By M.
So, this is a very heavy parshah. There’s a lot happening in the beginning of Sh’mot, or Exodus. We follow the story of Moses through his birth and being raised by Pharaoh and the murder of the Egyptian, all the way to the burning bush and Moses demanding that Pharaoh free the Israelites. What really caught my attention though, was at the end of the parshah.
Moses comes to G_d, after having Pharaoh refuse to let the Israelites go. He asks G_d, “Why did you send me?”
Like, “Why did you make me do this even though you knew he wouldn’t let us go and would in fact make things harder?”
G_d’s answer to Moses is, wait. Your redemption is at hand.
Chill.
I take G_d’s answer to Moses to be the following:
“Look, sometimes you just have to do things. It sucks when they don’t turn out the way you want them to, but you have NO control over it, so let it go. Do what you are supposed to do, and the leave rest.”
It’s a lesson that I know I need to re-learn all the time. I can’t control how other people react or how some things work out. I just have to do them. Do the good, leave the rest. Otherwise you end up carrying around stuff that is way too heavy for a simple human being to lift.