Calls The Unworthy

The Great I AM Changes His People

6.28.26 [Exodus 3:1-15] River of Life (5th Sunday after Pentecost)

Mercy and peace are yours in abundance from the Great I AM. Amen. 

In less than a week, we will be celebrating a big birthday. 250 as a nation. So many things to be grateful for. So many reasons to praise our living Lord. As we reflect on the many seminal moments, iconic images encapsulate historic American blessings. 

Some of those iconic images are indelibly etched in our minds because they feature famous individuals, like Washington crossing the Delaware or JFK leaning over his desk in the Oval Office. Others are memorable perhaps because they feature brave but ordinary Americans, like the Marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima or the sailor kissing a complete stranger in Times Square on VJ Day. 

Stressful, dangerous times have a way of creating iconic images—even images of wartime propaganda. Names like Rosie the Riveter and Uncle Sam conjure up very specific images and slogans like We Can Do It and I Want You. This past week, my family and I had the opportunity to enjoy the WWII museum in New Orleans. And we saw more than a few illustrations of Rosie and Uncle Sam. 

Rosie the Riveter and Uncle Sam had different target audiences, but the same goal. Rosie aimed to inspire women to serve in ways they had not thought possible before wartime. Uncle Sam pitched the need, the pride, and the honor in serving your country in the armed forces. During WWII, approximately 6 million men enlisted in the Army. Another 6 million women entered the U.S. workforce to support the boys abroad. 

Those numbers struck me as I was studying our text from Exodus 3. Uncle Sam and Rosie were inspiring images, but they were imaginary. The living Lord, Ex. 3:6 the God of Moses’ father Amram, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is very real and yet he still met real resistance when he called Moses to serve his own people. God himself descended from heaven and told this wandering shepherd I Want You and Moses gave him every excuse not to serve. 

God didn’t use a poster like our country has in times of war, but he used something pretty attention-grabbing. Moses was out in the wilderness, leading the flocks of his father-in-law Jethro, when he saw Ex. 3:3 a strange sight—a bush that was on fire, but did not burn up. As Moses drew near, he heard something that would have knocked his socks off—if he wore such things. Ex. 3:4 Moses! (2x)

All Moses could manage to mutter in response was Ex. 3:4 Here I am. 

Then God told Moses: Ex. 3:5 Do not come any closer. Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground. 

As Moses was untying his sandals, God told him who he was. The God of his real biological father, Amram, and the God of his distant ancestors: his great-great-grandfather Jacob, Jacob’s dad, Isaac, and Jacob’s grandfather, Abraham. Moses was afraid to look at his holy God, Ex. 3:6 so he hid his face. 

Then God explained why he was appearing to Moses in the first place. He had witnessed Ex. 3:7 the misery of his people in Egypt. He had heard their crying out because of their slave drivers and how the Egyptians were oppressing them. He was concerned about their suffering. 

Not only was the Lord aware of what was happening in Egypt, God was also going to do something about it. Ex. 3:8 He had come down to rescue his people from Egypt and bring them into a good and spacious land, the land he had promised to Abraham’s descendants. And God chose Moses to be the man to go to Pharaoh and bring Israel out of slavery. Moses should have been elated. 

Moses should have been elated because he knew firsthand the oppression in Egypt. Moses was born in a time when the Egyptian Pharaoh commanded that all Israelite baby boys must be thrown into the Nile River. He, himself, was spared from death because Pharaoh’s daughter discovered Moses and had mercy on him and took him in as her very own child. Because of this blessing, Moses was raised in a regal fashion. He lived a comfortable life until he took the life of an Egyptian slave driver who was beating one of his own Hebrew people. When Pharaoh caught wind of this, Moses skipped town and went to live in Midian, where he came to the rescue of Jethro’s daughters. 

If anyone should have been eager to see the Israelites freed from slavery in Egypt, it should have been Moses. But he wasn’t excited. Instead of rejoicing that God was going to redeem his people from slavery in Egypt, Moses was gripped by his own inadequacies. 

If we had continued reading the rest of this conversation, we would have heard three main excuses from Moses. Who am I to go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites out of Egypt? Why should Israel believe you sent me? Why should Pharaoh listen to me? 

With the benefit of historical hindsight, it’s easy to criticize Moses. 

Why is he being so uncooperative? He is humbly insubordinate. He speaks in ways that sound self-deprecating, but are stubborn and unreasonable: Who am I? What if the Israelites don’t believe me? I’ve got a stammering tongue, and I’ve never been eloquent. How am I going to convince Pharaoh to do something like this? Moses sounds like a man who is trying to talk his local draft board into a 4-F classification. I’m physically, socially, morally, & rhetorically disqualified from doing what you are calling me to do, Lord. Eventually, Moses flatly says: Ex. 4:13 Please send someone else. 

But don’t we do the same? None of us has been called to a mission like this, but we are just as prone to trying to dodge God’s calling. 

God calls us to flee temptation, not conform to the patterns and behaviors of this world, and to be perseverant in trials of all kinds. What is our response? Don’t we make excuses like Moses? 

Far too often, we flirt with temptation, telling ourselves that we aren’t really doing anything wrong, that no one is going to get hurt, and that nobody’s perfect. We say that if we don’t make exceptions to God’s commands, we’re going to get run over in this world. We look for shortcuts and easy ways out of things God would use to develop our character and strengthen our faith. We make excuses just like Moses. 

God calls us to pray continually, but we make excuses about being too busy and our prayers going unanswered. God calls us to forgive as we’ve been forgiven, but we point to a litany of reasons that won’t work in the real world. God calls us to evangelize and we point out that we’ve never really been great with words. We make excuses just like Moses. Ex. 4:13 Please pick someone else is our posture. 

But our God does not take our excuses, suggestions, or advice. He is the Great I AM. The God who is and who causes things to come into being. The merciful God who does not change for mankind but changes mankind through his mercy. The living God who has come to rescue his people, not just from physical oppression and slavery, but from the spiritual oppression of Satan and their own slavery to sin. The God who does not tell us we are enough, but instead says I will be with you as I have been with your ancestors. 

This living Lord is the Great I AM who has done what Moses would not and could not. Moses didn’t want to leave the life he fell into when he ran out of other options. Moses didn’t want to depart from the harsh wilderness to help deliver his own people from slavery. Moses begged God to please send someone else to redeem his people. 

Jesus, as true God, is the one who gives us all life and breath. Yet, God’s Son left the glory and comfort of heaven to redeem the ungodly, his enemies, you and me, from our slavery to sin. Moses only had to go and speak with Pharaoh, and God did the rest. Jesus went into the wilderness and confronted Satan. Jesus preached the Gospel to crowds who questioned his origin and authority. Jesus rebuked sinners in their self-righteousness. He forgave those who did not deserve it. He was patient with those who wanted to put him to death. And Jesus prayed continually. Time and again, we find God’s own Son sneaking away early in the morning or late in the evening praying to his Father. And Jesus didn’t pray because it got him his way. In the Garden of Gethsemane, we hear Christ praying for his Father to take away the cup of wrath from him. If there is any other way, he cries out. But we never hear Jesus say, Ex. 4:13 Please, send someone else. Jesus humbly and even joyfully embraced the cross because it was the only way to set us free from our sins. Jesus humbly and joyfully endured the oppression of our guilt and shame. Jesus humbly and joyfully died in our place so that we might receive life in his name.  

This is how the Great I AM came down into this world. He could have told us his name, but we wouldn’t understand him any better. When he tells his people what he is going to do, they don’t believe it either. But God shows us his heart, his face, his character, and his love. He is faithful, even when we are faithless. He is patient, even when we do nothing but get on his last nerve. He is merciful, even when we are fussy and uncooperative. He is sacrificial love, even when we are selfish and stubborn. He is devoted to his Word, even when we forget it. 

This is the Lord, the Great I AM. He does not change. But he does change his people. Look at the transformation he works in Moses. Moses opposes Pharaoh and even scuffles with the people of Israel when they question his authority. Moses’ humility is turned upside down and he becomes someone who is shockingly patient with Israel. 

And he’s not the only one. Look at what God did with Jacob, the deceiver; Samson, the selfish strongman; David, the forgotten runt of his family; Solomon, the young king who knew he wasn’t wise; and Paul, the former persecutor of Christians. Most of these men were nobodies without the Great I AM. The ones who thought they were something were lost fools. God teaches people that by nature they’re nobodies and then shows them what he can do with and through nobodies. And the Great I AM changes and transforms you, too. AMEN.