Here I Am: of callings and burning bushes

The message series we are in right now in church is called Here I Am, which is an exploration of Biblical characters who have been called by God for a purpose. The message yesterday was about Moses and the burning bush. Because of course it was.

The discussion of Moses and the burning bush in small group yesterday and in the sermon afterwards marked the 3^rd and 4^th time in two weeks that story has been brought to my attention. The first was a recommendation that I read the story, because of some directions I’m being led in right now, and because of the signposts God keeps giving me along the way. The first time that I read it, I was so surprised. Because this is a story I’ve known since childhood. But never until this time had I ever identified with Moses or seen myself in his story. Always before it had just been a nice story from the Bible about someone else.

The second time this particular message was brought to me was the next morning after I first saw myself in the reading of the story. I was questioning whether I was correctly interpreting where God was leading me and in that questioning, and doubt, and uncertainty, God brought the story of Moses and the burning bush to me again. Through it’s mention in the middle of a podcast I was listening to which had nothing to do with the rest of the subject of the podcast.

But apparently I still didn't get the point God was trying to teach me in the story, because yesterday there it was again. Not once but twice. In conjunction with the sermon message, the subject of our small group class was whether or not we had ever experienced our own personal burning bushes and times in our life we have experienced a call.

What I didn’t say in small group was that it appears that my burning bush moment seems, in addition to other things that are almost laughably obvious, to be Moses’ burning bush story. What I did say was that I have felt God’s call on my life more than once.  That, in those times, God has led me very clearly in a particular direction. That these weren’t directions I had planned to go but God made it so clear that’s where I was supposed to go, that I knew I had to head there. And then when I got to the door that I was sure God was pointing to, I found it was slammed in my face. It’s hard to understand when that happens. To see the lesson in the loss. 

With one of those experiences, I’m still not sure what God’s purpose was. Maybe there was no lesson. Maybe obedience to God’s call was the lesson. The other times God closed doors he was so clearly leading me to, were because I needed to stay in the outer room for awhile longer to take care of things in a way I wouldn’t have been able to if I’d already gone through those doors. And then, at the right time, he led me down the hallway to another and different door that led to a room much more my size and style and color than the first two. During all these times, God was leading me to places that were scary. To places that were outside my comfort zone. To places where I didn’t feel equipped or adequate to serve. To places that caused me, like Moses, to question who am I? 

With the prior two recent exposures to the Moses and the burning bush story, and all that discussion and all that reflection in small group, you would think I would've gotten all I could out of what is essentially 10-11 Bible verses. But apparently not because when I listened to the message of my pastor, the 4^th time in less than two weeks I had been exposed to that story, there were still things that stood out to me. The first were God’s admonitions to Moses, amidst his questioning, and arguing, and stalling. God’s direction to get going.  Just go.

The second was the pastor’s speculation of what it would have been like for Moses if he had put his foot down, despite God’s directions and persistence, and said I’m not going to go. God would have still found a way to carry out his plans, but he would have chosen someone else to do it. She asked how Moses would have felt if he saw the Israelites being led out of captivity and there he stood just tending his sheep. He would have missed out on the greatest calling of his life, because he had not been willing to step outside his comfort zone and heeded God’s call on his life to do more.

I know that God is leading me in a call right now. And I don’t know yet exactly where the door is to which he’s leading me. Or when it will open or what will be on the other side when it does. Or how much discomfort and inadequacy I will feel when I walk through it. But what I do know is this. I want to have the obedience and the courage to get going. To just go. To walk through that door and to meet God on the other side. Because the last thing I want to do is to stand around with my sheep and watch someone else do the thing to which God called me but to which I said no.