“If I have found favour in your eyes”

In Numbers 11:15, Moses was at the end of his rope. He was exhausted by the endless complaints and demands of the Israelites to the point of asking Yahweh to “put me to death right now so I don’t have to face my own ruin.” Like a terminally ill patient seeking a medically assisted death, Moses in his mental agony was seeking a Yahweh assisted death.

But didn’t he have the right to ask Yahweh for such a thing, when it was Yahweh who’d landed him in this mess? And why should Yahweh expect him to keep putting up with it too, when life in this wretched desert had become an endlessly repeating cycle of the Israelites making Yahweh so angry by their grumbling that he hit them with plagues and fire, and on two occasions had even threatened to kill them off? Meanwhile, Moses was stuck in the middle of all this, with no end to it, no escaping it and no relief. Worse still, there was no obvious purpose to it too. 

So what stopped him from storming off in a huff yelling “I’ve had it with you Israelites, and frankly, Yahweh, I’ve had it with you too”? There’s a clue back in verse 15, because right in the middle of him asking Yahweh to put an end to him, he adds “if I have found favour in your eyes.” 

In other words, “I’m only asking this of you with what you think of me in mind too.” Which was a jolly useful reminder, and a lifesaver for Moses too, because he already knew what Yahweh thought of him – Yahweh himself having told him at some time in the past, “I know you Moses by name and you have found favour with me,” Exodus 33:12. When Moses had a highly personal request for Yahweh, therefore, he included that too, as a reminder to both himself and to Yahweh. 

Which Yahweh deeply appreciated, verse 17, because in response to Moses he told him, “I will do the very thing you’ve asked because I’m pleased with you.” And why was Yahweh so pleased with Moses? Because in everything Moses thought, said, did, and asked for, it was always with Yahweh in mind and pleasing him. He was close to forgetting it at times, especially when the pressure on him was as intense and agonizing as it was in Numbers 11, but at the last minute when he was truly ready to throw in the towel, back to mind it came: “I’d like to die,” he told Yahweh, “but only if that meets with your favour too.”

And Yahweh honoured Moses’ humility, but he also reminded Moses that he had “No reason to throw in the towel” too….(next blog)