Moses has been tending his father-in-law’s flock near Horeb for forty years, far from the palace he grew up in and the murder charge that sent him running from Egypt in the first place. A bush is burning without being consumed, and when Moses turns aside to look, God calls to him from inside it by name and tells him what he has come to do: go back to Egypt and bring the Israelites out of slavery.
Moses does not say yes. He gives God four separate reasons why he is the wrong man for this.
His First Objection Was About Who He Was
“Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?” Moses does not dispute that the suffering in Egypt is real or that it needs to end. His first resistance is about his own qualification, a fugitive shepherd with no standing in either the Egyptian court he fled or the people he has been gone from for decades.
His Second Objection Was About Not Having the Right Words
When Moses asks what he should say if the Israelites ask for God’s name, and is given the answer “I Am Who I Am,” he still is not satisfied. He raises further concerns about not being believed, and then, more plainly: “I have never been eloquent… I am slow of speech and tongue.” He names an actual limitation, not a vague feeling of inadequacy.
God Did Not Argue Him Out of His Limitation
“Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.” God does not deny that Moses struggles to speak. He simply states that the same God who made mouths is capable of working through this one, and gives him Aaron as a partner anyway.
He Kept Objecting Until God’s Anger Was the Thing That Finally Moved Him
“Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.” After three specific objections and three specific answers, Moses’s final response is not a fifth reasoned argument. It is a flat request for God to choose somebody different. Only after the Lord’s anger burns against him does Moses go, still with Aaron beside him, exactly as he was told.
“Moses said to God, ‘Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?’ And God said, ‘I will be with you.'”
Exodus 3:11-12
He argued with God four times before he ever packed a bag for Egypt. The assignment did not change because the objections were reasonable. It simply came with help attached to it.
