Moses spent 40 years of his life as a stranger in the land of Midian (Acts 7:29). Being a stranger; does not this word often have a bad connotation for us? The old nature does not like it when the world makes us feel that it neither understands us nor accepts our convictions. Yet it was precisely at this time that Moses experienced God’s special blessing: He gave him two sons. Moses gave the older one the name Gershom, which means “a stranger there.” This name was more than just a personal designation; it was a confession of the father! Friends, neighbors, relatives, everyone who knew Gershom understood the statement: in the name of his son, Moses acknowledged himself as a stranger in the land where he was living.

We are well aware that we are strangers. But how great is our tendency to hide this fact from the world in order to escape its disdainful ridicule, its contempt and hostility, its hatred! All this is what we inevitably have to expect if we take the side of “Jesus of Nazareth” with a clear confession. He forewarned us, “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love you as its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you” (Jn. 15:18–19). Wanting to avoid this by all means is to deny the Lord. To live consciously as one who is “not of the world” means to be with Him, to honor Him and to be richly blessed ourselves.