The Calling of Moses

MSM September series: BEYOND BELIEF

Week 1 & Week 4

Week 1: Main Idea – When you doubt yourself, God can still use you.

Intro

Image: Choosing the right person for the job can be stressful.

Culture: Culture says that we choose the right person based on qualifications.

This would be their background, experience, education, skills.

Belief, the best person for the job is the person who is the most qualified.

This is because in a regular job, it all depends on this person.

God: God chooses people based on their availability, NOT their abilities.

God does this because He is all knowing (He can see things that we cannot. He is wiser. He also does this because He is all powerful (He has the power to accomplish anything, so the weight never rests on the shoulders of the person He is using.)

Belief, the best person for the job is the one who relies of God’s power, and not their own.

Subject: Today we are talking about the job of a follower of Christ. This is not a job from where you get your pay, but it is where you get your purpose... This is a day-to-day job of following Jesus that presents lots of opportunities to be used by God is big ways.

A job to share our faith, and even defend it.

To trust God, care for others, comfort, and guide people towards Jesus, to speak the truth about God to those who need it most.

Need: The problem is that, when it comes to choosing the right person for the job, we see things how the culture sees it and not how God see.

What does this lead to?

Feeling the way you do now. “I know all the bible stories…and there is nothing left for me.”

But, God has more in store for each one of you.

By the world’s standards, you are not the best person for the job, but according to God, He has chosen you.

Text: Exodus 3:1-15

Preview: I want you to see yourself the way God sees you…Ready…usable. I want you to see that “even when you doubt yourself, God can still use you.”

I want you do see how God calls, how we doubt, and how God assures us.

Body:

Context: Our story is set 3500 years ago. A man named Moses (you remember him right, exodus, prince of Egypt movie, baby in the river basket) has just failed big time, and he flees. He is a failure that God uses. He was royalty, and them after killing a man he fled to Midian (rural area) and became a shepherd. His failure took him from the highest to the lowest. He lived there for 40 years! In this time, he gave himself a new identity (a failure, forgotten, UNUSABLE).

· Reasons we feel like we are not qualified to do amazing things for God.

o Reason #1: We don’t have the experience or skill. (NOT good enough)

o Reason #2: We have disqualified ourselves. (NOT good enough)

· MTR: If doesn’t matter how good we are, if God is GREAT!

· Transition: In the desert Moses sees the burning bush. It is at this point that He has an encounter with God, and his calling.

1. Point 1: God has amazing plans for humanity, and He often uses us to carry them out.

a. Read Exodus 3:10 – “So now go, and I will send you”

b. Israel & Moses: Israel has been crying out to God while in harsh captivity under Pharaoh. What they long for they don’t have. The freedom, joy, hope, peace, safety, and salvation that God created them to experience, they don’t have. God hears their cries and sends someone to lead them out, Moses.

c. The world & Christians: Even now, the world around us is filled with people who are being held captive. What they long for they don’t have. The freedom, joy, hope, peace, safety, and salvation that God created them to experience, they don’t have. But God sees them, hears them, and will send Christians to lead them out of captivity.

d. MTR: Every believer is called by God to reach others for Jesus.

2. Point 2: Sometimes we doubt that we are the right person for the job that God is calling us to.

a. In verse 11: “Who am I that I should go…”

b. Moses doubted whether he was the right person for the job.

i. He felt disqualified, underprepared, and that someone else would be better suited.

1. Saving an entire people seemed not just scary, but impossible.

c. We doubt…whether we are the right person for the job.

i. He felt disqualified, underprepared, and that someone else would be better suited.

ii. Having the tough conversations, serving others in a way that seems difficult, going out on a limb even when it seems embarrassing. Taking care of someone who is in need, teaching, and leading other Christians, standing up for our faith seems like something a pastor would do, not me!

d. Feels like you could never do the things God is asking. Feels like you are not ready, and maybe someone else would be better suited for the job.

e. INCORRECT belief: This happens when you think that the results are based on you own power.

f. God always uses ordinary people, to do things that are extraordinary.

g. MTR: God is more interested in your availability than your abilities.

3. Point 3: God will be with you the whole time.

a. Read verse 12: “Surely I will be with you”

i. God is preparing everything that He is calling you to do.

ii. God will give you the tools you need.

b. With God, you can do anything He asks.

Application for Students:

1. God has more in store for each one of you.

2. It doesn’t matter if you think you are ready, God is ready to use you.

3. “If God has clearly called us to the task, he will see that we carry it through. He will give us the grace and the tools needed to accomplish the assignment. Maybe not perfectly—in fact, certainly not—but all he asks is our service, leaving the outcome to him.” The Gospel Coalition

4. Read Joshua 1:9

a. 9 Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”