Exodus chapter 6 in the Bible discusses God’s plan to liberate the Israelites from their slavery in Egypt. He laid out the specifics to Moses and Moses then delivered the plan to the people. Their response is depressing: “So Moses told the people of Israel what the Lord had said, but they refused to listen anymore. They had become too discouraged by the brutality of their slavery.” (Exodus 6:2) They rejected God’s plan. They had given up on the idea that they would ever be free.
What causes people to reject offers of help and hope? The Exodus passage explains that they refused to listen because they were “discouraged by the brutality of their slavery”. Their bondage had gotten the best of them. Their pain had caused them to give up. When people hurt badly enough, they can be tempted to reject hope. This is sad.
As if the pain isn’t bad enough…
God’s plan may now be derailed – if they refuse to believe and participate, things may not turn out the way God had planned. He wants them to participate in the escape process. If they don’t get involved and take action, their slavery will continue.
For sure, their misery would be compounded, without the hope of hope. The human spirit can endure amazing stress, if there is the promise of hope. Without hope, pain can destroy us.
No matter what you are going through today, please don’t reject hope. It may seem like there is no promise of things changing. But there is hope! If you reject hope, your chance of things changing reduces drastically. If you reject hope, your pain will intensify.
There is hope in Christ. Please don’t reject hope.
If you need someone to pray with you, feel free to contact me at rickwhitter@gmail.com or maybe I can help put you in contact with someone locally.
Thoughts on Life and Leading 
Great thoughts Pastor Rick. I can definitely relate to this. The thing that I find amazing about that passage is that Moses told them what God SAID and yet they still couldn’t listen. Sometimes I think in present day at least it’s so easy to lose sight of hope because you struggle to hear God or decipher what exactly He’s telling you or showing you. I mean, if some great God-sent messenger came to me with God’s “escape plan”, I’d be like, okay cool – well this might suck but God’s got a plan so let’s get this done. I just find it very interesting.