Moses

I've been thinking about Moses lately.

Not the part of his life where he was miraculously saved as a baby in the bulrushes. Nor where he encountered the voice of of God at a supernaturally burning bush, or when he freed his enslaved people from the powerful empire of Egypt, complete with plagues and show-downs with the Pharaoh and parting seas. Not even the part where he wandered in the desert leading the grumbling Israelites.

No, I've been thinking about the part of his life that is all but missed when you read the narrative in Exodus. The part covered in the verse: During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Some scholars think those "many days" may have added up to forty years. In any case, it was a really long time.

I wonder what he was thinking.

I mean, there he was--a wealthy, educated, skilled, once-powerful, adopted son of Pharaoh--tending sheep. A fugitive from Egypt. Stripped of his power. Stripped of his royal identity. For years. And that whole time, the people of Israel were groaning in their enslavement and crying out for help.

His people were suffering, and he was hanging out in the desert with some sheep.

How did he react to that?

I wonder whether he strained against his shepherd role, restless to run back to Egypt--fugitive or not--and do something to help the Israelites.

I wonder whether he felt like his life in Pharaoh's house had been wasted, whether he questioned God: Why give me all that wealth and resources and powerful background only to put me out here with the sheep instead of letting me using those resources to save my people? Why send me out here when I had so much to offer there?

I wonder whether he sometimes enjoyed his new life--working outside, his wife, his children--and whether he ever felt a bit guilty about that, being aware of and apart from his people's misery, and not doing anything to free them.

I wonder whether he ever felt a bit...useless.

And I wonder if he was ashamed and rather surprised to see how fearfully reluctant he was when God finally gave him the command: "Yes, now is the time. Go rescue my people."

Perhaps he didn't think any of those things. But I think I would have if I were him.

Forty years is a long time to think. To wait.

Moses lived a lot of life before he became the venerable, bearded "Moses" [spoken in a deep, venerating voice] of Pharaoh-defying, sea-parting, Ten-Commandment-receiving, people-leading fame. He did a lot of shepherding first. A lot of waiting. A lot of living normal life with his job and his family. Maybe it was those forty years of quiet preparation which made it possible for God to use him so much and yet for him to remain humble about it. Maybe becoming a shepherd was what it took for Moses to see--even with all the great education and resources and authority he could have "offered" as a son of Pharaoh--that it was God and God alone who had the power and deserved the glory.

...I think we can learn a lot from Moses.