The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.”
But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” Exodus 3:7-11
Moses had settled into his life in the wilderness. More than likely, he expected to live out his days far removed from the tumultuous times that surrounded his departure from Egypt. But then he came upon a burning bush, and everything was about to change for him.
The scripture says that Moses took notice of the burning bush. Rather than ignore it or run away in fear, he turned aside to take in its significance. That’s when God spoke to him and invited him to be His instrument in delivering His people from bondage.
Given Moses’ guttural reaction to watching one of his fellow Hebrews being mistreated years before, you would assume that Moses would have jumped at the chance to do something constructive. But he doesn’t. Instead what we see is resistance.
Moses claims that he’s a nobody that doesn’t have the authority to make such a demand. He goes on to question whether the Pharaoh will even listen to him. As far as that was concerned, he was not good at speaking anyhow. God just needed to send somebody else. Resistance, resistance, resistance.
Thankfully, Moses finally agreed to God’s assignment and was used to help deliver the people from their bondage in Egypt. But before there was agreement, there was resistance.
We are no different. God comes to us with a calling to join Him in His mission. He exposes some area of our lives that He is wanting to change. He brings a different understanding to something we’ve always believed. Whatever it is, it is common for us to experience some initial resistance.
When that happens, what we do next is critical. Rather than just plow through our resistance, we need to pay attention to it before God. In some respects we see Moses doing this. He engages in a dialogue with God about his inner resistance to God’s invitation. In the process he was able to reach a willingness to accept what God had revealed.
We need to do the same thing. By paying attention to our resistance, we will begin to discover what is often underneath our outward hesitancy. As with Moses, our resistance can often be traced to a fear of the unknown or our sense of inadequacy. It may be that we like the life we have, and we don’t want God messing with it. For some, resistance is a willful desire to be in control.
So the next time you find yourself experiencing some resistance to God’s movement in your life, pay attention to it. Sit with it long enough before God so that He can help you uncover what is behind your resistance. Then you will be better able to release your life into whatever it is that God is revealing to you.