From Exodus 40: “Just as the LORD had commanded him.”

“Moses did everything just as the Lord had commanded him.” (v. 16)

It’s an almost tedious refrain in Exodus 40:

Moses did “just as the LORD had commanded him.”

He put up the tent. He set God’s things in place. He got the water and washed up, and he led his brother to do the same.

“Moses did everything just as the Lord had commanded him.”

I’m always drawn to texts that highlight radical obedience. And this is why: I wonder if my own life story would read differently if I were doing everything the LORD commanded. My obedience is often minimal, not radical—and my biography is filled with stuff that couldn’t be followed by that statement. I do a lot, but so little of it is what He commands.

Maybe I ought to let Moses’ testimony influence my trajectory.

— Tyler