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Pioneers Memorial

W.D. Frazee

Most Expensive Wool

For some time I have been studying about a subject that I wanted to share with you.

I've given it this title, the most expensive wool in the history of the world.

The most expensive wool in the history of the world.

Now there was nothing extraordinary about the sheep that this wool came off of.

There were millions of sheep like them before and since.

See him as he leads his flock over the deserts of Midian, searching for the green valleys, for pasture, and the cool water springs.

That man out there leading those flocks was many things.

He was the heir apparent to the throne of Egypt, the great empire of that time.

The Bible tells us something about the experience of Moses in Acts the seventh chapter in the 22nd verse.

I'd like to have you look at this text and then imagine using a man like that to herd sheep.

And Moses was learned in all the wisdom of the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds.

They weren't like the Hottentots or other savages.

They excelled in arts and sciences, and Moses was learned in everything that they knew.

Perhaps I should read this statement concerning Moses.

You will find it in the book of Deuteronomy, the last chapter, the tenth verse.

There arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.

He was not only great in the eyes of men, he was great in the eyes of God.

You say, well that's talking about him after he did that great work of delivering Israel.

With such a past and such a future, what's he doing out there in the desert, herding sheep?

Behind him, the throne of the world's greatest empire.

Ahead of him, an experience that marks him for all time, is without a peer, as a historian, a poet, a philosopher, a lawgiver, and a great general and deliverer of a nation.

Why in between herding sheep and why, of all things, 40 years of it?

How much an hour do you suppose he was worried?

Some months ago I was called upon to consult a certain man in connection with some legal matters.

I talked to him for, oh I suppose, an hour, and you know what it cost us?

But Moses was worth a great deal more than $50 an hour.

His time was worth more than that down in Egypt.

Do you agree with me that that's expensive wool that comes off the back of those sheep that he's leading?

I can fancy that a number of people made comments about it and thought what a shame it was to use such talent for such common things.

It may be that somebody came along and said to Moses, Moses what in the world are you doing here anyway, a man with your talent and training?

Of course Moses, you're not anybody, you're somebody.

Men never would have planned it that way, that's certain.

In fact, we're told in the book Patriarchs and Prophets, page 247, man would have dispensed with that long period of toil and obscurity, deeming it a great loss of time.

But infinite wisdom called him who was to become the leader of his people to spend 40 years in the humble work of a shepherd.

Now with that I want to put this matchless statement in the book Education, page 64.

Speaking of these 40 years in the desert, infinite wisdom counted not the period too long, or the price too great.

What happened to the shepherd is of great importance, dear friends.

Do you know 1 of these days you and I, if faithful, are going to join in singing a song on the sea of glass, you remember?

He heard 144, 000 singing it, and he tells us it's the song of Moses and the song of the Lamb.

And somehow I believe, friends, that the ones down here in this last generation that sing the song of Moses will have learned some things from the experience of Moses.

In fact, we're told by inspiration, consider the experience of Moses.

And I propose that we focus especially on this question, why is he herding sheep?

Now to understand that, we shall have to see some things that happened before that period in the desert.

And also to appreciate it, we'll need to note some of the things afterward.

You remember, of course, his birth and the interesting experiences in connection with it.

Stephen, in this speech that we quoted from a moment ago in Acts the seventh chapter, says in which time Moses was born.

And Satan, knowing that a deliverer was to be born, set in motion some oppressive laws.

He moved upon Pharaoh to command that all the baby boys be thrown in the river, or otherwise killed when they were born.

He was trying to destroy that deliverer that was to come, just as hundreds of years later he tried to destroy the Savior when he was born in Bethlehem.

But you remember that God, in his infinite wisdom, he allowed the devil to put that machinery in motion and then use that very thing to bring about something wonderful.

For instead of Moses being destroyed, he was discovered there in the little ark, in the bulrushes, by the daughter of the king of Egypt.

And through that wonderful arrangement of God moving upon little Miriam and the others, it was finally arranged, you remember that Moses was brought up by his own mother and she was paid wages for it.

How the devil must have gnashed his teeth and writhed in agony over that turn of affairs.

He lets the devil go so far, then he lets him hang himself with his own rope.

So for 12 years Moses was trained by his mother, Jacobah.

She was a slave, but she was being paid by the daughter of the king of Egypt to train this boy.

My dear friends, I wonder how many of us as parents would be more faithful.

I don't know whether when she started out she knew she had that long or not, I doubt it.

She didn't know when Moses would be taken away.

And she poured into that young heart the truth of God.

She taught him how foolish idol worship was.

She told him the stories of creation, of Noah, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, of Joseph.

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Most Expensive Wool

Transcript

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