6 THE BURNING BUSH

The years of the life of Moses are interestingly divided into three forties: the first forty he spent as a prince in Pharaoh’s court, the second as a shepherd in Midian and the third a deliverer/leader/founder of a new nation. See how changeable are the lives of men and women, especially the lives of good people whom God can use. He has now finished his second forty, when he receives his commission to bring Israel out of Egypt. Sometimes it requires a long time before God calls His servants out of the preparation stage to the work for which He designed and created them. Moses was born to be Israel’s deliverer, and yet this is the first declaration of it when he is eighty years old. When Moses tried to help at age 40 that may have been just a hint of something he was feeling inwardy. His effort then was probably just an unproductive, human effort.

God appeared to Moses right where he was while doing what his employment required. Nowhere does the narrative say that Moses did not have a relationship with God. The story line seems to only imply that this was a huge, major turning point in any conversation he may have been having with God. He was keeping the flock near mount Horeb. As verse 1 says, “Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God.” This is a poor employment for a man of Moses’ upbringing and education, yet he seems satisfied with it and learns meekness and contentment in it. For this he is more celebrated in Scriptures than for all his other learning. Scripture says that Moses was the most meek or humble man. He did not develop that characteristic in Egypt’s court. It is good to be consistent in the work we are doing until we have good reason to change. Moses did. Even those that are qualified for great employments and services must not think it strange if they are confined to obscurity. It was the lot of Moses before us, who foresaw nothing to the contrary but that he should die as he had lived a great while as a poor despicable shepherd. Let those that think themselves buried alive in obscurity be content to shine like lamps even in their graves. We can learn to wait until God’s time comes to set us on a candlestick. Moses was watching sheep when he was honored with this vision. God encourages industry. The shepherds were keeping their flocks when they received the tidings of our Savior’s birth. Satan loves to find us idle; God is well pleased when he find us busy. Solitude is a good friend to our communion with God. When we are alone the Father is with us. Moses saw more of God in a desert than ever he had seen in Pharaoh’s court.

To his great surprise Moses saw a bush burning with no fire either from earth or heaven to kindle it, and, which was more strange, it was not burned up. And he saw an angel—the “angel of the Lord.” Was this an ordinary angel? Was it the second person of the Trinity? It could have been either one. The important point is that it was an extraordinary manifestation of divine presence and glory. What was visible was produced by the ministry of an angel, but Moses heard God in it speaking to him. He saw a flame of fire; for our God is a consuming fire.

When Israel’s deliverance out of Egypt was promised to Moses he saw a burning bush. This may have indicated a light of joy which that deliverance should cause. God in that deliverance of His people from Egypt brought terror and destruction to His enemies and simultaneously light and protection to His people. He displayed His glory before all. God has often been depicted in Scripture as a light or fire. Isaiah 10:17 says “The Light of Israel will become a fire, their Holy One a flame; in a single day it will burn and consume his thorns and his briers.” This fire was not in a tall and stately cedar, but in a bush, perhaps even a thorny bush. God chooses the weak and despised things of the world such as Moses, now a poor shepherd having been spoken to from within a bush, and with them confounds the wise. He delights to beautify and crown the humble. The bush burned, and yet was not consumed, a picture of the congregation of God now in bondage in Egypt, burning in the brick-kilns, yet not consumed; perplexed, but not in despair; cast down, but not destroyed.

Moses was curious to enquire into this extraordinary sight as verse 3 says, “So Moses said, ‘I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up.’” He speaks as one inquisitive and bold in his enquiry; whatever it was, he would, if possible, know its meaning. Things revealed belong to us, and we ought diligently to enquire into them. So he received an invitation to draw near yet with a caution not to come too near or thoughtlessly.

When God saw that Moses took notice of the burning bush, and turned aside to see it, and left his business to give it his attention, then God called to him. If he had carelessly neglected it as something thing not worth noticing, it is possible that God would have departed. But, on the other hand, God knows how to communicate and if He uses a bush, it is because He expects His communication to succeed. We therefore have a responsibility to enquire, to respond to what God is trying to say to us. Anyone that wants to have communion with God must pay attention to Him, and approach Him, in those simple signs in which He is pleased to show himself, His power and glory. Even though it is just a bush, we must come to the treasure, though in an earthen vessel; a fire in a bush. Hebrews 11:6 is a great verse, “he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.” Those that seek God diligently shall find Him, and find Him to be a bountiful rewarder. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. God called him by name, Moses, Moses. What he heard may well have surprised him much more than what he saw. Divine calls are effectual when the Spirit of God makes them particular, and calls us by name. The word calls in general, Ho, every one! The Spirit, however, by the individual application of that, calls, Hey! You! I know your name and I am calling you. To this, Moses responded. “Here I am.” Here I am, not only to hear what is said, but to do what I am told.”

God gave him a needful caution against rashness and irreverence in his approach. He must keep his distance; he must draw near, but not irreverently or carelessly. Could we say it this way? His serious conscience must be satisfied, but not his trivial curiosity. In all our approaches to God, we ought to be deeply affected with the infinite distance there is between us and God. “Do not be hasty in word or impulsive in thought to bring up a matter in the presence of God. For God is in heaven and you are on the earth; therefore let your words be few” (Ecclesiastes 5:2). Moses lived in an earlier period which was a period of darkness, bondage, and terror, from which the gospel happily frees us, giving us boldness to enter into the holiest place and inviting us to draw near. Moses must express his reverence, and his readiness to obey: “Take off your sandals for the place where you are standing is holy ground” (8). Putting off the shoe was like taking a hat off to show respect for a lady. “The ground, for the present, is holy ground, made so by this special revelation of the divine presence, during this conversation it must retain this character; therefore tread not on that ground with soiled shoes.” We ought to approach God with a solemn pause and preparation; and, though bodily exercise alone profits little, yet we ought to glorify God with our bodies and to express our inward reverence by reverent behavior in the worship of God, carefully avoiding anything that looks light, rude or inappropriate in the awesome presence of God. Draw near. Yes. Draw reverently near.

God further dignified the moment by saying, “‘I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.” God lets him know that it is God who speaks to him, to engage his reverence and attention, his faith and obedience; for this is enough to command all these: I am the Lord. Many times God’s Word requires something then adds: I am the Lord.” Let us always hear the Word as the Word of God.  He will be known as the God of his father, Amram, Levi, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob for whom God was now about to appear. By this God intended to instruct Moses in the knowledge of another world, and to strengthen his belief of a future state. This is how it is interpreted by our Lord Jesus, the best expositor of Scripture. Jesus said in Luke 20:37 “But that the dead are raised, even Moses showed, in the passage about the burning bush, where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses understood that God was the God of the living. Moses, Jesus says, showed it at the bush, that is, God there showed it to him and through him to us.  Abraham was physically dead, and yet God is (present tense), not was (past tense) the God of Abraham; therefore Abraham’s soul lives, to which God stands as his God presently. To make his soul completely happy, his body must live again in due time. This promise made to the fathers, that God would be their God, includes a future happy existence. God never did anything for them in this world sufficient to answer to the vast extent of His great promise to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. But, having prepared for them a city, He is not ashamed to be called their God. God assures Moses of the fulfillment of all those particular promises made to the fathers. He may confidently expect this, for by these words it indicates that God remembered His covenant as stated in Exodus 2:24, “So God heard their groaning; and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.” God, the ultimate promise keeper, has a covenant-relation with us as our God. He is the best support in the worst of times and a great encouragement to our faith in particular promises. When we are conscious of our own unworthiness we may take comfort and strength from God’s relation to us as it was earlier with our fathers.

This made a solemn impression on Moses: He hid his face, as one both ashamed and afraid to look at God. Now that he knew it was a divine light, his eyes were dazzled with it; he was not afraid of a burning bush until he perceived that God was in it. Yes, though God called Himself the God of his father, and a God in covenant with him, yet he was afraid. The more we see of God the more cause we see to worship Him with reverence and godly fear. The revelations of God’s grace and covenant-love increase our humble reverence for Him.

Now that Moses had taken off his shoes, God enters upon the particular business that was now to be conducted, which was the bringing of Israel out of Egypt. Now, after forty more years of Israel’s bondage and Moses’s banishment, when we may suppose both he and they began to despair. They despaired of being delivered and he gave up the hope of delivering them. But, at length, the time has come. God often comes for the salvation of His people when they have given up looking for Him. When He comes will He find us still believing and waiting expectantly?

God notices the afflictions of Israel. “The Lord said, ‘I have surely seen the affliction of My people who are in Egypt, and have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their sufferings. . . .  Now, behold, the cry of the sons of Israel has come to Me; furthermore, I have seen the oppression with which the Egyptians are oppressing them’” (7 & 9). I have surely seen. I have strictly observed and considered the matter. Three things God observed recorded in verse 7: 1. Their sorrows, “. . . the misery of my people . . .” 2. Their cry, “I have heard them crying out. . .” and 3. The tyranny of their oppressors. “. . . concerned about their suffering.” It is likely they were not permitted to present their grievances to Pharaoh, nor to seek relief against their task-masters in any of his courts, but God observed their tears! As the poorest of the oppressed are not unknown to God, so the highest and greatest of their oppressors are not above his reprimand. He will surely visit both of them.

Next observe God promises to rescue and deliver them. Verse 8 says, “So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey,” This verse reveals His resolution to deliver them, and that His heart was set on it. When God does something very extraordinary He comes down. Oh, that You would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake at Your presence. This deliverance was typical of our redemption by Christ, in which the eternal Word did indeed come down from heaven to deliver us: it was His errand into the world. He promises also their happy settlement in the land of Canaan, that they would exchange bondage for liberty, poverty for plenty, labour for rest, and the precarious condition of owned tenants for the ease and honor of free lords and land-owners. Whom God by His grace delivers out of a spiritual Egypt He will also bring to a heavenly Canaan. The unchanged and unchangeable God who called Moses to serve as a rescuer and deliverer is now calling you to do the same.

God gives a commission to Moses. “Therefore, come now, and I will send you to Pharaoh, so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt” (10). He is not only sent as a prophet to Israel, to assure them that they would speedily be delivered, though just that would have been a great blessing, but he is sent as an ambassador to Pharaoh to deal with him. Or we could say he was a messenger from God, a military messenger, to demand the release of God’s people and state the consequences of refusal. Furthermore, he is also sent as a prince to Israel, to lead them to freedom and govern them. Both Moses and David were taken from leading sheep to leading God’s people. These two verses refer to David, but they are equally true of Moses. “He chose David [Moses] his servant and took him from the sheep pens; from tending the sheep he brought him to be the shepherd of his people Jacob, of Israel his inheritance” (Psalm 78:70 - 71). God is the fountain of power and the powers that be are ordained by Him and are used by Him as He pleases. The same hand that brought a shepherd out of a desert, to be the founder of the Jewish nation, afterwards brought fishermen from their ships to be the planters of the Christian church and now He calls you and me to lead God’s people heavenward in our generation.