The Midweek

Moses Had Baggage. God Had Plans.

I wasn't at church on Sunday, so I caught this week's sermon the way some of you did, via one of our online channels. One thing Pastor Hannah said that has stayed with me is that God chooses Moses as he is. Moses has his deficiencies, as she put it, "locked and loaded." But God did not ask Moses to look at his deficiencies. God asked Moses to trust God's sufficiency.

Moses disqualifies himself. He is a failed activist, who became a killer, so Moses thinks that God has the wrong man. And while Moses describes himself correctly, that description is incomplete.

We all live within a story that we tell ourselves, about ourselves and the world we live in. Sometimes the stories we tell ourselves are kind and merciful. Sometimes they are harsh and unrelenting. Pay attention to the story you have accepted about yourself and the story you tell about yourself. Make sure it is the story God is telling about you.

Now notice what God does not do with Moses's story. God does not correct it. God does not say, you're right, you blew it, but I'll use you anyway. God does not say, you're wrong, you are more qualified than you think. God does not argue with Moses about the story Moses tells himself. God simply tells Moses a different story: "I will be with you."

That is the whole answer to "Who am I?" Not a word about Moses, only a promise of presence. But Moses wants more than a promise. So God gives him a sign: when the people are out of Egypt and worshiping on this mountain. The sign comes after the task. Moses wants everything up front, so he can be sure it is God before he goes, and God says, you will be sure when it is done. That is not how any of us want this to work. Underneath the sign is a question, and it is the one God asks all of us. Will you trust me?

Pharaoh tells a story about himself too. Who is the Lord, that I should obey him? I do not know the Lord.” Pharaoh's story is production. You are what you produce, what you own, who you can impress. Moses's story says I am too small to be sent. Pharaoh's story says I am too big to answer to anyone. God answers both with one name. I AM.

That name is the whole point. Moses thinks he has to bring everything with him in order to be used by God. Pharaoh thinks he already has everything, so he has no need for God. I AM says neither of them is right. One thing we can know about this God is that God is all-sufficient. God does not need anything from us, but God has everything we need. Paul said it to Athens: the God who made the world is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else (Acts 17:24-25).

So Moses does not have to be enough. He has to go with the one who is. And the deficiencies he had locked and loaded, the worst thing he had ever done, are not the full measure of who he is. Bryan Stevenson says each of us is more than the worst thing we have ever done. God knew that at the bush. God is not looking for human doings. God is looking for human beings who will trust that I AM is enough.

Hannah asked us to say out loud what we sense God calling us to. Here is a way in. If I asked you to introduce yourself to someone you have never met, what is the first sentence you would say? Write it down. Then look at what you put in and what you left out, on purpose or not. Is it a story of overcoming, of hard work, of privilege, of struggle, of failure? Then imagine the sentence God might use to introduce you. If you cannot imagine it, that is the work this week. Say both sentences out loud to one person who already knows part of your story. God seems to speak a fresh word when we let another voice into the story.

Sunday, I'm preaching Exodus 4:1-17. Moses stays at the bush and keeps saying no, and what God does with that is not what you might expect.

Name your Egypt. Trust the God who brings you out. And take another step toward becoming the people God is forming.

Were you gone this Sunday?

• Catch Pastor Hannah's sermon on Exodus 3 in our Out of Egypt series on YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts during your commute or morning walk this week.