Nothing Wasted

 

Moses had it all.  He was special.  He should have been drowned in the Nile River by an edict of the king. But the king’s daughter rescued him and adopted him, raising him in the palace as her own son.  He received a royal education from the most powerful nation in the world.  Moses was being groomed to be a special leader.

But something wasn’t right in his spirit.  Moses was a Hebrew.  He was from the same family of people who were mercilessly enslaved to serve his adopted family and build the colossal edifices of ancient Egypt.  As he grew older, he began to resent the power of the empire in which he had been raised.  The tension between the privileges he had enjoyed in the palace and the injustices that his brethren endured in slavery gnawed incessantly on his mind.  Through his inner turmoil, Moses began to envision a purposeful plan for his life.  He would use his power and influence as a member of the royal family to set his people free!

It was a noble vision.  In fact, one could say that it was a “God-inspired vision.”  The only problem is that Moses left God out of his plans.  He got ahead of the Lord and struck out on his own.  On one eventful occasion, Moses observed an Egyptian overseer beating a Hebrew man.  He flew into a rage and beat the Egyptian to death, burying the evidence of his misdeed in the sand.  But his Hebrew kinsmen saw what he did and rejected his presumption to be their “Savior.” Even worse, the king heard about it and sent out a hit squad to eliminate the unlikely “Prince of Egypt.”  Moses ran for his life.  He would spend the next forty years herding stubborn, smelly sheep in the deserts of Sinai and Arabia.  His vision and self-confidence were shattered.  Everything, all the privileges he had known and the hopes he had cultivated, seemed to be wasted on nothing. 

We are now emerging from sixteen months of social upheaval.  Prior to the pandemic, things were humming along pretty well.  The economy was healthy.  True, we had deep political tensions.  But that’s not new in a democracy.  In my own setting, there was excitement and growth at the church.  Things were looking good virtually everywhere you looked.  We had a positive vision for the future.  But then the virus came.  We shut down operations; some would never open again.  People got sick; some loved ones died.  Unemployment peaked.  Now, inflation is haunting our imaginations.  What are we to make of these last sixteen months?  Is it all a waste?

Not for people of faith.  Moses was radically transformed during his exile in the wilderness.  He developed a deep and intimate relationship with God.  He was humble.  Imagine that in a national leader!  If we are humble and have eyes of faith to see, we can recognize that God hasn’t been asleep during the pandemic.  It’s nice to have an economy humming along.  Job security and hope for tomorrow is a blessing we all want.  But, oftentimes, God removes those props in order to do a deeper interior work in us.  At our church, our corporate prayer life has been greatly invigorated. My preaching is more passionate.  Our leaders are asking questions that really matter.  Our love for one another is deeper and richer.  Perhaps God has done something deep in your soul during this last challenging year.  Do you have eyes to see?  If you have faith in God, it is true: nothing is ever wasted.