true greatness

Moses: Palace raised, dessert trained, Anti-Pharaoh, Pro-God, insecure leader of two million whining, complaining, violent, God doubting Hebrew children who, out of his willingness to serve, endured 40 years of public service without even entering the promised land.

Whenever I am tempted to give up and start an endless streak of rants and raves, I try to remember Moses. Moses had a complicated childhood. He was born in a Hebrew home but ended up being raised in the palace of Pharaoh (the same guy who decreed the elimination of all non-Egyptian male babies during his time) and his nanny/tutor was his own mother...TALK ABOUT DIVINE INTERVENTION! Well...Moses grew up with the proper understanding of who he is, and the real identity of his heritage. But his strong ideologies about his own people pushed him to kill and murder one of the oppressor. This act of crime lead him to the backside of the desert...this is where his real training will start! Alone and depressed, he opted to work for his father-in-law (oh yeah, in the mix of things, he got married while he was in hiding) There...he was trained to be a master herder of sheep! A not so intelligent bunch of creatures who need constant care (not far from what he's about to do). Then in the appropriate time, God called him back to Egypt to free his people...at first he tried making excuses. But in the end, it was Moses' destiny to lead the people out of bondage.

To make the looooooooooong story short...Pharaoh released God's people, all 2 million of them not including animals, after a devastating last plague. Moses accomplished the task not because of him but because he allowed God to work through him.. Moses encountered the difficulties of serving, but in all of those things...he gained a deeper relationship with God. Exodus 33:11 brought me to tears when I read that "...the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend..." The level of relationship Moses had with God was unbelievable. Moses had integrity and humility that made him acquire true greatness.

When you finish reading the story of Moses, you will notice that God did not allow him to enter the promise land because of an incident where Moses and Aaron misinterpreted and misapplied the instruction of God. It may seem unfair for them to get such punishment for one incident of disobedience...but you will notice that God's intention was not to punish, but to give grace. Yes...it is the effect of an intended cause...but with God, the effect of things may have a different purpose. In the last part of Deuteronomy...specifically in chapters 32-34, you will notice that every event that transpired before the death of Moses was grace filled. Moses even composed a whole chapter of praise attributed to God. Then in Deuteronomy 33:1, Moses even found so much grace from God that he chose to BLESS the children of Israel before his death. The same people who chided and complained and even went close in to stoning him were blessed.

Life may be full of irritating people who despises the very truth of God's word...but we have no excuse in giving up on them. As long as we are alive, we have been commanded to preach the gospel...but more than that...we have to love the people we are reaching with the same love God is showing us. Let us remember Moses...he's still human...he still failed...but we cannot deny the fact that he acquired TRUE GREATNESS!