2009 – Day 69.Mar. 11 – You Are His Concern

2009 – Day 69.Mar. 11 – You Are His Concern

Passage of the Day: Exodus 4: 19 – 20 … 19 Now the LORD said to Moses in Midian, “Go, return to Egypt; for all the men who sought your life are dead.” 20 Then Moses took his wife and his sons and set them on a donkey, and he returned to the land of Egypt. And Moses took the rod of God in his hand.

My Journal for Today: Swindoll uses this little, very personal vignette in the life of Moses to remind us how our God’s concern runs very deep. God’s love for His servant Moses shines through clearly as God exhorts Moses onward to Egypt, taking his family and heading back to the land where Moses had been public enemy #1 forty years earlier, a memory which had to have been a concern for Moses. But, we read of God’s personal concern when the Lord says to Moses, and I paraphrase, “Oh, BTW Moses, all those dudes who were after you 40 years ago are dead now. So, take that supernatural staff with you; and go with your family where I lead you.”

And that’s exactly what Moses did. He became a living example of the truth in Proverbs 3: 5, 6 by trusting in God completely and not leaning on his own fears or anxieties. He just acknowledged that God would make way straight and that His Lord would protect His family. And Swindoll is so right that those who shrink into self protection, ignoring or avoiding God’s calling on their life, will never experience the exhilaration of feeling the power of God going on ahead and leading the faithful servant into the “sweetspot” of life which comes from being obedient to God’s will and calling.

My Pastor teaches that Christians experience the “sweetspot” of their faith when their decisions and actions fall into complete alignment with God’s will. That’s the essence of obedience; and to describe this “sweetspot” of Christianity, my Pastor uses the word picture of a golfer hitting a drive, … where the swing brings the face of the ball during a hard swing into perfect alignment with the face of that club, powering the ball as far and straight down the fairway as is possible. But if one swings that club out of alignment (i.e., as when one is out of fellowship with God), the ball never hits the “sweetspot” of the club and the result is a drive which goes in errant directions.

But maybe you’re not a golfer; and this word picture means nothing to you in picturing Moses’ obedience to God’s calling. Well, let me use another analogy. If you were given a recipe to bake a cake which you had loved; and you decided to leave out a key ingredient like baking powder or sugar, would the cake come out tasting the way it should? No, of course, it wouldn’t. Well, Moses had been given God’s recipe for success in baking God’s redemption cake. And not following His recipe, either by disobedience or by mistake, would lead to an outcome which would not taste as it was designed and planned by our Lord. So, Moses set out, taking God’s recipe, and following it to the tee.

I’ve said it before, remember, … in Luke 9: 23, where Jesus gives us His recipe for the sweetness of discipleship … to deny our selves, to take up the crosses of life daily, and to follow our Lord. And that’s exactly what Moses was doing; and it’s exactly what we, who follow Christ, must do. And when we do, we will have God’s power driving us far and straight from the “sweetspot” of obedience. We will taste the sweetness which comes when we follow God’s recipe for success in life (which, BTW, you can also read about in Joshua 1: 8).

So, … off we go, … following God to Egypt and beyond.

My Prayer for Today: Lord, I follow Your recipe for life from your Book; and I know it is my sweetspot in serving You. Amen