Read for This Week’s Study
Exod. 18:3, 4; Exod. 3:1–22; Gen. 22:11, 15–18; Exod. 6:3; Joel 2:32; Exod. 4:1–31; Gen. 17:10, 11.
Memory Text:
“And the Lord said: ‘I have surely seen the oppression of My people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. So I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and large land, to a land flowing with milk and honey’ ” (Exodus 3:7, 8, NKJV).
God’s call to us will often change the direction of our lives. However, if we follow that call, then we discover that God’s path is always the best route for us. However, sometimes—at first—it isn’t easy to accept God’s call.
Such is the case for Moses and his call by God, which specifically began at the encounter with the Lord at the burning bush. Although Moses may or may not have known about the laws of combustion, he knew that what he was seeing was a miracle, and it certainly caught his attention. No question, the Lord was calling him to a specific task. The issue was: Would he answer the call, regardless of the radical new change in his life that this call would bring? At first, he was not very receptive to it.
You may recall instances when you had specific goals, but God redirected those plans. It is true that we can be useful to God in many ways, but following God’s call in our lives, and doing what He leads us to do, is surely the path to the most satisfying existence. It might not always be easy, and it wasn’t easy for Moses, but how foolish to go our own way when God is calling us in another direction.
*Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, July 12.
Supplemental EGW Notes
The divine command to deliver Israel, found Moses self-distrustful, slow of speech, and timid. He was overwhelmed with a sense of his incapacity to be a mouth-piece for God. But he accepted the work, putting all his trust in the Lord. The greatness of his mission called into exercise the best powers of his mind. God blessed his ready obedience, and he became eloquent, hopeful, self-possessed, and well fitted for the greatest work ever given to man. This is an example of what God does to strengthen the character of those who trust him implicitly, and give themselves unreservedly to his commands.—Gospel Workers, p. 359.
Consider the experience of Moses. The education he received in Egypt as the king’s grandson and the prospective heir to the throne was very thorough. Nothing was neglected that was calculated to make him a wise man, as the Egyptians understood wisdom. He received the highest civil and military training. He felt that he was fully prepared for the work of delivering Israel from bondage. But God judged otherwise. His providence appointed Moses forty years of training in the wilderness as a keeper of sheep.
The education that Moses had received in Egypt was a help to him in many respects; but the most valuable preparation for his lifework was that which he received while employed as a shepherd. Moses was naturally of an impetuous spirit. In Egypt a successful military leader and a favorite with the king and the nation, he had been accustomed to receiving praise and flattery. He had attracted the people to himself. He hoped to accomplish by his own powers the work of delivering Israel. Far different were the lessons he had to learn as God’s representative. As he led his flocks through the wilds of the mountains and into the green pastures of the valleys, he learned faith and meekness, patience, humility, and self-forgetfulness. He learned to care for the weak, to nurse the sick, to seek after the straying, to bear with the unruly, to tend the lambs, and to nurture the old and the feeble.
In this work Moses was drawn nearer to the Chief Shepherd. He became closely united to the Holy One of Israel. No longer did he plan to do a great work. He sought to do faithfully as unto God the work committed to his charge. He recognized the presence of God in his surroundings. All nature spoke to him of the Unseen One. He knew God as a personal God, and, in meditating upon His character he grasped more and more fully the sense of His presence. He found refuge in the everlasting arms.—The Ministry of Healing, pp. 474, 475.
The above quotations are taken from Ellen G. White Notes for the Sabbath School Lessons, published by Pacific Press Publishing Association. Used by permission.