If this is true...

Notes from the Pastor...

It is fascinating that you can look at the life of Moses and say that the burning bush story is not all that strange.  In case you haven’t read Old Testament narrative lately, I think those who follow Harry Potter or the Twilight series would find Exodus and Numbers equally entertaining.  There are supernatural plagues, the peaceful passing of a waterway with the pursuing army drowned, the healing of those who look on a serpent lifted on a stick, and miraculous feeding of a nation on food that appears from the sky.  Like I said, it is fascinating that Moses’ burning bush story is not all that strange.  In fact, if all things are relative, then Moses at the burning bush could be compared to you in your home in an intense moment of prayer.

Maybe if we humanized Moses, saw him as our mirrored image, then we would find immense value in the stories of Exodus and Numbers.  The burning bush then would become a potential narrative in any of our lives…
A discrete sheep rancher finds in nature a beautiful happening.  She notices something that others may simply pass by, and she walks toward it only to sense its inherent holiness.  In a moment of mental clarity, she removes her boots and kneels, and without expectation the beautiful happening momentarily reveals God.

Yes, that moment is possible.  Yes, that happening takes place in peoples lives; regardless of profession – somehow, someway the holy intersects the human.  Church Father Gregory of Nyssa, when commenting on Moses at the burning bush, tells his listeners that Moses’ posture, along with Divine revelation, are possible if “we are established in this peaceable, non-combative condition; [then] the truth will shine upon us, bringing light to the eyes of the soul with its own rays.”

If this is true, and I think it is, then what will be the result?  Will you, like Moses, arise from the momentary intersection of the human and the holy, and go out to your family, to your neighbors, to your community and participate in changing the world?

Grace,
Pastor Ryan