Well, good morning. It is indeed good for me to be back with you today. The sermon text is in Exodus chapter three. If you want to turn there with me, it's on page 46 in your pew Bible. And if you're somebody who likes to know the titles for things, the title for the sermon this morning is Living God, Living Fire. Living God, Living Fire. And I'll actually begin in my reading from the last few verses of chapter two of the book of Exodus and going down to chapter three, verse 12. So Exodus chapter two, verse 23 to chapter three, verse 12. Hear now the word of our God. During those many days, the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God, and God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel, and God knew. Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian. And he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, I will turn aside to see this great site, why the bush is not burned. When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, Moses, Moses. And he said, here I am. Then he said, do not come near. Take off your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground. And he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings. And I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey to the place of the Canaanites the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppressed them. Come, and I will send you to Pharaoh, that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh? and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt. He said, but I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you that I have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Let us pray. We come before you as the living Holy One. You are great and greatly to be praised, and we give you thanks for your life-giving word and spirit. We ask that you would work deep within our hearts to open us up to the truth of your word, to help us to see you more clearly, to see Jesus, our great King and Savior, that this word would take deep root within our hearts, and bear fruit in our lives to your glory, we pray. Amen. Well, you know, to me, one of the great difficulties of being people of faith in our present circumstances is the question, how do we deal with the silence of God? How do we deal with the silence of God amidst all of the suffering that we see around us in the world and indeed even in our own lives? How do we deal with crying out to God day and night? And it just seems like he's being so long to give an answer. And really, this is not unique to us. I mean, I think the Bible makes it very clear in many, many places That this is just part of what it means to live by faith in the world, doesn't it? The Psalms, the question over and over again you hear in many, many Psalms, how long, O Lord? How long is this situation going to continue? How long will you be silent? How long must I continue to cry out to you day and night and not receive any answers? How do we deal with this? as we sojourn in this world. And what I want you to see this morning is that this is actually a situation that the passage we just read speaks directly to. Because you see, in the context of Scripture, in the storyline of the Bible, it has been around 400 years, when we pick up in Exodus chapter 3, around 400 years since the last time that God has said anything to anybody. The last time God spoke in Scripture before Exodus chapter 3 is in chapter 46 when he was speaking to Jacob at the time when he originally called the people of Israel to go down into Egypt. And he said this in Genesis chapter 46 verses 2 through 4, he said, Jacob, Jacob, And Jacob replied, here I am. And indeed, we hear an echo of that when God appears to Moses in the fire from the bush and says, Moses, Moses. And Moses replies, here I am. So Exodus 46, Jacob, Jacob. And Jacob replied, here I am. And God said, don't be afraid to go down to Egypt, for there I will make you a great nation. I myself will go with you, and I will also bring you up again. 400 years, right, from that Jacob-Jacob to Exodus chapter 3, Moses-Moses, and here's the thing. What's been happening in the meantime? In the meantime, in the centuries in between those two statements of the Lord, those two callings of the Lord to these two men, has been an endless onslaught of suffering, and slavery and genocide. How do you deal with that? How do you deal with that? And you see, even with all of this, here's a clue as to how we deal with that. As God appears to Moses on Mount Sinai, what is the first thing that he wants Moses to know? It is this, I am the God of your father. I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. In other words, Moses, through all of these years of sin and suffering and slavery and genocide, I am who I have always been. And I always will be who I always am, right? I am the I am, which is what God is going to reveal to Moses in just a little bit after. the passage that we, the part that we just read. I am, right, no matter what happens in this world, it does not affect one bit who God always is. He is the living God. He is the holy one. He is the one who does not change. He does not go up and down with the shifting sands of this present age. And God wants us to know that even though it seems to you that I have been silent, I have not been aloof to the suffering of my people. I have seen, he says, I have heard, I know, and I have come down to save them. And so this is what Moses needed to know then, and indeed, this is what we need to know now, is it not? And it's what we need to know every single day of our lives, that our God is the living God, and he has all power, and he always is who he always has been, and he always will be who he always is. What I want to do in the time we have this morning is to consider from this passage what it means for us, three things, about what it means for us that the Lord is the living God. First, God has life in himself. Second, he has life for you. Third, he is life for the mission. He is life in himself, he is life for you, and he is life for the mission. First, God is life in himself. And because he is life in himself, nothing that happens in this world or in your life can change at all who God always is. Recall, once again, at this point, the people of Israel have been ruthlessly enslaved and oppressed in Egypt for many, many, many years. Chapters 1 and 2 recount the story of suffering and affliction that the people of Israel went through year after year, generation after generation. They have been toiling under both the bondage of slavery and more recently the horrors of genocide. as we read in chapter 2 about how the Pharaoh had told the people of Egypt, any Hebrew male child that you see born, you're to take him and do what? Throw him into the Nile River. Horrific! Imagine living in that context, right? Every child, every male child that is born in danger of being thrown into the Nile River and But you see, the thing is, it was through that, it was in that very context that the Lord saved Moses, right? And brought him to the house of Pharaoh as he was found by the daughter-in-law of Pharaoh. And so even in the midst of that seeming silence, God was still working out his purposes in secret, was he not? And so Moses grows up in the house of Pharaoh. Over time, he chooses to identify with his oppressed, afflicted people, the people of Israel. And eventually, he winds up killing an Egyptian to save a Hebrew. And he winds up fleeing for his life and goes to the land of Midian, which is southeast of Egypt. And there in Midian, Moses gets married. He starts a family. And now, as chapter 3 picks up, it is 40 years later. He is still living in Midian. a sojourner in a foreign land, right? And you have to think here about both the people of Israel and about Moses, right? Year after year, no doubt. They're crying out to the Lord. They're crying out to God. Lord, save us, deliver us. What is going on? And wondering if God is paying attention or hearing any of it right for the people of Israel. Lord, your people are enslaved. Lord, our children are being horrifically and brutally murdered. Why are you not acting? Lord, for Moses. Lord, I have been living in the land of Midian for 40 years with these smelly, stinky sheep doing something I never would have seen myself doing, right? Why are you not acting to do something about this? In our day, many of us, no doubt, find ourselves saying Perhaps all of us find ourselves saying things very similar, don't we, as we suffer and we sorrow and we look out and we see ever increasing darkness all around us. And even if, like this week, many of us had an answer to our prayers with the decision of the Supreme Court, it's still very dark out there, is it not? There's still so much suffering, so much darkness, so much death and violence and hatred and our children are being killed, our government is a mess, hatred and violence everywhere, and there seems to be really no end in sight. Lord, when are you going to put a stop to all of this nonsense, right? And so as chapter 3 of Exodus picks up, we find Moses out there in the wilderness of Midian, And as all of these things are going on, and what is he doing? He is keeping the flock of his father-in-law. In other words, he's just going about his daily work. This is the same thing that Moses has been doing, presumably, every day of his life for the past 40 years, keeping the flock of his father-in-law. I mean, consider, how many times has Moses done this very thing before? This is how Moses has been spending the past few decades of his life, just getting up, going out to the sheep, hearing all the wonderful sheep sounds, smelling all the wonderful sheep smells and the sweltering Middle Eastern sun day after day after day. And it cannot be lost on us, beloved, that it is precisely here that the Lord meets him. It is precisely as Moses is just going about faithfully doing the work that the Lord had entrusted to him that the Lord comes to him. And I think there's a lesson for us in this, isn't there? This life can be so mundane and monotonous that it winds up lulling you to sleep, doesn't it? You start wondering, what's the point of it all? Is there any point to these things that I keep doing every day of my life? Is there any meaning? Is there any value? Is there any purpose to any of it? You just start going through the motions. You start off every day the same way. Start the coffee pot, drink a cup of coffee, or if you're like me, three cups of coffee. And same breakfast every day, same work, same thing, same routine, and you just wonder. Is there any point? Is there any point? But we need to see, right? And I think this is the lesson of Moses here in Exodus 3. When you are walking with the living God, when God is with you, There is life and there is meaning, even in those seemingly mundane and pointless, meaningless details of your life, right? And for Moses, the place that all these things were leading was to this encounter with God on the mountain in chapter three. But you see, even in the days and the months and the years leading up to this point, what we need to see is notice What has Moses been doing? He has been leading the flock of his father and father-in-law. And there is going to come a day where Moses will be called. How long? For 40 years to lead the flock of the Lord. Psalm 77 The very last verse of Psalm 77 even uses the language of Moses being a shepherd. It says, the Lord shepherded the people of Israel by the hand of Moses, right? So Moses, calling from the Lord, is going to be to shepherd the Lord's flock in the wilderness, and he's going to bring them to this very same mountain. And so all of that time that Moses might have been tricked into thinking, fooled into thinking, that were pointless, that were meaningless, they were all being used by the Lord as preparation for what the Lord was going to have him do. Every detail. You see, there was not one single detail of this man's life that was not superintended, sovereignly superintended, and lovingly guided by the hand of the living God. And it says in verses two and three, There came this day, right, where the angel of the Lord appeared in the form of a fire out of the midst of a bush, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses says, hey, I'm going to go check this thing out. Good idea. So Moses turns aside to see. Now, the fire and the bush. The fire and the bush. There is a lesson for us in this fire that I think we can easily miss if we're not paying careful attention. And what is that lesson? That lesson is that God is life in himself. What do I mean? Don't miss this. The thing that really grabs Moses' attention, notice, is what? It is not the fire itself, is it? What is it? It is that the fire is in a bush, but the bush is not consumed. Why is that amazing? Well, because ordinarily, normal earthly fire, it consumes the thing that it is joined to and depends upon that thing for its existence, right? And once that thing that the fire is joined to is burned up, what happens? The fire dies. Why? Because the fire does not have life in itself. It is not independent of the thing that it's joined to. It is not so with God, right? This fire is a revelation of who God is. That is, that he is not dependent upon anything in this world for his existence. Just like this fire, he is entirely independent of the things of this world. He does not need this world, and yet he chose to create this world. He exists apart from this world, and yet he is active in this world. And that is what this bush is speaking, this fire. Fire is speaking to us. This is a living fire unlike any created fire a fire that has life in itself entirely independent of anything outside of itself for its existence and God is the God who is the living God entirely and sufficient in himself, not dependent for anything outside of himself for his existence. He is both imminent and transcendent, far above us, yet so very close. And you see, what that means, beloved, is this. World without end, God is who he always is. World without end, no matter how cold it gets, No matter how dark it gets, no matter how violently the winds of this world might blow, the fire and the light does not and will not go out. Amen? And that's the truth that's taught to us in John chapter 1, is it not? The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not and cannot overcome it. That is the hope for us that is in our God. And so, verses 4 and 5, after seeing that amazing fire, we hear something thrilling. After 400 years of silence, this God finally speaks. And this is what he says. He says, Moses, Moses, and Moses said, here I am. Then he said, don't come near, take off your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground. This is ground that has been claimed by this living God, which brings us then to the second point, that is that God is life for us. In other words, it is in the nature of this God to overflow in the life that he has in himself toward his people. in love and in grace. Verse 6, the Lord identifies himself to Moses as the covenant-keeping God of promise, right? I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. Moses hides his face in fear. It is an appropriate response, but the Lord reassures Moses that the purpose of this encounter is for good. It is not to destroy Moses. It is for salvation, verses 7 and 8. Then the Lord said, and this is really to me one of the most beautiful verses in all of scripture. Then the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, I have seen, I have heard, I know, and I have come down. This is what God is in the business of doing, seeing, hearing, knowing, and coming. No matter how much it seems to us like he is not there, no matter how much it may seem like he is silent, he is not. You see, beloved, what comfort is there for you in your life today with whatever you're going through in your life? to know that your Lord is the living God who has all life in himself. It is this, that God is not dependent on anything so that you can always depend on him. God is not dependent on anything so that you can always depend on him. And because of that, his ears are always open, his eyes are always open, and he never stops protecting and guiding and caring. You can think of it like this. I have three children. And a couple of them are sitting over there right now. And I love my children deeply, deeply. I'd do anything for my kids, right? Anything within my power to guide them, to protect them, to lead them, to care for them. But you see, that is the very thing, is it not? Within my power. My power is very limited. Right? No matter how much I love my children, no matter how much I always want to be present with them, there comes a time in each and every day where I need, because I am dependent upon things outside of myself, both for my own continued existence and for theirs, I need to take my eyes off of my kids. and put them on other things. I gotta go to work, I gotta make money, I gotta put them to bed even after I come home. They gotta go to bed, I gotta go to my own room, and hopefully not see them again until the next morning, right? But you see, beloved, it is not so with your God. His eyes are always open. His ears are always open. He always sees. There does not come a point in any day where God needs to go attend to other affairs. He is always present for you. He is always hearing you, always seeing. He is not dependent upon anything outside of himself so that you and I can always depend upon him. Psalm 121 says it this way. Right, that beautiful psalm that starts off, I lift my eyes to the hills, from whom does my help come? And at one point it says this, he who keeps you will not slumber. He doesn't have to go to bed. He who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep. That's good news. That's very good news. And so Exodus 3 verse 7, the living God assures Moses, I have surely, Moses, I have surely, no matter what it might have been seeming like to you or anybody else, I have surely seen their affliction, I have heard their cries, I know their suffering, and I have come down to deliver them. Psalm 135. talks about the idols of the nations, right? The gods that we like to make for ourselves, right? And one of the things that it says about the idols of the nations is that they have eyes, but they do not see. They have ears, but they do not hear. They have mouths, but they do not speak. They have feet, but they cannot walk, right? That is the character of our gods, our false gods, right? They are dead. And they have mouths, but they do not speak. Moses here, notice what's going on. Moses has seen no mouth, but his God has spoken. They have eyes, but they do not see. Moses here has seen no eyes, but his God has been looking and seeing. They have ears, but do not hear. Moses has seen no ears, but his God has heard. They have hands, but they do not act. Moses has seen no hands, but his God has come down to do what? To save his people with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Amen? You see, the gods that we want to worship, the gods that we make for ourselves, they have no life and they can give no life. And the gods, the dead gods of dead men leave us where? Leave us dead. Which is why Psalm 135 also says that those who make them will become like them. And so do all who trust in them. But the living God, our God, the true God, is the God who gives life to the dead. Which is why Jesus, our Lord Jesus Christ, when he speaks about this thing that we call the resurrection of the dead, What's the passage that is of central importance for Jesus when he talks about the resurrection? It's actually Exodus chapter 3, isn't it? Which is amazing to me, because reading this passage on the surface, you wouldn't think that this is about the resurrection, right? But this is what Jesus says one place in Luke chapter 20, verse 37. He says this, that the dead are raised, even Moses showed. In the passage about the bush where he calls the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob, he is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him. All of your loved ones who have died in the Lord, those whom you know and you love, like most recently I know one of your beloved elders, Royce, He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for all live to him. This is our hope. The living God overflows in his life to us. And think about Jesus, right? So that you and I, might know the depth of this God's love and of his life, what has he done? He has taken on our eyes and our ears, and he has spoken with human voice in the incarnation of our Lord Jesus Christ. John chapter one, the word became flesh and dwelt among us, and from his fullness we have all received grace upon grace upon grace, because the law came through Moses, but grace and truth comes through our Lord Jesus Christ, the overflow of his life to us through the Lord Jesus. For, just as he did in the Exodus, In Jesus, the living God has come down. And he has come down to bring us up, but in a way far more meaningful and far more wonderful than any of us could have ever imagined. He descended into our world and into our very flesh and even into the depths of the grave itself in order to bring us up into the highest heaven. It says that though we were dead in our trespasses and sins, Ephesians chapter 2, though we were dead in our trespasses and sins, God has made us alive together with Christ and seated us with Christ in the heavenly places. And in the same way, you see, that this uncreated fire was united to this earthly bush without consuming it, so when He became man, the living word, the divine nature of the second person of the Holy Trinity became united to our earthly human nature without consuming it. That's the gospel, and more than that, as if that were not enough, wonder of wonders, he now unites you and me to himself without consuming us by the living reality of the Holy Spirit. Why? Because in Jesus, the living God, the living God came to die as a man in order to give life to men who are otherwise dead. And so it's no mere coincidence, right? Remember, we're in the season of Pentecost right now. Remember on that first Pentecost Sunday, Acts chapter 2, what was the form that the Holy Spirit took when he came upon the apostles? flaming tongues of fire out of nowhere, living fire, not dependent upon anything outside of itself for its existence. Just like the fire in this bush in Exodus chapter three, fire in flaming tongues of fire coming down and resting upon the apostles without consuming them, but rather blessing them with power to speak this message, that God has come down in the person of Jesus Christ to save us from bondage to sin and death. Which brings us then to the last point, the third point, and I promise you I will be brief on this third point. God is life for the mission. What mission is that? It is the same mission that he gave to the apostles in Acts chapter 2 on that first Pentecost Sunday to go and proclaim this gospel, this message of freedom that our God has come to save his people from their sins in Jesus Christ. It is the mission to spread this message to all whom we can. And so at this point in the encounter, think about back again to Exodus chapter three. At this point in the encounter with God, after the Lord says, I've come down to save my people, you have to think, Moses is just like overjoyed at the good news, right? Great, awesome, God has come. He's gonna do something about all of this mess, about all of this suffering. So I can't wait to sit back and see how all of this is gonna play out. Maybe I'll just Netflix and chill and wait for it all to take place. God very quickly adds something else to his message, doesn't he? Verse 10, he says this, Moses, come, I will send you to Pharaoh. that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt." And what is Moses' response? Moses is like, wait, what? Who, me? Lord, surely you have the wrong person here. Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt? And you know, if you read on through the rest of chapter three and chapter four, Moses just kind of comes up with excuse after excuse after excuse until finally he winds up saying straight out, Lord, please just send somebody else. Please just send somebody else. And that's very much the way that we often think, isn't it? Who am I? What can I do? Just little old me. What am I gonna do to change anything, to do anything? But the Lord, note this, he adds a promise, another promise to Moses along with this calling, doesn't he? And this is the promise, Moses, verse 12, but I will be with you. But I will be with you. Interesting, note well, God does not tell Moses, hey Moses, you gotta just have a better opinion of yourself, right? Think more highly of yourself, it's not that bad, right? Don't you know that you could do anything that you wanna do, you can be anything you wanna be if you just put your mind to it because you're good enough, you're smart enough, and doggone it, people like you. That is not what God says to Moses, right? Why not? Because what Moses needs, you see, in order to do this thing that the Lord was calling him to do, was not more self-confidence, but more God-confidence, right? He did not need more self-confidence, he needed more God-confidence. Because the truth is, without God being with him, Moses is absolutely right. He could do nothing. He had no hope to accomplish anything in the presence of Pharaoh. He would be as good as dead, which is why he fled to Midian in the first place. But as God is with him, God wants Moses to know, no, I am the one who's going to do it. You need to trust that I am with you, Moses, and that is what you and I need to know as well. When I look at myself, Robert Murray McShane once said, for every look at yourself, take 10 looks at Christ. I think that that's so important. I think every day, right? Because if I look at myself, it's only despair. I'm so weak, I'm so frail, I'm battling against my own sins, right? All of this stuff. And if that's where my gaze remains, there's only despair. I can't do anything. But you see, as I look to Christ and I remember his promise, which is what? The very same promise as the Lord gives here to Moses in Exodus chapter three. I will be with you. That's the end of the Gospel of Matthew, is it not? On the mountain, as he says to his apostles, I will be with you always to the very end of the age. That is what we need. Not more self-confidence, but more confidence in our God, which day by day by day should drive us to our knees first in prayer, and then to rise up with confidence that he is with us. So what do you do with that? What do you do with that later on today as the battle picks up, or tomorrow morning as Monday begins and you start to feel to yourself having a case of the Mondays, or hump day, Wednesday, when that comes around? What do you do with this? Back to the beginning, right? Moses, what was he doing when the Lord met him? He was just going about his daily routine. He was just faithfully picking up what the Lord had entrusted to him, and it was in that that the Lord met him. And see, beloved, the calling is not to go out and change the world left to ourselves. None of us can do that. It is to simply go out and faithfully bring the presence of the risen Christ to bear upon whatever it is that the Lord has called you to do. and to live your life first receiving from this living God that overflow of life that he has given to you in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. And to receive daily, day by day, grace upon grace upon grace that the Lord has for you and me, forgiving our sins, cleansing us anew, giving us the hope and the life that comes through his word and his spirit and his promises and knowing that his eyes are always open, and his ears are always open, and he sees, and he hears, and he knows, and he acts, and to rise up and say, whatever it is that you call me to do today, Lord, I'm gonna go, and I'm gonna do it, and I'm gonna bring the presence of this living God to my neighbors in confidence, Even if that confidence is wavering, even if you find yourself every day saying, Lord, I believe, help my unbelief. But knowing that he will work and he will do it because he is with you, amen? And he is God and he is life in himself. He is life for you and he is life for the mission. Let us pray. Lord, I pray for this dear body, this flock, Lehigh Valley Presbyterian Church. And I ask for your empowerment to their pastor and their elders to continue to serve you faithfully, whatever struggles, whatever difficulties that lay before them. I ask for the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace. And I ask for the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace for this congregation as they are served, as they are shepherded by you first and foremost, and by your under shepherds. Lord, work within this church that they would know the depth, the height, the breadth, and the width of the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, and so be filled with all the fullness of God. and that out of that fullness they would overflow with your love for one another and for their neighbors. In Jesus' name and for the sake of his glory, amen. Amen. Would you please rise as we sing together the Doxology. Praise God from whom all blessings Go.