Moses Given Powerful Signs

Story: Moses Given Powerful signs

Passage: Exodus 4:1-17

Characters:  Moses, God, random snake

Summary: Moses questions God’s plan.  Moses wants to know what to do if the people don’t believe him.  God gives him three miraculous signs to use if the people don’t believe Him and promises to be with him.  Moses then complained that he was not a good speaker.  God reminded him that He had created the mouth and Moses would be fine.  Moses then asked God to send someone else and God got angry and told him that Aaron would help him.

Notes:  Moses was a coward.  In the previous chapter, God very clearly stated that the people would listen to him, but Moses didn’t believe it and he wanted a backup plan.  God listened to Moses and gave him three signs.  His staff would become a snake, his hand would become leprous, and water would become blood.  The first two signs involved something being restored which is cool since God is trying to restore His people to their land.  I find it hilarious that God asked Moses what he was holding.  Of course it was a staff!  But God wanted to make sure Moses was fully aware of what God was about to do.  When he sees the snake, he runs from it.  Apparently, Moses had a fear of snakes as well.  God told him to do something that no one with a fear of snakes wants to do.   Grab it by the tail.  If you know much about snakes, you know that grabbing a snake by the tail is a good way to get bit.  To his credit, Moses obeyed and the snake turned back into a staff.  Now that God had covered how to make the people believe, Moses moves to his next excuse.  He is slow of speech and slow of tongue.  In the words of Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof, “For a man who was slow of speech and slow of tongue, he talked a lot!”  Anyway, God reminded him that He would be with Moses’ mouth and teach it what to speak.  Now Moses had just been told by a fiery bush that he was supposed to go to Pharaoh and be the leader of God’s restoration and deliverance.  God would work wonders through him and would be in his mouth teaching his mouth what to say.  Moses had to do very little but be in the right place at the right time.  Yet his next question is “Can’t you send someone else?”  At this point God got angry with Moses.  Moses was not being humble here, he was being distrustful of God’s words.  God even obliged Moses here though by supplying Aaron.  I find it cool that the relationship between Moses and Aaron was supposed to be the same as between God and Moses.  Moses would give Aaron the words to say in the same way God was going to give Moses words to say.  God finished the conversation by making sure Moses had his staff.  Overall, this was not a high point in Moses’ life, but it does really encourage me!  I will talk more about that in the lessons though. 

Questions:  Why could Moses not trust God?  Why did God not get impatient with Moses earlier?  Why did God choose these three signs?  Why was Aaron on his way to meet Moses?

Lessons:  This is an encouraging story for me because it shows that as many times as we reject God and try to do things our own way, He is still willing to use us.  Moses obviously did not trust God very much, but God still used him in amazing ways over his life.  I find it interesting as well that Moses was allowed to question why we was chosen for this task.  God had no issue with that.  Moses realized his human flaws.  God wants us to know we are useless.  Moses went wrong when God told him how He would fill Moses’ imperfections and Moses did not believe Him.  It is okay for us to realize we are weak and inadequate, but if we assume that God cannot compensate for our inadequacies, we are very wrong and in a dangerous spot.  Yes we are weak, but in our weakness, He is made strong.