Mike Shelton 
After Sinai 
The Ten Commandments Were Not the Beginning, nor the End, of the Exodus Story

The story of the Exodus of Moses and the people of Israel has been told many times and in many ways, especially in movies like The Ten Commandments. The Israelites are being led to the Promised Land, but because of their faithlessness, most are banished to forty years in the Sinai Desert.

After Sinai takes a completely different look at an old story. Michael Shelton reviews the major threads in the accounts in the books of Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy and concludes the problem wasn’t the faithlessness of the Jews; it was the overbearing demands of the one who let his people go and then refused to let his people go back. After Sinai is a remarkable essay of a people who sought freedom but instead left one human pharaoh only to find him replaced by a divine pharaoh. The story sounds more in keeping with Mount Olympus. But it’s Mount Sinai and the drama that took place before, during, and after the Ten Commandments. In fact, the Big Ten is not the climax of the story. It’s the events—the interaction among God, Moses, and the people of Israel leading to the banishment to the wilderness—that make for the real climax.

About the author

Michael Shelton grew up as an only child in Phoenix, Arizona. His grandfather and his Uncle Boots ran a home salvage yard business where he learned the value of hard work and basic human kindness. He attended North Phoenix High School where he was accepted into the U.S. Senate Youth Program. This was followed by a B.A. in Political Science at Arizona State University and a Master’s in Public Administration as a National Urban Fellow from Bernard Baruch College, CUNY, and a Certified Public Manager designation from the ASU Advanced School of Public Affairs.

Mr. Shelton would combine a professional life in media with a commitment to public service. He was a PBS television producer/director for KAET-TV when he was executive producer assigned to the impeachment saga of former Arizona governor Evan Mecham. He was a classical music radio broadcaster for KHEP-FM. He was appointed Chairman of the Phoenix Community Services Commission, Phoenix’s Anti-Poverty Program. He was also a leader in a successful citizens effort challenging in federal court school closures in the Phoenix Union High School District.

Living in Yuma, he’s known as a longtime public affairs professional working for eleven years as Assistant to the Yuma City Administrator for Communications and Public Affairs, and then Public Affairs Manager for Rural/Metro. He is currently working as a substitute teacher at Yuma Catholic High School and the Yuma Union High School District.

The religious background contributing to “After Sinai” includes academically studying religion at Arizona State University, where he was also a student member of Campus Crusade for Christ. He’s read theological materials extensively on his own. He has taught adult Sunday Schools at Tanner Chapel AME Church in Phoenix, Arizona and Trinity United Methodist Church in Yuma, Arizona.

Michael is a writer, a requested keynote speaker, a frequent guest columnist for the Yuma Sun, the composer of a play based on the Book of Job, an extended essay on the Book of Exodus, and performer of dramatic readings from comic book themes. He is an accomplished speaker, having earned his DTM from Toastmasters International. .He has been the keynote speaker at events at MCAS, YPG, and the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. In every high school classroom he substitutes in, he greets them with Mr. Spock’s “Live Long and Prosper”.

His wife Sharon passed away in November 2010 due to cancer complications. He received a kidney transplant 5 months later in April 2011.

August 25, 2015 Mr. Shelton was elected in the primary to the Yuma City Council. He is possibly the only post-kidney transplant recipient ever elected to any public office in the United States. He is partnering with the National Kidney foundation of Arizona.