Do not be terrified; do not be afraid of them. - God
Happy are you, oh Israel! Who is like you? A people saved by the LORD, the shield of your help, and the sword of your triumph!
- Last words of Moses, the servant of the LORD.
I am inadequate. I am unworthy to be doing this. I do not deserve this. There has to be someone out there that can do this so much better than I. It feels like a poison doesn't it? Do you feel this seeping down your spirit, coating everything it touches in a slimy ooze that no matter how much you scrub, scratch or claw at, it just wont come off. Do you notice the dimming light of life, vitality and grace slowly close as inferiority consumes you in it's warm death. The worst thing about this is its true. When rubber meets the road are we really worth the effort. A great man once told me that the greatest thing I ever did in my life was drive the nails into the bleeding wrist of the LORD. In church building after church building, do we fill the pews with numb, dislocated individuals loosely connected to a body all ready fragmented and broken? Moses, when he stood before God, gave every excuse in the book. He held nothing back in the contempt he held himself in, never concerned with how God might see him. Did he look back on his years being a prince looking down on his relatives? Was guilt and remorse slowly tightening its grasp around his hairy neck? Moses had 40 years to reflect, repent and forget, and here we find him in front of a burning bush that is making him rub his nose in it. Was that what God was doing? If I were Moses I would have wanted so badly to run from that place and immerse myself back into the calm life of a shepherd and husband and leave God to his own machinations. If I were God I would have made Moses remember all that he did; show him aerial views of his murder, of his arrogance over his brothers. However, God does not do this; instead, he embraces a broken man thats believes he is not worth the effort of a loving redeeming God. Yes at first God is furious, wouldn't you be? This man whom God created tells God that he doesn't know what he, God, is doing. Crazy right? But in the end, when all pretenses and excuses are brushed easily aside, Moses lays his heart down.
"Please God...send someone...just not me."
I mean really haven't we all said this at one time; yet God time and time again refuses to do what we say. Knowing that there is someone better for the job, or worthy of the responsibility; God still looks at us in the face and says I want you and you are perfect for the job. That is truly beautiful because He could do this by himself and instead he chooses you and I to do it. Worth does not factor in with God, Thank goodness for that or else nothing would get done. God factors in Christ and in that equation you are worthy, you are capable, you are everything that is needed to make real lasting things happen. Really let this sink in for a moment. God knowing what you would do, knowing what we would do to his son once he got here, he did it any way so that we might have a chance to work together. It is easy to look at ourselves as incompetent, unworthy sinners but it takes real effort to see us as God does. In God's eyes we are worth everything. In God's eyes we are real people, not the fake ones we have become so accustomed to but living breathing talking beings. I pray that you see in you the worth that God sees in you. I pray that we embrace hope, life and faith instead of popularity, culture and this life. God bless
