When the God of all Being Calls YOU: Exodus 3:1-15, 4:10-17

One of my favorite statues of all times stands to your right when you enter the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. It is a statue of Jacobed, Moses' mother. She is a seated figure carved of smooth white stone, holding her infant son Moses. Her face if full love and full of grief, her story and the story of her infant son written all over it. If you have never seen here there, she alone is worth the trip.

Moses, is the primary figure in our passage today. Quite a lot has happened to bring Moses to this point. Pharaoh, was nervous because it seemed there was a lot of Hebrew people living in his land, so he enslaved them. But although they suffered in their slavery their population continued to grow and Pharaoh was afraid that there was the possibility that they would over run the place, so he decided to fix “Hebrew over population problem” by having all their boy babies murdered at birth. It is Jacobed, Moses' mother who saves her baby boy by putting him in a basket and floating him down river, were he is found by Pharaoh's daughter who took pity on the infant and decided to raise him as her own.

So, Moses, is raised in the household of the very Pharaoh who was seeking to have him and his kindred killed. As he grew, he became aware of the hardships of his people and when he came to the defense of a fellow Israelite who was being abused by a slave master, he killed the Egyptian in his zeal. He fled the land of Egypt and ran all the way to Moab (which is just on the other side of the Jordan from the land God had promised to his forefathers). There he marries, Zipporah, the daughter of a priest (whom we can only assume is what would at this time be called a “god-fearer,” one who followed the God of Abraham). And he settles down, starts a family, and watches after the flocks of his father-in-law.

He is doing just that, watching the sheep, when our passage catches up to him today. He is alone watching sheep and sees a bush catch fire. “Now that’s odd,” he thinks and goes back to counting sheep, “231, 232, 233, (yawn) 234, 235, (head nod), Wait, is that bush burning? It’s on fire, but it’s not burning.” “Count sheep? Check this out? Count Sheep? Check this out.”

So he goes over to look at this bush that refuses to burn, while still burning. And then the bush does something entirely unexpected, (as if burning, not burning was not unexpected enough) it speaks to him. Well, more precisely, God speaks to him from out of the center of the bush.

Now, I want you to hear me, God calls to him from out of the bush. I am not sure what to do with this. The God of the universe, the God who put the stars into place, who created all that lives and breathes and swims in the sea, is in this bush. The burning, not burning bush, is somehow containing the inexhaustible, uncontainable God of the universe. If I ever doubted that God could and does choose to use anyone (or anything) to accomplish whatever it is God needs done, there is my ‘proof’ right there. God uses a bush. But I digress.

God speaks to Moses out of this bush. In fact, God and Moses have a little conversation about the people of Israel. God has come down because God cannot stand by and allow God’s people to suffer as they do. God will rescue them, God will not allow them to be oppressed. God is going to do something. God is going to send Moses to them.

Moses is not immediately keen on this idea and does not believe the people will trust him. And they have a really good reason not to, because you know after all he was raised as an Egyptian, as the grandson of the Pharaoh, it would be kind of hard for them to immediately see where his loyalties lie. Not to mention he killed a guy. Sure it was an Egyptian, and he was doing it in defense of an abused Hebrew, but he still, just up and killed a guy. Between his family ties and his past actions, his character is a little less than trust worthy. He is not so sure this is a good idea. So, as a way to “distract” God from this silly idea of choosing him to rescue the people, and perhaps get God off track he asks God for a name.

Now names are interesting. As parents we get to actually take on the task of “naming” our children. It is one of the many things parents do as they prepare for a new baby. Well, let’s face it, many of us thought about what we would name our children long before our children were even a possibility. Mike and I, who were not planning on having any children when we were dating, discussed what names we liked, if we did indeed have children. In fact we picked out Cidra’s name during one such conversation.

What makes a good name? The sound of it? Does it need to have meaning you like? Does it have sentimental value? Does it have a connection to family? Is a character in a novel you like? What makes a good name?

We all kind of take names for granted, we all have one, after all. But God did not have one. Not at this point, not that we know of. If Abraham or Isaac, Jacob or Joseph knew it, none of them ever passed it on. Moses did not know God’s name, the scriptures do not tell us, or at least prior to this point it is not revealed.

What is really interesting about Moses asking God for a name, is that’s not the way is usually worked. Usually the people named their own gods. The gods’ of Egypt were named and formed by the people who worshiped them. Just as you or I might name a newborn child.

The Egyptian God, Rah's name was not given to his people, but the people gave it to Rah. The great god Rah was the Sun and the god of the Sun was named Rah, by the Egyptian people. The people understood the power of the Sun. The power the Sun had for good, to bring light and life and the power it had to do evil, to scorch and burn, to turn a fertile land into a desert. They knew the power of Rah in that they knew the power of the Sun.

Who is this God who has gone unnamed? How is Moses to understand this God? What power does this God have? How can God make promises to save the Hebrew people, if they do not know or understand who this God is? What does God do? What is God’s name? It is in God’s name that they could begin to know and understand what kind of power God might have? Is rescuing them from their Egyptian oppressors even within God’s power? If Moses was being honest these were the questions that were truly at the heart of all this is, “Can I trust you?” “Can you actually do what you say you will do?”

So what is God’s name? We translate it here, “I am who I am.” Or “I will be who I will be.” Or, “I am who I am being.” Or even, “I am being who I am.”

Translation is such a funny thing. It gives the impression of a thing, a close proximity. Translation in itself is almost like rewriting a metaphor so that people in a different place and culture can understand it, but things are so very often lost in translation, especially when something is hard to translate or has no clear equivalent. And the four Hebrew letters that make up God’s name: “Yhod-heh, vav, heh,” are not very easy to bring over to English.

So let me be very clear the word here is not just a word. It is not like God’s name is something easy like “Sun,” or “the Creator.” The word here for God’s name is not really a “thing,” nor is it a descriptive phrase. God's name is a cognate, a form, of the verb “To be.” But there is not good or precise way to translate what it means in its entirety.

The word is a verb, but it has no tense, it is a non-declined verb. It is verb-like, but it does not have all the pieces parts that give a clear and distinct meaning. When cleaned up and polished it can be brought into English, “I am who I am.” Or less clean, “I be, who I be,” but at the same time it has a future cast, since it is not in a tense per-se, it is in the present tense and the future tense at the same time and also is in the past. “I will be, who I will be” “I have been who I have been.” But it is more about God “being”; “I am being, who I am being.” “I am who I am being.” “I will become who I am.” “I am who I become.” “I am being who I am.” It gives the idea that God is the “becoming God.” That God is “being.” All being, what it means ‘to be”, what it means to “become,” is found in God. God is the God through whom all things find being, in whom all being is found. God is the ONE in whom all, everything IS. God is the IS in all things. We “are” because all that makes us able “to be”, “to become,” “to do” is found in God.

God does not simply have a name like Bob, because Bob-ness would be limited to name who God actually is, because God IS. The name God gives to Moses is not a name it is not a noun it is kind of verb (because God is the action that God does), but not a verb that can be nailed down to yesterday, today or tomorrow. It has no tense because who God is, is not found within the confines of time.

This is fantastic. Moses wants to know God’s name because he needs assurance that God can be trusted. He needs to be able to tell the people that God is capable of doing what God says God will do. Is God powerful enough to fight Pharaoh, all the god’s of Egypt, and the great god Rah for God’s people? Is God mighty? Is God powerful? Can God truly rescue them? So he asks, Who are you? What is your name?

And God says, “I am who I am.” I am the God who is, who was and will be. I am the God who IS BEING itself. Anything that IS finds its BEING in me. I AM! Um yeah, I think the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob, can take on Egypt and her host of puny limited gods who find their power in the things to which this God gives being.

At this point it should be fair enough to say to Moses, “Yes, Moses this God to whom you speak, the God of your fore-fathers, of Abraham, of Isaac and of Jacob, the God whose name is Being itself, can handle rescuing a population of people from their oppressors. They can trust God and you can trust God.

But Moses is not fully convinced that HE is the one God really wants. Moses was uncertain about this God who seemed to have forgotten about them for a little while, this God he had perhaps forgotten about for a while. But this God is not merely the God of the sun or the Moon, this God is the God of all being and that is pretty amazing, but then this God of all being tells him, Moses, the baby in the basket, the adopted grandson of Pharaoh, the killer, the runner, the sheepherder that he, Moses, has been chosen to lead his people to freedom.

Perhaps he has no reason to not follow this God of his ancestors from here on out, but what he can not do is go talk to grandfather (who is pretty upset with him and probably wants him dead), and all the the Hebrew people living in the land of Egypt. Nope, he can not do that. No way no how. They won't believe him, they won't follow him, and besides he can't talk very well. God has heard that through the course of this conversation. “You have heard me as I have spoken to you!” Moses says to God.

So what does God do? God gives Moses, God's own name, so the people will believe him. God gives Moses signs to show the people, so they will follow him (and to give him some authority with ole Pharaoh) and finally God tells him that he did not need to worry about his inability to speak, if he is worried that he can't do this, God will allow Moses to use Aaron, his brothe, to help him speak to the people and to Pharaoh.

Moses is full of excuses as to why he can not follow God, as to why he can not do what it is God has called him to do and God is full of answers. No matter what Moses throws at God, God has an answer. God has called Moses and there is not amount of excuses real or imagine which God will not over come to allow Moses to do what it is God is calling Moses to do.

So there we have it,God give's Moses God's own name. We have God’s name, “I am.” God is not merely the God of all things, God is the God in whom all things find being, God is being, the ONE whose very essence it being itself.” “The Being God, the ISing God, the Becoming God”

“Yhod, heh, vav, heh;” We often bring it into English as Yahweh. But we don’t hear it very often. In fact other than right here, our English Bibles seem to not ever mention it again. But in Hebrew it is all over the place. It is used throughout most of the Old Testament books. But it is not there in English. That is because from very early on the Hebrew people decided the name of God was sacred and they avoided saying it. They would write it, it is there in the scriptures, but whenever they read the name of God they would instead say the word “Adonai”, which means “Lord”. And out of this long standing tradition of not actually “saying” the name of God, we translate it, “Lord”. And to distinguish it from when the original word is actually “Lord,” often times it is there in all capital lets, “L-O-R-D”

But when the early Hebrews read their scripture the name of God was there, they knew it was there, a constant reminder of exactly who God is, of exactly who they were worshiping. They could see it there, they knew it was there, always before them. They had no excuse to ever forget. We on the other hand, because of the way our bibles bring the word into English, do not have this constant reminder. Sometime it is harder for us to remember. Sometimes we forget.

We like Moses during the course of our lives find ourselves in situations, going through periods, where we might begin to wonder. “Can I trust God in this? Can I trust God with this?” We may even be brave enough when we are honest with ourselves, to ask, “Can God really handle this?” And we need to remember, we need to remember exactly who we worship. We do not worship a God who can create all things. We do not worship a God who can command all things. We worship the God who IS the is in all things, the being-ness behind the actual being of all things. We worship the God in whom we all find our being. No matter how frightening, no matter how disconcerting, no matter how all consuming, the situations in our lives are, God it bigger. Our God can be trusted to be able to handle our situations and the concerns in our lives.

But even when we have come to trust God, we still have excuses, both real and imagined. We are uncertian we can do the things God is calling us to do. We are uncertain we can be the people God is calling us to be. We are unsure we can live up to what it means to be a Christian living wholly given over to God. We feel as if we could never be the kind of people who can talk to our friends or neighbors about this Jesus we love so much. WE feel like no one we know really wants to hear about our God and how absolutely amazing God is. We are unsure if, we can be the kind of person who can live the love of God in all the places we go. We are uncertain if we can respond with loving kindness in the face of disparities that we face in our day to day lives. We are uncertain we are the ones who really should be standing up for the oppressed in our world or if we are the right people to speak truth to power in this world where those in power are daily perpetrating and allowing injustice to run rampant all around us. We feel we are too small, to insignificant to make any real changes in this world. But when God calls us to do these things. We are able, God will give us any of the tools we need and will even bring people to come alongside of us, as Aaron did for Moses to bring strength to the places we are weak. We may have excuses as to why we can not be the people God is calling us to be, but our God, the God of all being is bigger than our excuses. God will enable us and empower us to do anything God is calling us to do.