Who Hath Made Man's Mouth Is a Question God Asks About Himself

The first time my hand shook badly on a stage I dropped a microphone, and the room thought it was part of the act.

I want to say that because it is funny and because the second time was not funny. The second time was in a small room, in front of about forty people, and there was no stage business to hide behind, and I saw somebody in the second row notice and look away, which is the kindest thing a person can do and is also the worst.

What happens after that is what this article is about. It is not the shaking. It is that a man starts arranging his life around not being watched while he works.

You take the jobs where nobody is close. You develop a way of holding things. You stop volunteering for the thing you are actually best at because there is a version of it where somebody sees.

There is an argument in Exodus between God and a man who did exactly this, and I have read it more times than any other passage, because the answer God gives is not the answer anybody expects.

Moses makes a good argument

Here is his case, and it is not unreasonable.

And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. (Exodus 4:10, King James Version)

Neither heretofore, nor since. He is being precise. He is saying this is not new and it has not changed since the burning bush started talking, which is a pointed thing to mention.

He is not being falsely modest. Whatever the difficulty was, it was real, and he is going to be sent to argue with the most powerful man in the world.

And notice what he does not say. He does not say he is unwilling. He says he is unsuited, which is a completely different objection and much harder to answer.

You are not making an unreasonable case, and Scripture lets Moses make his in full. Exodus 4:10 records the whole objection without cutting it short. It is the same Spirit, Romans 8:26 who helps our infirmities because we know not what we should pray for as we ought, who is named for the exact category Moses is describing.

God does not dispute the limitation

Here is the answer, and the first thing to notice is what is missing from it.

And the LORD said unto him, Who hath made man's mouth? or who maketh the dumb, or deaf, or the seeing, or the blind? have not I the LORD? (Exodus 4:11)

He does not tell Moses he is better than he thinks. He does not correct the self assessment. He does not say the speech is actually fine.

He asks who made mouths.

That is a strange answer and it is worth sitting with, because it does two things at once. It refuses to argue about the facts, and it moves the whole question up a level to the One who designed the equipment in the first place.

And then, crucially, He does not remove it either. Read the next verse: Now therefore go, and I will be with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say. The mouth stays as it is. Something is added beside it.

You are being sent with the limitation rather than after its removal. Exodus 4:12 says go, and I will be with thy mouth, without one word about changing the mouth. It is the Spirit of God, Luke 12:12 saying the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say, who is named for exactly the accompaniment that verse promises.

Aaron is not a rebuke

There is a detail people use to make this story into a failure, and I think that reading is wrong.

Moses pushes back one more time and asks God to send somebody else. God's anger is kindled, which the text says plainly, and then He does something that is not a punishment: He gives him Aaron.

And thou shalt speak unto him, and put words in his mouth: and I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, and will teach you both what ye shall do. (Exodus 4:15)

I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth. Notice He does not withdraw the first promise when He adds the second. Moses still gets the accompaniment. Aaron is added, not substituted.

I used to read that as God giving in. I read it now as accommodation, and it is the same thing that happens when a man who cannot manage a thing alone is given somebody to do it with. That is not a demotion. It is how most of the work in the world actually gets done.

You are allowed to be accompanied, and God adds a person without withdrawing anything. Exodus 4:15 keeps both promises in the same sentence, and it is His Spirit, 1 Corinthians 12:11 dividing to every man severally as He will, who assembles people who are not each individually sufficient.

Where the sufficiency is located

Paul writes one sentence about this that puts the whole thing in the right place.

Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God. (2 Corinthians 3:5)

Not sufficient of ourselves. He says it about thinking, which is the least physical thing he could have chosen, and he is talking about a man in full health.

Which means the shaking hand is not a special category of insufficiency. It is a visible instance of the ordinary condition of every person who has ever done anything, and the only difference is that somebody in the second row can see it.

That was the sentence that actually helped me. Not that my hand was fine. That everybody in the room was operating on borrowed sufficiency and mine had simply become visible.

You are visibly in the condition everybody in the room is in. 2 Corinthians 3:5 puts sufficiency outside the person even in the matter of thinking. It is the Holy Spirit, Zechariah 4:6 saying not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, who is named as what the work actually runs on.

And if being watched has begun to cost you more than the work is worth, say it out loud to a person: a doctor, a counselor, a pastor you trust, or the 988 crisis line, which answers every hour there is. Arranging a whole life around not being seen is exhausting, and it is the kind of thing that should be said out loud to somebody.