Holy Ground

HOLY GROUND

Ex 3.1-10

A few weeks ago, in Griffith, a man found a little baby in a garbage dumpster. This isn’t the first time this has happened. It has occurred many times in Chicago and other places. Among all the feelings which flood our minds and hearts when we hear of such things, the thing which I most often think about is the future of the child. The child whose life was worth nothing to its parents, that they would try to get rid of it. Or what would the child think of himself or herself. Would it one day be told that it was found in a garbage can? What kind of self image would that give you? What kind of life would you have?

But it would make all the difference to an abandoned child, who found her and raised her.

You may know the story of Moses in the book of Exodus. His story fills up most of the book, it tells of the greatness that Moses achieved in his lifetime in spite of being abandoned as a baby. Of the great man of God he turned out to be--how he led the Israelites out of slavery in egypt to the Promised land.

But I want to look at the foundational beginning which caused Moses to be the great, godly leader he was. IN exodus 3 we find all the events of Moses’ life coming together in perfect harmony as God calls HIm to do great things.

Let’s read together the first few verses of Exodus 3 and see how an attitude of reverence and humility and honesty in worship opens the door for God to use us for His glory and our blessings.

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We picked up the story when Moses was around 80 years old. But remember how his life started? You’ve heard of rags to riches stories? Well, Moses’ is kind of a rags to riches to rags to riches story which begins in chapter 2. The Israelites, Hebrews were slaves in Egypt, working like dogs. ONe of the commandments given to the Jews by God was be fruitful and multiply. Well, the Jews were multiplying just a little too fast for the Pharaoh’s comfort. He decided that all the new born babies must be killed so that there wouldn’t be so many Jews to outnumber the Egyptians.

Eventually. Pharoah ordered all the newborn Jewish boys to be thrown to the the alligators and piranhas in the Nile river. Well, little Moses is born and his mother, could not do that so she hid him for a couple months and after she could do so no longer, she put him in basket and set him in the Nile river to be found by the Pharoah’s daughter who felt sorry for him and took him in. So Moses, the little jewish boy supposed to be killed came to be the grandson of the Pharoah.

Moses was given the best education and the most lavish life you could imagine, he lived in the palace while his fellow jews where slaving away in the brick yards. Some say he was being groomed to be the next Pharoah--the king of Egypt. From rags to riches. But then back to rags.

ONe day Moses went to see how the rest of his fellow jews were being treated. He didn’t like what he saw. He decided not to wait for God to free the Jews, he decided to take matters into his own hand and he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Jew.

Well Grandpa Pharaoh heard about this and tried to kill Moses, so he escaped to Midian where he eventually married a Jewish named Zipporah and had a family and a job. Life became stable and predictable and comfortable for Moses in MIdian desert.

Meanwhile back in Egypt, things hadn’t gotten any better for the Jewish slaves. Finally, the end of chapter 2 tells us, God had enough, he had heard their groans and cries and decided to do something. "so God looked on the Israelites and was concerned about them."

And just then everything in Moses’ life came into focus. His abandonment, his rise to prominence in Egypt. It would take someone who knew Egypt, to get the Jews out of Egypt. Moses about screwed it up, trying to kill all the Egyptians one by one, but God was still in control.

So after Moses was about 80, been in Midian for about 40 years. Working for his father-in-law Jethro tending his flocks, probably looking forward to retirement, taking it easy, probably had a sign on his staff "rather be fishing".

One day, a day just like any other day. He was tending sheep going about his business. He took them to the far side of the desert to a mountain, Mt. Horeb--which meant ’wasteland’. At that place, a place just like any other until now, Moses met the Lord.