God has worked with me and changed me substantially over the past year. I am growing into a leadership position in ways that I could not have imagined without His direction. I am sure that some people stand amazed as they watch how God has grown me and changed me as a pastor/shepherd/elder and find very little similarity between the former pastor and this current pastor.
God has led me in some directions this past year where I did not want to go. And God has called me to make decisions in this past year that I would not make without a firm conviction that I must make these decisions to uphold His name and the character of His church. However, it is still difficult for me to boldly make decisions. Often, people look to me to make decisions or to have answers to situations, and I just want to cower and allow someone else to make a decision or avoid making a decision altogether.
In some ways, I have taken great comfort in the story of how God used Moses to lead His chosen people out of captivity in Egypt and toward the Promised Land. I can relate to Moses in ways that I previously criticized him. In the biblical account, we see God grooming Moses to be the leader God designed him to be. Is God working in my life in the same way?
From the first time we see Moses presented in the biblical narrative, we see God’s sovereign hand at work in Moses’ life. Moses is spared from the Pharaoh’s decree that all male Hebrew newborns be put to death. When it becomes impossible for his parents to hide this boy child, he is delivered into the hands of Pharaoh’s daughter where he is raised within the Egyptian court, receiving the best education and cultural training at that time. When Moses flees Egypt as an adult, God leads him to the desert where, among other things, he learns how to survive as a nomad in the same desert climate that he will lead the Hebrews through for 40 years after their release from slavery.
All of this training leads up to God’s call on Moses’ life. God calls Moses to go back to Egypt, confront the new Pharaoh, and lead the Hebrew people out of Egypt to the Promised Land of Canaan. It is at this point that I can relate with Moses. Moses begins to object to God’s plan. He claims that he cannot lead the people. He claims that he is not an eloquent speaker and that he cannot speak to Pharaoh or the Hebrew people. God answers all of Moses’ objections, and Moses reluctantly becomes God’s leader.
We see Moses grow into his role as God’s appointed leader. This man who claims that he cannot lead the people becomes a storied leader. The man who claims that he is not eloquent will elegantly interceed for the Hebrews through prayer and boldly call the people to obedience to God’s word and law.
Like Moses, I have somewhat reluctantly taken a role of leadership. Please understand, I do feel God’s clear call on my life, but I am still somewhat hesitant to fully submit to God’s call and unabashedly follow God’s call on my life. And please understand that I am not comparing myself with Moses or claiming that God’s purposes for my life are similar to God’s call on Moses’ life. But, as I see God leading Moses to become a stronger leader, I also sense and feel God’s working in my life to make me a stronger pastor/leader for the church he has entrusted to my care. May Christ be glorified through His work in me. May it never be said that I refrained from making decisions for fear of people’s perceptions. May it never be said that I made decisions outside of God’s authority to further my personal ambitions or agendas. I pray that I always submit to God’s authority as He molds me into his undershepherd.
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