Training for Life - Pt 4

One day, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his people and looked on their burdens, and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his people. He looked this way and that, and seeing no one, he struck down the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. When he went out the next day, behold, two Hebrews were struggling together. And he said to the man in the wrong, “Why do you strike your companion?” He answered, “Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.” When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well. (Exodus 2:11-15 ESV).

Our reading today provides a tough lesson for Moses. He had thought that killing an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew was a good thing to do. Maybe he had thought that by killing the Egyptian he might endear himself to the Hebrews. Maybe the Hebrews would see that Moses’ loyalties were with them even though he had grown up in Pharaoh’s household. However, that was not the outcome at all. The Hebrews didn’t trust him, and Pharaoh soon found out about Moses’ murder of the Egyptian. Pharaoh then declared that he would kill Moses, and Moses found that he was not so valued a member of Pharaoh’s household as he might have thought. Moses learned a very valuable lesson: Taking matters into his own hands was not a good solution to the dilemma he and his people faced. I am fully aware that is counter-intuitive in our culture. There are many other examples of this mistake in the Scripture. Abram and Sarai (cf. Genesis 16) is just one of those examples. Sarai, later to become “Sarah,” thought God needed a little help with the fulfillment of His promise to give them a child to begin the nation of promise. She instructed her handmaiden to be the vessel of that fulfillment. We know how that turned out. It began 6,000 years of strife between two people groups that continues to plague our world today with strife, animosity, and war. Of course we are just as guilty. It is easy to fall into the trap of trying to fix things without waiting on God. We pray to Him and plead with Him, we tell ourselves that we are trusting Him, and then we soon decide we need to solve the problem ourselves. Our mouths open when we should keep them shut, we take on tasks we should leave for others, we play God instead of letting God work out His perfect plan. Moses had had quite an education already, both the hardship of his earliest years and the luxury of his growing-up years had shaped him. Now this mistake, the murder of the Egyptian, would become a teacher as well. It would teach Moses to wait on the Lord instead of pretending that he, Moses, was in charge. That is a grave mistake. However, I would encourage you to “forget the mistake and remember the lesson.” Trust the Lord and His timing!