My Upper Zoom ladies are still belly-crawling our way through the Torah. We’ve finally concluded with Genesis and made our way into Exodus. Our chapter-a-week rhythm often disintegrates into weeks of scripture soaking in one passage until we finally pull up stakes and move to the next. I wind up reading and re-reading, letting the Word steep into my soul.
Moses has made quite an impression on me. His unforeseen foray into Midian has mirrored my own emigration from ministry. He committed murder, I committed misstep. Regardless of the means, the results are the same. He and I have each found ourselves living hundreds of miles away from the life we expected. The question begs to be asked:
What do we do when find ourselves living on the brink of an unwanted wilderness?
I’ve come to believe Moses offers us an example, even a primer of sorts. We can look at his Midian experience and find a blueprint for our own.
"Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well." (Exodus 2:15)
Moses rested and reflected.
Moses was chased out of Egypt with only his life in his hands and he didn’t stop running for three hundred miles. He arrived in Midian breathless, exhausted and hungry. His first priority? Rest. He found a well and took a load off. Moses made time to collect himself, rest his frame and reconsider the events that led up to that point. He let his soul catch up with his body. And as he rested, the Lord brought about the next divine appointment.
When we wind up in Midian, we need to take time to stop and consider how we got there. Skipping this critical step can result in an increased aptitude for sin. (No one makes good decisions when they are exhausted.) As we engage in rest and reflection, God is faithful to open the next door.
"Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came to draw water and fill the troughs to water their father's flock. Some shepherds came along and drove them away, but Moses got up and came to their rescue and watered the flock." (Exodus 2:16-17)
Moses held to Kingdom values: defending the weak and serving others.
Moses still had his feet up when some lovely local ladies arrived at the well with their flocks in tow. About the same time, unruly shepherds showed up and started hassling the women. Though Moses was spent and a long way from anyone who could call him out, he spoke up. He defended the weak and then watered their flock.
Arriving in Midian doesn’t mean abandoning our Kingdom values. We learn to thrive on foreign soil when we recognize that God lives here, also. He’s with us, He sees us and He has the same expectations for us wherever we go.
"Moses agreed to stay with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage. Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, "I have become a foreigner in a foreign land." (Exodus 2:21)
Moses embraced the community offered to him and became fruitful though far from home.
God has divine purpose for the detours in our life. Moses had a calling but he lacked the character required to fulfill it. He needed a holy time-out where he could be reformed into God’s man for the job. Midian must have felt like a backstep, but time would prove it to be a critical part of the greater plan. Much to Moses’ credit, he didn’t waste his decades in Midian. He settled in and looked for ways to grow.
We don’t know why we wind up when and where we do, but we do know God sits sovereign over the whole story. When He relocates us, we can trust His purposes will continue to play out. You and I are far too small to thwart the plan of the Almighty. Our Midian seasons are simply unfamiliar places to trust Him in new ways.
"Now Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God." (Exodus 3:1)
Moses continued to seek God in places he’d prefer to avoid altogether.
This particular passage of scripture has played on repeat in my soul for months now. Moses didn’t go to Midian and tap out on his relationship with God. Instead, he tested the limits of his understanding and comfort. He climbed over his fear of the unknown and willingly went deeper into the wilderness than he’d ever set foot before. And at Mount Horeb, he came face to face with a living God, wilder and mightier than he’d ever imagined.
That’s been my experience, too. On the other side of pastoral ministry, hundreds of miles off course from the life I loved, I’ve discovered a God who is so personal and powerful, so present and compassionate. I know Him now far more intimately than I knew Him in the throes of local church work.
I suspect I’ll look back at my Midian years as a special season, an extraordinary opportunity to walk with God in a raw and rewarding way. I don’t know how long He’ll have me here. I don’t know what He hopes to accomplish in this barren stretch of earth, but I’m sure of His nearness now and His sovereignty over every chapter in my story.
See, friends, Midian isn’t a bad place. It’s a new place. It’s often brought on by circumstances we deem as bad: the sudden change in career, the subtraction that devastated financial security, the spouse that walked away, the loss that was unrecoverable. The events that send us to Midian might be brutal, but the geography itself is neutral.
The life that we build on the brink of the wilderness is up to us. We decide if we wallow or thrive. Our attitude about Midian makes all the difference. Will we rest and reflect? Will we hold to Kingdom values when we’re far from Home? Will we embrace the community offered here? Will we fight to become fruitful? Will we seek God in the place we’d prefer to avoid altogether? Our answers to these questions will determine if our Midian years are dormant or productive.
Lord, thank You for the example of Moses and the primer for living in Midian. When we wind up in off-plan places we have big questions and bigger regrets. Yet, in Your mercy, You are never done with us. You meet us in the edges of our understanding and speak purpose into off-script seasons. May we rest and reflect on the hard things that led us here. May we have the courage to live out our values when we are far from home. May we embrace the community You see fit to provide. May we strive for fruitfulness in arid places. May we be brave enough to delve still deeper into the wilderness. May we climb into more intimate relationship with You as we seek to serve You in this land, too. Amen.