Exodus: The Flaws of Moses
Why Highlight?
As we continue our study of the book of Exodus and more specifically the character of Moses, we are going to look at the flaws that Moses struggled with in his life. Some of you may be thinking about this, ‘Why would we study a godly man’s flaws?’. This may seem a little disrespectful at first when looking at such a godly man in the Bible, but the flaws of Moses that God was able to overcome in order to still use Moses is what makes this character so relatable and hopeful for us as sinful human beings as well. As Freddy Fritz says, “Moses, along with Abraham and David, was one of the greatest men of the ancient people of God. Jews today, along with Christians, still revere him for his great faith, and rightly so. Yes, Moses had his flaws. But Moses also had great faith.” Now the flaws of Moses are not aspects of his life that we should aspire to mimic or replicate, that would mean we strive to practice sin which is simply not biblical by any means. The flaws that Moses has show us again just how great God is for His continual use of Moses and how no matter what sin we may have committed in the past, God can wash away all of our flaws and use us for His glory despite our shortcomings. With that in mind, let’s look at some of the areas where Moses came up short.
The First Flaw
One of the very first sins we ever see Moses commit in scripture is one that is overlooked by many even though the sin was murder. Exodus 2:11-12 says, “Now it came about in those days, when Moses had grown up, that he went out to his fellow Hebrews and looked at their hard labors; and he saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his fellow Hebrews. So he looked this way and that, and when he saw that there was no one around, he struck and killed the Egyptian, and hid his body in the sand.” This is one of those areas where we try and justify the sin that takes place here because the beating and enslavement of the Israelites is of course immoral and sinful, however, the answer to sin is not more sin. In fact, as the adopted son of the daughter of Pharaoh, you would think that Moses has access to power that would help out his fellow Hebrew people outside of murder. The effects of this sin are what the rest of this Exodus chapter is all about. Word started to spread about what Moses had done to this Egyptian and Moses knew that it was only a matter of time before Pharaoh would find out. This is where Moses runs away in fear for his life and rightfully so. We are told in verse 15 that Pharaoh sought to kill Moses for this act except Moses fled to Midian. It is in this land where the infamous story of Moses and the burning bush takes place and it’s also where he meets his wife and father-in-law. Even though Moses had sinned and fled from the consequences of his sin, God still watched over him and chose to use him for His great purposes later on. Way too often when we sin and flee from its consequences, we suppose that God no longer has a plan for us since we are ashamed of what we have done. However, if there is anything we can learn about this great sin from Moses, it’s that no matter how great the sin, God is greater.
Wrong View of God
Furthermore, let’s look at this popular story where God intervenes in Moses’ life for the freedom of the Israelites. While Moses is tending sheep, God grabs his attention by setting a bush on fire and not letting it burn. It is through this bush that God speaks to Moses and informs him that he will be the man that God uses to free the Israelites from the hand of Pharaoh in Egypt. It is during this discussion that we see one of Moses’ biggest flaws. Moses says to God in Exodus 3:11 “But Moses said to God, “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh, and that I should bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?” Immediately I think we see what is wrong here. Moses responds to God here with ‘Who am I?’. And if there’s anything we’ve learned up until this point, it’s that this question doesn’t matter. I know this seems harsh when talking about one of the biggest characters in the Bible, but when God fulfills a particular plan, it’s going to be fulfilled regardless of who He decides to use. It’s just as the old saying goes, God doesn’t call the qualified, He qualifies the called. This unfortunate flaw of Moses is not just the only time he brings up his shortcomings in front of God, but this banter continues back and forth until God is fed up with Moses’ doubt and uses his brother Aaron to speak on his behalf. This by no means shows that the plan for Moses has ended, it just shows that because of Moses’ self-centeredness, God must intervene with someone else as well. Now it’s easy to read this story and say that Moses should have just trusted God and moved forward without looking at his own flaws, but I think we can all relate to Moses more than we’d like to admit. When we are new to following the Lord and only have our past failures to look at to figure out who we are, it can become overwhelming.
But when we trust that God will always be faithful regardless of how weak we are, our view of self becomes less and less important. Beyond all this, we have one of the last biggest flaws that is evident in Moses’ life once the Israelites are freed and wandering in the wilderness. This flaw was so big in fact, that God said Moses couldn’t enter the Promise Land because of it. This story is actually found in Numbers where God is going to bring forth water from a rock for His people to drink from and Moses instead strikes the rock to bring forth water, giving the impression that it was he possessed the power to bring forth the water. To put it more concisely, Moses took credit for God’s miracle. Numbers 20:12 says, “But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Since you did not trust in Me, to treat Me as holy in the sight of the sons of Israel, for that reason you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.” This one act determined whether or not Moses and his brother would ever be able to enter the land that they were leading the Israelites to possess. Yet because of Moses’ sin, the punishment prevented him from entering. In one story we have Moses with a low view of self affecting his view of God, and in the other we see Moses with a high view of self, leading him to take glory away from God. Despite whichever story we can relate to more, the biggest aspect and lesson we can take away from Moses’ failures is that when we focus our attention on who we are instead of who God is, sin will follow every single time.
Sources
[1] Blue Letter Bible. (n.d.). Blue Letter Bible. https://www.blueletterbible.org/
[2] Moses: a flawed hero of the faith. (2023, January 23). Logos Sermons. https://sermons.logos.com/sermons/1061676-moses:-a-flawed-hero-of-the-faith
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