When You Are Weak and He is Strong {Emily Jensen}

What is your weakness, and what does God think about it? Join Emily Jensen and me for a conversation about ineloquent Moses and his assignment from God that felt impossible. Learn how to live like it's true that your weakness isn't a problem for God.

Guest: Emily Jensen 

Bible Passage: Moses Given Powerful Signs - Exodus 4:10-17

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Mentioned Resources

• He is Strong by Emily Jensen
• Risen Motherhood by Emily Jensen
• What You Need to Know About Your Identity Crisis - Burning Bush Episode on Live Like It's True

Emily Jensen

Emily A. Jensen is an author, a podcaster, and the cofounder and content director of Risen Motherhood. Her first book (coauthored with her podcast partner and sister-in-law) Risen Motherhood: Gospel Hope for Everyday Moments, has sold more than 100,000 copies. Her latest book is He is Strong: Devotions for When You Feel Weak (October 2023). Emily lives in central Iowa, with her husband and their five children.

Connect with Emily:

Website: emilyajensen.com

Instagram: @emilyajensen

Podcast: Risen Motherhood

Shaped by God's Promises: Lessons from Sarah on Fear and Faith 
     {buy now}

Comparison Girl for Teens
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Get our free "Pray God's Promises" prayer guide.

Go to Shannonpopkin.com/PROMISES/ for more information on my neww Bible study, Shaped by God’s Promises: Lessons from Sarah on Fear and Faith. 

Visit ResoundMedia.cc for the Live Leadership Podcast, along with other Gospel centered resources.

Transcript

Shannon: 1:36

Emily Jensen welcome to Live Like it's True.

Emily: 1:40

Thank you for having me. It's a joy to be here.

Shannon: 1:42

It's such a pleasure to have you here, emily. I'm so excited about your new book. He Is Strong. Before we talk about that, let me just back up and share. You are an author, a podcaster and co-founder and a content director of Risen Motherhood. So I have your book here beside me, risen Motherhood Such a beautiful book. I wish I would have had this as a young mom. It's just very well-written, so gospel-centered, you know. Risen Is that. The idea behind it Is like Christ is risen and so our motherhood should be risen, right?

Emily: 2:13

Yes, yes, you've got to live in light of the resurrection of Christ.

Shannon: 2:16

Yeah, so gospel-focused but yet so personal, transparent, like real motherhood stories and insights. So I just love the book and just love what God has done with Risen Motherhood in general. But you live in central Iowa.

Emily: 2:31

Yes.

Shannon: 2:31

You're married and have five children. So you can find more from Emily at EmilyA Jensen it's J-E-N-S-E-N dot com or on Instagram. So your new book he is Strong. I sat down with it yesterday, just to kind of. I was just thinking I would get a little glimpse at what you're doing there, and I found myself reading and reading and reading. You are such a beautiful writer, Emily.

Emily: 2:56

Oh, thank you. That's such a sweet compliment. As you know, whenever you pour your words and your heart out there, it just means a lot when someone connects with it and finds truth there.

Shannon: 3:06

Yes, you just, you have a beautiful way with words, but you're also vulnerable and always pointing us to truth. So, and this book, it seems, is written for a wide variety of ages of moms yes, yeah, yeah.

Emily: 3:19

I just really had a woman at any age and stage on my heart. I write a lot from my perspective as a mom because I've learned so many lessons about my weakness in God's strength and motherhood. But really this book is also written just to be accessible for a woman who is not a mom or is not married. You know, I don't think those things are in any way requirements to feel weakness.

Emily: 3:43

So in the book I definitely tell a lot of stories as well, from just being a young woman or growing up and stories from different seasons of life. So I hope it'll connect with a lot of different women.

Shannon: 3:53

Well, it connected with me. I'm 52. I'm probably twice. Well, how old are you?

Emily: 3:58

37.

Shannon: 3:59

Okay, so I'm not twice right, so I love that. The title he is Strong is kind of an overflow of the lyric Jesus loves me. I am weak, but he is strong, and so it's 30 devotions rooted in scripture, exploring different feelings of weaknesses. I don't really like to talk about my weaknesses, you know. I honestly would rather be a strong person.

Emily: 4:21

Uh-huh. I've actually found that to be a little bit of a barrier of getting the book in people's hands, and I've heard that feedback is just kind of it's not a topic that people want to identify with. I think sometimes we are in those seasons where we feel our weakness really overwhelmingly or acutely, but most of the time when we're going about life we prefer to not think of ourselves that way. So it's been a little bit tough, but what I've heard from women is, once they pick it up and they actually see what it's about and they read it, it's like oh okay, these are actually things that I'm experiencing, things that I am wrestling with. These are very everyday things and these are important things to take to the Lord and not to just stuff down and ignore, because I think that that's our default when we see an area of our lives where we're feeling insufficient or we're lacking, or we feel like, oh, I'm not enough in this area.

Emily: 5:11

We don't want to spend a bunch of time examining that and thinking about that, and so I do think there's that little bit of a barrier to get through. But boy, once we acknowledge those things and take them to the Lord, there's so much hope and help available.

Shannon: 5:25

That's so true. I think we kind of have to be forced into that weakness corner right. We'd rather be in a strong corner and God's like oh no, you're weak. In general, we don't really. We live in a culture that celebrates strength right In autonomy, especially as women. Like we are strong, girl, you're strong. Like you do you and be a boss, or whatever.

Shannon: 5:48

All the strong commentary from the world, and yet Jesus calls us to something different. In my book Comparison Girl, I was really honing in on that, because comparison is one of those ways we want to be better than we want to measure up. We want to always outdo, and yet Jesus constantly calls us back to the weaker, the smaller or the you know. It's like this me free, like I don't have to be better, I just have to be available and willing, and God makes up for any lack that I have. And in fact, he wants to use our weakness and in fact, gives us weakness. I think that we're going to see that in the story that we're going to look at. So it's. We're going to look at this story of Moses when he was being called to go to Pharaoh and set his people free, and Moses is like complaining about his capacity level. He's like send somebody else, like not me.

Shannon: 6:38

And you know, just he's noticing his weakness, does not feel equipped to go do this thing. God has asked him.

Emily: 6:43

And.

Shannon: 6:44

I loved how in your lesson where you were kind of recapping on the story, you talked about capacity level. Tell us the story about riding in a plane where you were asked a pretty personal question there, Emily.

Emily: 6:55

Yeah, I was going on a riding retreat and my husband is fascinated by airplanes. He loves airplanes and so any chance that he can get me to get on any type of airplane he gets really excited about. So we have this friend who's getting his pilot's license and he has a little tiny plane. Like I couldn't really understand how small this plane was until I went and saw him in person and I thought I'm riding in that like that window of glass is the only thing between me and the sky. That feels not okay.

Emily: 7:27

But the night before we get this text from him that says, hey, what is your weight and what's the weight of your suitcases? Because in a plane that small I mean this is true for big planes too but in a plane that small the weight matters for the amount of fuel that you put in the plane, and so you don't want to be off a few pounds in one direction or another and then not have enough fuel to make your trip. And so I just thought that was such an interesting picture of capacity and thinking, hey, this plane, like this pilot, has to kind of count the cost and think through this, because we don't want to get in there and be taking off or be in the sky and not actually have enough of what we need to get to our destination. And yeah, just really made me think about our human capacity and thinking through some of those things right, like, do I have what I need to do? This thing that is in front of me and kind of counting the cost ahead of time.

Shannon: 8:26

Yeah, you said, and when you told the story that you took an extra pair of shoes out of your suitcase because getting the weight down, I was thinking in my head like, okay, what I would probably do is put some of my weight in the suitcase weight you know?

Emily: 8:38

Oh, I didn't think about that. I wish I would have.

Shannon: 8:41

It's like oh my God, that would be to tell a friend who knows me how much I weight. Anyway yes, these are things that we women think about, right. But I mean it's not wrong to consider your capacity level, like it's not wrong for that pilot. You know we don't want him to wing it.

Emily: 8:58

Right.

Shannon: 8:59

And so like it's not wrong for Moses to consider his capacity level, but I think what's consistent in the Bible is that God asks us to do things that we don't really have the capacity to do. Yeah, you have a child, Emily, who, like you, wrote a lot about this child in your book, I've got the sense that it has really stretched your capacity. Looking in on this, would you have said I can't do this, God, Like I don't have the capacity. Would you have said that early on?

Emily: 9:25

Absolutely, absolutely. And you know, for those who haven't read the book yet, I share a little bit about our fourth son, who has a rare genetic syndrome and we found out about that when he was a little over a year old. But he is non-verbal, he just started walking when he was seven and so he's eight and a half now, but just has a lot of, you know, he has intellectual disabilities. It's just a huge challenge and he has since been diagnosed with epilepsy, which is part of what launched me into just facing my weaknesses and really needing to grapple with this topic. Because definitely at the beginning, but still every day sometimes I will just think how, lord, like, how do I care for all five of my kids? They all have very different needs, but I have one that has really significant needs. It makes it, you know, sometimes a challenge to meet my other kids where they're out and give them what they need.

Emily: 10:26

And I'm married and there's all kinds of other roles and responsibilities that I have in my life, and all the time I feel like God is asking me, no-transcript, impossible for me to do well in any way on my own and in my own strength, and so it really is a daily act of going before him and trusting that he knows my frame, he knows what I'm capable of, what I'm not capable of.

Emily: 10:56

He knows my weaknesses, in the sense of the things that maybe I'm not quite as good at or the things that I'm very limited in at that time. And yet he's still choosing to work and in through me. And if I look back over the journey of not only my son's life but just of my life, of walking with him, I see him carrying me through that and I see him in the rear view mirror bringing me through these really tough situations and being strong and helping me be strong in ways that I felt very incapable of. And I look back and I say I have no explanation for that other than God, in and through me, did that.

Shannon: 11:37

Yeah, that's so good. I loved when you wrote about the rocking chair that you put together in your nursery and you had envisioned rocking your little ones. You never envisioned having a child that you I think you said you rocked him more than all the others put together in that chair, like you. Just, god has put you in a place that you just haven't progressed forward the way that you thought. And so the demands of children they don't stop with extra demands of one, and your family, I'm sure, has felt that. And yet God has given you what you need, and I think we're going to see that in this story from Exodus, for God is not afraid to ask us to do things that we can't do. That's just kind of what I'm seeing in this Moses story. So let me set us up the context and then I'll have you read, starting verse 10. So God has shown up that we've had the burning bush experience. We have another episode on the burning bush here on the podcast and that we will link to if you want to do a deep dive into that part. So then God tells Moses you're going to go back to Pharaoh. You're going to tell him let my people go. And Moses, in verse, one of the chapter answers but what if? What if they won't believe me? What if they won't obey me? What if they'll say the Lord didn't appear to you? What if they doubt me?

Shannon: 12:51

And what I hear in Moses here Emily, I wonder if you agree is like back when he was living in Egypt 40 years ago. He tried to intervene. God positioned him to be raised in the palace, to both be a Hebrew but also have all of this Egyptian power. And he tried to intervene when a Hebrew was being mistreated, and he actually killed the Egyptian and hit him in the sand. And then the next day he's trying to break up a fight between two Hebrews who are both slaves and they're like oh, are you going to kill me too? Like you killed that guy at, which prompted Moses to flee Because he's like oh, everybody knows and Pharaoh knows, and this is bad. Well, pharaoh tried to kill him.

Shannon: 13:29

But what I think is intriguing, though, about that is these Hebrew people. They did not think of Moses as on their side. They didn't see him as sticking up for them. They saw him as just on his own side, like they didn't consider him one of them. And so if he's going to be heading back as their deliverer. What if they don't think of him as their deliverer? What if they don't believe him Like? These are the what ifs, and I love that the CSB translation it starts with what if, like he brings his what ifs to God. I just love that because we can bring our what ifs to God. What if, what if, what if. First, any thoughts on that.

Emily: 14:01

Yeah, I have so many thoughts on this passage. So God is speaking to Moses right Out of the burning bush. He tells them in the previous chapter like I am, who I am, you know, this is the God of the universe. And God has already told him that he is going to do it and that he is going to be with Moses. And he's already, like, given him the full game plan and the full rundown of how this is going to happen. And he's like, and Pharaoh's not going to believe you, so I'm going to send these signs and wonders, and he kind of like lays it all out To us. To me, this is like the ideal situation right.

Emily: 14:37

Here's what I'm going to give you, but I'm going to do it and I'm going to be with you the whole time.

Emily: 14:41

And here's the roadblocks and here's how you're going to get around them.

Emily: 14:43

And so it's just amazing to me that, in the face of this, in front of the Holy God, that Moses just lays out his list of excuses, that the what ifs, in comparison to what God is saying, still feel very big and very real and very threatening to him. And so I almost, you know, part of me thinks like oh, what a kind thing of God to lay out this conversation for us in scripture. Because how often do we come to God having had his word, having already known the grace of Christ, having already been strengthened so many times, in so many ways that we can be absolutely sure he's going to do it for us again, and yet we come to him with our laundry list of reasons why this is probably not going to work, and I'm still not going to be sufficient anyway, and this isn't going to turn out the way I think it's going to, and I'm probably not a good person for this right now. I think it's so fascinating that this is included in that Moses opens his mouth to even say these things to the Lord.

Shannon: 15:43

Yeah, right, and you're like I have your shoes, you're on holy ground, you know. You know who you're approaching here. What if, though? Right, I love that he asked the question, and so, in response, god gives him these three signs the staff turning to the snake, the leprosy, you know, water is going to turn to blood. So then, after these three signs, moses objects again. I mean, I feel like we're getting a little bold here, moses. So can you read Exodus 4, 10 through 18 in the ESV translation?

Emily: 16:11

Sure. But Moses said to the Lord oh my Lord, I am not a Lord, I am a eloquent, either in the past or since you've spoken to your servant, but I am slow of speech and of tongue. 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? Now, therefore, go and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak. But he said oh my Lord, please send someone else.

Emily: 16:37

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's coming out to meet you and when he sees you, he will be glad in his heart. 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. He shall speak for you to the people and he shall be your mouth, and you shall be as God to him. And take in your hand this staff with which you shall do the signs.

Shannon: 17:07

So here we have Moses, like he just won't be put in that weakness corner. He just wants to squirm out like no, he's not okay. And so the thing that he brings up is he's never been eloquent, he hasn't been able to speak. So what is surprising about how God responds to Moses there?

Emily: 17:23

I think God's patience is just amazing in this passage.

Emily: 17:28

Again, we've already talked about it a little bit, but this is Moses pushing back against the great I am and the fact that he can so casually bring up these things to the one who God says has made man's mouth.

Emily: 17:44

It's really startling and I think about this a little bit as a parent with a child when a child is just kind of pushing you and pushing you and you're being gracious, and you're being gracious, and you're being patient, and you're being patient, and then you kind of hit that point where you're like, okay, seriously though, we have to do this, this is the way it's going to go.

Emily: 18:03

But God, of course, is our Heavenly Father, is infinitely perfect and good in his responses. But even here we see how patient he is and he knows Moses's frame and he considers Moses's frame and his weaknesses. I think it's interesting in here that he points out he says, aaron, your brother can speak well, and so we notice that God knows what's going on with Moses. He knows about his lack of eloquence. He's like, yeah, there is somebody who's more well-spoken than you and he patiently provides for Moses in a situation where Moses could have just gone and done what the Lord asked him to do. But God still is patient with him and equips him and gives him what he feels like he needs to go forward with confidence.

Shannon: 18:58

I know, I thought that too when I read that this morning, verse 14, in the CSB, the Lord's anger burned against Moses. And then he talks about Aaron. So it's like his anger burns because Moses isn't willing to trust God and yet he does give him the provision of his brother. I love too that you brought up the contrast. Like he knows, moses can't speak good. I think that was even grammatically incorrect. Speak well, and maybe I can't speak well either, but God knows, and he knows, that Aaron has this capacity, this higher capacity level, in this particular area. In the CSB it says who placed a mouth on humans? I just love that. Who stuck that mouth on the front of your face, you know? And then God goes on who makes a person mute or deaf seeing or blind, right? So God? It's like he creates these categories of things we can do and then he gives us our individual ability to either do them or not.

Emily: 19:57

Right, yeah, I do think that's a good point is that God brings unique limitations into each of our lives and he's sovereign over those things and he has them in our lives for a purpose and for his glory. You know, I think it says that in the New Testament whenever someone is asking Jesus, was this man born blind or, you know, because of his mom's sin or his dad's sin? The conversation is something to that effect.

Shannon: 20:26

The disciples are asking. It's in John 9. And the disciples are saying is this man blind because of his sin or because of his parents' sin? And Jesus says it's not because of either of their sin. It's so that I can show my glory in this situation.

Emily: 20:41

Yes, and so I think about that a lot. In our limitations, of that so humbling, I feel like there's just a clear link even between these verses of God talking about who makes man mute and Jesus saying it's because of God's glory, and that's true for our limitations and our weaknesses as well.

Shannon: 21:01

How has that played out with your son? I mean, you said he's nonverbal, so he can't. Is he still not speaking at all?

Emily: 21:07

No, he does not speak at all, so he uses like some intonation or kind of noises that indicate like happiness or frustration. And then he has a communication device now where he is just now learning to touch buttons that might say like I want this, or he can point to a person's picture or say hello, but still kind of struggling with that, and so I think we'll get there someday. But you know, it has been such a comfort to me that God's word specifically gives the reason for muteness right, or for someone not being able to speak, and he also talks about like epilepsy and healing people with seizures. I think it's just been so such a comfort to me because it can kind of feel like God, do you see what's happening here? Like why would you allow this?

Emily: 22:05

Where you know, is there something that we have done, or we need to put him in more therapy, or I need to be working with him more, or we need to just find the right doctor. And, yes, all of those things are good and they're good for us to pursue and I think God has provided measures of healing through some of those means. But in the end God has said look, it's up to me and this is what I chose. This is my sovereign plan for this child, and that's hard, but it's also a comfort. It's also a comfort to know this is not random. This is not cruel. This is my sovereign good plan for my glory.

Shannon: 22:43

That is so good, emily. You know we look at the world as a whole. It is broken because of the fall. You know, we just did a deep dive in this podcast on Genesis one through three and, like we looked at the brokenness that has spread throughout all of creation and that is the cause for disease and for genetic disorders. That's the large scale and you're looking, though at as individuals. God has a sovereign plan over each of these.

Shannon: 23:11

Open theists would say God is just as surprised as you that someone has a genetic disorder. He's sad with you in this. You know he's mourning it with you, and that does not give me any comfort, right Like that. God is just as sad as me, just as surprised as me. Now, even though it's a hard reality to have this weakness, it gives me so much more comfort to recognize that God is sovereign over this, just as much with your son as with Moses.

Shannon: 23:39

Yeah, god just didn't loosen Moses's tongue. He didn't give him this eloquence. I mean, I picture him growing up in the Egyptian palace. He was probably trained by the best you know and he was probably had speech class or was asked to speak and didn't work for him. He didn't click. He's here. He is an 80 year old man and he can't talk. He's never been able to talk and so to go into lead and to approach this pharaoh and have to talk to him is like that is just super intimidating to him. And yet God has sovereign over that and created him with this weakness, also with this purpose. Do you feel that too in your ministry, emily, like where you've been asked to give an assignment? Like God has grown this ministry for you in amazing ways, like your book has sold 100,000 copies, the Risen motherhood book, and so all of these opportunities. And yeah, I'm sure you feel this weakness paired with the opportunities. Any thoughts on it?

Emily: 24:40

Absolutely, and some of it is my story and kind of the way that I got into doing some of this ministry more publicly. You know I was a stay at home mom and had four kids at the time when Risen motherhood started. They were all babies, toddlers, preschool age. We had five kids in five years and so those years were a blur, just really, really in the thick of things, and I was not trying to work myself into a part time job, like I was not trying to become a part of this ministry that was getting off the ground. Really, the way it started was my sister-in-law and I just having these conversations about how God's word and the gospel impacts these very regular everyday things in motherhood and just saying what if we recorded some of these conversations and we shared them to see if this could help other moms? Because we're really struggling to figure this out, we're trying to make these connections. Maybe this can kind of start some conversations, help some other moms. No big deal. We'll wake up at you know, 6am a couple times a week to do this and we'll just kind of fit it in the margins. And so for me, when the podcast started to really take off and you know we had, you know, a publisher saying, hey, we want to publish this into a book. I remember just thinking there's no way. There's no way. This was just a casual thing, like I was making time here and there, but this is not something that I can commit to on a regular basis, this isn't something I can give more time to. How in the world would I possibly write a book?

Emily: 26:16

I had my fifth child on the way and it just felt like, god, there's no way I can continue to be faithful with what you've given me, with my family, and I can step out and do this ministry. Like the time, resources just felt like I can't make that math work and I, I have no idea. And then also, you know, in those little years your mental capacity just feels so full already with all these things they need, and so there's brain fog and I also just thought like, can I even muster up enough words that would be clear enough or helpful enough to reach moms? And so it's just so fascinating to me now that I look back and you know, all my kids are school age now my youngest is in first grade, like we're in a very different season, and I think, how did that happen. How did I do that?

Emily: 27:09

And yet God didn't call me to something that he wasn't prepared to equip me to do. He provided the type of childcare and like support system that I was going to need to be able to get that done. He provided words, he provided time. I mean, I cannot tell you how many times I would look at my week and just think, okay, I don't see how these hours are going to fit in. Or I had a writing chunk planned out and then that day got canceled because someone ended up sick and like, somehow this book still got written, like this ministry kept going.

Emily: 27:45

And I think a lot of that was just step by step by step, as God would call me and Laura to do something. He would also open up windows and ways for that to happen. And I never felt like, oh, I'm doing this because I feel so prepared and I feel so equipped, and I have this all mapped out and I have it all figured out and here's my master plan and I'm going to just stay up late and get up earlier. And I did that sometimes, but I never went into it feeling that way. I always was walking through it feeling like, okay, lord, I need you, I need you today, I need you this week and so, yeah, definitely have felt that in ministry a lot over the years.

Shannon: 28:22

And.

Emily: 28:22

I still do, because I am a flawed woman who dreckles with things that I'm not always feeling like. Oh, here I am, I'm basking in God's presence. I've got all these wise words to say Like. I'm often showing up feeling like Lord. Are you sure you still want me to talk about you because I'm a sinner and all those different things?

Shannon: 28:44

Yeah, yeah. And I can say too, the thing that causes me to have the most doubt, especially speaking, I just feel like stepping into a platform in front of a group of women, I've got all of these nagging doubts of, like, who are you to say these things? Like look at how you just failed again last week, even after writing these books, and you know the truth. Or look at what these people have said about you. You know, like when there is people who are disagreeing, or I'm like I don't know. Maybe I am Like I just recently met with someone about writing another book and she said why are you the right person to write this book? And in my head I'm thinking maybe I'm not. I don't know. Yeah, I know it's not the right answer here, but maybe I'm not like I don't know.

Shannon: 29:27

I feel so many doubts, I feel so many hesitations and yet what I have experienced, especially on a platform in the moment because I mean you can go in with the best plans and even speaking on things that I have already spoken on dozens of times I just sense God's presence and I sense him empowering my words. I am just a very ordinary person. If you just knew me as a friend, you would not say, oh yes, she should be doing this public thing. No, you wouldn't. You would be like what Her? Like really. I just feel this weakness and ordinariness. I think that's what I'm seeing here in Moses, and yet I feel like God's presence. You know, there is something that he unleashes when I say yes.

Shannon: 30:52

But, here we see Moses not actually saying yes, he's like please send someone else, Please send someone else, and I just love just how that is. So how we are, you know I can just relate to that. Please send someone else. And have you ever said please send someone else? Emily.

Emily: 31:08

Oh, yes, all the time. But I really feel like this can be part of God's design for our heart as we go through ministry, like, I think, of Paul and him talking about the thorn that was in his flesh and how he recognized that, even though he didn't want this thorn in his flesh, that there was something about it, and I don't know exactly what the thorn was, but there was something about that that was keeping him humble and it was keeping him aware of his need for Christ, of his need for Christ power to be made perfect in his weakness. It was keeping him dependent and it was giving him perspective. And I think that when I have those moments where I'm like God, I'm not sure I'm the right person for this, call someone else, I don't have what it takes.

Emily: 32:01

I have had all the same thoughts you have where I get on a stage or I get in front of a microphone and all I can think about are all the ways that I have failed and all the ways that I am insufficient, and yet I think that that is a gift. Praise the Lord that I'm not coming to the mic saying I've got this, I've got great things to say. Everybody's just get ready for my wisdom. I want to stay humble before the Lord. I want to stay dependent before God. I want to always remain aware of how much I need Christ, that every single thing that's coming out of my mouth I need, and I may need it more than you, and I would rather go through ministry like that. So it is a gift.

Shannon: 32:40

It is, and do you see something interesting here about Moses and Aaron? Aaron can't speak, well, moses can't, and I feel like there was a plan A where God wanted Moses to be dependent on the Lord, and now he's going to be dependent on Aaron. Do you see something interesting in that?

Emily: 33:01

Yeah, it's so interesting and this is one of those passages that kind of gets your head like spinning in a circle when you start thinking about God's sovereignty and like what actually happened here? And did God relent? Like God knew that Moses was going to, you know. So it's something we can kind of go round and round about, but I think that there was going to be a great gift for Moses in fully depending on God. And there's still a gift in it, right, even with Aaron involved.

Emily: 33:29

And God is kind of gentle and merciful in that way, and I think the verse that comes to mind is a bruised reed he won't break like a faintly smoking fire he won't snuff out I'm paraphrasing all of that. But this idea that like God's like heart towards his people is you know, I don't think he was going to like break Moses into submission Like there was an element of in his kindness. He provides Aaron for Moses and I think God was pleased to do that or he wouldn't have done it, even with his anger, you know there. So this is such a complex passage, but I think the thing that's key here is he doesn't just remove Moses's weakness, right, because if he was able to have him have the snake and the staff and the blood and the water, like if God's able to do all of that, he can absolutely instantly make Moses speak eloquently. So he still makes Moses go into the situation to your point dependent.

Shannon: 34:31

Yes, yeah, and in weakness, in humility. It's kind of interesting Moses's writing, but it says that Moses is the most humble humble man, I mean that's probably added most humble man on the earth.

Shannon: 34:44

And so I mean Moses maintained that humility and probably this lack of eloquence helped him right. Just like Paul with his throne. God wanted Moses to go forward as a leader with a weakness, and I think you're exactly right. I see such tenderness and such kindness in saying all right, I'm going to give you Aaron, I'm going to give you somebody with this strength.

Shannon: 35:05

And so I think, for those of us who can speak, like my mom says that when I was one, I was bald and tiny and I would like pipe up in the grocery store and say hi, my name is Shannon and I went to the playground today and people look at me like, wow, that baby is talking. So I've been talking for a long time. I really love to talk, I enjoy speaking, and so that's not wrong. Like God has given us our strengths and our weaknesses, and often he puts us together with people who lack what we have, or vice versa, and I think that's a beautiful thing of two brothers leading together. This is God's kindness and providing him with his brother. So any other thoughts on this before we turn to, like how to live, like this is true and other interesting or surprising things in the story.

Emily: 35:50

Well, I just wanted to piggyback on what you said. When we think about the church, I think sometimes we can start to get maybe like competitive and our giftings or weaknesses or our strengths. Or we can tend to look at others gifts and then feel like this frustration or this longing of like, well, why don't I have that? Or they have this and I've always wanted to be like that and they're getting more recognition than me. You know, we have these weird games that we play in our mind and yet God has designed the church like to be the body of Christ and all of these different parts and pieces have their own role to play and they all matter.

Emily: 36:33

I remember I was teaching about that with our children's program last year and we were talking about the smallest bone in your body, which is a tiny bone in your ear, and I forget what it's called now.

Emily: 36:45

But essentially, even though it is the tiniest bone in your body, if you didn't have this little bone in your ear, you would not be able to hear and you realize that, like every bone matters.

Emily: 36:58

You know there's not a bone that if you take it away, oh well, you're still fine. I mean, yes, like I'm sure that happens people, but like the idea and the picture still stands right that no matter how seemingly small of a rule you are playing, it matters. And so I think this is such a beautiful picture, like you said, of two brothers serving together in their different strengths and weaknesses, but when they come together they are able to, by God's grace, by God's strength, do what he's asking them to do. So I do think there's that little sub point in here of being willing to partner with other people in ministry and other people in our lives, and to be able to bring someone else in where we are weak or we are limited, to even ask the Lord like is there someone you are providing to come alongside me in this and to help me with this mission?

Shannon: 37:52

And I think it gives us a different perspective on those who do have a weakness. You know, like your son, you have a son with special needs and he is a gift to the body. Right, the body is to encompass him with the other strengths. You know your family maybe to offer support, to offer encouragement. That's the way the body works together, where we have some with weaknesses and others with strengths, and we it forges like a need for each other.

Shannon: 38:47

And with my book Comparison Girl, I use this measuring cup analogy, like a glass measuring cup, you know, with the lines on the side. And I talked about how, like some cups have less and some have more, and that is by design. And we can live constantly putting our cup next to somebody else's and looking over like she is more, I wish I had them. Or feeling I have more, I feel superior. And yet God just wants us to take that measuring cup and tip it sideways.

Shannon: 39:12

And the beauty of that metaphor is, if you tip the cup, the lines don't matter anymore, and that's what we're meant to do with whether we have less, whether we have more, we all have something to give. And so if we're constantly comparing, all we do is we pull away from each other, like I picture a room full of people, all like hovering on the sides of the room, like with their measuring cups, thinking like I don't want to be compared, I want to pull away from others who seem superior or inferior to me. But when we come in, not focused on the lines but focused on the spout, on our measuring cup, like we cluster in the middle of the room oh, here, let me pour some, let me receive what you have, and that is the body, because we're not called to uniformity, you know, we're called to unity and there's a disparity between our gifts. Have you experienced that with the body, with your son?

Emily: 39:58

Oh, absolutely. I think that I have needed help. I think that's one of the biggest changes, and motherhood is just how much support I have needed from other people in the midst of this. I'm not the super independent mom that I want to be, like. I have this wonderful gal that comes over after school three evenings a week, from, you know, three o'clock to five thirty. And there have been times where I feel like, oh, I'm embarrassed that I need that, but on the other hand, I need that. Yeah, and having her there has allowed me to mother all of our children well.

Emily: 40:35

And those things are hard right, when we realize, like you said on the measuring cup, like, oh, I don't have enough, but how might God be providing for this? And I think you're right, too, about just seeing the ways that someone who is maybe weaker than us is also contributing to our lives, and that being so important, it's more blessed to give than to receive, you know, and there is something so special as well about being able to love and come alongside someone who is in need. And the years will tell, but I have already seen how much our son has enriched our lives, even through challenges, and he forces us to slow down at a pace that we otherwise wouldn't slow down to. He teaches all of us to be open-handed with the things that we want, to not just bulldoze through things, to be thankful for small provisions, to be content with what we're at. You know, there's just so many little gifts that we get in observing his life and I'm so grateful for that.

Shannon: 41:46

I love that, Emily. Yeah, I think all of your kids will be impacted in a particular way by this brother, who has so much to offer your family but given an opportunity for all of them to serve in ways that they wouldn't without him. What a sweet blessing and what a sweet perspective you have. I love that. So any false narratives? How does this story expose or correct any of the false narratives in the world?

Emily: 42:11

I think sometimes, when we look at leaders or people who we perceive as being strong, we think they forged ahead in whatever they're doing, without hesitation, without fears, without challenges. You know, we're very aware of our own limitations and our own challenges, but then when we look at someone else, we tend to go well, she probably doesn't have any of these problems and she probably doesn't struggle the way I do. You know, what I have found about most people is when you get to know them and you know what's on the inside, they do have insecurities, they have fears, they have challenges. And so I think about fast forward when Moses is leading the people and they're in the desert and all these things.

Emily: 42:52

You know, if you probably would have asked an ordinary Hebrew what they think of Moses, who's this great Moses, who's leading all of these people they would have probably seen him as someone who was pretty strong and impenetrable and amazing and wow, he's done all these things. And yet here's Moses with all of his excuses and his inability, right. So I think we have to be careful to judge on the outside and think, well, they're so good because they're so strong and not recognize that, like, they have their own weaknesses too. But God is working in and through those, and so that's true for us too, especially as we have things like imposter syndrome, where we feel like oh, I got here, but you know, someone's going to find out.

Emily: 43:36

I'm not actually as talented as they think I am or all of these different things, but instead to just be a little bit more self-forgetful and to recognize look, I didn't get here because I'm so great and I'm so amazing and I'm so strong and God's going to do what he's going to do Exactly.

Shannon: 43:52

Yes, it's so true, and I think in this conversation we've already identified some other false narratives too the idea that weakness doesn't come from God, or that it's outside of his control he didn't oversee that or that weakness is bad Right.

Emily: 44:08

Yeah.

Shannon: 44:10

Like that's kind of the whole point of your book. He is strong, isn't it that weakness? It brings us into the right position before God, right.

Emily: 44:17

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Emily: 44:21

And so my weaknesses are a barrier to me serving God and living the kind of life that I want to live, the kind of life I'm supposed to live, and that no weakness is actually like a conduit.

Emily: 44:34

It's a tool that God uses in our lives to help us follow him, and it's also just a way that he's able to have his glory be seen Right. That's something that I don't have the verse right in front of me, but later we're going to find out like God does all of this through Moses, so that God would know he was the one who did it, god was the one who did it, so God would get the glory. And so there's something beautiful in there, right that, as he chooses someone who's imperfect and has flaws and has limitations, the people are going to know for sure, for sure, for sure, that God did this and it's not ultimately Moses. And I think when God uses us in the midst of our weakness, we get to have that same experience where, as people watch us walk through hard things, they watch us do things that they know we're maybe not fully capable of doing. In and of ourselves, they go oh, god was in that.

Shannon: 45:26

Yeah, yeah. So for the glory seekers, this isn't a great message, right, but for those who are willing to humble themselves and receive, this is encouraging. This is an encouraging message. So how can we live like this story is true, about Moses asking God like just send somebody else and God giving him Aaron? Any thoughts on how we can live like this particular story is true?

Emily: 45:49

Yeah, I love the idea that you don't have to be fearless to move forward. You can take what I like to think of as expectant action, which is I am walking forward in this, but I'm also expecting that God is going to be with me and he's going to provide for me, like we've talked about that.

Emily: 46:12

He knows my frame, he knows my capacity, he's aware of all of that stuff, and yet he's going to be with me anyways. And so I think that we don't have to be avoidant of hard things or, as the New Testament talks about, we don't have to shrink back in our faith. We can have courage, not because of what we have in and of ourselves, but because the Bible promises us that God is going to be with us the whole time and that his spirit is going to lead and guide us, that he's going to help us to walk by the spirit, that he's going to produce the fruit of the spirit in our lives and that he has a plan that we are just participating in. And I think that just gives us so much ability to keep going. Even when we don't see the outcome, and even when we feel like in and of ourselves, we're not going to be able to, we can still move forward.

Shannon: 47:07

Yeah, you know, we started with that analogy of an airplane and considering the capacity level, with the weight that it was going to carry. Well, god's airplane can carry whatever.

Emily: 47:17

It has no limit?

Shannon: 47:18

There is no. You know he can carry you right, whatever limitations you have, he's got it. Just board the plane right and move forward. I love that I'm thinking like as a mom or as a friend. Is there a time that you might want to just help somebody remember this story, this particular story about Moses, like any situations we can be watching for, like to retell this story to someone.

Emily: 47:40

You know, I do think this story comes to mind for me whenever someone feels like God has asked them to do something that feels impossible to them. Because what God asked Moses to do was impossible. You know, I think, even with a SWAT team at his disposal, an army at his disposal, like and you know the amount of coordination and coercing that would have to happen to free these Hebrew slaves was just like mind blowing. And so the fact that God was with Moses in it. He did what he said he was going to do, and, again, moses didn't have to have all the things he needed in order to serve God and do what God was calling him to do.

Emily: 48:24

I think that whenever we face things in our lives, whether it is something like, hey, it's impossible for me I think right now we're at the holidays I think it's impossible for me to go to this family gathering and have a good attitude, or it's impossible for me to get through the rest of the week with any energy because I've had kids sick up at night, or it's impossible for me to face this person with kindness and forgive them because I feel like I have this grudge that I can't get past. You know, whatever that thing is that we feel like is impossible, it's like, well, no, it's not with God and his spirit can work and move in that situation in ways that is beyond what we can hope for or imagine or understand it, and that's really true.

Shannon: 49:08

Yeah, I agree. I'm thinking too of those who are going through cancer treatments or a divorce they didn't want. Not that God has called us to divorce, but whatever God has put in front of you that feels like I don't have the capacity to do this. Whatever God is asking us to move forward in, he will give us what we need. So thank you so much, emily. So much truth here and so many reminders. It's been a joy to talk through this story with you.

Emily: 49:37

Yeah, I loved it. I love this word-centered format, so nice work on it.

Shannon: 49:42

It's been great. I hope you'll also get a copy of Emily's brand new book he is Strong. This is a book that will encourage you in your faith, encourage you as you face feelings of weakness and help you to determine what to do about it. It's a devotional. Emily is so relatable, so open and honest with her sense of weakness, especially as a mom. Hope you'll get a copy for you and for a friend.