In "Desert Lab 101," Stephen Davey turns Exodus 2:15-22 into a study of three biblical failures—Moses, exiled to the desert of obscurity after his methods got ahead of God; David, languishing in a desert of guilt before he learned to repent; and John Mark, who deserted Paul on the mission field and seemed destined to be remembered only as a coward. Davey shows how God deliberately leaves the failures of His servants in the record so that readers can learn from them, contrasting that honesty with the world's instinct to cover up shame—illustrated by the unforgettable true story of a biographer paid to disguise a grandfather's execution at Sing Sing as a man who "occupied the chair of applied electricity." Tracing each man forward, Davey reveals that Moses named his second son "God is my help," David penned his greatest psalms of worship, and Mark went on to write the second Gospel—because each one learned dependence, repentance, and endurance in his desert. The capstone insight is a striking one: the Hebrew word for "desert" is the same word that means "God speaks," and in each life God spoke through another believer—Jethro to Moses, Nathan to David, Peter to Mark. Listeners will be left with a searching personal question—when God brings them into a desert and sends someone to declare His counsel, are they truly listening?
Desert Lab 101
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