“A decisive encounter”

By Rev. Michael Stonhosue

Meditation – Sunday, September 3, 2023

Exodus 3:1-15 (Forward, p. 35) CEV p. 56

Today’s account relates what is possibly one of the most decisive and important encounters in all of the Scriptures. I never cease to be amazed at it, both in terms of what it says about God and in terms of what it says about one key individual, a man called Moses. This account begins with Moses, but it is actually God who starts everything in motion (see chapter 2 verse 23-25).

So, what does it say about God? It reveals that the God of the Hebrews is anything but a ‘watchmaker’ God who creates everything and sets it in motion and then leaves it to ‘run itself.’ Instead, we see an active God, an aware God, and interventionist God. Notice what God says about Himself—these are His own words in verses 7-8:

I have seen…how my people are suffering;

I have heard them beg for help;

I feel sorry for them;

I have come down to rescue them;

I will bring them out of Egypt;

I will give them a good land, a land rich with milk and honey;

But then, there is one catch, of which we will read more later:

I will send you…to lead my people out of Egypt.

This, then, leads us to Moses, the escaped murderer and fugitive from justice, and his role in the whole business:

By the time this takes place, it is quite possible that many years

have slipped by, as Moses has now made a home for himself

and started a family there in Midian. Furthermore, the king (or

Pharaoh) who’d put a price on his head was now dead;

Moses, when today’s event takes place, is in the midst of an

ordinary, everyday type of day. He is out in the desert tending

his father-in-law’s sheep. For some reason, quite unknown to

us, he decides to take the sheep across the desert to Horeb

(or Sinai).

There, in the midst of his seemingly ‘normal’ day, he encounters

something that is most ‘abnormal’—namely a bush that is burning

without being consumed. Seemingly, this is not something expected,

something that he is familiar with, so, being curious about it, he goes

over to check it out. A bit of divine or sanctified curiosity, I would call

it. I have often wondered how the story would have unfolded had he

merely shrugged this off and done nothing. We will never know, but

history, and the history of Israel might have been widely different.

There, from the burning bush, God speaks to Moses:

He calls Moses by name (hey, a personal, intimate God);

He warns him that where he now stands is holy ground;

He reveals Himself as the God of his ancestors, Abraham,

Isaac and Jacob;

He reveals His concern for the Israelites and His intentions

for them (as seen previously in verses 7-8);

And then, He drops His bombshell: lo, I am sending you.

Clearly, staggered by all this, Moses naturally has some reservations about this, and some questions about how this will take place. (Doesn’t this sound like all of us when faced with a new and seemingly overwhelming task?)

Who am I to go to Pharaoh and lead your people out of Egypt?

Good question, coming from a fugitive and murderer

Good question, coming from someone who’s been ‘out of the

loop’ of palace politics and procedures all these years;

Good question, coming from a man that, to all appearances,

would simply come across as a rustic, a rube, a rural

shepherd and nobody.

God’s answer is, to me at least, less than convincing:

I will be with you (good, good beginning: where next?)

You will know that I am the one who sent you when you come

back here to worship me after all this is done.

‘Whoa’, I would be certainly saying: ‘I will know for sure only

After I have been through all this?” For me, this

supposed reassurance, after the fact, indeed, would not

have been overly welcome or appreciated. I like to know

right up front, but sadly, truthfully, this is seldom the way

that God works!

Moses has still more questions to put to God: “after I tell them that the God of their ancestors has sent me, what name shall I use for God?

(After all, the Egyptians had a whole multitude of gods, a whole

pantheon of them!)

“You are to tell them that the Lord, whose name is Yahweh, ‘the

I Am, ‘I am who I am’, ‘the one who is’, ‘the one who is who I

will be’, ‘the one who calls everything into being’, has sent you.”

God then continues on, in the rest of the passage, with a whole

raft of detailed instructions about how Moses is to perform his

task, which, to me at least, is quite reassuring;

But Moses, ‘the man of God’, is not quite finished, finished with his questions, or his objections (see chapter 4);

“What if Pharaoh refuses to listen to me and people in general

don’t believe that you sent me?” (verse 1)

Here God makes use of Moses’ staff to work miracles

One final objection: “I have never been much of a public

speaker, then or now. I am slow of speech and often can’t

think of what to say” (verse 10).

Here God grows exasperated with him, and gives Moses

his brother, Aaron,, as his deputy and spokesman.

I find this passage to be so very homey, so down to earth, and so very reassuring, for many reasons:

God calls us in the midst of our everyday ordinary lives;

God calls us and uses us, in spite of our imperfects and

flaws, and less than exemplary former lives;

God especially relishes and honours those who want to

draw nearer to Him (as with the burning bush), who

want to know more, who have a divine curiosity;

God cares about what is happening to us and to those

around us, and does something about it, but then,

often chooses to use us;

God guides us and instructs us along the way;

God hears us out, listens to our questions and objections, and

deals with them.

Moses really wonders whether he can be of use to God which, I suspect, is probably like most of us. But, be assured, God can make use of each and every one of us, if only we will let Him. God has such an incredible belief in us that it often astounds us. Thanks be to God for such a mercy.

Forward notes: “There the angel of the Lord appeared to [Moses] in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed” (verse 2).

“Exodus radiates grand, miraculous moments: insect manifestations, seas parting, and mass liberation of oppressed people. Before these unfold, though, this peculiar encounter between God and Moses takes place. While it has magnificent elements, I am intrigued by the minutes contours: the flock of grazing animals; Moses’s bare feet on ground declared holy; and the vulnerable questions that emerge from Moses’s mouth: ‘Who am I?’ and ‘Who are you? God and Moses find each other in grace notes of earth and flesh. A plan of mighty deliverance arises among plants, empty sandals, and a reluctant human being.

“Sometimes our churches strive so hard to make what we do special and grant for a God who parts seas. But this story reminds me that God enters the small moments of our lives too. What may seem too incidental for God’s magnificence can become part of a divine liberation plot.”

Moving Forward: “Give thanks for the big—and small—ways God enters your life.”