God's Nature Made Evident Through Us

The Rev. Sara Warfield

Scripture: Exodus 3:1-15

“I am who I am.” That’s the name God gave to Moses when Moses asked, “What do I tell the Israelites when they ask who sent me?” The original Hebrew is Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh, which literally translates to “I will be what I will be.” Another translation is, “I am what I am becoming.” Another interpretation that I like is, “My nature will become evident from my actions.”

Imagine if, when someone introduces you, they do not say your name but give a list of your ten most recent interactions with other people. The smile you gave someone when you walked into the church. The way you responded to another driver on your way here. The last words you said to your family member this morning.

Now imagine that whatever you do in the next five years would define how you are known forever. Not just how you present yourself on Facebook or Instagram. Not just what’s on your resume or what you tell people about yourself at work or church. But also everything you do when no one is looking. The way you talk about your coworker or neighbor in the privacy of your own home. What comments you post anonymously on the internet. What you spend your money on.

My nature will become evident from my actions. This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.

God does not want to be named. God would rather let God’s actions speak for themselves. So God’s name is actually a verb. God will be known only through what God does.

And what God will do in this Exodus story, God will do through Moses. Because that’s how God works: through the actions of God’s people.

I should back up. The Israelites in this story were in a very terrible situation.

Though they made up a big part of the population, they were slaves in Egypt, and “the Egyptians became ruthless in imposing tasks upon them, and made their lives bitter with hard service in mortar and brick and in every kind of field labour,” we’re told in Exodus 1. Pharoah enacted cruel policies over them: that workers be beaten if they didn’t keep up, that their male children be thrown into the Nile, that those who tried to stand up for themselves be killed.

I imagine the Israelites felt stuck. Egypt was one of the most reliably fertile and abundant lands in the region. People immigrated there to avoid the famine that they suffered in their original lands. That’s what scholars think brought the Semitic people there in the first place. Though they lived under harsh conditions, the food would not run out. They may not live joyfully, but at least they would live.

I know a lot of us are not living so joyful ourselves lately. I know a lot of us feel like we’re living through a pretty terrible situation. Our institutions are being demolished. Corruption is now happening openly and seemingly gleefully at the highest levels of government. And most frightening of all, the federal systems that so many of us depend on—Social Security, Medicaid, VA benefits—feel like they could be stripped away at any moment.

I can’t speak for each of you, but this country of mine no longer feels like home. I feel stuck, not sure how to change the situation, how to make things better. And I find myself crying out most nights during my prayers, “God, where are you?”

Which brings us back to Exodus.

Then the Lord said, “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians.”

Here, God is speaking to Moses on Horeb, or Mt. Sinai, and I’m sure at this point in the conversation Moses is like, “This sounds awesome. I can’t wait to see how you set our people free.” And then God says to him, “So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt.” At which point, Moses is like, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute. I’m sorry. Did you say you’re going to send me to Pharaoh? I’m not sure I’m the person for that.”

You see, at the beginning of this passage, Moses is a simple shepherd in Midian. And he is pretty far afield with his flock when he notices a bush on fire but not being consumed by the fire. I imagine his first instinct is to mind his own business, keep his attention on his flock, but there’s something about that bush that calls to him. So he turns aside from his path and, in his willingness to be turned aside, encounters God.

I think that is the first way Moses shows his faith in God, and that’s also when God knows that God’s purposes, God’s very name, can be accomplished through Moses: his willingness to be pulled off the usual path when he notices something is off, is strange. When he honors that intuition that says, “No, slow down. Be curious. Go check it out.”

We’ve all had those intuitions from time to time. That unhoused person you usually walk past but something tells you to stop this time. That person on the plane who starts chatting you up when all you want to do is put your headphones on, and something tells you to hear them out. Yet another post in your feed about taking action that you’re about to scroll past, and something tells you to click on it.

I wonder how many times God has thrown a burning bush in your path that caught our attention but you had other things to do, other places to be.

Fortunately, Moses does stop and was probably glad he did until God says, “I’m sending you.”

“But I’m just a shepherd,” Moses basically says.

“That’s perfect!” God seems to respond. “I need a shepherd. Someone with your particular gifts to guide sheep to nourishment and safety. I just need you to do it with people instead of sheep.” And then God says, crucially, “I will be with you.” It takes a bit more convincing, but Moses nervously and with not a little trepidation goes to the Pharaoh, trusting God is with him. You know the rest of the story: the escape of the Israelites, the parting of the Red Sea, the wilderness, and—though it took 40 years—a land to call home.

God doesn’t call Moses beyond his gifts, God calls him INTO his gifts. But then God doesn’t send Moses on his mission by himself. God tells him, “I will be with you. Not only have I already created you with everything you need for this task, I’m also going to be right here to support you the whole way.”

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What a powerful story for this moment. Moses being willing to be turned aside from his usual path. God telling him that his gifts are essential for this moment and also reassuring Moses that God will be with him.

And then God telling him to tell the Israelites that “I am who I am” sent him. God’s nature, God’s very name, made evident through the actions of Moses.

Because God’s nature, God’s very name, is made evident through the action of God’s people. Y’all, that’s us! That’s you.

Will you let yourself be turned aside from your usual path? When you see injustice, when you see your neighbor suffering, when you read a headline and think, “someone needs to do something about this!”, will you slow down and realize that it is you who is needed, beckoned by that burning bush?

And when you see that injustice, when you see that suffering, will you let yourself know and believe that God has already given you whatever gifts you need for this moment? If you are an artist, to make art that brings people into God’s radical and sometimes challenging love. If you have a lot of extra money, to give where it will build up the Body of Christ. If you are a preacher, to preach that love looks like giving AND flipping over tables. If you are a musician, to make music that Jesus would dance to. If you code, to code for the gospel.

Whether you quilt or bake or garden or write or work with wood or numbers or people, you have the gifts to confront injustice and suffering.

And God is going to supercharge that gift, the way God supercharges Moses’ gifts for shepherding. It may not be in the way you expect, but if you allow yourself to be turned aside, if you believe that you’ve already been joyfully and maybe cluelessly honing the gifts this world needs, the gifts God gave you, if you are able to step into those gifts in this pretty terrible situation and trust that God is with you, well…I don’t think Moses could have even imagined that it would be his shepherd’s staff that would help him guide the Israelites out of Egypt.

God was with Moses, and God is with you. And, like Moses, I don’t think you can even imagine how much you’re capable of blessing this world. Amen.