Hero's Journey; Moses

April 1

(Some lessons in Exodus)

Read: Exodus 2:11- 25

Hero’s Journey Revisited (Part 1 of… ?)

“Then Moses was afraid, and thought, “Surely the thing is known.” When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh and stayed in the land of Midian. And he sat down by a well.” (v.14,15)

Just like Jesus, Moses would not be able to learn his true identity - who he truly was - nor embrace the mission that God had for him without first facing the wilderness… without first facing rejection and rugged barrenness. Moses would have to leave the comfort and ease of the Egyptian palace in the same way that The Son - Jesus - left heaven to come to earth before he could take hold of The Heavenly Fathers plan for him. (cf. Phil. 2) Once again, as we looked at earlier in this study, the people and places that once represented rescue and refuge for Moses (Egypt, the Pharaoh’s household) were now actually roadblocks for Moses… things that were keeping him from entering into who he truly was… the very mission he was built for.

Moses had a sense of this. I think we all do… an inner restless that stirs when we are not living out who God has designed us to be. What would stir Moses to walk out and look upon “his people” as the slaved away? (cf. v.2:11) What would ever compel Moses to leave the comfort of the palace? Moses was most likely around 40 when he fled Egypt… talk about a mid-life crisis! Somehow, despite years of living with Pharaoh in luxury and comfort, Moses still chose to identify with the Hebrews. You can clearly see Moses does not really know who he is in the deepest sense. This is why it is so harsh for him to be rejected by the people he thought where his own. Look at v. 2:14: When Moses was trying to help his “fellow” Hebrews he is told, ““Who made you a prince and a judge over us? Do you mean to kill me as you killed the Egyptian?” You see Moses is rejected by those he thought he was a part of. He comes to the realization that who he thought he was for all these years … the roll he thought he would or could play … that it was all wrong. When the Pharaoh heard of what happened, he was anger and “sought to kill Moses” as well. Rejected again. Moses is rejected by the people he was born into and the people who had adopted him and raised him. He was stripped of his identity… like a blank slate… sent into the wilderness to learn who he TRULY was.

(The wilderness as a place where God brings you a helper / a “family”)

One of the first gifts of this “exile”… this leaving home for a foreign and unfamiliar place… is the gift of a help-mate / a spouse / the gift of love. Notice how Moses “sits down by a well”. Now I do not know if he is aware of it or not, but Moses goes to the very sort of place where God likes to bring a man of God his spouse. Moses sits down by a well and finds himself in the midst of the same circumstances that brought Isaac and Jacob their spouses. (cf. Gen. 24:11, 29:2) Moses - now stripped of his comforts and identity - finds himself “standing up for and saving” the daughters of the priest of Midian from a band of belligerent shepherds. Moses must have been a pretty scrappy dude! He flies off the handle and kills a slave master, then out-numbered he fights a crowd of rugged shepherds. What a boss! The point is that Moses is - in a small way - coming into his new identity as a rescuer.

When the girls tell their father, he insists that Moses come and “eat bread”… that he would come and visit. It says that “Moses was content to dwell with the man, and he gave Moses his daughter Zipporah.” (v.21) Moses found companionship and love with Zipporah. He found a family that welcomed him. He eventually was given a son by the Lord. It says that Moses was “content” to dwell with Jethro. In the midst of his “exile” or time outside… after leaving “home”… he was met with blessing and contentment. Gifts from God given in the “wilderness”. But we know more of the story is coming. God WAS NOT “content” to leave Moses there in Midian. Just like his mother knew decades ago… “there must be more to the story”. Moses may have been “content” with his newfound home, wife, family, and simple life carved out with the flocks of animals but God was working something bigger in him. There was more for Moses than just settling down with Zipporah. We will continue tomorrow but for today:

As God’s people, we will always become restless when we are living anything less than what God has called us to. The restlessness will drive us out looking for “our people”… looking for our identity. When we anchor our identity outside of who God says we are, we will never find any comfort or rest. (Notice how Moses wasn’t “content” until he was 40yrs old, exiled out of the comfort of the Egyptian palace and rejected by both his adoptive family and the people he thought he was a part of!) There is an increased stirring and restlessness that comes when God is moving us into the meaning and purpose that HE has for us. We are not fit to lay hold of it until we have experienced leaving the comfort of the palace and tasting rejection from the earthly people and places we have been anchoring our identity and hope in. Once we are stripped of our comforts and the identities we have assigned to ourselves (think go the games we play where we try to decide for ourselves who we are and then materialize that identity through what we say, do, and wear) we are fit to embrace God and be embraced by Him. These rejections and losses of comfort will lead us away from “home” on a journey to “foreign lands” and this is where we can powerfully meet God… this is where the “burning bush” is located… this is the place where “angels come down” and supernaturally attend to us (as they did to Jesus in the wilderness). (cf. Mark 1:13) This is oddly enough where we will find ourselves “content”. God makes us a part of a “new family”… the family of God. We are initiated into a new group of people… people who have braved the wilderness and met the ONE TRUE LIVING GOD there. We enter into a stream of men and women who have been stripped of / let go of earthy comfort and labels in exchange for the “contentment” of a different land and the “holy ground” of a burning bush. And just like Moses, the Lord will not leave us in “exile” - he is transforming us through this process so that we will be fit to embrace our part in his story. This is always the hero’s journey - leaving home to one day return transformed by his or her time in the wilderness. What comforts do you need to walk away from? What people are you afraid of being rejected by? What restlessness is God stirring in you? Do not fear this journey… HIS journey for you. God will bring you help along the way. He will meet you. Love you guys. - JDP