Discussion Guide
God has a big plan for Moses and the Israelites. He also has a plan for each of us. How can we find out what He wants for us - what His plan is?
How does God speak to us today?
Look back at the story of Exodus and all the plagues. How do those events show how creation responds to God? How did the plagues bring glory to God?
Complete Transcript
As we continue our study of God and nature, we're going to look at three unusual and unexpected miracles in the Old Testament. In a way, all miracles are unusual and unexpected--that's why we call them miracles! But, we sorta expect Jesus to heal blind people and sick people. Those events were still miraculous, but not unexpected. This first story is one you're probably familiar with, but sometimes when we become too familiar with a story we miss the miracle. Have you heard about Moses and the burning bush before? Let's try to peel back the familiar and find the miracle again. I want you to use your imagination today.
Imagine you are a shepherd. You are out in the wilderness. Really try to picture the wilderness, okay? It's a hot desert wilderness, and you have to keep a flock of sheep safe, well fed, well watered, and alive. Probably not the easiest job in the world.
You approach a mountain, Horeb, which actually means "desert". And out of the corner of your eye you see something you've never seen before. You do a double-take and look back. Squinting and shading your eyes you can't really believe what you're seeing.
A bush is on fire but it's not actually burning up. Anything on fire is supposed to burn up. That's how it works. Set it on fire and it reduces to ash. But this bush isn't being destroyed. It's not breaking apart and turning to ash. It's simply burning.
Your curiosity is overwhelming. And besides, if you tell anyone about this, they're going to ask you: "why wasn't the bush burning up?" Otherwise, they'll just say, "nice story, Moses, you've been hanging out with the sheep too long." So you go over to the bush to see if you can figure out what's going on. Maybe you are just seeing things and that's dazzling sunlight shimmering off of berries. Or some other logical explanation.
As you approach the bush, wanting to understand what you have seen, there is a voice. In fact, the bush knows your name. "Moses! Moses!' Okay, this went from unusual to weird in sixty seconds flat. But you're invested now, you gotta know more so you say, "Here I am!"
At this point, you have no idea what to expect next. One minute you're looking after some sheep and the next minute you're talking to a bush that's on fire but not burning up. And then....then this goes from weird to miraculous.
“Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.”
Instantly, you drop to your knees. Without looking up you remove your shoes. Whatever you do, you don't look at the bush again. God himself is in the fire. Only God could cause the bush to burn and not be consumed. And not only that, but God is speaking to you. God could consume you just like that bush. He's so holy, so powerful, so perfect, so righteous, and you are a sinful human so full of mistakes and failures. And yet, he's not destroying you in your sinfulness. He's speaking to you.
The God of our ancestors, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is speaking to you. He's explaining that he has seen the Israelites suffering in slavery in Egypt. You remember how you saw that suffering too. You'd been raised in the palace by the princess, but you're an Israelite just like the slaves. And you hated their suffering. In fact, you murdered that Egyptian who was beating the Israelite slave that day forty years ago. That's why you were in the wilderness to begin with. You had done something terrible in your anger and you had to leave Egypt to save your own life. The Egyptians didn't want you, the Israelites didn't want you. The desert wilderness with the sheep is where you belonged.
Expect God is saying something else entirely. Something you can't quite understand. He's telling you that he wants you to return to Egypt and tell Pharaoh to let the Israelites go so God can bring them into the Promised Land to bless them. This can't be right. Maybe your ears need cleaned out.
You say, as respectfully as you can, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”
And God says “I will be with you. And this will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”
This sounds too good to be true. God wants to deliver his people! Of course he does, he's a good God. He is worthy of praise! But he wants you to do it? You? The one who had to flee Egypt? The one your own people aren't sure they can trust? God must have the wrong guy.
You ask carefully, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”
God said to Moses, “I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’”
When God says "I am who I am" chills run through your entire body. From the hair on your head to the tip of your tiny toe tingles. It's the holiest, most powerful thing you have ever heard in your entire life. And so you ask a few more questions, trying to iron out your fears and doubts. God continues speaking to you, and instructing you. As he speaks, you feel courage rising. You are not alone. You've never been alone. God has seen you all the time and has had a plan. And now it's time to do what he has called you to do.
As you return home from this most holy conversation, you know your entire life has changed. You stop dead in your tracks for a moment. The sheep by your side look up at you strangely for a moment as your stop is so sudden. You're wondering what would've happened if you hadn't bothered to investigate the burning bush. What if you had just rubbed your eyes, shrugged your shoulders, and moved on? What if you had decided it wasn't worth going out of your way? What if you just ignored the unexpected and unusual, and had missed God?
The story of Moses and the burning bush can be found in Exodus 3. When you read it for yourself, you'll see that I took God's and Moses's words exactly from the Bible. But I gave us space to imagine what it might have been like for Moses that day. The fact is, we don't know exactly what was going on with the burning bush. Maybe it was the angel of the Lord within the bush that simply gave it the appearance of being on fire. Maybe it was the sun. Or there's even this plant that grows specifically in that part of the world that gives off gas and occasionally catches fire on its oily leaves, but doesn't burn up. It only burns for a few minutes then extinguishes. But when I read the text, I think about God and his creation. It does what he tells it to do. And if he tells the bush to not burn, it won't burn.
Does that sound too simple to be true? Maybe it is. But think about some of the other stories we've already discussed on this podcast. The very first episode we talked about Jesus calming the storm. The winds and the waves immediately obeyed him when he said "be still!". God created the water, Jesus was there at creation. The water recognized that Jesus was its master and when he commanded it to settle down, it did. Think about the parting of the Red Sea and the Jordan River. God told the water to get out the way and it did. Then he told it to go back where it belonged and it did.
So it seems to me that if God tells a bush "don't burn" it won't burn. At any rate, we learn two important things from the burning bush. One, God is all-powerful and his holiness can consume like any fire, but when we ask Jesus to be our savior, we all become like the burning bush. We carry the flame of God's spirit inside of us and we are not consumed. And two, God will speak to us in unexpected ways, but we have to have eyes to notice it, we have to make time to seek answers, we have to be curious enough to find out the truth. Moses was confused and curious that day--he certainly wasn't expecting to encounter God in a bush on the mountainside! And we don't know when we'll encounter God either. But it's safe to say that if we are not curious and we are too busy to care, we will miss him.
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