Sermon Tone Analysis
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Main Point: God desires to redeem our past and use it for his good.
Opening story:
Times that I’ve really blown it and thought - well… that’s it.
It’s all over for me now.
I’ll never recover this - I’m damaged goods.
28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.
Transition: Where are the places in our lives that we’ve come up against this tension of who we’ve been told we have to be, verses who we feel like we really are?
Where are the places where our dreams and expectations have hit a wall and we wonder if our past failures have disqualified us from ever being used by God again?
In a very similar way, Moses was asking a lot of these very same questions.
Today we are kicking off a new series titled “Who am I” where we are going to look at lessons from the life of Moses - “and other burning questions”…
But today we’re going to be looking at how we encounter God in the desert.
What are the ways that God is trying to get our attention and help us to see that he can redeem our past and use it for his good.
Well, as we look at the beginnings of Moses life, we’re going to discover three invitations from God that offer to transform us and our past so that it can be used for good.
These three invitations are, the invitation to:
Encounter Ourselves
Encounter God
Encounter His call
So if you have your Bibles, turn with me to Exodus chapter 2:11-15
As you’re turning there, just a little bit of background.
The Israelites have been growing like crazy.
It’s estimated that there’s about three million Israelites at this time and the Egyptians were fearful of them taking over so they enslaved them.
It even got to the point that Pharoah told the Hebrew midwives to kill and Hebrew boys that were born.
Moses, being a boy, was kept hidden, put in a little raft and strategically put in the river close to where Pharaoh’s daughter came down to bathe.
Moses sister kept watch and the plan worked.
Pharaoh’s daughter discovered Moses, and decides to keep him.
So Moses sister “happens” to come along and say - want me to find someone to nurse him for you?
So Moses is raised by his mother for the first several years until put in the care of Pharaoh’s daughter, and is a Hebrew that is now being raised as an Egyptian.
This is a pretty dramatic childhood.
Separated from his people, his family and not really fitting in either world… Moses is conflicted.
He was destined for greatness - says he was “instructed in the wisdom of the Egyptians” - he had the world on a silver platter.
But eventually his internal life caught up with his exterior life and Moses - encounters himself:
11 One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor.
He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people.
12 Looking this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand.
13 The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting.
He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?”
14 The man said, “Who made you ruler and judge over us?
Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?”
Then Moses was afraid and thought, “What I did must have become known.”
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.
14 The man said, “Who made you ruler and judge over us?
Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?”
Then Moses was afraid and thought, “What I did must have become known.”
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.
Encountering Ourselves
Moses has an identity crisis where he encounters the unrefined parts of himself.
He doesn’t fit in either world - he’s a Hebrew that’s been raised in Pharaoh’s household but isn’t free to go and worship with his people.
He had to learn how to cope… just like we all do.
In his early years he was told who he was to be - “You are an Egyptian” and you can see the inner turmoil surfacing as he “goes out to where his own people were and watched them”.
Pressure is mounting inside Moses… until finally in a fit of rage it all came out.
Moses encounters himself.
How many of us have spent our whole lives striving to be someone that we have been told we need to be?
For many people it’s striving to earn the approval of a parent that just never seemed to be satisfied.
For others we have an inner critic that is constantly telling us that we are worthless - that we’re not doing enough - incessantly driving us to do more than humanly possible and it brings us to the brink of collapse.
You work yourself to the bone to get a 3.9 GPA but the only thing we here is why it isn’t a 4.0.
Or maybe we had a deep desire to pursue a specific degree or education but were told by our parents that they wouldn’t pay for it if we did because there was no money in that field.
Eventually if we don’t deal with these things our lives implode.
how many of us have been striving to be someone that we have been told our whole lives that we need to be? Eventually if we don’t deal with these things our lives implode.
Be a doctor not a musician
Or maybe as a kid we had a formative experience - something we witnessed or experienced where we made a promise to ourselves.
I’ll never be like that, I’ll never be hurt again, I’ll never let anyone get that close, be seen as week, share what I really think, I’ll be self sufficient.
But what do we do when these parts of ourselves come to light?
When we can’t bottle it up any longer and we explode?
Or our lives crumble before our very eyes?
Do this, don’t do that.
This is who you have to be for the world to love you, for me to love you, or for God to accept you
This is how you survive - but you die on the inside.
Many of us carry wounds from our childhood where we’ve promised ourselves - I’ll never be hurt again, I’ll never let anyone get that close, be seen as week, share what I really think, I’ll be self sufficient.
But what do we do when these parts of ourselves come to light?
When we can’t bottle it up any longer and we explode?
Or our lives crumble before our very eyes?
Interesting to me that we spend our whole lives trying to act like we’ve got it together, that we’re strong enough… trying to ignore the huge undercurrent of insecurity just under the surface - it’s how we protect ourselves.
But yet scripture says that true power is found in weakness.
That in our weakness… he is made strong.
Where are the places we’re afraid to be real about our weaknesses?
We’re afraid if we are honest that the whole facade is going to come crashing down around our ankles?
The invitation today is to see that true life isn’t found in hiding but in accepting those parts of ourselves - and that starts first and foremost by becoming aware.
Moses has a lot of raw talent and qualities - but then his repressed anger surfaces.
He responds to a situation and ends up killing an Egyptian.
He’s crossed a line and can never go back.
His internal life is now public and with nowhere else to go - he runs.
Where are the places that we’ve encountered ourselves?
The raw and unrefined places in our lives that we’ve been running from?
Where do we find that we’ve been repressing our frustrations, or angst or our emotions to the point that if there isn’t some sort of pressure blow off valve that we’re going to explode?
Fearful that we might wound someone with our words or actions?
Moses likely was having an identity crisis.
Not fittin
David Benner: “Christian spirituality involves a transformation of the self that occurs only when God and self are both deeply known.
Both therefore, have an important place in Christian Spirituality.
There is no deep knowing of God without deep knowing of self, and no deep knowing of self without a deep knowing of God.
John Calvin wrote, ‘Nearly the whole of sacred doctrine consists in these two parts: knowledge of God and of ourselves.’”
David Benner: Suddenly the gap between his inner reality and external appearance was exposed.
Things that he did not know or accept about himself welled up within him and shattered the illusion his life represented.”
Marriage - we see the effects of our unbridled anger that surface and the toll it takes on our relationships
Experienced a divorce, lost a job, or some other circumstance that leaves us wondering if we are damaged goods?
Moses was a man that was destined for greatness!
He was raised and trained in the house of Pharoah!
But little did he know that God desired to redeem his past mistakes, his unrefined and raw parts of himself, and to use it for good.
But in order to do this, Moses had to come to grips with reality.
He had to:
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