God Works Through His Servants – Pt. 2

Memory verse: I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from Me, you can do nothing (John 15:5)

Let’s continue using the Seven Realities, to look at Moses’ call and response

Reality 4. God spoke to reveal Himself, His purposes, and His ways.

“There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush…God called to him from within the bush, ‘Moses! Moses!’ and Moses said, ‘Here I am’. ‘Do not come any closer,’ God said. ‘Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing in holy ground.’ Then He said, ‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ The Lord said, ‘I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So, I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land’ “(Ex. 3:2-8).

Reality 5. God’s invitation for Moses to work with Him led to a crisis of belief that required faith and action

“Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?...Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘what is His name?’ Then what shall I tell them?...What if they do not believe or listen to me and say, ‘the Lord did not appear to you’?...O Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither in the past not since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue…. O Lord, please send someone else to do it” (Ex. 3:11,13; 4:1,10,13). 

Reality 6. Moses had to make major adjustments in his life to join God in what He was doing

“By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a short time… By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king’s anger; he persevered because he saw Him who is invisible. By faith he kept the Passover and the sprinkling of blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel. By faith the people passed through the Red Sea as on dry land; but when the Egyptians tried to do so, they were drowned” (Heb 11:24-29)

Reality 7. Moses came to know God by experience as he obeyed God, and God accomplished His work through Moses

“Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on. Raise your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea to divide the water so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground. I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians so that they will go in after them. And I will gain glory through Pharaoh and all his army…’ Then Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and all that night the Lord drove the sea back with a string east wind and turned it into dry land. The waters were divided, and the Israelites went through the sea on dry ground, with a wall of water on their right and on their left. The Egyptians pursued them. Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘stretch out your hand over the sea so that the waters may flow back over the Egyptians and their chariots and horsemen.’ Moses stretched out his hand over the sea, and at daybreak the sea went back to its place. Thus, the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead on the seashore. Israel saw the great power that the Lord used against the Egyptians, so the people feared the Lord, and they believed in the Lord and in his servant Moses” (Ex. 14:15-17, 21-23, 26-27, 30-31)

The people you generally see in the Scriptures were ordinary. Their relationships with God and the activity of God made them extraordinary. Anyone who takes the time to enter an intimate relationship with God can see Him do extraordinary things through his or her life. God delights in using ordinary people to accomplish His purposes. Paul said, God deliberately seeks the weak things and the despised things because from them He received the greatest glory (see 1 Cor. 1:26-31). Then everyone knows only God could have done something through them. If you feel weak, limited, or ordinary, you are the best material through which God works.