the Israelites out of Egypt for 40 years.  This is very similar to later on when the Israelites do not want to enter the promised land because they are afraid of the Canaanites and are forced to wait 40 years for the unfaithful generation to die off.  Because of their unfaithfulness these people chose to live in slavery the rest of their lives instead of living as free men.

 

We too have a decision to live the rest of our lives as slaves to sin or to take a leap of faith as Moses did and trust in God.  Moses went through a lot of turmoil because of other people’s unfaithfulness, but “He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward.” (Hebrews 11:26).  You can endure all suffering if you can keep your eye on the Kingdom reward that we all eagerly await.

-Chris Mattison

Painful Growth Rewarded

Gen 15 13,14

Moses: Introduction and backdrop

 

Hey i’m Chris Mattison and I would like to take this week to look at Moses and his incredible life story. First, though I would like to take today to look at the situation into which Moses was born.

 

God had made a covenant with Abraham that his descendants would be numerous and would inhabit the promised land (Genesis 15).  In this promise God did tell Abraham that his people would have to leave to a strange land and be enslaved for 400 years, but that they would return to their own land.  As we know countries do not like to have foreigners moving into their land, so God moved Joseph into place as the right hand of Pharaoh so that he could guide the nation through a seven year famine and so that he could provide a place of protection inside of Egypt for the Israelites (Genesis 45:8-11).  As they continued to live in Egypt they prospered and grew in numbers so much that the Egyptians became worried that they would pose a threat to them someday so the Egyptians enslaved the Israelite people. Through all of this their numbers continued to grow as their nation was being painfully incubated inside the protection of Egypt (Exodus 1:8-14).

 

It is difficult to form a new nation in the ancient world because groups always intermarry with those around them and we see this as a major issue for the Israelites for the rest of the Old Testament, and later on God uses the laws and customs that he gives them to keep them separate and unique, but at this time God uses their enslavement to keep them as a single coherent nation of people.  This is maybe one of the most “tough love” ways to keep a promise.

 

During this time the Israelites began to forget about God’s promise and to worship the gods of the Egyptians, because in their minds those gods must be more powerful if the Egyptians are more powerful than them.

 

God’s people always seem to thrive in adversity.  In the early church the numbers of Christians continued to grow even though they were being fed to lions for spectator sport and were being persecuted in every manner imaginable.    Today in areas like China where Christianity is viewed as a threat to the government and is actively repressed the number of Christians is estimated to be around 30 Million and growing rapidly.

 

Maybe you feel like your faith in Christ has set you apart and alienated you from your friends, and that is probably very difficult for you to deal with.  Following Christ means dying to self and maybe that means you have to die to your social group and put up with some ridicule and rejection from society. It can be easy to be worn down by the world and give in and start following the gods of society, and many people do that.  But we need to have endurance to run the race to the end (2 Timothy 4:7).

-Chris Mattison