When Moses went to Pharoah, he continued to learn to go to God. You know the story: God sent plagues, Pharoah repented, asked Moses to pray, Moses prayed, God removed the plague, Pharoah changed his mind. This happened 9 times before Pharoah let the people go, then pursued them to the Red Sea where God miraculously delivered the Israelites and destroyed the Egyptian army in the sea.
After the deliverance of Israel from Egypt,
Moses sang the first recorded song of praise, recorded in Exodus
15:1-19. I think
this is an important aspect in Moses growth; that he celebrated and praised God
for the good
works He had done.
Exodus 15:1-3, 11
Then Moses and the people of Israel sang this
song to the LORD, saying, "I will sing to the LORD, for he has triumphed
gloriously; the horse and his rider he has thrown into the sea. The LORD is my
strength and my song, and he has become my salvation; this is my God, and I
will praise him, my father's God, and I will exalt him. The LORD is a man of war; the LORD is his
name. "Who is like you, O LORD, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic
in holiness, awesome in glorious deeds, doing wonders?
Exo 15:23-26 When they came to Marah, they
could not drink the water of Marah because it was bitter; therefore it was
named Marah. And the people grumbled
against Moses, saying, "What shall we. drink?" And he cried to the
LORD, and the LORD showed him a log, and he threw it into the water, and the
water became sweet. There the LORD made for them a statute and a rule, and
there he. tested them, saying, "If you will diligently listen to the voice
of the LORD your God, and do that which is right in his eyes, and give ear to
his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will put none of the diseases on
you that I put on the Egyptians, for I am the LORD, your healer."
This became a regular pattern. The people did
not have something they needed. They complained to Moses. Moses made the
request to God. God took care of it. The people did not seem to really learn
from these experiences, but Moses did. As he came to God to make requests on
behalf of the people, and saw God provide, Moses grew in faith, and became more
intimate with the Lord.
Moses was not the only one who had the opportunity to have an intimate relationship with the Lord. In Exodus 20, God spoke to all of the people.
He told Moses for them to get ready, and come to the bottom of Mount Sinai.
Then God gave the 10 commandments to all of the people, not just Moses.
Exo 20:18-21
Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and
the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and
trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, "You speak to us, and
we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die." Moses said
to the people, "Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear
of him may be before you, that you may not sin." The people stood far off, while Moses drew
near to the thick darkness where God was.
At the beginning of this great journey, when God first spoke to Moses,
he was afraid, but he had the courage to stay with God and listen to him.
When the rest of the people had the
opportunity to hear God, they were afraid. And they made a sad, bad
choice, to
withdraw. Fear of God is not bad, it is a good thing. But the right kind of
fear of God does not cause
us to draw away. In our fear, we come to God
recognizing that He is holy, but also that He invites us to come
to Him. When
Moses confronted God at the burning bush, he was afraid. God told him to remove
his shoes
because the ground was holy. Moses responded to his fear in an
appropriate way, removed his shoes, and
heard from God in a way that changed
his life.
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