Exodus 4:1-5:21, Matthew 18:1-22, Psalms 22:19-31, Proverbs 5:15-21
Today is the 27th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It’s great to be here with you today. And here we are at the close of another week. Man, it won’t be but a couple days and we will have completed the first month of the year. That’s how fast this all moves. So, let’s dive in for the next step. We’re just getting to know Moses. Moses is going to be a part of our story for a long time. And then once his life is over the impact of his life will be felt throughout the rest of the Bible. But right now, before all of that, he’s having a conversation with a burning bush. Exodus chapter 4 verse 1 through 5:21.
Commentary:
Okay, in the book of Exodus, Moses is talking to God through this burning bush and all of the signs that he was given and the command to go back to his people. And Moses is just backpedaling the whole way. He has a lot of questions and a lot of excuses until he finally says some words that are pretty sad words in the Bible, please just send somebody else. And we could just linger there, we could just stop there because it invites us to consider the ways that we find and have found ourselves in the same position, where we’re being called into a season of transition that is going to be a bunch of hard work, where we’re being invited into something risky and new, when we’re being invited to mend old fences, any number of things. And we find ourselves working through it, feeling God pulling us in certain directions, and we’re thinking it over and we have every excuse. Until we, finally, with our lives or with our words, simply say the same thing. Can’t you just get somebody else to do this?
Of course, this contrasts starkly with Jesus discussing the kingdom and who is the greatest in the kingdom. When he pulls a child upon His lap and says unless you have the faith of a child, you can’t even get into the kingdom. Every time I read that passage I think of my own children. And we can easily think of our own children. I mean, my children of varying in their ages, but I have a little guy who is five years old and the world of wonder that he lives in, where really nothing is impossible and he knows that his mother and father love him and are caring for him and will continue to care for him. So, that that’s not a concern on his radar, that’s not a part of his life. Just the wonder of it all is what he experiences each and every day, new, each and every day. It’s what Jesus is talking about. That’s the invitation here. Right? Because Jesus has been telling us all you have to do is look around. Just look at the natural world. Look at how beautiful it is and look at how the seasons change it, so how beautiful flowers fade and go away. If your heavenly Father can care about those and cultivate those He can certainly take care of you. That’s the invitation. That’s how we can live. Like, what would fall off of us? Like, what would begin lifting? What clouds would blow away in our lives if we actually exhaled into that and thought, okay the faith of the child is wonder and trust, faith and an endless reservoir of hope, discovery, and adventure, and an assurance that we’re being cared for. This is what we’re invited into. But it’s more than just an invitation. According to Jesus, that’s how the kingdom works. You can’t be in the kingdom unless you can trust your heavenly Father as your children would trust you. That’s a pretty big invitation and it’s a pretty big deal because that’s not just a picture of how we could live, it’s a picture of how were supposed to live.
So, we can see that that's different than Moses’ response. Moses is still going through identity crisis. Right? He was born a slave, he was then rescued by Pharaoh’s daughter and raised as royalty. Then he killed an Egyptian and went on the run and was an immigrant and homeless. Now he’s married and has a couple of kids and God is calling him to go back to Egypt and be a part of setting his children free. And Moses just wants God to send somebody else. In the end, of course, God sends Aaron, Moses' brother to meet up with them and they will be a pair for a long, long time in the leadership of Israel. And the family sets out. They’re not going to accompany Moses all the way back to Egypt. Only Moses and Aaron will be making that trip, but the family starts out and we encounter this really, really strange paragraph in the middle of everything that’s just odd. So, God tells Moses that when he does get back to Egypt and he does ask Pharaoh to let his people go that Pharaoh’s not going to do that. So, Moses is instructed to tell Pharaoh, ‘this is what the Lord says Israel is my oldest son. I said to you, let my son go so he could worship me, but you refused to let them go. As a result, now I’m going to kill your oldest son.’ Okay, so that’s the context that leads us into the strange paragraph. And the strange paragraph reads, ‘during their journey, as they camped overnight, the Lord met Moses and tried to kill him. But Zipporah took a sharp-edged flint stone and cut off her son’s foreskin. Then she touched Moses’ genitals with it and she said you are my bridegroom because of bloodshed. So, the Lord let him alone. At that time, she announced, a bridegroom because of bloodshed by circumcision.’ Okay, so what does that even mean? So, there have been several interpretations of this over millennia, but I’ll tell you what I think is the most congruent explanation. So, the first verse in that paragraph during their journey as they camped overnight, ‘the Lord met Moses and tried to kill him’ is probably a mistranslation. The earliest Hebrew manuscripts that exist today - so, the most ancient versions of this passage of Scripture that we have on earth - do not say that the Lord met Moses and tried to kill him. They say the Lord met him and sought to kill him. Now unless we think this is just something in the translation that were reading this week, that wouldn’t be the case. Many translations have this as Moses and many others have it as him. But why would this be a big deal? Because it changes who we’re talking about. It’s easy enough to assume Moses, as many scholars have thought over the years, but if the word is him and circumcision is the issue and Moses’ wife Zipporah is involved in circumcising her son because of this issue, then the him is probably Gershom, Moses firstborn son, because remember the context? God had just told Moses what to tell Pharaoh and it was a conversation, not a good one, but a conversation about firstborn sons. We already know that Moses doesn’t want to do this. We already know that Moses has asked God to send someone else to do this job. And, so, when he sets out, we can’t imagine that he’s ecstatically excited to get back to Egypt. He doesn’t want to go there. And yet circumcision is a sign of the covenant with God. And so, if Moses hasn’t circumcised his son as he heads back into Egypt where this massive confrontation with Pharaoh is awaiting, then we can see that Moses is very halfhearted in all of this. And God is confronting that because this is in no way a halfhearted mission. So, here’s a little bit of a back story. Circumcision - and I know you didn’t wake up this morning or you haven’t laid your head down tonight thinking that you’d tune in and listen to some of the Bible and then we would have a discussion about penises. But the Bible isn’t a candy-coated book. So, here we go. The Israelites were not the only people in the world to invent circumcision. And the people that Moses fled to, to live among as a person who was homeless, after he fled Egypt, they practiced circumcision too. Just differently. Apparently, not quite as comprehensively. So, it could have been that Gershom, Moses' firstborn son, had been circumcised in the Midianite way, but this was a little bit different. And Moses not taking the time to make sure everything in his household was right before God as he walks back in to demand the freedom of all of the slave labor of the Egyptian country. Right? He’s asking for something that would completely affect the country economically and God had already told Moses that Pharaoh wasn’t going to have anything to do with it. So, for Moses not to get everything in order as he moves into this conflict is likely why we see this short paragraph, this little scene in the Bible. And Zipporah, Moses’ wife, being raised as the daughter of a priest steps forward and circumcises her son. So, her taking the foreskin and then touching Moses feet or his genitals or touching Gershom’s genitals - however that’s being done - is probably the right. Right? The ceremony as she understands it. And then she says to Moses you are my bridegroom because of bloodshed, which sounds ominous and maybe even angry. But, put into a vernacular that we can understand, she is saying, you are my blood relative, which is not an ominous thing. So, whether she’s saying that to Gershom, her son, or whether she’s saying it to Moses about their son it makes a lot more sense. And, so, there you go. The point would be Moses’ posture of heart and preparedness for what he’s stepping into and how he doesn’t want to step into it and how he’s going in halfhearted. And, believe me, there’s going to be many times that we see Moses exasperated at what he’s being called to do. But, I’ve got to tell you, the Bible would be quite, I mean drastically different, if Moses hadn’t done what he was called to do, which forces us to consider our own lives again, because our own family story can be drastically different on down the line in future generations if we don’t step up, full hearted, and walk with God. So, the Scriptures have given us plenty to consider today in our lives.
Prayer:
Father, we invite Your Holy Spirit into that as we do every day. All of the things that You bring up in Your word, we choose to take them to heart, which choose to hold them dear, and we ask Your Holy Spirit to plant them in our lives. We ask that Your word seeps down to the roots of who we are, down to the level of our identity, transforming us. Give us the faith of a child. Show us how to live that free and with that sense of wonder. Show us how to do this with a whole heart and not halfheartedly. Show us the things in our lives that are making us halfhearted. Help us God. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.
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And that’s it for today. I’m Brian. I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
Hi brothers and sisters. It’s January the 23rd. I’m calling because I live Minnesota and we recently had a very __ snowstorm yesterday. This morning I just feel like I need to confess something. I was on my way to work and my work had notified me it was okay to be up to two hours late because of the snowstorm, very generous of them. I left early to make sure I got to work on time and I arrived in plenty of time. And then, on my way to work this morning, there were people stuck in the middle of the road in my residential area and I felt annoyed with them. They were in my way, preventing me from getting to work, which I had plenty of time to do and I’m sure they could have used my help. And instead of getting out of my car and helping them I just found all these excuses in my head as to why I couldn’t stop. And, so, I’d just like to pray for us all, that we remember that God will give us what we need if we just stop and listen to Him. And that’s what we need to do, is to stop sometimes and listen. And, so, I pray we can all find the strength to do that, that God will give us the strength to do that. And He does it because He loves us, and He loves everyone around us, and He wants us to be a witness to them. Thank you. Goodbye.
Hey DAB this is Luke and Colorado. I just wanted to lift up Jordan, the teacher in Michigan, I believe, in prayer, and just encourage you brother that, you know, you just make it through this time, you know. And God has got you in the palm of His hand and He is holding you, He is your Father, He is your Abba, and, you know, I just need you to be strong and courageous in this time. You know, we at the DAB, are backing you in prayer, but more importantly the Holy Spirit is with you every step of the way. You cannot do this, but God can do this. And God can do this through you. So, believe and just lean on Him with all that you are and fall on Him. I just…love you so much Jordan and we are with you brother and we are standing with you in faith and in love, most of all, in love. Father God, I thank You so much for Jordan. And God, thank You for his courage to call in and just speak what he needs to speak God, that he need you near him and God that he needs his family near him as well, the DAB, and the whole of Your family, Lord Jesus. Just come around him and just stand over him God. Let him be in the shadow of Your wings. Lord, protect him and guide him. And God we just pray for the school system God, that You would lift these insidious evils away from the school. We bind those up in the name and in the blood of the Lamb, in Jesus’ name. God, we just loosen the teachers that are Christian men and women, wholesome, that are infiltrating, if you would, the school system in the United States in changing it and bringing it back to the values that you have put forth in Your word Father God.
Hi Daily Audio Bible this is Tess in California. I was wearing today for James, the teacher in LA. James it’s so good to hear your voice. I’ve been listening for, I think, 10 years, and I have been following you and your family praying for you. I’m praying that you would be engaged in the kingdom. That’s also something the Lord’s put on my heart. And I have a piece of paper on my desk at home that says __, so I know what you’re talking about, to be present with Christ. It’s really important, and it’s a great reminder for me that you called in. I also wanted to encourage anyone that has begun the Daily Audio Bible this year to remember, when you miss days and you feel like I failed, I can’t do this, remember that the Lord would never tell you not to listen to the Daily Audio Bible because you missed a day. That would probably be the enemy. So, in the last 10 years there’s been times where I have missed days for whatever reason. And sometimes I just start on the day I’m on. And it is such an epic story that I often will want to know, wait a minute what I miss, and so I will go back and complete as of days as well, but it’s not a checklist. It’s a relationship. So, be blessed and encouraged. It’s not a heavy weight, it’s just an invitation. Bless you all, love you all. Bye-bye.
Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Linda from Alberta calling. I usually try and touch base about every six months and it’s that time again. Things are going relatively well. I’m leaning on the Lord every single day and, you know, a life happens but with God we have hope and that’s a really, really good thing. I was prompted to call in today because I heard Pelham call and I think it was yesterday’s podcast, the 22nd. And Pelham, I just want to know that I am praying for you and I know you sounded kind of hopeless. I remember your journey and I remember when you called in and you and Molly had just got married. And, so, I just really think and believe that God has something for you and He is in control of everything and He knows exactly what’s happening in your life right now. And I hope that will mean something to you and I am praying for you. Also, it was Mary the physician, thank you very much for calling and explaining the difference between a loss, when we say someone takes their life or they died by suicide. I think that was a really good explanation you did, where you compared fault and blaming to a disease. And I, myself, have taken a lot of mental health training and I thought you did such an awesome job as a reminder. So, thank you so much for that. Will from Bozeman it was really, really good to hear you today. I often wonder where you are but I thought, oh, it was nice to hear from Will. So, I’m praying for you also. And everybody, when I listen, I pray along. Sometimes I have to stop and just really get into a really intense prayer, and then carry on the listen to your requests. So, everybody know that you’re covered by so many people. Okay, well, I think my time is up. So, God bless everybody and we’ll talk to you again. Bye-bye.
Hi friends. It’s Lisa the Encourager. Bee, my beautiful Bee from Canada. Oh, my goodness, for thinking of me and praying for me, you just filled up my juices, and I just thank you so much for that. I can not tell you how much your prayer was so spot on with every little detail of everything you said about just needing some real R&R and that we just need to trust God and stay focused and praying for my encouragement, and I can’t even tell you how much it meant to me. I love you so much for your prayer and it was just a beautiful, beautiful gift that I needed to refill my tank. Som I thank you so much. I also wanted to pray for Billy from Montgomery in regards to his new second job at Home Depot and I’m praying that that all worked out. I know you probably already either have the job, or working the job, or are looking for something else, but I’m going to be praying for you. And also, Shannon from Texas would like us to pray for her and her healing of celiac disease. So, I will pray and again, thank you Bee, I love you so much. Dear Lord, I thank You God, so much, for the beautiful prayers in this community and all the wonderful people that share in so many lovely ways God. I pray for Billy in Montgomery that is going through looking to secure a second job at Home Depot God. I pray that worked out for him and that he is able to land that job and get the extra money that he needs to support his family. And I pray that it’s a smooth transition and he doesn’t have any issues with lack of rest or lack of time with his family. And I pray God for Shannon from Texas God as she is suffering from celiac disease. I know God that You know exactly…