Exodus chapter 2 verse 15 When Pharaoh heard of this matter, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from the face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian, where he sat down by a well. I've entitled this sermon, Desert Training. Because the land of Midian was nothing but a desert and a wilderness. And you remember, as we noted last week, when Moses ran off to Midian, he was there for 40 years. Tell me, Do you consider a desert, a wilderness, do you consider it a suitable place for training to be a servant of God? Would you think of going to a desert place for 40 years to equip yourself for ministry of some kind? Interesting isn't it? Tell me this as well. Those of you who are exercised about guidance, do you find it easy? I think I've often said before, I find it one of the most difficult things in my Christian life. Guidance. Waiting on God. The complaint I hear most people saying is, I'm not hearing God's voice. You know it's interesting this God sent Moses ran to the desert of Midian and it's interesting the Hebrew word for desert is derived from the Hebrew verb to speak. Have you got it? Have you got what the Bible is saying to us tonight? The desert is the place where God speaks. I want to read Deuteronomy chapter 32 verses 10 to 12. Very, very interesting few verses there. It tells us about God and deserts. You can turn it up with me. Deuteronomy 32 verse 10. He found him in a desert land, and in the wasteland a howling wilderness. He encircled him, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye. As an eagle stirs up its nest, hovers over its young, spreading out its wings, taking them up, carrying them on its wings, So the Lord alone led him. And there was no foreign God with him. We're talking about guidance. We're talking about preparation for a great ministry. And here's the Bible telling us what God did in a desert place. And there's another verse we find very interesting in the Bible. Hosea chapter 2, verse 14 of the verse 10, I will allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak comfortably to her. What is God saying there? What is God saying to us tonight? I will allure her into the wilderness and speak to her. I found Him in a desert land, in a waste howling wilderness. What's God saying? If God does not seem to be guiding you, maybe you need a desert place. In a desert, you see, one is uncomfortable. Maybe our lives are just too comfortable and we can't hear God speaking to us and it might take us to a desert place. In a desert one is lonely and if we are not hearing God's voice maybe our lives are too crowded and we can't hear God speaking. In a desert place you don't seem to be doing anything but marking time. I mean, what do you do in your evenings in a desert? What do you do? What is there to do? Maybe we are just too busy to hear God's voice. Something else we need to know, you know, about deserts. are tailor made for those God sends there. It was tailor made, you know, for Moses. How long was Moses in the Midian wilderness? Forty years. How long was Israel in the wilderness? Forty years. Desert training for desert camps. That's what we have. What's God doing to Moses in the desert, in the wilderness? He's preparing him. He's training him for great work. Something else very interesting I want to read in Deuteronomy chapter 8 verses 2 and 3. Here's God explaining why He took Israel into the wilderness for 40 years. Deuteronomy 8 at verse 2. And you shall remember that the Lord your God led you, we're talking about guidance, led you all the way these 40 years in the wilderness to humble you and test you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna, which you did not know or did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord. Isn't that something? Why did God lead Israel into the wilderness for 40 years? So that they would know themselves. It wasn't that God would know them, God knew them, that they didn't know themselves. And you know God can lead you and me into desert places so that we discover ourselves. That you might know yourselves. What did God teach Israel in the wilderness? They might learn, man does not live by bread alone. What else did Israel learn in the wilderness? What does God teach His people in the wilderness? How to live by faith day by day. There was Moses in the wilderness of Midian for 40 years on the back of the desert trying to find some blades of grass to feed the sheep. It's good. to learn. Deserts are great places to learn how to depend on God day by day. How to live by faith. How to discover that man doesn't live by bread alone. That man really does live by the Word of God. And sometimes we have to be brought to desert places to be reminded of that. But you say, now come on, God doesn't lead people into deserts today. Oh, but he's got the equivalent. What's your desert? Your desert will not be a wilderness like Midian. Your desert could be Something like being stuck in the same job that you don't like for years. You've got a hunger to serve God but you're stuck in this job. This job you don't like for years and years. Or maybe you're in business, you feel a call of God. But there's some contract you're duty bound to finish first. That's your desert. God keeps you there waiting for these years. But oh, what there is to learn in desert places. Your desert could be some handicap at home that restricts mobility. Some unusually taxing domestic duty that you have to perform and you're not able to serve God instantly or immediately if you want. That's your desert place. The place where God speaks to you. The place where you're lonely, but you can hear God's voice. The place where you've got plenty of time, but God speaks to you and you can hear His voice. Maybe it's some financial burden that you've got to honour first, but it's a place and a thing that God uses to speak to you. and to teach you. That's the wilderness of Midian for you, just as it was a real desert place for Moses. But what's that shadow just to the west of Midian? And everywhere that Moses would go there'd be this shadow casting him from the west. What was that that was in the West? Look up a map. What is it? It's Mount Sinai. Mount Sinai. Well, well, well. Do you know what happened there? That's the place God came down to earth. That's the place where God, as it were, chipped out on these tables of stone the Ten Commandments and gave it to who? Moses! Moses, that unique spot on earth where God revealed His will to mankind through Moses. Listen, the desert may be a long time away, but it's not far away from where God reveals Himself in unique ways. There He was for 40 years, just beside Mount Sinai, where God was to do that miraculous thing for the children of Israel. hand over to them the oracles of God, to them we're committed, but God himself as it were chipped out of these tomb tablets. It's there, it's casting a shadow on them in the desert, but oh what glory it is yet to give Moses. It's a place where Moses, his face is yet to shine, but at the moment he's in the shadow of it. What a lesson That is surely for you and for me as we are in our desert place. Just wait. What was it that sent Moses away to the desert? You remember what we noted last week? Doing God's will, Moses way. Instead of doing God's will, God's way, he did God's will, Moses way. Instead of waiting for God's time, Moses said it's time now to strike out and attack the Egyptians. And it meant 40 years wait, 40 years in the desert. But all it was to reap blessing, it was to prepare them for a tremendous and a fantastic work. Well, I want to look now at the lessons that are taught desert places? What lessons did the desert of Midian, what lessons did God teach Moses that can apply to you and me even today? Well, number one, didn't Moses learn there in Midian how to be a servant? Verse 17, Then the shepherds came and drove them away. But Moses stood up and he helped the shepherdesses, the daughters of Jethro, another name for him. They were shepherdesses and he helped them. He protected them from the shepherds and he stood up and he helped them water their flocks. He learned how to be a servant. I'll tell you this. He didn't learn that in Egypt. He didn't learn that in Pharaoh's palace. He was the Prince. He was to be the next Pharaoh. But he was to learn to be a servant. Do you feel called by God to do something for him? Forget any visions of grandeur. You have to be a servant. Do you feel called to lead? Well, remember Hebrews 2, 9 and 10. We see Jesus, who was made a little more than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, leading many sons to glory, to make the captain, to make the leader of their salvation perfect or mature through suffering. Do you want to lead? Well, listen to what the Bible says. You should serve others that you lead. Do you want to be a great servant of God? Remember Matthew 23 verse 11. When Jesus said to the disciples, who among you would be the greatest? He must be your what? Servant. Do you want to be great? Oh, nothing wrong with wanting to be great. There's nothing wrong with wanting to be great in God's eyes. But listen, what does God mean by being great? It means by being a great servant. That's what it means. Do you know how to serve? Do you want to be Christ-like? Do you want to be like Jesus? Luke 22-27, Who is greater, he who sits at the table or he who serves? Is it not he who sits at the table? Yet, I am among you as one who serves. in the desert, you learn how to serve God. Because it doesn't come naturally to be taught how to serve God. I'll tell you something else that Moses learned in the desert. He learned how to be obscure. How to be out of the picture. Can't you hear them in Pharaoh's palace 25 years down the line? Remember that guy, remember that person we adopted, he used to be, what was his name now? Where is he? Where is he? This man was going to be the next Pharaoh. Where is he? No one knows. And I'll tell you something else. Is there anyone Praying for Moses in Midian? Well, I'm sure his mother and sister were. But you see, in desert places, you learn to take a low profile. And that must have been very, very difficult for someone like Moses. And he had to learn in the desert how to be forgotten. How to be given up and lost? Are you willing to be forgotten? Do you want to know would you be a good servant of God? Are you willing to be forgotten? Are you willing to be thought as lost? Thought as out of the picture? I'm a person who's used to be on the front page. Where is he? for 40 years. Not one of them. He's an obscurity that God hasn't forgotten. Remember that if you're in a desert place. God has not forgotten you in the desert. He's got a purpose. He's training you. He's preparing you for something. He really is. Third thing, and I often wonder, how he felt it in verse 19. How did he feel when he was called an Egyptian? Verse 19, the father rule asks his daughters, how is it you've come home soon? All they said, an Egyptian delivered us from the hand of the shepherds. An Egyptian. That despicable name to Moses. That very people that Moses felt so called to deliver his people out of. And he's called one of them. Now to put salt on the wound, who is it that calls him that? His wife-to-be, Zipporah. Isn't it one of them? That's who calls him. He's willing or he has to look like the very people he despised. And I often wonder what did he feel like? What did he feel like when those he helped thought he was an Egyptian? I mean they weren't calling him names. They really thought he was. What did he feel like? His calling was to deliver his people out of Egypt. Something else he had to learn or he learnt in the wilderness. He learned how to live with his father-in-law. Verse 21. Then Moses was content to live with the man. Wasn't Moses meant to live in a palace? Wasn't Moses meant to sit on a throne? Oh, he has to live in his father-in-law's house. He's to be brought that far down. He can't provide for his own family. He can't provide for himself. He's to borrow his father-in-law's house. The man who was to be the next Pharaoh. Wasn't that something? Was that not something? And here's something else. Same verse. Somebody else is to learn the desert. how to marry a shepherdess. Here, wasn't this Prince Charming? Wasn't he the one that was meant to marry some exotic Cleopatra-like beauty? Wasn't he the one that was on the front page of the equivalent of Hullo magazine? Prince, I need to marry a shepherdess. Now, you remember how shepherds were despised in these days, despised especially by Egyptians. And you remember how shepherds were so despised in society, they weren't allowed to be witnesses in the court. That's a shepherd. What about a shepherdess? Moses marries a shepherdess. He's to come down, you know this? God works in the opposite way of gravity. You throw something else, what goes up must come down. But you know, God's way is this, if you are going to go up, first of all you have to go down. You have to come down if God is going to lift you up. Moses has learnt that in the back of the desert. But you know the main thing he learned? It covers it all. The main thing he learned in the desert was this. He learned how to rely on God. How to rely on God. That's the main thing he learned. Deserts are great places for having to depend on God. I mean, there's not many McDonald's in a desert. Where do you live? Where do you eat? What do you eat? Where do you go at night? You don't meet many people in deserts. You must be a servant of God. There's no libraries in the desert. No theological colleges. But God can speak to you. God can train you in the desert. It's the way God works. His ways are not our ways. Deserts are great places at teaching us how to live day by day by faith. Instead of relying on the wisdom of Egyptian colleges of art and science. Instead of relying on the wealth of Pharaoh's treasures. Can you think of all these years of training in Pharaoh's house? The wisdom and the learning he got in the colleges of art and science. Not much use in the desert. I think they were to be of use in the wilderness, mind you. I think they were to be of use when he went to go to face Pharaoh. But for 40 years in Midian, not much use to him. God's ways are not our ways. But here's the big thing. Here's the thing to remember, if you feel God has put you in a desert place, it may be because God has big plans for you. He had big, big plans for Moses. But Moses wasn't quite ready for them. So it's the desert. Good place for training. Good place for training. Now I want to return to Exodus 32 verse 10 and 11. What is it that God says there about desert places? Let's look at it carefully again. He found them in a desert land and in the wasteland, a howling wilderness. Do you know this? The desert is a place where God finds His best people. Do you feel lost? Do you feel lost? Do you feel God's forgotten about you? Do you feel no one's seen what you're going through? Do you wonder where God is? Well, this is the way God works. He finds His best people in desert lands. Deuteronomy 32.10 But what else does He do to them? Once He finds them, what does He do with them in the desert according to Deuteronomy 32? He encircles them. He encircles them. Tell me this, do you feel things are closing in on you? Do you feel things are closing in on you? Could it be God closing in on you? He encircles His best people in the desert land. In the desert place. What else does He do to them in the desert according to Deuteronomy 32? He instructs them. Oh, there's hard lessons in the wilderness. Hard lessons, but you know this? Hard lessons are the best lessons. Hard lessons are the best lessons. and God gives the best lessons. If you're smarting in a desert place, if it's God's lesson, it's blessed. There's a great reward. There's a great future. There's a great blessing in store. Don't complain too much about the desert place. What does he go on to speak about in verse 11? What else does he do to his best people that he finds in a desert place? He disturbs them, does he not? As an eagle stirs up its nest and hovers over its young. Do you know what it's referring to there? Do you know what the eagle does when its young chickens are growing up? They're not going out of the nest to learn to fly. Do you know what the mother eagle does? It goes over to them and it tips them over the edge so that they fall down. They've got to learn to fly. They've got to learn to come out of the nest. They've got to learn. And their life has been disturbed by their mother. And so he says, as the eagle stirs up its nest, the time has come for its young to face the world. throws them out of the nest. Do you feel, do you feel God's interrupted your life? He's disturbing your plans. He's upset your apple cart. Do you feel everything's gone wrong? It could just be God. It could be God teaching you how to fly like the eagle and it's young. But don't miss the next bit whatever you do. What's the next bit? What happens once the eagle throws its eaglets out the nest? It scoots down underneath it and spreads out its wings and carries the eaglets on its wings. Do you want to be carried by God? Do you want the everlasting arms to be underneath you, carrying you through life. Do you want that? Do you? Well, don't say too much against the desert. That's why God has desert prisons. That's why God sends His people to these lonely spots. That's why He gives them these lessons. He's got a big future. and a great plan for them. So He's disturbing them, but He's training them and qualifying them for great things before, great things ahead of them. God's ways are not our ways. Our God's ways are best. God's ways are good, and do you know this? God's ways never fail. But the last thing I want to say is this. What was it that sparked all this off? What was it that made Moses go to Midian for the safety of his life? Do you know what it was? It was a failure. It was a failure. He mistimed it completely. He did God's thing his own way. Can you give God permission to come into your failure? Maybe you've let Him down. Maybe you've sinned. But if God's got His eye and He says, I can train you. I can teach you. But you've got to let me into your failure. You see, some people fail and they say, well that's it forever. I remember reading a couple of weeks ago something that, I think it was Sir Winston Churchill, he said, do you know what success is? Hope I've got it right. Success is, he says, going from one failure to another failure without losing enthusiasm. Going from one failure to another failure without losing enthusiasm. Well, I think if it was me, I'd have lost a lot of enthusiasm for 40 years in the desert. Any call I would have felt God would have given me to lead Israel out of Egypt, I think it would have left me. But God's ways are not our ways, and we mustn't go by what we think, and we mustn't go by what we feel. We must go by what God says. And what does God say about desert places? I find my best people in a desert, in a waste, howling wilderness. And I've got big, big plans for them if they let me into their life. May God, the Holy Spirit, make His Word effectual to every one of us. Let's pray. Thank you.