God followed up on that first encounter that Moses had with Pharaoh.  God sent plagues--ten of them--to show Egypt just Who was in charge.  Pharaoh thought he was.  Not so.

God had been in charge all along.  But you have to wonder about the process God used to bring Pharaoh to his knees.  And the process of bringing Moses to faith and trust in the power of God.

Because when it was all over, after Pharaoh let the Israelites go, it wasn't really over at all.  The Israelites had forty more years of wandering around in the desert ahead of them.  And in the end, only two of them (Joshua and Caleb) would get to the promise land.  The people had left slavery, misery, poverty and brutality in Egypt. The only thing they got was freedom.  I think that should have been enough.  But they didn't.

Humans are seldom grateful for what they have.  The Israelites grumbled, complained and made Moses' life miserable.  Moses had led them to freedom.  They didn't appreciate it.

We are sometimes the same.  Wanting more.  Not appreciating what we have, but complaining about what we don't have.  Never enough.

Moses must have been totally frustrated.  His role as a leader was constantly buffeted.  When God gave Moses the law--the ten commandments--Moses returned to find the people, led by Aaron in Moses absence, worshiping a gold calf.  Talk about betrayal, that was the final straw.

Alone.  That must have been how he felt.  But God was with him, and Moses knew it.  Moses had come to rely completely on God.  Not on people, family or circumstances.

God is enough.  But sometimes, it takes difficult circumstances for us to realize that.  The old song, "Through it All" comes to mind:  Through it all, through it all.  I've come to trust in Jesus, I've come to trust in God..."

And that's all God ever wanted from us.