The Nature of God

PROPERS:          PROPER 17, YEAR A 

TEXT:                 EXODUS 3:1-15

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MAGNOLIA SPRINGS, ON SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2017.

ONE SENTENCE:        In the oracle to Moses, God says that he is with those who suffer.      

                                   

            Those of us of a certain age remember a movie that was released in 1957 – The Ten Commandments.

            It was the filmmaker Cecil B. DeMille’s grandest and most successful production.  It had an all-star cast: Charlton Heston as Moses, Yul Brenner as Pharaoh, and Edward G. Robinson as Dathan.

            It was based on several works – The Prince of Egypt, Pillar of Fire, On Eagle’s Wings, and the Book of Exodus. It told the story of the life of Moses – his birth, his being rescued from the bulrushes by Pharaoh’s daughter, his rise to power in Egypt, his escape to the wilderness, his call by God at Mount Sinai, and all that followed.

            The movie was four hours long – a movie length you won’t see in theaters today. It even had an intermission!

            It was spectacular for its era.  There are many stunning scenes.  But one seems especially appropriate today.

            It is the scene we hear in the first lesson today – from the third chapter of Exodus.  It is God’s call to Moses.

            If I recall it correctly, the scene is set as Moses is tending his flock in the Wilderness.  He is working for his father-in-law, Jethro (No, not the one from the Beverly Hillbillies).

            In the distance, Moses sees a strange sight, on the side of the mountain (Exodus, at this stage calls the mountain Horeb; it is later called Sinai).  He sees a bush afire.

            As he approaches the bush, the scene gets stranger – the bush is not consumed by the fire.  A voice out of the bush tells him to take off his shoes because he is standing on holy ground.

            The first lesson today describes the scene well. The voice speaks from the bush:

“I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God… [The voice speaks again:] “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.”

            The dialogue between Moses and the burning bush continues – with Moses asking, “Whom shall I say sent me?”  God responds with an answer that deserves its own sermon: “I AM who I AM.” That is a sermon for another time – the Divine Tetragrammaton, the Holy Name.

            This lesson is highly appropriate today, but it is highly appropriate for any day.  The message is timeless.

            It connects to other passages of scripture so well.  Think of the Beatitudes.  We hear that people want the Ten Commandments posted in public places. But how often do we hear of Exodus 3 and God’s words to Moses, or the Beatitudes proposed as public monuments?

The nature of God comes through in these words. “I have observed the misery of my people… Indeed, I know their sufferings.”

            And how they connect with Our Lord’s words from the Sermon on the Mount:

³ ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

⁴ ‘Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.

⁵ ‘Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.

⁶ ‘Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.

⁷ ‘Blessed are the merciful, for they will receive mercy.

⁸ ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God.

⁹ ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.

¹⁰ ‘Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

¹¹ ‘Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely^* on my account. ¹²Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

            As I read the passage from Exodus in preparation for today, I was first drawn to the idea of God’s self-identification.  But then my heart and my attention turned toward Houston.  And I thought back…

            I thought back to times that may be similar to those you may have known.  I thought back to August 29, 2005 and the weeks which followed.  I thought of the mass of humanity which was displaced by Katrina.  I recalled the utter devastation I saw three days after the storm, when I first visited the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

            Words cannot describe it.  And try as they might, the news commentators cannot describe what they are seeing in Houston.

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Write these words on your heart, for now and in the future: “I have observed the misery of my people… Indeed, I know their sufferings.”

Our God, the Great I AM, is a God of the last and least.  The desert God that Moses encountered in the burning bush, YHWH Elohim, walks with those who are broken… those who are lost… those who are rejected by society… those who grieve… those who struggle through life.

Our call, as his followers, is to be the heart, hands, feet, eyes, ears and voice of that incarnate God who came to earth that we might see him in the flesh.

Our call is not to rest in the assuredness of our salvation or in the familiar comfort of our lives. Instead, we are to act and live the tender compassion of our God in those situations where we find the lost, the broken, the destitute, the despairing, the rejected, the hurt, the hungry, the naked, and the grieving.

In our responses, Moses comes alive once again.