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Exodus 4:10–12
“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.’ 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.’ ”
The Lord answered the objection of Moses that the Israelites would not believe that he was commissioned by God to lead them out of Egypt by giving him several miracles to perform that would authenticate him as the Lord’s messenger (Ex. 4:1–9). However, that did not result in Moses’ immediately accepting the task that God had revealed. As we see in today’s passage, Moses found another reason to hesitate in accepting his divinely ordained vocation.
Exodus 4:10 reports the second objection from Moses: he did not believe that he was the man for the job because of his lack of eloquence and his slowness “of speech and of tongue.” Some commentators believe that Moses was referring to a speech impediment or something else that kept him from being the ideal spokesperson for the Lord. That seems unlikely, for there is no evidence in Scripture that Moses ever had any problems speaking to others once he set out to do it. In the book of Acts, Stephen even refers to Moses’ eloquence (Acts 7:22). More likely, Moses’ objection reflects his not wanting to be the Lord’s representative to Pharaoh, as Exodus 4:13 demonstrates. It may also be that Moses employed a standard way of speaking in his culture for addressing a superior wherein the inferior party was supposed to confess his own unworthiness.
Either way, God graciously responded by assuring Moses that He could equip him with what he needed to address Pharaoh because He, the Lord, is the sovereign Creator. God reminded Moses that He had created the mouth and that He gives the power to speak and takes it away. In fact, the Lord does this for all of our faculties (v. 11). Our abilities and inabilities come at God’s disposal. This does not mean that every case of blindness or muteness or deafness is God’s work directly, for the Lord works through secondary causes such as genetics and accidents and medical treatments to give and take away our sight, hearing, speech, and so forth. It does mean that God is sovereign over everything. Matthew Henry comments: “The perfections of our faculties are his work, he makes the seeing; he formed the eye (Ps. 94:9); he opens the understanding, the eye of the mind, Luke 24:45. Their imperfections are from him too; he makes the dumb, and deaf, and blind. Is there any evil of this kind, and the Lord has not done it? No doubt he has, and always in wisdom and righteousness, and for his own glory, John 9:3.” In light of this sovereignty, God promised to enable Moses to speak to the Egyptian king (Ex. 4:12).
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Cyprian of Carthage, an important church father from the third century, applies today’s passage to later readers by noting that God is able to give us the courage to speak if we are ever persecuted just as He gave it to Moses. This does not mean that we should neglect preparing to speak the truth of God to His enemies. It does mean that we should not worry that our words will be insufficient, for the Lord will bless us as we speak.
For Further Study
- Isaiah 51:15–16
- Ezekiel 3
- Luke 12:8–12
- Ephesians 6:18–20