God With Us

God answered, “I will be with you.”

Exodus 3:12

When Moses encountered God at the burning bush, he was not the same Moses who had fled Egypt forty years earlier. Then, Moses had been a man of power and influence. Stephen described him like this: “Moses was taught all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was powerful in both speech and action” (Acts 7:22), and when he happened upon an Egyptian taskmaster beating an Israelite slave, he took matters into his own hands.

Consequently, this once-important leader was reduced to the lowest rank—a shepherd of someone else’s sheep. Much later, Genesis 46:34 tells us how shepherds were viewed in Egypt: “The Egyptians despise shepherds.” Moses, once admired, was now despised. Having fled from his own land, he was exiled into the desert. Moses fell very far, very fast.

I wonder about Moses during those forty years. Did he assume he had lost his chance and that his time had passed? I think so. He certainly didn’t seem to be expecting to have another shot at rescuing his people. (He had already failed at it miserably and publicly.) When God called Moses to rescue the Israelites, the Moses who once assumed his fellow Israelites would realize that God had sent him to rescue them now said, “Who am I to appear before Pharaoh? Who am I to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt?” (Exodus 3:11). That’s a big change in attitude from “I’m the one” to “Who am I?”

Why should Moses expect to succeed where he had already failed? This time Moses would go empowered by the promise of the presence of God: “I will be with you.” The contrast was so striking that Moses developed a desperate dependence on the presence of God. At one point Moses told God, “If you don’t personally go with us, don’t make us leave this place” (Exodus 33:15).

The same promise that God made to Moses—“I will be with you”—accompanies God’s call in your life. Whatever God asks you to do, he promises his empowering presence. That will make all the difference.

Lord, teach me a desperate dependence on your presence. I believe that you will be with me, whatever you call me to do.

Return to the battle again, no longer trusting in the false and insufficient human resources which so foolishly we had taken into the battle, but now trusting in the limitless resources of our risen Lord.

Alan Redpath(1907–1989), English evangelist, pastor, and author