I’m not sure if Moses ever knew the concept of deja vu, but even if he didn’t, he absolutely knew the feeling.
Think about what Moses has tried to do for these people. Forty years before Exodus 6, Moses had tried to inspire an uprising by killing an Egyptian taskmaster. They didn’t listen to him then, and unfortunately, nobody is listening to Moses now, either.
From the outside looking in, disbelieving Moses is preposterous. After all, Moses gave them three reasons (from God) as to why they should listen to him.
First, God notices their sufferings (Exodus 6:5). Their groaning had reached God’s ears, and as a sympathetic God full of compassion and love, He head them. Because He heard them, He could respond.
Second, God has promised He will bring them out of Egypt. Whether any of them actually wanted to leave Egypt—instead of just leaving slavery—is debatable, but for God, the two were intertwined. You can’t stay in Egypt and not be a slave, you have to leave to find freedom.
Third, God told them He would bring them to Canaan. Pointedly, God calls this their “inheritance,” which certainly includes land but also includes the fulfillment of other promises. It is the culmination of the promises that God had made to Abraham centuries previously.
All of those sound like pretty amazing promises to me. As if to further cement His authority on these promises though, notice how God beings and ends His message to Israel by saying “I am the Lord” (Exodus 6:6, 8).
So, why didn’t they listen to Moses? According to the Text, it’s because they couldn’t see past their immediate circumstances. Their “despondency and cruel bondage” clouded their vision, not enabling them to see anything beyond their pain. They had no time for hope, in other words, because they were too busy dealing with the now.
But isn’t hope an antidote for the now? We live in a period of extreme tension. Every single day there’s a new “historical event” that seems to cloud our news reports. Perhaps it’s too difficult for us to think about our own hope because we’re too focused on the present circumstances. We can’t think about the future when we’re behind on our mortgage payment that’s due tomorrow.
Hope isn’t a luxury though, and we shouldn’t think of it as such. When we allow ourselves to become faithless because of our “despondency and cruel bondage,” it not only brings us down, but those around us. In Exodus 6:12, Moses relates his struggles with the people and prophesies his own failures with Pharaoh. If his own people won’t listen to him, why should Pharaoh?
For the sake of our souls and our loved ones, let hope start with you. Don’t give in to the cloudiness of today and think that’s how it’ll always be. Don’t let the future become dark just because today is. Have faith in God—have faith in hope—-and keep your eyes focused on Him.
