Your Life's Purpose - Exodus Part 4 Series

INTRODUCTION

• How important is worship?

• There is nothing more important.

• All God does begins with worship…not activity.

• Worship is not singing songs…but surrendering to God.

• Healing, deliverance, destiny all here.

I. HIS POWER IN PEOPLE

• The story of Mt. Horeb (Mt Sinai) and the burning bush.

Exodus 3:2-5, “He looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. 3So Moses said, ‘I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up.’ 4When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, ‘Moses, Moses!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ 5Then He said, ‘Do not come near here; remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.’”

• He learned to live in the unseen, in this desert.

Hebrews 11:27, “By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured, as seeing him who is unseen.”

• He is 80 years old and for the past 40 years he has lived in exile…he was being groomed to become Pharaoh.

• His first 40 years were spent preparing for this…then he took his destiny into his hands and lost his way.

• Then wanders into the Sinai desert where he marries into a family of shepherds and for the next 40 years he walks this desert.

• Any human…especially a very gifted man like Moses…would be filled with regret for all he had become or not become.

• To go from Pharaoh’s court to a shepherd. Life lost its challenge. You know Moses stuttered. When did that begin? We are told he is a stammering shepherd.

• I have to believe he had a huge amount of internal angst and pain…stuck in the desert of life, lost hope.

• Why didn’t the burning bush happen 10 years before, or 5 or 15? It took years for God to touch and heal him; to position him to receive.

• This day is like every other day…crucial…how God works. You never know when the break through is coming, not a hint of warning.

• Jesus’ return - Matthew 24:37 will be the same.

Vs. 2 - He looked…he must have thought what is up with this…not the bush, the fire.

Vs. 3 - He said, “I must turn aside and look.”

Vs. 4 – Key - “When God saw he turned aside, He spoke.”

• Are you longing for a word from the Lord…a touch from God?

• Turn aside! Stop, be still.

• There is no other way to connect with God…turn aside.

II. GOD’S HAND ON HUMAN HEARTS

• Vs. 4 - “Moses, Moses, I know you.”

• Vs. 5 - Take off your sandals…worship me.

• As you worship me, I will complete you, restore you and use you.

• Vs. 6 - “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

• You’re the God of my fathers?

• That qualifies me to be big enough to use a guy like you Mo.

• With all your fears and insecurities…all your failures and frustrations…just like them.

• Moses is about to join good company, Abraham, who lied, Isaac did the same, Jacob stole birthright, Moses killed, God uses broken people.

• I work with guys like these… “I will do it.”

• Vs. 6 - “Moses hid his face” - worship

• Vs. 12, 18 - Bring them to worship.

• Vs. 8 - “I have come down to deliver them.”

Acts 7:25, “And he supposed that his brethren understood that God was granting them deliverance through him, but they did not understand.”

• He was not the deliverer, but he was the instrument.

• Getting this right is so important for all of us.

• How resentful was he? He was a zealous guy…he had a fire within when he killed that Egyptian guard.

III. THE FIRE OF GOD

• This fire wasn’t in Moses, but it would certainly change him.

• God’s fire comes upon people and things and consumes them; yet it doesn’t burn them up or out.

• If you want to follow God you better pay attention to things that are burning.

• Luke 24:32, “Were not our hearts burning within us when He was talking to us on the road?”

• God’s fire doesn’t destroy. Moses is learning this lesson.

• God must do God’s work. I am not responsible to insure it happens, only to obey.

• Get those shoes off…and remove the undergirding of men…and see how I undergird you…never wears out.

• This is learning to worship in God’s power.

• Not in our zeal but in His; this is the burning bush.