Contemplative Bible Reading

Exodus 4:20 (New Living Translation)

20 So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey, and headed back to the land of Egypt. In his hand he carried the staff of God.

This is part of the (hi)story of God sending Moses back to Egypt to bring God’s people out of captivity and into the land promised to them.

Egypt is rich. It is a powerful nation—one of the world’s great powers at this time.

Their opponent? A middle-age flop of a livestock herder. He has his wife and little boys on a donkey. He walks. And, let’s not forget, he is carrying a stick.

Are you kidding? This is what God sends into a powerful nation to bring a million or so people out carrying gold and silver and riches from the people of the rich nation? This is preposterous.

The next thing you is that God will send the savior of the world to be born to a poor teenage girl in a damp, stinky cave in a backwater town… and, oh wait, that is what God did next. Never mind.

I live in one of the richest towns in the richest country in the history of the world. I am typing these words using rich technology invented by rich people in the last twenty rich years.

Where is God? Where is the next great messenger from God? Probably sitting on a cold sidewalk somewhere huddled in rags. Why do I think that? Look at Moses, his donkey, and his stick. Look at Mary and Joseph and that smelly stable. The examples go on and on.

God, please help me to see You and the people You send.