Moses was looking after the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, priest of Midian. He led his flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of Yahweh appeared to him in the shape of a flame of fire, coming from the middle of a bush. Moses looked; there was the bush blazing but it was not being burnt up. 'I must go and look at this strange sight,' Moses said 'and see why the bush is not burnt.' Now Yahweh saw him go forward to look, and God called to him from the middle of the bush. 'Moses, Moses!' he said. 'Here I am' he answered. 'Come no nearer' he said. 'Take off your sandals, for the place on which you stand is holy ground. I am the God of your father,' he said 'the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.' At this Moses covered his face, afraid to look at God.
And Yahweh said, 'I have seen the miserable state of my people in Egypt. I have heard their appeal to be free of their slave-drivers. Yes, I am well aware of their sufferings. I mean to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians and bring them up out of that land to a land rich and broad, a land where milk and honey flow, the home of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites. And now the cry of the sons of Israel has come to me, and I have witnessed the way in which the Egyptians oppress them, so come, I send you to Pharaoh to bring the sons of Israel, my people, out of Egypt.'
Moses said to God, 'Who am I to go to Pharaoh and bring the sons of Israel out of Egypt?' 'I shall be with you,' was the answer 'and this is the sign by which you shall know that it is I who have sent you... After you have led the people out of Egypt, you are to offer worship to God on this mountain.'
* ‘Moses was looking after the flock…’ Moses was doing what he did almost everyday for 40 years, ‘looking after the flock’ when he was ‘called’. What about you? God calls us in the ordinary circumstances of our lives, and yet His call puts in that extra-ordinariness into the circumstances that you are called. Do you allow yourself to be attentive to God’s voice speaking to you in the ordinariness of your life?
* ‘I must go and see this strange sight…’ Moses could have ignored this strange sight and think it is a figment of his imagination. Or he could have been struck with fear and ran away, rather than moving forward to see this burning bush sight. What about you? What are the ‘burning bushes’ in your life? Do you try to encounter it with eyes of faith, or do you run away from it in fear? Perhaps there are some ‘burning bushes’ in your life that you fear sighting because you cannot comprehend it. Bring it to the Lord in prayer, and pray for the grace of wisdom to understand, and the courage to respond.
* ‘Take off your sandals…’ Moses wanted to do things his ways when he was a prince in Egypt for the first 40 years of his life, then he went into self-exile for another 40 years before encountering the Lord in the burning bush. Moses seemingly wanted to live life in his own terms and conditions, yet God’s command is clear, ‘take off your sandals’. Moses is to come into God’s presence under God’s terms. What about you? Where are you at this point of life? The tension between Moses’ will and God’s will that Moses faced is much the same and real in your life. ‘Take off your sandals…’ is easier said than done, but it is possible with God’s grace. It is in prayer that your aspirations meets the mind of God, thus God’s will becoming yours as well. Pray for the humility and docility in taking off your sandals.
* ‘I have seen the miserable state of my people… I shall be with you.’ God’s call does not appear out of the blue nor is it plucked out from thin air. God’s call is rooted in the realities of your life and the circumstances in which you live in. There is a purpose in God’s call, and sometimes that purpose may seem overwhelming. Have you felt that way sometimes too? Have the circumstances of your life, in your home, college and workplace seemed to speak to you of God wanting you to ‘renounce yourself, pick up your cross and follow him’? Moses was hesitant, and perhaps for you too. But God’s promise is clear and certain! ‘I shall be with you’. Do not be afraid to respond!
(Thanks to http://www.thebricktestament.com for the above pictures)
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Stay tuned for the next post by Br Peter Anthoney on 12th Oct 2010.
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