“All these officials of yours will come to me, bowing down before me and saying. ‘Go, you and all the people who follow you!’ After that I will leave.”’ Then Moses, hot with anger, left Pharaoh.”
~ Exodus 11:8
Hi James and Ellen,
Are you really good listeners? Are you really good at listening to what your dad and/or ma say to you? Are you really good at listening to what your teachers say to you? Are you really good at listening to what God is saying to you? Are you better at talking than you are at listening? Are you really good at telling your dad and/or ma what you think that they need to hear? Are you really good at telling your teacher what you think that he or she needs to hear? Are you really good at telling God what you think that He needs to hear? Are you really good at doing what your dad and /or ma ask you to do? Are you really good at doing what your teachers ask you to do? Are you really good at doing what God is asking you to do? Does anything happen to you when you do not do what your dad and/or ma has asked to you to do? Does anything happen to you when you do not do what your teachers have asked you to do? Does anything happen to you when you do not do what God is asking you to do? Do your dad and/or ma punish you when you do not do what he and/or she has asked you to do? Do your teachers punish you when you do not do what they have asked you to do? Does God punish you when you do not do what He is asking you to do? When your grandpaa was a kid, your grandpaa was almost never punished by his dad and/or ma. Even though your grandpaa was never scared that his dad would spank or yell at him, your grandpaa when he was a kid knew that he needed to always listen to his dad. Your grandpaa’s dad often did have really bad migraine headaches. When your grandpaa’s dad had a really bad migraine headache, your grandpaa and the rest of the kids in your grandpaa’s family had to stay really quiet while your grandpaa’s dad rested in bed or they would be told to go outside and run around the house. When your grandpaa was a kid, your grandpaa had chores that your grandpaa’s dad expected that your grandpaa would do. If your grandpaa’s dad asked your grandpaa to do something, your grandpaa never ever thought about finding a way out of doing what his dad had asked him to do. If your grandpaa’s dad asked your grandpaa to clean the manure out of the gutter or throw down silage for the cows or carry bedding from the haystack for the calves or . . . your grandpaa always listened to his dad and he always did what his dad asked him to do.
Your grandpaa was never punished by any of his teachers for doing something that one of his teachers had asked him not to do or because he did not do something that his teacher had asked him to do. It has not been hard for both your grandmaa and grandpaa to not speak up in groups versus thinking that they need to do talking in groups. Because both your grandmaa and grandpaa are introverts versus being extroverts, your grandmaa and grandpaa do not become energized being around guys, gals and kids and/or when they have done a lot of talking. Your grandmaa and grandpaa find that their energy is being drained from them when they are spending time with guys, gals and kids who are extroverts and/or when they are spending a lot of time doing talking. Do you know if you are introverts or extroverts or an introvert and an extrovert? Do you think that Moses was an introvert or an extrovert? Your grandpaa thinks that Moses probably was an introvert. Moses did not think that he could speak well in front of guys and gals. Moses did not think that he could get guys and gals to listen to what he had to say. Your grandpaa often feels like Moses. Your grandpaa feels frustrated sometimes when his mouth will not say what his brain is telling his mouth to say. Your grandpaa feels frustrated sometime when he sees by the body language of a guy and/or gal or by guys and gals that they really are not interested in hearing what he wants to say to them. How do you feel when the words that you are saying are not resonating with the kid with whom you are talking? How do you feel when a kid who is your classmates will not listen to what you have to say when you really want him or her to listen to you?
When Moses wrote Exodus 11, your grandpaa thinks that Moses may still have been harboring frustrated feelings towards Pharaoh for not listening to what he had said to him. Moses had gone to Pharaoh to warn Pharaoh about plague number ten. Plague number ten had God sending His death angel to kill every firstborn Egyptian boy and every firstborn bull calf. By the time that God was ready to send plague number ten, the Egyptian leaders over the Egyptian people group’s guys and gals were willing to do whatever they could do to stop the plagues that God was inflicting them. God had been inflicting plague after plague on the Egyptian guys and gals to get them to allow His specially chosen guys, gals and kids – the Israelite people group’s guys, gals and kids, to leave Egypt where Egyptian guys were using them as their slaves to do their physical work. Moses – in verse 8, describes how he really felt as he was leaving Pharaoh after visiting with him for the tenth time – and after he had told Pharaoh what God was going to do to every single Egyptian family unit and what God was not going to do to His specially chosen guys and gals, “All these officials of yours will come to me, bowing down before me and saying. ‘Go, you and all the people who follow you!’ After that I will leave.”’ Then Moses, hot with anger, left Pharaoh.” Moses maybe thought that God would make Pharaoh’s heart become hard again so that Pharaoh would not listen to what he been told by God to tell him. Your grandpaa would like you to never forget that God is in control of everything that is happening around you – just as God was in control of everything that happened in Egypt 3445 or so year ago when He had Pharaoh finally let His specially chosen guys, gals and kids leave Egypt. Your grandpaa also would like you to never forget that God designed you to be exactly who you are and that He will always dearly love you and see you as holy.
Exodus 11 (390)