Turn Aside and Listen: Its Time to Act

Do you feel like your life has lost direction? Maybe you feel that all you could achieve in this lifetime is in your past. Perhaps ten years ago you were a “somebody” wielding a lot of power and influence. People looked up to you and respected you because of who you were. Today that seems like a long time ago and you are a shadow of your past.  You are alone perhaps doing what you never thought you could be doing today and living a lifestyle that you only associated with “certain” people. You are dishonored and ignored everywhere you seem to go. Well you are not the only going through this and neither are you are the first.

Do not focus on your situation as this may jeopardize your hearing or seeing what the Lord is saying to you. Open your hearing ears and seeing eyes because there is a “burning bush” burning near you that God is using to get your attention.  You are finally ready to do the work that you were really meant to do in this world. God has allowed you to go through what you have been through to prepare you for what he created you for. Your age is not an issue, for God’s ways are not our ways, nor his thought our thoughts (Isaiah 55: 8-9). Further, with the Lord “one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day” 2 Peter 3:8. So no excuse about your age or where about; you are exactly where the Lord wanted you at this time.

Moses was forsaken in a foreign country for forty years after a lifestyle of fame and lavish in Egypt. He now lived as a nomad in the wilderness unknown and rejected by his own people. At the age of eighty he did not think there was anything left for him to accomplish in his lifetime. Yet the purpose that God had created him for was about to come true starting at his forgotten place.  One day as he was tending sheep, his vocation in the foreign land, he saw a burning bush that was different from other burning bushes. He decided to leave his comfort zone to investigate the cause of this burning bush.

Moses said to himself “I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn” Exodus 3:3. He did not wait but the word used is “now” for he acted immediately. At that moment everything depended on his willingness to interrupt his normal routine to find time for God. Consider this, at this very moment God maybe using unexpected sources to communicate with you or to get your attention.  Do not let your busyness prevent you from knowing God and receiving His instructions for your life.  Moses could have ignored the sign and kept on going as usual, but by so doing he could have missed God and the great things that God had called him to do.

God appeared to Moses at a time when his self esteem was at its lowest. He had lived in the wilderness for forty years and it would appear all his past education in Egypt was of no value to him. He was no longer a young man yet God’s timing always conflict with ours because our standards are way below His. When God told Moses what He was calling to do, Moses resisted strongly because he based his worth on his past failures and on his physical limitations.  He asked God, “Who am I that I should go to pharaoh, and that I should bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” Exodus 3:11.  God reassured him that he was not sending him alone but He would certainly be with him (Exodus 3:12).

God maybe calling you to do something right now but you are allowing your inadequacies to get on the way of your calling. God only wants your availability and obedience and He will equip you with the resources that are necessary to accomplish your purpose. God already knows your capacity and your limitations. Moses excuse was “I am not eloquent, neither before nor since you have spoken to your servant; I am slow of speech and slow of tongue”. Exodus 4:10. He thought he would get out of his calling by reminding God of his inadequacies. God’s answer to Moses was “Who has made man’s mouth? Or who makes the mute, the deaf, the seeing, or the blind? Have not I, the Lord? Now therefore, go and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall say.” Exodus 4:11-12.

When God calls you to do something He equips you for the work. If what God is calling you to do right now involve some of your weak areas you can be assured that He will provide the words, courage and ability where needed.  God is so faithful that even when Moses inadequacy overcame him, God was willing to give a helper in the form of his brother Aaron (Exodus 4:14-16). God had selected Moses for the work that he was to do from his birth and there was no getting out of it. Jeremiah also tried to argue out of his calling by suggesting that he was too young. But God said “Do not say, ‘I am a youth,’ for you shall go to all to whom I send you. And whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of their faces, for I am with you to deliver you” Jeremiah 1:7-8.

Just like God assured both Moses and Jeremiah of His presence in the mission He had called them to do, He is also assuring you right now that he is with you and He will see you through.  Your age, disability or race does not matter for God prepared you for this occasion with this in mind.  So get moving and start obeying and acting as led by the Lord. The time to act has come.