It’s 1.30am. The night is warm. The dog is barking. I am awake.
As is often the case I am thinking of what I have not yet done. This blog-post is at the forefront of my thinking. As I consider why it is that way a mixed bag of motives spills out across my consciousness. None particularly noble.
Life has recently changed for me. I think it is for the good. None the less the changes have me in a state of flux. This blog is preparing me for Easter and I invited you along for the journey. I really want to do justice to my own preparation and I also want to offer something to you that is of some value. I have told you I don’t want to get all ‘preachy’ but I find myself wanting to talk about faith, and God, and Jesus, and Gospel. This has been a part of me for as long as I can remember. At first I wanted to argue against it, then I ran away from it, then I gave in and it has been a fire in my bones ever since. It has been the thing that shaped me and continues to shape me. I can’t escape it nor do I really want to. Having seen I can’t unsee. Having tasted I can’t untaste.
But here I am at 1.30 in the morning. The night is warm. The dog is barking. I am awake.
As we move towards Easter via the story of Passover we come to the person of Moses. His introduction into the story is relatively short. Like so many of the leading characters in the Biblical narrative he appears as an unlikely contender. He enters the story at his birth. Even before he is born he, along with all the other boys born into slavery, is marked for death by order of Pharaoh King of Egypt. In a brief narrative of eight paragraphs he is saved from that death, adopted into the royal family, kills an Egyptian, and flees for his life from Egypt into what is today the Sinai Desert.
In the first bit of his story he is not named. Neither are his parents. Names in ancient writings were important; they made you somebody. He was a nobody. When Pharaoh’s daughter names him Moses he becomes somebody. But now he is somebody wanted for murder and probably treason, hiding in the desert where nobody knows his name. He is now ‘the Egyptian’. He falls in with a bedouin, marries one of his daughters and takes up the life of bedouin shepherd himself. Yet he knows this in not where he belongs; he is a stranger in a strange land.
Then what we think is a really weird thing happens.
While tending his father-in-law’s flocks he takes them to the far side of the desert, to a mountainous area, a sacred place for a number of tribal religions. It was known as the Mountain of God or Mountain of the gods. It was also known as a place of reliable pasture.
While pasturing his flocks something caught his attention; a bush on fire but not burning up. Naturally he went to have a look. Then he heard his name called.
“Moses, Moses.”
“Here I am.”
“Take off your sandals, for the space where you are standing is Holy Ground. I am the god of your father, the god of Abraham, the god of Isaac, and the god of Jacob.”
Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at god.
Moses has an encounter with the divine. He went out to tend the sheep and God speaks to him!
He sees himself as a stranger in a strange land and God speaks to him. He wants to hide his past and be a nobody and God speaks to him. He has murdered and God speaks to him. He lives between two worlds – Hebrew and Egyptian belonging to neither – and God speaks to him.
And through Moses’ story God speaks to me. Possibly be he is speaking to you too. We perceive of God as being far off and aloof, when actually he is near and engaged. I suspect that God speaks to us a lot more often than we think! I also suspect that we are more likely to hear him when we are ‘on the other side of the desert’. When we are awake for no good reason at 1.30 in the morning. When we are uncomfortable. When our lives are in flux. When our own brokenness and the brokenness of the world around us put cracks in our consciousness that give opportunity for the light to get in.
And when God speaks, what do we do?
We answer, “Here I am”.
Then we listen.
Notes – The bits from the Bible can be found in Chapters two and three of Exodus. You can read them at these links – Exodus 2 and Exodus 3:1-4
The words of a very minor prophet 
I am feeling angry with God at the moment and because of that I am also feeling selfish and a bit unhappy. Still, He is engaging with me, an active participant in the wrestle i am currently involved in. He is faithful.
Fight the good fight girl, fight the good fight. If we are not struggling with God we are not following in his ways. he will always stretch us and grow us, often through the pain and trouble of life. To trust the only wants the best for us is a stretch at times, or so I have found. We all come away with a limp.
Somewhere we have lost the truth of who we really are to God. For what every reason, we believe that we cannot be valuable to God, yet He finds us so important! We are His children and He loves to spend time with us! I think God is always present and always wants to talk to us. We are the ones who are either too busy or believe we are not “good” enough for God to speak with us. Yet like Moses, who believed he had so many negatives and yet God called to him by name, God calls to us everyday! My hope during this lent season is that we begin to know God’s value of us. He gave up everything to become one of us and then went and died for us. That in itself makes us extremely valuable! May we also experience the joy of hearing Him call our name; the peace of a father’s open arms that says, “Child, let’s talk for a while. I have so much to talk with you about. I want to hear about your day!”
I like this very much.
Thanks Brian .. For this reminder of God being there for us in the desert of our brokenness .. It’s through these times that I feel closer to God and feel his presence .. Even at 1:30 am we can say ..
Here I am Lord ..use me …and face another day… Come what may ..