The Pattern of Life

Annie Mae was the live-in housekeeper for a local Rancher and his family. She enjoyed the job and loved the family that she worked for; they treated her more like a member of the family than a worker.

One Sunday morning Annie Mae was cleaning in the kitchen after the family had eaten their breakfast. Kate, the mother of the family, came in and sat down to have a glass of juice and take her morning pills. Kate was four months pregnant; Annie asked how she was feeling, and Kate said that she was feeling much better, and at that moment Kate’s eleven year old daughter, Hannah, entered the kitchen and sat down at the table with her mother.

Hannah was confused about something that had been said in Bible class the previous day, and she wanted to know if her mother could shed some light on the matter. Hannah said that they’ve been doing a series of lessons to help them learn about the events that took place during Moses and the Children of Israel’s forty-year journey in the wilderness. One of the students spoke up in class and said that his mother told him that Moses, and a lot of the people of Israel, didn’t get to go in to the land, promised by God, because they were bad people. The teacher, knowing that his mother didn’t mean it in that way, quickly replied that they were people who made mistakes.

Hannah asked her mother’s thoughts about what had been said in class. Annie Mae couldn’t wait to hear Kate’s response, and she was praying that she wouldn’t be asked to leave the room while they talked. Kate asked Hannah if she wanted to know her thoughts about what the boy said, or what the teacher’s reply was, or about what her own feelings are concerning Moses and Israel; what exactly was she wanting her input on?

So Hannah asked, “Do you think the boy’s mother was right?" Kate replied that she didn’t agree that Israel and Moses were bad people, but she questions if that’s even what the mother had said. Hannah said, “So you agree with the teacher, that they were people who made mistakes?" Kate replied, “It’s not so much whether I think that they made mistakes, but if God felt that they did. I don’t know what else to say beyond that, I’m sorry!” Hannah left almost as confused as when she came in.

The mother asked Annie Mae if she would come and sit down. She said, “I don’t know how to respond about things that I don’t have an understanding of myself. I’ve always felt sad that Israel had to wonder in the wilderness for forty years, and then Moses didn’t even get to enter the Promised Land with his people, I can’t comprehend all that; what would you have said Annie?” Annie Mae replied, “Kate, tell me everything you know about a woman’s pregnancy.” Kate asked what that had to do with what they are talking about, and Annie said, “It has everything to do with what we are talking about.”

So Kate said, in short, that a woman ovulates and if the egg gets fertilized, then in a few weeks it would either be a conception or the egg would be aborted and the woman’s menses would begin. If it is a conception, then it would be an additional thirty eight weeks (or so) to delivery. The birth takes place, the umbilical cord is cut and life outside of the mother begins. Kate then added, “I ask again, what does that have to do with Moses and Israel?”

Annie Mae replied, “When God gave His Word to Moses and the Children of Israel just a few weeks in to the wilderness journey; that could be likened to the fertilization of a woman’s egg.

Two years later when the spies went in to the land and came back with a bad report, which resulted in an additional thirty-eight years of wondering in the wilderness, that could be as the conception of the egg, (As opposed to the egg being aborted), and a pregnancy continues. Just as a baby grows inside its mother's womb, the Word of God was growing inside of Israel.

After forty years had passed, when the wilderness journey was coming to an end, and Moses died on his birthday, that could be compared to the birth and cutting of the umbilical cord, and though the umbilical cord is cut off, the evidence that it was there is forever on that human, so too will Moses forever be a part of the Word of God.”

“So don’t feel sad that the things concerning Moses and the Children of Israel went the way that they did. They were chosen to play the interval roll as Mother, in the Life of the Word of God.”

Kate was overcome with emotion at the explanation Annie Mae had just given her. She had never heard anything like that before. The correlation Annie made between a baby to the Word of God and the umbilical cord to Moses was the most beautifully illustrated use of the pattern of life that Kate had ever heard, and she would never forget. Kate told Annie that she couldn’t thank her enough for taking the time to help her see things using an example that was so dear to her heart, and that she can relate so closely to. Kate told Annie Mae that she would never see Moses and the Children of Israel it the same dim light ever again, and that they would forever be connected to the beautiful narrative of the Living Word of God.