Excuses and Arguments: Moses' Reluctance

You're listening to the Bible Guys, a podcast where a couple of friends talk

about the Bible in fun in practical ways. Well, welcome to the Bible

Guys. What do you think? Well, no, I think that didn't

work for me. No, no, no, no, it was a

little jazzy. Did you ever see SpongeBob where he goes Christ? Do you

cry? Maybe maybe I should have took that round Bible Guys. Maybe whatever.

So I thought you were gonna sing good morning, Oh well yeah,

and switch it up. Okay, Wow, that was incredible. You are

so talented. Well, you know, thank you for tuning in for this

lame welcome. But hey, if the ministry doesn't work out for you,

maybe you have a future in jingles. Jingles. Yeah, yeah, well

that's a business. Please call me for your next jingle. Is that even

a thing anymore? I don't know. In the fifties, I'm sure it

was. I don't know. So, hey, we are Jeff and Chris

were the Bible Guys, and we are just welcoming you to the next episode,

which is this one. And we are starting off with a segment called

would you rather? Oh, I like, would you rather? Yeah?

And we have not read these. I have not because we want to read

them in real time right now. So we're just gonna just let's do it.

Pick, let's do it. You want to do the first one?

Would you rather only communicate using emojis or only communicate using giffs? Oh?

I know immediately the answer? What is Jeff's me? Yeah? Yeah,

jeffs Yeah yeah. Jeffs are so they're so widespread. I think there's way

more gifts than there are emojis. First of all. Yeah, and which

is hard to believe. Emojis are pretty direct thumbs up, praise hands,

all that stuff. But jeffs are so funny. They're funny. A lot

of them are funny. Yeah, I choose funny. Yeah, okay,

all right. Number two? Would you rather have a pet dinosaur or a

pet dragon? Is this even a competition? A dinosaur? I fear a

dragon. I guess I've feared too, But I've seen I've seen House of

the Dragon, I've seen Game of Thrones. I think that I'd rather try

to ride a dragon really and have it be my pet. That'd be the

nice Kalisi. So I thought, I don't know what you're talking about.

I thought dinosaur, not dragon. Why because not all dinosaurs were violent.

Dragons are by nature, you know, big teeth, big claws, fire

out of their mouths. But remember you remember mean and hey, there are

dynasts. Remember remember the dinosaurs that were just eating the eating the leaves in

Jurassic Park and sneezed on them. Yes, those were nice. Did you

ever see the Lion King of the Cartoon when they found somebody in the desert

and he goes, I have an idea, what if he was on our

side? That's true, if a dragon was on your side, Yeah,

then you'd be the man. I don't know, Yeah, I was.

I chose dinosaur, you chose dragons. That's all right, Let's let's just

move on number number. Would you rather have your voice sound like Mickey Mouse

or Darth Vader? That can't be a real question. That was a great

one. That is a great one. Hi, my name is Chris Harmon.

I want to be Darth Vader. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Darth

Vader. Yeah, I would choose Darth Vader over Mickey Mouse. Well,

not only that, but Darth Vader's voice technically is James old Jones, who

is one of the best voices in the universe. Ever, yes, ever

in humanity, Yes, and so it makes for good preaching. Yes,

it'd be hard to preach like Mickey Mouse, it'd be, yes, it

really would. But although you'd have to deal with the whole uh, the

breathing sounds that'd be. That'd be irritating, but still okay. So the

other one is would you rather have to speak? Would you rather have to

speak in pig Latin for a week or wear a kick me sign on your

back for a day? Oh? Oh man, kick me for a day?

Really? Yeah? Yeah? Well kick me be pretty violent depending on

whose season, because it doesn't say it's the only sign I could wear,

Oh my goodness. Trying to do a work around. So then i'd have

a sign below it this says kick me and find out I kicked me,

and then I just tun underneath it and find out that's what I do.

So I'd put two signs out. Oh man, that's a workaround, dude.

Well, the intent of the question is to be kicked all day,

to be punished by kicked all day. Otherwise it's not a competition, come

on, Jeff, Okay, all right, but but pig Latin, which

I already speak, you're good and pig Latin, so I can go ahead

and say pig Latin for a week for me, that's right, yes,

yeah, but i'd have to speak with somebody who also speaks big Latin.

Yes, so it's a conditional answer. Would you would you rather have a

permanent clown smile or a permanent clown nose permanent for all time? Oh my

gosh, that is pretty funny. Yeah, that's a great one. These

are good ones. Hey, permity clown smile, you couldn't even interact with

somebody. Well, you'd be like the Joker. Remember remember the who was

the really crazy joker? That not the crazy one, the earlier joker,

Jack Nicholson. Oh yeah, remember his permanent smile? Yes, yeah,

that one, yeah yeah uh. And then yeah, there's a different different

versions of the Joker. I don't want to get in all that, right,

but that one was like this really fabricated permanent yeah yeah, yeah,

yeah, yeah, a permity clown knows you could get past. People would

look and go, oh my goodness, and then you'd have to be like

yeah and explain it away. It's as clear as the nose on my face.

But Wizard of I was nineteen thirty nine there you go. But the

the idea of a clown nose, gosh, I mean, the smile would

just creep everybody out. You would be avoided forever. I'd have to choose

to choose. You have to This is awesome, Okay, you couldn't walk

around with that permanent smile. Does you elevated your game today? This was

a good one? Yea? These were really difficult? Would you rather?

I agree? I agree? Although pet Dragon, yeah, I still like

that. Get wrong on that one. I like it? Okay, Well,

hey, moving on. As advertised in the previous episode, yes,

Moses is going to argue with God, which is always a good idea.

Let me just say, when you have a disagreement, argue with the creator

of the universe. That's that's always. But you know what, it does

give us permission to argue with God. Because David argues with God, Moses

argues with God, Abraham argues with God. God never says stop it.

He never says how dare you? He doesn't say that God is willing to

hear our thoughts even if they're unreasonable. Just like job, right, job,

last couple podcasts for chapters and chapters, he goes on and then God

finally says, okay, fine, I'll respond now, But he never says,

Job, how dare you? So God's not afraid of our arguing.

It's just he does say to Job, how dare you? Where were you

when I made this? Where were you when I I? No? No,

what I'm saying is he never says, don't you dare argue with me?

Oh? Yeah, yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah. In

verse fourteen, here God gets mad at Moses for arguing with him, So

it comes up verse fourteen. It Lewis says, then the Lord became angry

with Moses. Verse fourteen. Well, we'll get to it. Let's read

the story. Well, let's read the story. People. People are riving

it out. People are let be clear, okay, people are going to

wait to get the verse fourteen and say verse fourteen is a little different.

Okay, here you go. We're in Exodus, chapter four Verse one.

Good, it's so good. But Moses protested again, what if they won't

believe me you're listening to me? What if they say the Lord never appeared

to you? Then the Lord asked him, what is that in your hand?

A shepherd's staff? Moses replied, throw it down on the ground,

the Lord told him. So, Moses threw down a staff, and it

turned into a snake. Moses jumped back. Then the Lord told him,

reach out and grab its tail. So Moses reached out and grabbed it,

and it turned back into a shepherd's staff in his hand. Perform this sign,

the Lord told him, and then they'll believe that the Lord, the

God of their ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac,

and the God of Jacob, really has appeared to you. Then, the

Lord said to Moses, Now put your hand inside your cloak. So Moses

put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out again,

his hand was white as snow, with a severe skin disease like leprosy.

Now put your hand back into your cloak, the Lord said. So Moses

put his hand back in, and when he took it out again, it

was healthy as the rest of his body. Lord said to Moses, if

they did not believe you and are not convinced by the first miraculous sign,

they will be convinced by the second sign. If they don't believe you or

listen to you even after these two signs, then take some water from the

Nile River and pour it on the dry ground, and when you do,

the water from the Nile will turned to blood on the ground. But Moses

pleaded with the Lord, Oh Lord, I'm not very good with words.

I've never been, and I'm not now, even though you've spoken to me.

I get tongue tied and my words get tangled. The Lord asked Moses,

who makes a person's mouth? Who decides whether people speak or do not

speak? Here? Do not hear see or do not see? Is it

not I? The Lord? Now go, I will be with you as

you speak, and I will instruct you in what to say. But Moses

again pleaded, Lord, please send anyone else. And then the Lord became

angry with Moses. All right, he said, what about your brother Aaron

the Levite. I know he speaks well, and look, he's on his

way to meet you. Now. He'll be delighted to see you talk to

him and put the words in his mouth. And I'll be with both of

you as you speak. I'll instruct you both in what to do. Aaron

will be your spokesman to the people. He'll be your mouth peace, and

you'll stand in the place of God for him telling him what to say,

and take your shepherd's staff with you and use it to perform the miraculous signs

I've shown you. So Moses went back to his home. First of all,

it's that is an amazing passage, yea. And would I would,

I would defend myself a little bit by saying this, is that after all

of the arguing and after all the rebuttals, Moses said no to God.

And that's when my God get angry. That's right, that's right. So

the debating of going back and forth and reasoning with God, that's what I

consider arguing, right. And then after all I knew that was going to

be your difference. And then all the arguing gets over Moses. God literally

takes away every single complaint, every every excuse that Moses has, and then

send somebody else. I don't want to go. I'm not going. And

then and then so God's like, now I'm mad. Now you're making me

mad. You're just making excuses at this point. But at least he doesn't

smite him, right, So smite him. Smite me, by the way,

is a fabulous word. Yes, just the whole idea of smitey,

what movie smite me almighty, Smiteter Evan, Almighty, Bruce, Bruce,

Almighty. I know it is one of the all ladies. So yeah,

So again I made reference yesterday that I originally or I just recently preached a

message. And so to summarize Moses' excuses is, you know, yesterday he

said to God, hey, I'm a nobody, and then uh, and

then and then and then today he says, hey, I'm I'm I'm not

a communicator, and then and then he says, uh, I'm not convincing,

and then finally he ends up saying, okay, fine, send somebody

else. I don't want to go. So he has all these different excuses,

and every single time God answers with either a truth or a promise.

And the truth is like, hey, I'm gonna be with you. Here's

the promise. I'm gonna be with you. Uh hey, uh go ahead,

and uh, you know, I'll give you miracles. That's that's that's

the promise. So he gives he gives Moses all these different things. And

sometimes when we go up against God and say God, I don't want to

do this thing, we have to actually measure our fears and our excuses against

the promises of God today. Right, So if God, if God equips

us, if God calls us, if God asks us, you know,

to step out in faith, we have to cling to the promises of the

scriptures, and you know, and because they're just as relevant for us today

as these direct words word of Moses. Right, yeah, yeah, I

don't think he could fathom how I mean, ultimately he comes down to I

think his best argument isn't people aren't going to believe me. Man, when

God makes it possible for you to turn water into blood and you know,

turn your hand to the leprosy and turn your staff into a snake, you

kind of go, Okay, people are kind of going to believe that.

Now it turns into I don't think I can right. So first it was

they're not going to believe me. Why I don't have any credibility. God

goes, I'll give you credibility. Well, then I don't think I can

do it. I'm never been good at speech class. I've always been terrified.

I'm always a little tongue tied, I'm a stutter or whatever. And

God's argument was who made your mouth? Of course you can say what you

need to say. You're saying it because I'm telling you to say it.

And even then Moses, after having seen his staff turn into a snake and

his hand turned into leprosy, he's not convinced God can use him. I

think a lot of times inadequacies, or our perceived inadequacies, become so strong

that even when we've seen God do other miraculous things, we still refuse to

believe that God can use us. And that's when God gets a little upset

with Moses. Yeah. Right. And here's such a great overlooked verse in

this whole dialogue, verse number two. The Lord asked him, what is

that in your hand? He says, a shepherd's staff. Moses replied,

Now, it's so interesting about this is First of all, do you think

God didn't know it was a shepherd staff? Yeah? Right, right,

So he's asking Moses to identify what's in his hand. He says, a

shepherd staff. Now have you think about it? That staff represented three things

in Moses' life. It represented his identity, It was who he was.

Right. When you see somebody walking down a road, you know, and

they have a shepherd's staff, you know they're a shepherd. Yeah right,

So it is it is going to bet that guy's a shepherd, right,

it is, it is who he is layer he's either ball player or is

this shepherd? So I'm pretty sure it's a shepherd staff. Yeah, so

so, so it's his identity. The second thing it represents is his income,

right, So it's it's basically that shepherd staff represents his livelihood. Right.

The third thing it represents is his influence. Right, so his his

position is title and then and so and then the next verse that, you

know, the very next words, it says, throw it down the ground.

And then you know, basically he's saying, throw it down the ground

and watch what I can do with it. So I think to myself,

surrender it. So so it's like God asks us to throw down our identity,

our income, our influence, everything that men, especially hold deer.

You know. It's like it's like, this is who I am, this

is what I do, this is how I provide, you know. And

he says, no, no, God says, throw it down, lay

it before me and watch what I can do with it. Surrender it.

Don't hang on to you know these things thinking that you know they're yours.

Give them to me, and God will give us a new identity. He'll

he'll take our income and do great things with it. You know, he'll

take our influence and multiplied exponentially if we just simply give it to him.

But in our own hands it can only be so many things, right,

It'll never be miraculous, you know, it'll be ordinary, and give it

to God will be extraordinary. Wow, that's good. That's a sermon.

That is it. You should preach it. I already did. Yes,

you did. That was a good one. Yes. So then Moses,

with this miracle after miracle after miracle, still struggling with with going, Okay,

God, you got this, and he still thinks it's him. And

how narcissistic are we that we still think it's us? Right? So I

okay, God, listen, I hear what you're saying. Yes, the

problem is I know me better than you know me, and I know my

circumstances better than you know my circumstances. So I don't know if you've heard,

but I stutter. I just just stutter, right, I don't know

if you heard. But and it's just today, Happy Gilmore. I'm sorry,

Billy Madison. So the the absurd thing is we as humans still tend

to think we know more than God knows, and that somehow we have some

kind of inside information that God doesn't have. And I think that that's where

it shifts from. Oh, I get it, you're a little nervous.

Let me help you out a matter of fact. That's nothing. Stick your

hand in your shirt, watch it. That's nothing. That's nothing. Get

some water and poured out on the ground. Right, and and so he's

God's helping Moses out here. Hey, I get it, you're a little

nervous. People are going to believe you. Here's some authority. Go in

my name, right, that's what we talked about yesterday. Use my name.

People are gonna believe you if they don't do these things. I gave

you three three things. Was okay, But then Moses pivots into this,

I've got some insider information. You don't. You just don't know. You

don't know. And it's amazing because as humans, we don't We can't see

very far, and we can't see very much, but we often presume to

tell God everything we feel like he needs to know to get things right.

Yes, right, and you know, by the way, you know what

it is also a narcissisist narcissistics. Oh mys Dick, and I blew this

whole joke. Go ahead, I blew the whole joke. I was going

to say, leaving not returning your shopping cards. I blew the joke.

You pronounced narcissists. That's a callback from from like episode two, right,

so that's funny. Was an episode two, but as long time. Yeah,

I told h Kyle Crenshaw, who's the campus executive campus pastor over in

the city campus, returning shopping carts not returning them is a really big thing

with him, and he actually used it recently in a sermon, and I

said, I said, you should have said, it's the being of narcissism.

It is, so yeah, and so Moses goes back and please.

And by the way, we never talked about the fact that God says,

reach out and grab the snake by its tail. Yeah, no, thank

you, no, thank you. You're supposed to grab a snake by its

head or near its neck, right right. You're not supposed to grab it

by its tail, because if you do that, then you know it's it's

it's now. The more docile snakes I've seen snake handlers grab them by their

tails. You know the ones that aren't going to be lethal. I've seen

that before. But you know, if it's a snake, that's I guess.

It doesn't say cobra. Do you hang out a lot with with snake

handlers? I didn't mean personally, I mean like if you watch movies,

take movies some of my snake handle and friends and and and and uh you

watch those documentaries, right, Yeah, yeah, they pick up a snake.

Sometimes they'll do it by its tail or, sometimes like little clips.

In all fairness, I have been with snake handlers several times. So yeah,

yeah, so sometimes I'll make it fun of you. And I'm the

nerd. Well, I just realized, even by me making that comment,

I just assumed it was a cobra. I assumed it was a deadly snake,

a deadly snake. But it doesn't say that, does Is that what

it says? No, it doesn't say that alone. But but I picture

myself like in the Middle East? Remember, Uh, did I ever tell

you the time I went to Middle trying to kill you? Yes, when

I went to the Africa, and this quick story. There was a pastor

there, Pastor Abraham, and uh, and he says, I said,

hey, I have to use the restroom. And it was number one,

right, and he says, and I said, where's the restroom? And

then he motioned to the entire to the entire plane. It's all the rest

and he goes, he goes, yeah, right there, just go use

the restroom. Well, you know that there's like a little bushes, right,

there's no big tall trees, so these bushes maybe stand up like waist

high. Right, that's and so you can basically see forever. Sure.

Well, I decided to walk far away from the village because I didn't want

anybody to see me. I didn't want to be rude, right, So

I'm like, so I leave the little enclosed village and the fences. I

walk really far and I find a bush and I'm standing behind this bush and

I look over and as I'm in the middle of my deal, I look

over and there's a black mamba snake. And I just researched black mambas.

I just I knew exactly what it looked like. I looked over and it

was probably maybe I'm trying to measure here. I would say, twelve to

fifteen feet away. Wow, And they jump mambas are fast, Yeah,

And they jumped that far in there, so it's fifteen feet away and it

was curled up. And so right away, I'm thinking myself like, okay,

I hope I didn't need like a sparagus or something like, you know,

make it mad, make it mad. So I mean, I'm makes

me mad. So I thought to myself, Okay, immediately I have to

I have to you know, stop, and which, by the way,

is difficult. And then I just decided to move slowly away. And then

I decided to you know, go far away. And I was scared out

of my mind right and then I go somewhere else. I finish up.

I go back to the to the to the village. I look over Pastor

Abraham, and I am just literally just I'm shaking, I'm sweating, I

am scared out of my mind. I thought that my By the way,

did I mention that we had to drive eleven hours to get there? And

then we parked the car and walked an hour. And if you get by

a black mama, if you're not treated in thirty minutes, you're dead.

Yes, So literally that was death. That was literal death. There's no

hope. And so anyway, I go back to the village and I and

I said to Abraham, I go, you'll never believe what just happened.

And I just explained this whole thing in a dramatic fashion, and he said,

he did hand motions. Okay, so for the listeners who aren't listening

to me. He made hand motions like a circle and then hand is like

a wavy snake, and he goes, h was he says, was the

black mamba like this? And he did a circle motion and he goes,

or was it like this? And he did a waiting motion. And I

said, well, it was like this. I did the circle motion.

He goes, oh, you're fine, that's what he says. So so

he didn't even didn't even fret. No big deal, no big deal,

Yeah you're fine. Yeah. But this one it was like this. It

was wavy because he had to reach down and grab it. But it may

have been a do cele snake, non poisonous. I doubt it. It

wouldn't have been that cool of a trick if if God did, that's right,

that's it. So I'm gonna I'm gonna assume considering how important cobras were

picture God like like, come on, God, that's right, that's that's

so as important as cobras were an Egyptian art, Yes, head dressing,

oh, you know what, that's fine, paintings, all this. I'm

going to guess that was a cobra. Yeah, me too. And guess

what because God's trying to establish this dominance over the gods of Egypt, and

Cobra's were an Egyptian god. Yeah. And and Charton Neston's was a cobra.

Yeah. Yeah, So there you go appropriate there. Yeah, we

got it on video. There's a lot of laughter in this. Okay,

Oh, that's so much. I don't think it's getting any better. We

better, we better shut this one down. We're twenty three minutes. This

is so silly. We're better shut this one down. That's right, I

think. I think that's that's we had a little video. It's so funny.

Okay, okay, So did he help I'm trying to wrap up with

a good thought here, and I want to leave on just on crying and

laughing. So I guess there's a lot of sermons in here, right,

and he'll help you out. Yeah, And and and I think that you

know, when he says, please send somebody else, I think sometimes what

we do is we come up with excuses. There's another sermon. We come

up with excuses, but we're trying to hide the real reason we just don't

want to do it right. We didn't mention that yet, the fact that

we said, well, you know, if I do give this money to

help this lady down the street, you know, I won't have enough to

do this or this or that, you know, Or we'll try to justify

well, if I do go here, it might cost me, I might

be late for this. You know. We'll come up with any excuse that

we can, you know, but if God nudges us to do a specific

thing, the reality is sometimes we actually just don't want to do it right,

and so and and God can see right through that. And it's only

when God said, only when Moses said no, that God actually got angry,

which is what we mentioned at the beginning. So all right, that's

good. So we'll leave on that note, and we're going to try harder

tomorrow. It'll be better tomorrow. We'll see you next time on the Bible. Guys,