moses as a leader

Moses returned to the LORD and said, “O Lord, why have you brought trouble upon this people? Is this why you sent me? Ever since I went to Pharaoh to speak in your name, he has brought trouble upon this people, and you have not rescued your people at all.”  (Exodus 5:22-23)

You feel the Lord has told you to do something and that you have his blessing. Then when you do it, everything falls apart and the people you have gone to to do this “great thing the Lord told you to do” are mad and wish you had never come. “We were fine until you came,” they say.

And you wonder why. Why did the Lord tell you to do this and then it just explodes in your face?

God came to Moses and told him to lead his people out of Egypt where they were currently slaves. Moses didn’t want to in the first place and tried everything he could think of  to change God’s mind. Finally Genesis 4 records God becoming angry at Moses for his stalling. Just go and do it, God says.

Moses does and makes things worse for the Israelites by his proclaiming the Lord’s deliverance. Their response to his God-inspired help: “May the LORD look upon you and judge you! You have made us a stench to Pharaoh and his officials and have put a sword in their hand to kill us.” (5:21).

It is no wonder why Moses says to God, why? Did you send me here just to cause trouble?

It doesn’t say so in the text, but it appears that Moses and Aaron had been there for a while, maybe even for a couple of years. They could not have caused the unrest they did by just walking into town and getting motel rooms. By now they should have been building a group of people ready to go. But his talking has evidently caused enough unrest that Pharaoh personally intervened.

And Moses looked like a jerk. And he wasn’t happy, his people were not happy and Pharaoh sure wasn’t happy to have his production halted.

Sooner or later it turned out well. Moses spoke to Pharaoh, Pharaoh needed some verification and there were the ten plagues. The Israelites left, Pharaoh changed his mind and his soldiers were killed and the Israelites came to their promised land through a series of major divine interventions.

One of the bad things about all this was no matter how hard Moses worked, his people never really appreciated him. They venerated him, they almost worshiped him, they were scared to death of him; but at every opportunity they complained about the way he was leading them.

As far as they were concerned, he couldn’t do anything right.

We see him, and history sees him as a great and God-inspired leader. He is universally recognized as one who was great. Yet his own people had nothing but complaints about him.

There are things that you feel strongly that God has called you to do, yet they never work out. It seems like there has been all but an angel with a flaming bulletin given you to do something. Yet it ends badly.

And the people to whom you came with such high hopes are angry because you changed their situation.

Not long after Moses began his leadership, he faced a serious leadership opposition effort. God dealt with it by removing the people involved. In this case, by death.

Then Moses was left with the ones who, if not committed to him, were at least resigned to him as their leader.

In many ways, Moses died thinking he hadn’t done some of the right things. Here was the best man who ever lived. Deuteronomy 34:10-12 says, Since then, no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses, whom the LORD knew face to face, who did all those signs and wonders the LORD sent him to do in Egypt—to Pharaoh and to all his officials and to his whole land. For no one has ever shown the mighty power or performed the awesome deeds that Moses did in the sight of all Israel.

But he had nothing but trouble, he led a congregation for forty years to where God wanted them and for his trouble heard nothing but whining and griping.

Just because you are in the will of the Lord does not mean that it will be a bed or roses. Sometimes, what you get most of is the thorns.