RCL Proper 22A
31 August 2014
Saint Faith’s Anglican Church
Vancouver BC
Focus
text: Exodus 3.1-15
Click here to listen to the Sermon as preached at the 10.00 a.m. Eucharist.
Click here to listen to the Sermon as preached at the 10.00 a.m. Eucharist.
At
an early age I learned the importance of names.
This learning came from my experience within my immediate family circle. My father and I share the same
first name, but my dad was always ‘Dick’ and I have always been ‘Richard’. However, visiting my grandparents in New York
brought a shift in names. For reasons
that are still unknown to me, my grandfather, whose given name was ‘Donald’,
was known in town as ‘Geyser Dick’. This
meant that in Saratoga Springs my father went from 'Dick' to ‘Richard’ and I became either
‘young Richard’ or ‘RG’, my initials.
My
sister and I also had family nicknames that are used only within the family
circle. A university friend of mine once
visited my parents and overheard them using my family nickname. During his visit he used that nickname
several times. After he left, my mother
was quite put out and poor Dan was in the doghouse for some time. Unfortunately, he never knew exactly why and
I was ordered to keep silent! Even Paula
did not use my nickname until we were well and truly married.
Names,
whether our given names or nicknames, are deeply symbolic. To speak someone’s name is to do more than
simply identify one person from another; a name tells a story and describes an
identity. My children tell me that their
close friends who have come to know our family and who have been part of many
family dinners, car pools and just ‘hanging out’ at our house have a verb: ‘to leggett’. ''To leggett' has a variety of meanings: ‘to
have spirited discussions’ or ‘to seek clarity of language’ or even ‘to form a
united front within two seconds of having just had an argument with each
other’.
In
the ancient world to know the name of a god or gods meant to know something
about the character of the god and, in some cases, to have a lever to persuade
the god to act in a particular way. In a
world where gods were numerous and each family or tribe or nation had its own
gods, it was not enough to say simply, ‘God says this or that’; people wanted
to know which god and whether the name of that god indicated that ‘this or
that’ were actually in that god’s power to perform.
So
is it any wonder that Moses, when faced with the burning bush and the divine voice
commanding him to undertake an extraordinary mission, would ask, in so many
words, ‘Who are you? Do you actually
have any power to help me do what you are asking me to do?’ After all, this God is asking Moses to free
the Hebrews from their slavery to the mightiest monarch of the time and to
bring them into a new country which is already occupied by many tribes and
peoples who are not likely to pack up and move because Moses comes and says,
‘Move. God says this is our land.’
What
is most important in this revelation to Moses is that God does not give a noun
as the divine name; God gives a verb.
The God who appears to Moses, the God who will save the Hebrews and the
God whom we believe was present and active in Jesus of Nazareth and who
continues to be present and active in the Spirit is a God who acts. This is what is crucial to know about
God: we know God by what God does in
time and space.
To
know this God, though, requires a relationship of trust. Over the centuries scholars and teachers have
wondered why the noun ‘God’ is repeated in the opening words: ‘I am the God of your father, the God of
Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ (Exodus 3.6a) In one Jewish commentary on the Jewish prayer
book the repetition of ‘God’ is understood to mean ‘that each person should
believe in God on the basis of personal investigation, not merely tradition’. (The
Jewish Study Bible, 111) If we want to
know God, we have to take a risk and enter into the challenges of life,
trusting that we will find the strength, the help and the vision to do what
must be done in order to work with God in making the divine vision reality.
Think
of it this way. The first step in the
liberation of the Hebrews is taken when Moses leaves the burning bush and turns
towards Egypt. How difficult a step that
must have been, leaving family and security behind in order to pursue what most
would consider a foolhardy if not suicidal mission. This God has that effect on people; one
burning bush and they’re off to save the world!
As we follow the story in Exodus, we will learn that Ha Shem, a Hebrew
phrase meaning simply ‘the Name’, will be saviour, healer, revealer, covenant
maker and more (The New Interpreter’s Study Bible, 91). But every time the Hebrews think that they
have put God in a convenient box, God breaks free and wreaks havoc with the status
quo. This is definitely not a 'tame' God (cf. C. S. Lewis, Chronicles of Narnia)
If
anyone wants to know who God is, then one must look aback at one’s own
life and ask the question, ‘How has God acted in my life?’ This will not give you or me a ‘name’, but it
will tell us something about the mystery of the Holy One who chooses to be with
us and to be for us. In remembering what
God has done, we are presented with opportunities to act in our present as God
has acted in our past. It is not a matter
of believing in God because of tradition; it is the personal commitment to
choose to act like the God who will be who God will be, the God whose nature
becomes evident from the actions that God does (The Jewish Study Bible, 111).
As
I grow older, I have become more reluctant to use the adverbs ‘always’ or
‘never’. I have learned that when I use
either in the context of my relationship with God, I am quickly confronted with
a situation or a question where my ‘always’ or my ‘never’ are put to the
test. To be sure, there are some
constants: God expects me to act justly,
to be steadfast in my relationships and to avoid thinking that I am the centre
of the universe. I have learned that ‘both/and’
rather than ‘either/or’ is generally a quality of God’s relationship with
creation. I have found that God is more
alluring because God is elusive. Each
day I realize that entering into the mystery of God is like peeling an onion that becomes bigger
rather than smaller with each layer (cf. C. S. Lewis). What God asks of you and me is that we
examine our own histories and then decide whether this God, this mysterious
God, is worth trusting.
I
hope that we will all be like Moses and take the risk of faith in this God of
the burning bush. That faith will take
us places that we never imagined; that faith may cost us some of the
certainties we have always held. But
that faith will lead to genuine freedom, the freedom to be passionate for the
well-being of all God’s beloved, the freedom to be compassionate to all those
in need and trouble, the freedom to be who we are rather than who we are
not. Amen.
