Description / Transcription
This sermon originally delivered by Kevin DeYoung at University Reformed Church in East Lansing, Michigan
Fanny Jane Crosby was born in Putnam County, New York (north of New York City) in 1820. She developed a serious illness soon after she was born, and her parents took her to the doctor. Their usual doctor was gone, so they took her to someone who claimed to be a doctor. It turned out he was a quack doctor, and he prescribed that her parents should put a hot mustard concoction on her eyes. Her illness eventually got better, but this ill-advised treatment left her blind for the rest of her life.
A few months later, Fanny’s father died, and her mother went to find work as a maid. Fanny was raised mostly by her Christian grandmother. Amazingly, she wrote her first poem at age eight:
Oh, what a happy soul am I,
Although I cannot see,
I am resolved that in this world
Contented I will be.
How many blessings I enjoy
That other people don’t!
To weep and sigh because I’m blind
I cannot, and I won’t!
Years later, when a pastor told her what a pity it was that she had been blind all of these years, she replied that she was thankful for it, because it meant that the first sight she would ever see would be her Lord and Savior in all of His splendor and glory.
Fanny was extremely bright. She worked hard to memorize the Bible. Even as a young girl, she had the first four books of the Old Testament and the four gospels (in the New Testament) memorized. Around the age of eighteen, she went to the newly-founded New York Institute for the Blind, where she would stay for 23 years, first as a student and then as a teacher.
In 1844, she published her first book: The Blind Girl and Other Poems. Soon, she was one of the most well-connected, well-respected American poets and hymn writers of the entire age. She was under contract to submit three hymns a week to her publisher—which sounds like a lot, but she often wrote six or seven hymns a day. Although she could play several instruments, most of the tunes came from other musicians: some from her pastor, Robert Lowry; several from Dwight Moody, who was a leading revivalist; and some from his musician, Ira Sankey. When some of her words were put to Ira Sankey’s music, her fame grew even more.
All told, she wrote (are you )ready for this number?) more than 9,000 hymns, including some of the most sung hymns of the last 100-150 years: Blessed Assurance, Jesus, Keep Me Near the Cross, Rescue the Perishing, and To God Be the Glory.
She died a century ago, in 1915. We just sang one of her hymns, even though it said “Rich Mullins” there at the bottom. He did a version of it, but it was a Fanny Jane Crosby hymn: All the Way My Savior Leads Me. It’s a hymn we need—and it’s a hymn that Moses could have used:
All the way my Savior leads me;
What have I to ask beside?
Can I doubt His tender mercy,
Who through life has been my Guide?
Heav’nly peace, divinest comfort,
Here by faith in Him to dwell!
For I know, whate’er befall me,
Jesus doeth all things well.
All the way my Savior leads me,
Cheers each winding path I tread,
Gives me grace for every trial,
Feeds me with the living bread.
Though my weary steps may falter,
And my soul athirst may be,
Gushing from the Rock before me,
Lo! a spring of joy I see.
Like Moses, we all have times where it is hard to believe that God is really going to go with us. We are all tempted from time to time to think that He is asking too much of us. Some of you know that feeling all too well. You think, “Lord, I don’t think I can go another day feeling the way I am. I don’t know if I can go another week with such little sleep. I don’t know if I can go another month with all of the trials that I have in my home. Lord, I don’t know if I can keep doing this with the situation that I have at work.”
Sometimes when God calls us, we’d much rather not pick up the phone. We have to remember that God made each of us. He made all of you—even the feeblest, weakest things about you. None of us are so clumsy, so bad, or so far gone that the God of the universe doesn’t have a way to use us. Not Moses. Not you. Not me.
Exodus 4:10-17:
10 But Moses said to the Lord, “Oh, my Lord, I am not eloquent, either in the past or since you have spoken to your servant, but I am slow of speech and of tongue.” 11 Then the Lord said to him, “Who has made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? 12 Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak.” 13 But he said, “Oh, my Lord, please send someone else.” 14 Then the anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses and he said, “Is there not Aaron, your brother, the Levite? I know that he can speak well. Behold, he is coming out to meet you, and when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart. 15 You shall speak to him and put the words in his mouth, and I will be with your mouth and with his mouth and will teach you both what to do. 16 He shall speak for you to the people, and he shall be your mouth, and you shall be as God to him. 17 And take in your hand this staff, with which you shall do the signs.”
(Exodus 4:10-17)
We come in these verses to the fourth and fifth objections that Moses presented to the Lord. Remember, God spoke to Moses out of the burning bush, telling him that “I’m sending you to Egypt. Go back there, speak to the elders, and to then go speak to Pharaoh. You will set My people free.” Moses objects five times. He asks, in Exodus 3:11, “Who am I?” Exodus 3:13: “Who are You?” Exodus 4:1: “What about them?” Those have been the three objections so far. To “Who am I?”, the Lord says, “It doesn’t matter.” “Okay, who are You?” “I am the ‘I am’.” “But what about them? What if I go to Egypt and the elders don’t listen to me?” He said, “They’ll listen to you, and here are some signs.” Now he comes with his two final objections. Verse 10: “I can’t.” Verse 13: “I won’t.” Let’s look at those two final objections this morning.
“I Can’t”—Moses’ Fourth Objection
In verses 10-12, He says quite plainly to the Lord, “Okay, let’s cut right to the chase here. I can’t do what You are asking me to do. It sounds like a good plan. It’s a good idea. I can’t do it.” Here’s the problem Moses presents: “I’m not good at speaking.”
On the one hand, we can understand his reticence. A diplomatic mission like this would involve a lot of high-pressure speaking. He is going before the most powerful man in the most important and impressive kingdom on the face of the earth. We can understand that him feeling a little unqualified. On the other hand, it’s hard to be too sympathetic with Moses, who says, “I’m not good at speaking to people!” as he continues to argue with God. He seemed to have found his voice in speaking to God. He could speak to Pharaoh.
Scholars have long discussed and debated what exactly is behind this assertion. Some people have said that he’s just being polite—that it’s a kind of Middle-Eastern way of presenting his exaggerated humility. It’s a ritual protest: “You want me to go to Egypt? Oh, no, I couldn’t do that.” It’s just an expression of polite humility—kind of like when you’re out to eat with your friends and somebody offers to pick up the check. That’s when my wife starts nudging me and saying, “No, we can get this check.” So I’ll say, “You know, we could get this check.” And they’ll say, “No, no. Really—okay, well it is more blessed to give than to receive. What a blessing you’re getting today to give to us. Isn’t that great?” Yes, we’ve all been there. Depending on your family and how you do things, you may have to do it once…or twice…or ten times, until you’re at each other’s throats. “No, I’LL pay for the check!” “Give me that check!” “No, I’ll do it.” Some people say Moses is just making a kind of ritual protest here.
Others say, “No, it’s honest self-doubt. He’s got an idea in his head that he’s not good at this.” Some have said, “He’s just making excuses.” That’s certainly part of it. It’s almost funny what he says in verse 10:
I am not eloquent, either in the past or since you have spoken to your servant…
(Exodus 4:10)
Okay, Moses—wasn’t that like 20 minutes ago? “I’ve never been good at speaking, and even since you’ve gave me this message (which was just in the last hour or so) nothing miraculous has happened to my speech.”
Was he worried about language difficulties? Perhaps he thought, “I can’t speak Hebrew very well to the Israelites, because I didn’t grow up speaking that in the househ0ld of Pharaoh. And then I’ve been in Midian all these years.” Or maybe it was the opposite, and he thought, “How am I going to go speak Egyptian to Pharaoh, because I’ve been in Midian for half my life?” Or perhaps he had a genuine, medical, physical speech impediment. Maybe there was something wrong with the way he said his words, or something different about his voice. A stammer, perhaps. Many scholars have thought so, and there are some reasons to think that this could be the case. In the Middle Ages, Jewish exegetes understood this to be a reference to a physical speech impediment. The famous Jewish interpreter Ibn Ezra said that Moses was born with a speech defect. The Midrash document, Exodus Rabbah, says that he accidentally burnt his mouth with a coal when he was a young boy, so he couldn’t form his words correctly.
Then there are the words used in verse 10. The Greek translation of this (the Septuagint, which translated the Hebrew into Greek) uses the word ‘ischnóphōnos’ where it says, “I am slow of speech”. You can hear the word ‘phonos’ in that second half—like a ‘phono’-graph or a tele-‘phone’. It’s the Greek word for ‘voice’ or ‘speech’. The first part of the word (‘ischno’) means, ‘weak’. “I’m weak-speeched.” Look it up in a Greek lexicon, and it’ll give the definition, “having an impediment in one’s speech,” so perhaps this was a reference to a physical speech problem.
Then there’s a second phrase:
…slow of speech and of tongue.
(Exodus 4:10)
This is the Hebrew phrase ‘kebad lasown’. ‘Kebad’ is also ‘kabowd’. You may have heard that Hebrew word before. It’s the word for ‘glory’, and literally means ‘weight’ or ‘heaviness’. He’s not saying, “I have a glorious tongue.” He’s saying, “I am heavy of tongue. I am slow of speech.”
Interestingly, these same two words are used together in Ezekiel 3:5 to describe a people who speak a different language that Ezekiel could not understand. They were a people of a “heavy speech”, something indecipherable to him. So perhaps Moses had something physically wrong with the way in which he spoke.
In the end, we can’t be sure. Perhaps it’s best that we don’t know. Perhaps that’s God’s way of saying, “Look, I’m not just going to isolate this to one particular kind of infirmity. This is applicable to any sort of reality or perception you may have of weakness.” If God had said to Moses, “Look, Moses. You are super gifted. There’s nothing wrong with you,” then we could feel like, “Well, that’s fine for Moses, because he was really gifted, but I have something wrong with me.” Or if He had said, “Moses, you’re right. You do have a speech impediment, but I’m going to heal you of that,” then some of us would think, “Well, okay Lord, if you don’t heal me, then I guess I can’t do it.”
Maybe God does not want us to know exactly what was or wasn’t wrong with Moses. As I’m sure all of us can appreciate, if Moses understood himself to have a real problem with his speech—and I think there’s every indication that he wasn’t just feigning humility, but really believed himself to have a problem here—whether it was medically diagnosable or not, the perception for Moses was the reality for him. He said, “Lord, I can’t do this. You’re giving me a job that is chiefly to go and to speak: to speak to the Israelites, to the elders, and to the most important man on the earth. And I am not good at speaking. I am slow of tongue. I am not gifted in this way. I have real problems.”
The Lord’s response to this problem is two-fold. First, He says to Moses, “I made you.” Verse 11:
“Who has made man’s mouth?
(Exodus 4:11a)
“Okay, Moses, something’s not right with your mouth. What is it? You don’t form words correctly? You’re stammering, with a lisp? What is it? Moses, I made you that way.” No, this is not a reference to moral failings. It’s not a reference to fallen desires, so that you can just say, “Whatever I desire, whatever I think about myself: you know, God made me that way.” It’s not talking about desires which are affected by the Fall. This is not a verse that says that you can’t give your kids braces so their teeth get straight, or have physical therapy to walk again, or fix a cleft palette, or get heart surgery. But this is surely an important word, in our gift-obsessed, looks-obsessed, skills-obsessed, achievement-obsessed world. He says, “Moses, I made you like that.” And He says to us, “I put your DNA together.” God made your mouth. God gave you that hair. God gave you that weakness. Now, take into account all of the important caveats about the fall: the way things are now is not how they are supposed to be or the way they will be in glory. Take all of that into consideration. And yet, in a very real way, God gave you that handicap, just like He did to Moses: not to punish you, but because He loves you and you are fearfully and wonderfully made.
Surely, verse 11 screams to us about the value of life. The life of the unborn in the womb—healthy or with extra chromosomes—is a life valuable to God, and should be so to us. Surely verse 11 speaks of the value of life for those who have disabilities, for the aged, the infirmed, and the terminally ill. God made us. That’s what He says to Moses: “You think you have a problem? Just remember, if your mouth doesn’t work, I made that mouth. You don’t like the way you look? You don’t like the way you sound? You don’t like the way you talk? I made you that way.”
And then He gives another response. He says in verse 11, “I will be with you. I’ll be with your mouth. I’ll be strong in your weakness.”
Isn’t this the point of 2 Corinthians 4?
But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.
(2 Corinthians 4:7)
Jars of clay. We have a different cultural context. Most of us hear “Jars of Clay” and think, “Yeah, that’s a good band. They’ve got some good albums.” But think of it as paper plates. We have this meal on paper plates to show that the all-surpassing power is from God. We are a church of paper plates.
I think the fancy restaurants know their food isn’t that good. You know, it’s got all the little garnishing sprinkled around it. People are going to push those vegetables off to the side anyways. It’s got stuff drizzled on it, because they’ve got to present it. It’s on the finest china, the most expensive crystal, or what you would do for a wedding or a state dinner—and here it is. Well, when it’s got all that presentation, you feel like it has to be good.
But when somebody can serve you food on a paper plate, like I would serve if you came over—my wife would probably have do a different thing—but on a paper plate, then you know, “This piece of pizza must be delicious, because I have a cup with some water, and a paper plate with a spork, and it’s so good!” That’s what 2 Corinthians 4 is about. We have this treasure in jars of clay. We have this meal, this delicious feast, on a paper plate, so that everyone knows it isn’t the presentation. No, it’s the meal. It’s the substance. The Lord wants to say to us, as He said to Moses, “I made you. I’ll be with you. I get glory when you have weakness and I’m strong.”
Calvin said,
“This over-anxious caution [from Moses] is, therefore, deservedly condemned, although it may have some admixture of virtue; because whatever difficulty we encounter, this ought to be a sufficient encouragement to us, that as often as God chooses men as His ministers, although they are in themselves good for nothing, He forms and prepares them for their work.”
Cheer up! You may be good for nothing, but it’s good enough for God to use—good enough for God to draw up a play in His divine playbook just for you, because He made you. He will be with you. He has a plan for you. He loves you in Christ.
Do you ever have your kids make something for you? They draw a picture, cut out a doll, or come up and bring this LEGO creation to you. They’re so excited to show you. And it looks like a jumbled mess, and you just wish that they would pick them up so that you’ll stop impaling your foot as you walk across the floor.
But he or she comes and explains it. “Look what I did, Mom! Look what I did, Dad! There are some wings over here, and there’s a rocket booster on his back, and he’s got a big sword and jet things on his feet.” And you’re looking at it and thinking, “He’s got an extra arm, and it’s coming out of his head. The legs aren’t quite right. That thing’s never going to stand up and…you know, you didn’t even use the same color or bricks from the same set.” But as he describes it and you see the enthusiasm, you know, “Even if this looks like some junk to me, I know the little creator that made it. He’s got such a plan for this little robot. It’s put together with all of his ingenuity and creativity.” He’s ready to tell you exactly what it can do, all the bad guys that it’s going to defeat, and all the good guys that it’s going to save—because he made it. God made you. God will be with you. Don’t say, “I can’t,” because God can.
“I Won’t”: Moses’ Fifth Objection
We get to the real heart of the matter in verse 13: Moses doesn’t want to go. God has already said “Go!” three times. Chapter 3, verse 16:
16 Go and gather the elders of Israel…
(Exodus 3:16a)
Chapter 3, verse 18:
18 And they will listen to your voice, and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt…
(Exodus 3:18a)
And then chapter 4, verse 12:
12 Now therefore go…
(Exodus 4:12a)
Three times! “Moses, go! Go! You’re still here. Go!” Now, finally, after a serious of excuses, Moses reveals his true heart: “Will You please send somebody else?”
Ever go up to a church missions conference? You hear a special singer, and you’ll sing that song of commitment: “Here I am, Lord. Send someone else, Lord. I have ignored your calling in the night.” That’s what Moses is doing. “I hear you, Lord! I love that plan. Send him.”
You know, this is the first time in the Bible where we read that God is angry with someone. Surely we know that He was not pleased with the sin in the Garden—and He cursed them, so you can infer that there’s anger. We know that He wasn’t pleased with the whole earth, since He wiped it all with a flood. But even in Genesis 6 it says that He was grieved in His heart. This is the first time that we read about God’s anger being kindled. Moses will write later, in Exodus 34:6, that God is slow to anger—and surely He was slow to anger as Moses went through objection after objection and excuse after excuse. But now, finally, on the fifth time, the Lord’s anger is kindled. “Enough, Moses!”
If Moses is just trying to be polite, he’s doing it in the most annoying way possible. Notice that God is merciful to provide provision even for this whiner of a prophet. He says, “Okay, okay: I’ll give you two things: a sibling and a staff. I’ll give you a sibling. I’ll give you Aaron, your older brother. He’s good at speaking to people. I’ll give you the message, you give it to him, and then he’ll go and speak.” We actually don’t see a lot of this, but He gave Moses a sibling to help to him. Now, Moses is going to find out later that this was a bit of a mixed blessing, because when he was on the mountain one day, Aaron (who was really good at speaking and persuading people) decided to get everyone to build a golden calf. Maybe Plan B was not as good as Plan A.
“I’ll give you a sibling and I’ll give you a staff.” A staff was one of the most basic elements of someone’s possession. Think of Jesus saying, “Don’t even take a bag, a tunic, or a staff when you go.” It was a source of protection and of identification. He says, “Alright. I’ll give you a staff to do the signs. I’ll give you a sibling to help you speak.”
But notice what Moses is doing. Moses, you recall, has already asked the Lord, “Who are You?” And remember He replied to him, “I am who I am.” And He revealed to him His name: ‘YHWH’. And when that name is used, it shows up in your English Bible with small capital letters as ‘Lord,’ ‘YHWH,’ or ‘Jehovah’. But notice what happens in verse 10. “Oh, my Lord,” Moses says. It’s a different word: not ‘YHWH’, not ‘I am’, but ‘Lord’. Then verse 11: “Then YHWH said to him”. Verse 13: “Oh, my Lord”. And then verse 14: “The anger of YHWH was kindled against him.” Moses may have had the knowledge of the Lord revealed to him, but he had forgotten it quickly—or he doesn’t want to admit exactly who this God is whom he now thinks is incapable of fulfilling His purposes through him.
See, we can have all of the greatest theology in the world, and believe all of the glorious things about the ‘I am,’ and it won’t make a difference if we don’t believe that the ‘I am’ is with us. He is self-existent, independent, the Creator, and Sovereign of all the universe. That’s what the Lord revealed to Moses, but now Moses says, “Uh, I don’t think this is going to work, Lord.”
How do we know that God is calling us? It’s easy to see here that Moses was disobedient, because God had so clearly spoken to him in the bush, given him the signs, and gave him a mission—and he wanted to do something else. Certainly the most obvious way that we know God’s calling in our lives is to read the Scriptures to see what He tells us. 1 Thessalonians 4:3: This is God’s will in your life: Your sanctification. That’s what God’s calling you to: to be holy, to seek first His kingdom and righteousness, and to obey this word.
It’s also true that there can be a subjective sense of calling. I think most of us have had an experience like this or have known people who have. It always needs to be tested against Scripture, and we don’t want to tie ourselves in knots looking for it, but there can be times—through wisdom, a sense of opportunity, need, open doors, and counsel from others—that there is a strong sense of knowing that God wants us to do something. Again, it’s not an excuse to go willy-nilly into any sort of place or profession without listening to others. Sometimes there can even be a sense of calling, not that you know what job you should take, but that “Lord, here I am and here’s what you would have me do. You have me here for a purpose.”
Maybe that’s what God needs to remind you of, Mom, as you think, “How could this possibly be the Lord’s will for me?” Well, this is what He’s called you to, right now, in this season. Or think about the job that you’re in, or about the task that you’ve been putting off, or the hard conversation that you don’t want to have. “This is what God would have me do to be obedient to Him. If I don’t, it will be disobedience to His calling in my life.”
You may think, “If I were a pastor or a missionary, every day would be great. I’d just know I’m doing the Lord’s will—that I’m called—and I’d feel fulfilled.” Well, I’m a very normal person, just like you, and I don’t feel that way every day. There are times—not because there’s some secret sin, or I’m depressed or something—but there are days (let’s call them Mondays) where I wonder, “Is this really doing anything? Is this work helping anyone? Is that word going forth to accomplish anything?” You probably feel that in whatever your calling is. I feel that. And I can tell you: if I didn’t have a sense that to go do something else would be disobedient to the Lord, I might have found something else to do.
When you avoid your calling, you may end up in the belly of a big fish in the middle of a lake somewhere. That’s what happens when you run from God’s calling. Will you serve God with whatever strengths and weaknesses He’s given you? Will you speak of His name? You may think, “I can’t. God isn’t going to use me to save people. You don’t know the people in my life. They are so far gone. They don’t know Jesus. They don’t want anything to do with Him. God cannot use me.” Well, He spoke through a donkey before, so give yourself a chance. You know what Jesus said to the disciples?
19 When they deliver you over, do not be anxious how you are to speak or what you are to say, for what you are to say will be given to you in that hour. 20 For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.
(Matthew 10:19-20)
It’s not you speaking. It’s God speaking through you to share, to bear witness, and to testify. I love the way Phil Ryken put it in his commentary:
“God is not looking for an orator, just a reporter.”
Moses didn’t have to be an orator with all the rhetorical gifts, and be able to give the best speech in the world. “Just report what has happened.” Can you be a reporter? Tell people what God has done in your life—and, even more importantly, tell them what God has done in the world to create it, to save sinners in it, and to send His Son into it to die for those sinners, to be raised on the third day and to come again. Can you bear witness to that? Not as an orator. Just a reporter.
Whatever our abilities are, we often wish we had someone else’s abilities. “But she’s so musical. Oh, he’s so good with people. They can talk to anyone. He’s so smart. She’s so athletic. They have so many connections. He’s so good with money.” We often wish we had someone else’s abilities. We often wish we had someone else’s calling. What really matters, though: your gifts or God’s help? Human abilities or divine assistance? Will you serve God with whatever He’s given you?
The One who Didn’t Say “No”
Of course, this story about Moses isn’t the last story in the Bible about a royal prince who left a palace to go on a seemingly impossible rescue mission. But if you know the other story, you know it’s about a royal Son who did not say “No”: the Lord Jesus Christ, who did not consider equality with God a thing to be grasped, but took upon Himself the form of a servant, to be made in human flesh, and to become obedient to death, even the point of death on a cross. The Son did not say no. Picture Him there in the garden, sweating drops of blood, pleading with His heavenly Father: “Is there another way? Nevertheless, not My will but Yours be done.” The most important thing you can do with all your gifts, opportunities, weaknesses, impediments, and obstacles is to worship and serve the One who said “Yes” to His Father in the garden.
I started with a story about a hymn writer. I want to finish with a story about a hymn writer. William Cowper (pronounced ‘Cooper’) is regarded as one of the best Early Romantic English poets, and also wrote some of the best English hymn texts. He often wrote in collaboration with his friend and mentor, John Newton.
You may know the story. Despite his literary success and friendship with one of the most warm-hearted and wise pastors in the history of the church (John Newton), Cowper struggled with severe depression his entire adult life. He had a powerful conversion when he was younger, but he always struggled to find assurance, and he often wondered if he was still under the wrath of God. His life was a testimony to God’s sustaining grace and His willingness to use weak vessels to glorify Himself and to encourage others.
At six years old, when his mother was dying, he was sent away to school, where he was bullied by another student. As a young man in his early twenties, he suffered the first of several bouts of depression. In his thirties, he attempted suicide. He was committed to Saint Alban’s as a certifiable madman. The madness relented, but resurfaced several times in the years ahead. One time, in recovery, he tried to calm himself and steady his nerves by taking up gardening, sketching, and keeping rabbits. If you’ve ever had a pet bunny, I dare you to read his poem Epitaph for a Hare and try not to cry. He began to write poetry. His brilliance as a poet was often interrupted by bouts of melancholy and insanity. Cowper wrote God Moves in Mysterious Ways in 1773, just before he fell into a deep depression. In the mysterious providence of God, this hymn has brought hope to countless believers, even as Cowper himself often struggled to find that comfort and that hope. Just as Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4:12:
12 So death is at work in us, but life in you.
(2 Corinthians 4:12)
The hymn reminds us that God’s ways are not our ways, and that things are often not what they seem. He often works most powerfully in apparent weakness, and those who feel most abandoned by God may in fact be His most beloved children, closest to His heart.
One of my all-time favorite hymns is Cowper’s other masterpiece, There is a Fountain Filled with Blood. Listen to these verses:
E’er since by faith I saw the stream
Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die.
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue
Lies silent in the grave,
Then in a nobler, sweeter song,
I’ll sing Thy power to save.
Someday, if you are in Christ, you will sing that nobler, sweeter song without any of your maladies, depression, anxiety, or self-doubt; without cancer, heart palpitations, chest pains, arthritis, canker sores, joint pain, digestive problems, or migraines. But for now, and for however many years God gives us on this earth, He calls us to praise Him, to serve Him, and to sing to Him with our lisping, stammering tongues, just like Moses. In weakness, God will be strong.
