Wilderness Preparation: How God Shapes Leaders Through Obscurity

Editor’s note – Randy DeVaul reads Moses’ forty years in Midian alongside Israel’s decades in Egypt and finds the same temptation in both: staying put because the familiar feels safer than the unknown. We’re running this piece because it’s a useful mirror for our own routines – the comfort we call stability but that might just be fear in disguise. If you’re in a season that feels like exile, DeVaul’s walk through Exodus is worth your time.

The Flight to Midian

Moses never planned to live in Midian. He didn’t wake up one morning and decide to trade palace marble for desert dust. He fled Egypt because he had nowhere else to go. Pharaoh wanted him dead. The Hebrews didn’t want him alive. And Midian, a foreign land among foreign people, was far enough away to hide. Yet what looked like escape became the classroom of transformation.

In Midian, Moses entered forty years of quiet obscurity. Gone were the royal robes, the Egyptian language, and the influence of Pharaoh’s court. Gone was the confidence that once made him act in impulsive strength. Now he was a shepherd, serving nameless, faceless, and tending sheep that weren’t even his. The man who once commanded servants now followed animals. The man who once led armies now led livestock.

But this was not punishment. It was preparation.

Editor’s note – Moses didn’t lose his usefulness when he lost his title in Midian – he was finally being shaped for it. The skills that build a resume rarely match the character God is after.

God was doing something in the silence that Moses could not yet see. He was reshaping identity, teaching humility, and forming character. The palace had taught Moses leadership; the desert would teach him dependence. The palace had taught him command; the desert would teach him surrender.

And while Moses was learning to be faithful in the ordinary, God was also working in Egypt. The Hebrew people groaned under slavery, crying out for deliverance. Yet even in their oppression, they had grown comfortable in the familiar. Egypt was cruel, but it was known. The rhythm of bondage had become predictable. They feared the unknown more than they hated the chains.

It’s a sobering truth: both Moses and the Hebrews were stuck in comfort zones. One was in the quiet safety of Midian, the other in the predictable misery of Egypt. Both needed to be moved. God had to disturb their comfort to awaken their calling.

Editor’s note – God didn’t ease Moses or Israel out of their ruts – He disrupted them, through a burning bush and ten plagues. If disruption feels severe right now, that may be a sign God is moving, not that He’s absent.

The Comfort of the Known

Comfort is not always peace. Sometimes it’s paralysis.

Moses settled into Midian’s rhythm. He married, raised a family, tended sheep, and likely stopped imagining anything beyond the next day’s grazing route. The fire of calling that once burned in his heart had cooled to embers. He had found a life that was safe, simple, and predictable.

The Hebrews had done the same. Though oppressed, they had learned to survive within Egypt’s system. They built homes, raised children, and accepted slavery as normal. The fear of Pharaoh was real, but the fear of change was greater.

God’s people often prefer the known to the unknown, even when the known is bondage.

We cling to what we can control, even if it limits us. We settle for what feels secure, even if it stifles growth. We stay in Egypt because we understand its rules, and we stay in Midian because it doesn’t hurt anymore.

But God loves us too much to let us stay comfortable.

The Discomfort of Transformation

When God begins to move us, He rarely starts with convenience. He starts with disruption.

For Moses, that disruption came through a burning bush. It was a divine interruption in an ordinary day. For the Hebrews, it came through plagues and confrontation as a divine shaking of everything familiar.

God’s call always disturbs before it delivers.

He unsettles our routines, challenges our assumptions, and exposes our false security. He reminds us that comfort is not the same as calling.

In Midian, Moses learned that identity cannot be rebuilt through isolation. He had to encounter God to rediscover who he was. In Egypt, the Hebrews learned that freedom cannot be experienced through fear. They had to trust God enough to step into the unknown.

Both had to leave what was familiar to find what was promised.

Editor’s note – DeVaul’s point that calling without character leads to collapse is worth remembering. Scripture doesn’t rush Moses from the burning bush to Pharaoh’s court without the shepherd years between them.

The Challenge for Us

We are not so different.

We get comfortable in our own versions of Egypt and Midian – the jobs we know, the habits we tolerate, the routines that keep us safe but stagnant. We tell ourselves that stability is faithfulness, when sometimes it’s just fear dressed in discipline.

But God calls us beyond comfort. He calls us to trust Him in the unknown.

He may lead us into a season that feels like exile to a place where we lose titles, routines, or relationships. He may strip away what we thought defined us so He can reveal who we truly are. He may silence the noise of success so we can hear the whisper of purpose.

And in that silence, He is not absent. He is aligning.

The desert is not wasted. It is where God forms the heart of a deliverer.

The Invitation to Faithfulness

Moses’ forty years in Midian were not wasted years. They were shaping years. He learned to lead sheep before he could lead people. He learned to listen before he could speak for God. He learned that calling without character leads to collapse but calling with surrender leads to destiny.

Likewise, the Hebrews’ years in Egypt were not forgotten years. God heard their groaning, remembered His covenant, and prepared their deliverance.

When the time was right, God called Moses by name and sent him back to Egypt, not as a fugitive, but as a deliverer. The man who once fled in fear returned in faith. The people who once feared the unknown walked through the sea into freedom.

God moved them both out of comfort into calling.

A Word for Today

If you are in a season that feels quiet, foreign, or uncertain, take heart. God may be preparing you in your own Midian. He may be teaching you humility, patience, and dependence. He may be shaping your identity for a purpose you cannot yet see.

And if you feel trapped in an Egypt of routine – surviving but not thriving, knowing but not growing – God may be stirring your spirit to step into the unknown.

Faith is not found in comfort. It is found in obedience.

So, remain faithful in the ordinary. Trust Him in the silence. Let Him move you beyond what is safe into what is sacred.

Because the same God who prepared Moses in Midian and delivered Israel from Egypt is still calling His people today to come out of comfort, into purpose, and toward holy ground.

A Word from the Editor
DeVaul’s piece is a good reminder that the wilderness is never wasted on God’s people. David wrote of walking “through the valley of the shadow of death” and fearing no evil because God was with him (Psalm 23:4). Moses’ years in Midian prove that valley can be exactly where God does His deepest shaping.

Editor Comment: This is a timely reminder that God is still shaping His people in seasons that may feel like obscurity.

This article appeared on Medium and is reprinted with modifications and by permission.