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Moses said to the Lord, “See, you have said to me, ‘Bring up this people’; but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’ 13Now if I have found favor in your sight, show me your ways, so that I may know you and find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” 14He said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” 15And he said to him, “If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here. 16For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people, unless you go with us? In this way, we shall be distinct, I and your people, from every people on the face of the earth.”
–– Exodus 33:12-16
In the acclaimed Spielberg/Hanks adaptation of Stephen Ambrose’s, Band of Brothers, a history of Easy Company through the Allied Invasion of WWII Europe, we find Major Winters in a challenging position. Easy Company had played a significant role on D-Day, the Arnhem campaign, and the Battle of the Bulge, even though they were regularly without supplies or support, under persistent enemy fire, and ill-clothed for the brutal French winter. They had courageously exceeded all reasonable expectations while in the face of extreme duress. They were exhausted, frazzled, and in need of rest and convalescence.
Even as the Germans retreated, Easy Company was again and again thrown into the fray. Following a dangerous and deadly night raid into an enemy camp across the river, Major Winters was ordered to send the same patrol back across the river for a second raid to capture additional prisoners. The value of such a raid at this point was minimal, but the soldiers were ready to follow the orders of the Major. So, he called the company together and laid out the target and intent and complexities of the mission that would commence at 2:00am. However, the Major then said –– “Is that clear? … Good, because I want you to get a full night’s sleep tonight, which means that in the morning you will report to me that you made it across the river into German lines, but were unable to secure any live prisoners … Understand?” –– The soldiers are exchanging the glance that says, “Did he just say what I think he said?”
There would be no raid, yet no one was to say that there hadn’t been a raid. It was a moment marked with the kind of selfless love that will own the consequences if it means saving someone else. The Major would not compel his soldiers to pursue that which he himself regarded as unconscionable. Love requires us to regularly set aside self-interest in the interest of those in our care. Jesus said, “For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”
In the desert wilderness, the slope of Sinai is a sacred, identity shaping destination for the escaped slaves of Egypt, but it was never meant to be the terminus of their journey. At the mountain they would encounter the presence of the Lord, receive the law of God, and hear the word of the Lord. However, it was not the Lord’s intention for the people to set up permanent residence on the mountain. There was a purpose to pursue, a people to form, a nation to establish, a land to steward. Thus, the Lord said to Moses, “Go, leave this place, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, and go to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your descendants I will give it.’” However, being given a mission, and pursuing a mission are not the same thing. The mission, by itself, does not necessarily instill the motivation or courage for the pursuit of it. Those who are sent have to trust the One who sends them, believing/knowing the One who sends them would not send them in vain, believing/knowing the One who sends them understands them, and is concerned with their welfare. Even if we cannot see the goal or rationale with any clarity, we will go if we trust the One who shapes the plan, and we’ll walk through fire if the One who sends us, understands us and goes with us. If Major Winters had asked, the soldiers would have gone, not because of what the mission was, but because of who was leading the mission. The character of the One who sends is reflected in those sent. And so, comprehending the risks before him, and perceiving the odds against him, Moses seeks some assurance about who is going with him –– “If your presence will not go, do not carry us up from here.” The Lord promises –– “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.”
Remember that centuries later, Paul did not boast, “I can do all things.” Rather, what Paul confessed was, “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” The hope of the mission is always dependent on the character of the One who sends. And the One who sends, goes with us. As Jesus said, “Remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
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