“Then Pharaoh called Moses and said, “Go, serve the Lord. Your little ones also may go with you. Only let your flocks and your herds remain behind.”
– Exodus 10:24
So, this was the temptation in a sense for Moses, plague, after plague, after plague, Pharaoh in the Book of Exodus is still not delivering the people of Israel from slavery. He’s not letting them go. So, finally, in his frustration, he says to Moses, “Okay, you can go, your little ones can go with you, but let your flocks and your herds stay here.” But that’s not what God had said. God had said He was gonna deliver the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. And not only were all the Israelites, including the little ones, gonna go but the flocks and herds were gonna go. And not only that, but the people of Egypt were gonna send all kinds of goods with them.
We must trust God and fight the temptation to only obey partially or when it is convenient.
Exodus 10:24: The Temptation of Moses
But I can only imagine it was tempting at this point for Moses to say, “Okay, we got to this point. Let’s compromise in a sense. Okay, if he’s willing to let us go, that’s better than staying, so let’s go. Even though we won’t take the flocks and the herds, we’ll go anyway because Pharaoh’s giving us that much.” But that is not what God had called Moses to do. God had called Moses to deliver these people out of slavery in Egypt. With all the flocks and herds, and with goods the Egyptians would provide on the way. So, Moses says “No, God,” through Moses says, “that’s not what I am calling you to do.”
This Verse Reminds Us to Follow the Entirety of God’s Will
And I just wanna encourage you the way I was encouraged reading this. Today, there are all kinds of temptations, similar to Exodus 10:24, for us to compromise, for us to say, “Okay, I’ll do part of what God’s calling me to do. I’ve got this much. Maybe it would be pressing it to trust Him to do more.” And I just want to encourage us not to give in to that kind of thinking But, instead to trust God to do all that He calls us to do. And to trust Him to show His faithfulness and His power, to bring about all that He purposes to do.
So, let’s just pray in our lives, God we pray. I pray in my own life that You would uncover areas where I have the temptation to compromise. In purity and holiness, in obedience to You. Or maybe you have called me to give resources in this way and I am tempted to say, okay, I’ll go part of the way. I’ll give part of what You have called me to do. God, I don’t want that to be the commentary of my life. That I just compromised, that I stopped short of doing all that you were telling me to do. I trust none of us to do as we’re praying for this right now. And so God, we pray for Grace and strength not to compromise in that way.
Asking God to Help Us Follow His Will
God, help us to do all that You called us to do. God, help us not to be half-hearted in our commitment to you. Help us not to be half-hearted in our trust in you. Help us to obey You all the way, and to trust You all the way. God, please help us to resist temptations to compromise in all kinds of areas in our life and our work and our family and our future and our plans, our dreams, our use of every resource You’ve given us from our time to our money, to the gifts, skills, abilities that You’ve given us. God, we pray that you would keep us from compromise today. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
