CHANGING WORLDS BY CHANGING HEARTS

By Jill Roberts and Michael Canalé

 

How does God deal with people He sends on mission when those individuals become discouraged and even recalcitrant toward God and the mission itself? Michael and I believe very few questions could be more important than this one. Why? It is highly relevant to each of our lives because God has every one of us on one kind of God-ordained mission or another, and, during the course of this, every one of us will, at some time, become discouraged and even not wanting to comply with God, due to our discouragement.

 

Like Moses and Aaron, we may lack confidence that we will succeed in fulfilling what God has set before us to do.

 

When we left these brothers, last week, Moses, in particular, was at the end of his rope. The Pharaoh had excoriated his request for this King of Egypt to release the Israelites from slavery, by, instead, keeping them enslaved and, additionally, greatly increasing their already difficult work load. As stated last week, they were told that they would be given the same quota of bricks to produce but now with the withholding of the straw to actually make them.

 

As a result, Moses and Aaron were summarily rejected by the elders of the Israelites, a severe step backward in their quest to lead the Israelites from Egypt.

 

The outcome of this was for Moses to accuse God, Himself, of not rescuing His People. Even after God reiterated His power and authority, Moses, full of consternation, once again tried to beg off from this entire mission, stating,

 

“If the Israelites will not listen to me, why would Pharaoh listen to me, since I speak with faltering lips?”

(Exodus 6:12) NIV

 

What Michael said regarding Moses is even more compelling with this development. That is,

 

“God needed to change a whole world by changing one person.”

 

To return to our opening question of how God deals with those whom He sends on mission, who, like Moses and Aaron, are now strongly resisting the authority of God and are ready to give up, let us turn to the very next verse that follows Moses’ “faltering lips’” comment. That was verse 12 of Exodus, Chapter 6. The next passage begins with verse 13 of the same chapter:

 

“NOW the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron ABOUT THE ISRAELITES…”

(Exodus 6:13) NIV

 

While no quotation marks surround the following verses, we can reasonably infer that these verses are what God was bringing to Moses’ and Aaron’s attention. Verse 14 of this same chapter, begins:

 

“These were the heads of their families:”

(Exodus 6:14) NIV

 

What follows is a tremendous insight into God and how He dealt with Moses and Aaron and, is, likewise, highly relevant as to how He still deals with us today. What does He do? How does He work? What is God Strategy like?

 

It is like this. This is God Strategy. For the following five, extended verses, God’s Word recounts two things:

 

1) Who the Israelites, the ones who need rescuing, are, in general and

2) Who Moses’ and Aaron’s family and tribe were, specifically

 

What is this? Instead of chastising Moses and Aaron, telling them that He is weary of their excuses and that, by the way, they could have been more forceful when they spoke to the Pharaoh, God basically pulls out the family tree, the family albums, in our day, and says, in so many words,

 

“Men, here are MY People, the Israelites. They are worth everything to Me and are, therefore, worth whatever trouble you need to go to in order to rescue them from their hellish existence.”

 

In these Exodus 6 verses, He does this by beginning with a recounting of two of the twelve tribes of Israel – Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, and Simeon. He lists their sons and clans. (Exodus 6:14-15) NIV

 

Then, in God’s brilliance and matchless kindness, there is an in-depth list of Moses’ and Aaron’s own tribe, the descendants of Jacob’s son,  Levi. In this, are the actual names of the mother and father of Moses, as well as Aaron’s wife and sons, and of his grandchild!

 

What could be more inspiring for these two discouraged brothers than to be reminded of, first, who the Israelites were and are at that moment in history, as well as their own closest relatives, WHO ARE ISRAELITES, themselves.

 

In order to accomplish what Michael so astutely said about how God would change the world, He chose to show Moses the heart and soul of the whole world He wanted to change.

 

In so doing, God has NOW put Moses and Aaron, reluctant heroes though they were, into the equation. God tells them to demand that Pharaoh let the ISRAELITES go. He had done this before, but now these men fully recognize that God is speaking not just of HIS PEOPLE, He is also talking about MOSES’ AND AARON’S PEOPLE of both past and present. While, they are not personally enslaved under the Pharaoh, they are close blood relatives of those who are.

 

God has given his rescuers a vested interest in the outcome of their efforts in Egypt. God is saying, “THESE ISRAELITES ARE YOU AND YOUR FAMILY!”

 

How we can all relate to both Moses and Aaron. How faithful God is to put us in the equation and gently bring us to see more clearly all our mission entails. There is no angle from which God is failing to work.

 

In talking about this God perspective, Michael made such an insightful observation:

 

“Don’t think that angel’s swords only fight for you. Angels fight for everybody.”

 

How beautiful to think of this! There’s no side of humanity that God and His “Angel-Armies doesn’t consider.

 

Michael adds,

 

“Don’t lose yourself on knowledge. With God, the center is always about heart. It’s always about love.”

 

How careful we must be to not think that we should simply steep ourselves in information and forget that the essence of it all is love. God didn’t forget it when He put before Moses and Aaron the names of their Israelite family, as stated, right down to the name of Aaron’s grandson. Why? Because God was after a heart. (Then, as now, there is no faster way to a Grandparent’s heart.)

 

God used His own love to teach these two brothers, missionaries to His People, that this is what moves mountains.

 

May we always reach first for the heart, as God did in this week’s study. So many are discouraged enough. God could have chastised Moses and Aaron but, instead, He, as we said, opened the family album and, in the process, opened the hearts of the men He needed to change. This was how God changed the world. Glory!