October 1, 2006 Sermon

Moses
Exodus 2

What do Alex Haley’s Roots, James Michener’s Texas , Saul Bellow’s Herzog, and the Bible book of Exodus all have in common? They all have Moseses. And each Moses leads his people. All right, so Michener’s Moses is a longhorn bull that leads his herd of cattle across the Great Plains, but you get the idea. Moses leads.

We all follow somebody. An admissions officer at a prestigious college recently stated, “I see about fifty applications a day. Each claims that the student who wrote it is a leader. Everybody thinks we’re looking for leaders. But if just one student wrote, ‘I’m a good follower. I make wise choices about who leads me,’ I think I might automatically forward that application for more consideration.”

Whom do you follow? God has chosen leaders. Every once in a while God creates a person to act as a Moses, to lead the people of God where God wills them to go. Who should act as a Moses for you? For this church? For our community?

God used a man named Moses to lead the Hebrews out of slavery in Egypt . More than four hundred years before his birth the Hebrew people had come to Egypt to escape a famine. They had prospered and multiplied. They had grown from a mere seventy to tens of thousands. They had pastured their flocks in the choicest land. But as the generations passed the Egyptians forgot the Hebrew Joseph, who had saved all Egypt from that same famine. The Egyptians enslaved the Hebrews and their Pharaoh decreed the killing of all male, Hebrew babies.

Moses is born a Hebrew. For three months his mother hides him. This seems plausible. Newborn babies make a great deal of noise when hungry, but otherwise they are manageable. Newborns cannot move around. I used to nap with our newborns by simply laying them down on the couch beside me, they against the back, me over by the edge. But babies grow. They learn to roll around. Their cries become louder. Moses’ mother finally reaches the terrible decision to try to find a home for her baby boy among the very Egyptians who seek to kill him.

Moses’ mother puts him in a wicker basket daubed with pitch and hides it among the rushes along the banks of the Nile . You mothers: can you imagine doing this with your newborn baby? She sends Moses’ sister to stand guard, hidden nearby. But she has not left him there at random. Pharaoh’s daughter comes to that very spot to bathe. She sees the basket and sends one of her handmaidens to fetch it. She opens it and—surprise!—sees a baby, which she correctly identifies as a Hebrew.

This is the moment of truth. What will the daughter of the man who has ordered the murder of all newborn Hebrew males do with the one now in her arms? As the Princess of Egypt ponders this, Moses’ sister approaches and initiates a conversation with her. What chutzpah! How dare she? But Exodus tells us she asks, “Shall I go and call you a nurse from among the Hebrews to nurse the child for you?” This smart sister tries to prevent the princess from even thinking about killing Moses by moving her along toward caring for him. She succeeds. “Go,” Pharaoh’s daughter orders her. She does and brings back—of course—Moses’ own mother. She takes him back home, nurses him, and, once he is weaned, takes him back to Pharaoh’s daughter’s household, where he will grow into manhood. It must have been extraordinarily difficult to give him up again, but at least her huge gamble had paid off with his survival.

Fast forward now, with Exodus, to Moses as a young man. He happens upon an Egyptian beating a Hebrew. He looks to see if the coast is clear, then kills the Egyptian and buries him in the sand. Next day he chances upon two Hebrews arguing. When he tries to mediate one asks, “Will you kill me as you did that Egyptian yesterday?” This panics Moses, and well it might. If his murder of the Egyptian becomes generally known his own life becomes forfeit. Indeed, the Pharaoh orders his execution. But Moses has escaped into the wilderness of Midian.

Moses flees a great distance over the desert. He stops only when he finds a well. This is a smart move. Who knows when he will find more water? As he rests there seven daughters of a local chieftain come to water their flocks. The do all the work to get the water up out of the well and into some troughs, but then a gang of shepherds arrives and drives their flocks away so their own can drink. Moses, fighting as he always will for justice, helps the women. They take him home, he meets Jethro, their father, and (long story short) marries Zipporah, one of the seven sisters.

Exodus chapter two closes with a brief historical marker. At this moment in time the Pharaoh dies. Apparently the new Pharaoh is no better, for the Hebrews moan under his oppression. And “God heard their groaning, and remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob.” In other words, dear reader, don’t get too worried. Things look bad now, but eventually God will make them right.

So we have met Moses. Born a Hebrew, raised an Egyptian, he has a hot temper and a passion for justice. He commits murder and flees the country. He marries a non-Hebrew. What is it about him that makes him a candidate for leadership? What makes anybody a great leader?!?

The biblical answer is that God calls a few—a very few—people to lead. God calls them and gives them the qualities they will need to lead in the particular circumstances of their lives and times. We can see this principal at work in the Bible and in history. Great leaders come from different backgrounds. They have wildly divergent character traits. They behave differently from each other. Yet they possess what it takes to lead in their time and place. And all leaders have a passion for justice.

Abraham Lincoln was born poor. His mother died in his boyhood. He suffered from debilitating depression. He had no formal education. He was ugly. As a child Susan B. Anthony was not allowed to play with toys, which her parents felt would distract her from her search for the Spirit of God. She was terribly self-conscious about her appearance and voice. She believed in Jesus yet spoke out against organized religion.

Yet Lincoln grew up to lead the moral campaign against slavery and national division. Anthony led the fight to get women the vote. How did they manage to become leaders? God had created them to fit perfectly into the circumstances of their lives and times. Put simply, they had what it took. Plus, they had a passionate commitment to the justice of their causes. So did Moses.

Whom do you follow? Who is your Moses? Who has what it takes to lead you where you need to go? Who has a passionate commitment to God’s justice in our life and time? Pray that you might choose wisely whom you follow. Seek to follow Jesus, first, last and always. But seek to follow, also, those who will lead you in his way. Test your leaders. Examine their words and deeds to learn whether they get you closer to, or farther from, Jesus’ path. Look for their dedication to their calling, not to their own empowerment and/or enrichment. Look for their trustworthiness. Look for their willingness to sacrifice—themselves, not others.

Whom do you follow? Who is your Moses? May God grant to us all the wisdom to choose our leaders wisely. As you prepare to vote next month, remember these words. As you examine your business practices, remember these words. As you consider our life together as a church, remember these words. Who is our Moses? Whom do we follow?

We follow Jesus. But we must also follow others who lead us to him. Choose your leaders carefully and wisely.