Starting from verse 1 of chapter 3, it says, "Now Moses was pastoring the flock with Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led the flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horib, the mountain of God. The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire from the midst of the bush.

And he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. So Moses said, 'I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burnt up.' When 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.' Then 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 also said, 'I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God." Let's take a moment to pray.

Father, we thank you, God, for your grace and your light to us. Lord, I pray that all the more we would strive to have an accurate and full knowledge of who you are. And God, that being in your presence and seeing you for who you are, we would be so convicted that your glory needs to go forth.

And we pray, God, for all the ministry happening across the globe. We have our friends in China, we have our friends in Korea, and Pastor Peter is out there. We pray, God, that the ministry of the word would go forth. And seeing how marvelous, how your splendor and majesty is beyond measure, I pray that, God, your light would continue to go forth to all people.

We thank you, Lord, it's in Christ's name. Amen. Now, I want to ask you, if you've ever had a life-altering event happen, or something perhaps of like a traumatic experience, you know, and I want you to just think about that for a moment, and I want to share with you one of mine that I just so vividly remember, I can tell you all the little details, what I said, what I did, how I felt, till this day, even though it was more than 15 years ago.

When I was a junior in college, it was Christmas Eve, and rather than being home by the Christmas tree and having dinner with the family, our family, we were working at our parents' t-shirt shop. So we were working that late night, but it was a great day because there was a lot of sales, a lot of customers came in, and the family was at least together.

We just happened to be working. I was at the register. Now, it was very busy, and one gentleman happens to come up with an arm full of clothing. Now, typically at our store, it's like one of these bargain stores, you know, you get five shirts for $10 and stuff.

So people bring a stack of shirts, but nobody brings clothes like this, you know, because we don't even have baskets at the store. So this guy comes over, and it's just, "Let me also get that and that and that and that," and so I'm like, "Okay, sure." I grab him this and that, and I turn around, and he's got a gun to my face.

And at this point, he's screaming and yelling, and I didn't realize somehow he grabbed my brother, who happened to be, like, reorganizing a shelf, cleaning something on the side, and he just grabbed my brother. He was holding my brother by the back of the shirt here, and he had a gun to me and was screaming.

And I had one of those, like, blurry moments where the sound was all muted, and it was just like, "Boom." I was like, "What do I do? Do I karate chop his armor?" And I was just running through these things in my head, but my mind, all of a sudden, it froze, and I froze.

And I was just like, "Ahh." And then I just kind of made, like, sense of what he was saying. "Open the register! Open the register!" So I started just pushing buttons, and then it got him all, like, frilled up, and then he raised the gun to shoot. And thankfully, I'm here, so you know that story went okay.

I'm here. Thank God. Now, to spare you all the details, the point of me telling you the story is not so much all the details of what I felt, but afterwards, how we ran the business changed. When you experience something quite traumatic, the way you do business changes. All of a sudden, we got a big TV that says, "Smile, you're on camera." Right on the front, we had this and that, and we were looking into the button where you can just push and call the police, and, you know, all this kind of stuff.

And we didn't put any of the valuables outside. We just put it in a case. The way you do business after a traumatic experience changes, and individually, when something traumatic happens to you, the way you go about your business day to day changes. Well, we read a story in which there is a dramatic, I'm going to say traumatic, introduction of God showing himself to Moses.

And this is a pivotal moment, what I would call a watershed moment, in which, you know, Moses is going down one path in his life, and boom, after this event, he cannot go the same way anymore. It's just like with other significant figures in the Bible, whether it be Apostle Paul, he's just knocked off his horse, Christ comes to him in a glorious light, he can't be the same.

Eternally, he's not the same. Both internally, externally, in every shape and form, he is now different. Likewise, it's the same for Paul. Dang it, Moses. Likewise, it's the same for Moses, in this chapter in the book of Exodus. And I just want to say that this sermon today, then, is not so much a, "Here's three things you need to do this week," and "Here's three simple applications for you," this is a sermon about a perspective of Moses as he is being prepared by God.

As he is being raised up for a dramatic experience for the nation of Israel, something that's going to be recorded down in history, it's going to be repeated in the Bible, referenced, and used to cause us to have greater faith in the Almighty God. And so today is going to be a rundown of a view of God and the encounter that Moses had.

So, by way of context, I'm going to read to us, starting, if you'd kind of look over in chapter 2, verse 15. Chapter 2, verse 15. It says, "When Pharaoh heard of this matter, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from the presence of Pharaoh and settled in the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well." I read that because it's a transition verse telling you the context of the story.

And I want to give you a little context. That here, what you have is that, you know the story of Moses. He was raised in the palace. Right? And as he was being raised in that privileged sense, he still knew that he was of Hebrew descent. And he saw the slavery and the oppression of his people.

One day, as he was going about, he saw that an Egyptian was beating on his fellow kinsmen, on a Hebrew man. And he looked this way, and then he looked that way, and he killed him. He killed the Egyptian. He buried them and he hid them, and he thought that, "Nobody saw, I got away with it." But the next day, he finds that actually a couple of his own kinsmen are fighting each other.

The people who are enslaved, they're having to fight each other over some disagreement. And Moses steps in and says, "Hey guys, what are you doing? Don't fight each other." They look at him and say, "Who made you judge? Did you kill us? Did you do that Egyptian?" And Moses is shocked.

How did they know? And what's interesting about it is quickly the news spreads and the pharaoh finds out. And the pharaoh actually wants to kill Moses. The pharaoh wants to kill Moses, so Moses has to flee. And so Moses goes from Egypt all the way past the Sinai Peninsula.

So if you're in Egypt on this side, and then there's a body of water, the Gulf. And then you have the Sinai Peninsula. He crosses that entire thing, which is the area in which the nation of Israel, when they're traversing through the wilderness, that's where they go through. He crosses the Red Sea, and then now he's in the land of the Midians.

He travels far to run away. So you're thinking about this instance in which Moses, he is not in the prime of his life. He is in runaway mode. He knows he's a sojourner. So when he meets up with his next family, who essentially adopts him, the family of his wife, he names his son after the fact that I'm just a foreigner in this land.

And that is the context to which I'm going to read to you the next verses, verse 23. So this is chapter 2, verse 23. Chapter 2, verse 23 says, "Now it came about in the course of those many days that the king of Egypt died." And Moses is going, "Woohoo!

The guy's dead." But for us, we're thinking, "Wow, a lot of time has passed." Which is true. And he says, "And the sons of Israel sighed because of the bondage, and they cried out, and their cry for help because of their bondage rose up to God." Just because the Pharaoh died, it didn't get any better for the nation of Israel, for the Jewish people, because as they were numerous, they were still oppressed.

Verse 24, "So God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God saw the sons of Israel, and God took notice of them." I want to encourage you with a Bible study skill here, that when you study the Hebrew narrative, pay attention to the verbs, because the language, the Hebrew language, is a verb-oriented language.

And what you find is an emphasis of God's benevolence, mercy, and kindness, and grace. As not only in the individual life of Moses, he is on the run, the nation, the Israelites, these Jews, right? They are suffering, and God sees with compassion for them. And it says that He hears, He remembers, He sees, and He notices them.

This is the grace of our God. But, that's us looking in hindsight at the commentary that the Bible is giving. If you were to look perhaps from the people's perspective, those who were oppressed, those who were being beaten, those who are now having their children murdered, those whose life expectancy was dwindling, those who were in utter chaos, and there was a sense of, "What hope is there for us?" And I mentioned just a little bit ago that perhaps a lot of time has passed.

It has! Eighty years has passed! So you know the time in which Moses was born, and Pharaoh made a decree that the babies would be killed, and we know the whole Sunday school story of how Moses was on the little basket? Eighty years has passed since then! That's a lifetime!

That's nearing in on a century of suffering and crying out to God, "God, where are you?" So I want to make the case that perhaps from the people's perspective, they're rating this like, "And God heard their groaning." How come you didn't hear it before? "And God remembered." Did you forget?

"And God noticed." Oh, you noticed, huh? Is it like when you step on the tail of a dog and the dog goes, "Errr!" And you're like, "Oh, sorry, I didn't notice your tail!" "Your whimpering has rose to my ear." You know? Is that the scene? And you can imagine the bitter people looking for God and saying, "Where are you?" "Are you there?" "Do you care?" "Can you do anything?" But what we have is an introduction of God interjecting into this moment.

And I want to say, to answer those questions, just in case there's any doubt, the Scripture teaches us, and we want to affirm the Bible's teaching, that our God is a God who never forgets. Our God is a God where Scripture says, "He neither sleeps nor slumbers." He neither needs rest.

He is not a God who is limited in capacity. He is not a God who is forgetful. He is not a God like me, where if I get busy, I don't respond. Where if I get tired, then I want to rest. If I get this and that, whatever comes in, I'm too busy for you.

That is not God. God is a God who is sovereign. God is a God of providence. God is a God who is not only sovereign, but is precisely sovereign. He is engaged in the intimate attention of man. And I want to show you by the story of Moses. So if you go over to chapter 1, we're kind of like working backwards here.

We're going over in chapter 1. And the story essentially is that if you look over at chapter 1, verse, let's say, 5 through 7, "All the persons who came from the loins of Jacob were seventy in number, but Joseph was already in Egypt. Joseph died, and all his brothers, and all the generation.

But the sons of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly, and multiplied and became increasingly mighty, so that the land was filled with them." Okay, the land was filled with them. And so the king of Pharaoh, I'm sorry, the king of Egypt, Pharaoh, he goes, "What are we going to do about this?

Let's be shrewd here." So his initial strategy is, "Well, we can't just eradicate them. We can't just kill them off. We can't send them out of our country." Why? Because that's our labor force. They're slaves. There's a lot of them, and they're the ones building, and they're the ones doing all the manual labor.

So they have to be shrewd about this. So what they say is, "Well, we're just going to drive them hard, make them know their place." That's the strategy of Pharaoh. And what's really interesting about it is the Jews continue to grow. You would think, yeah, if you drive them hard, and we know history.

When you read about the history of building the monuments and the cities, yes, many of the slaves died. They didn't give them proper burial. Just buried them in the building and just continued to build. The life expectancy of the people was diminishing. And so you'd imagine the population would be controlled.

But no, the population still grew mightily. That is the invisible hand of God working. That's on a general level, but more intimately, we see God's hand working on an intimate level. You see, because once the people start to grow, the king, Pharaoh, says, "No, no, no, no, no. We can't have this." Strategy number two is, let's kill off all the male boys.

All the boys, all the children. And so he says, he gives out a decree that if it's a female, then you let it live. But if it's a boy, you cast it into the Nile. How wicked of a man. How wicked of a man would you be to even think something like that?

To take all the babies and throw it into the Nile. But that's what this wicked generation was oppressing the Jews with. And so the people, again, were crying out and crying out. Well, what happens if you go over in verse 17, this is an interesting verse, so chapter one, verse 17, "But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt has commanded, but let the boys live." So the king of Egypt called for the midwives and said to them, "Why have you done this thing and let the boys live?" You don't think that's the hand of God?

Midwives? I just imagine these ladies who happen to just stand up to the Pharaoh and be like, "Oh, can't do nothing about it." And what's really funny is later on they just kind of make this excuse and they say, "You know, we tried to get there, but these Hebrew ladies, they just pump them out so fast, we just can't even get there in time." And they kind of make up this half lie and they say, "We just couldn't do anything about it." But the fact of the matter is God was working in them.

Because you see it later on in verse 21, "Because the midwives feared God, he established households for them." Is God far? Is God deaf? Is God blind to their suffering? No, he is not. He is intimately involved. But what's more, chapter 2 verse 21, "Now a man from the house of Levi went and married a daughter of Levi.

The woman conceived and bore a son, and when she saw that he was beautiful, she hid him for three months. But when she could hide him no longer, she got him a wicker basket and covered it over with tar and pitch. Then she put the child into it and set it among the reeds by the bank of the Nile." That's a pretty intense verse right there, is it not?

I mean, you've got this infant baby, three months old. Three months! That means they're tiny, you know? And you can imagine, yes, maybe in the early stages, the baby, all they do is eat and sleep and she did it right. Maybe he wasn't crying that much and maybe it was a good baby and she would shush him, but by the time they're three, once they cry, it's loud and their vocal cords are developed.

She's like, "Oh my gosh, you can't do this." Somebody already probably walked by and is like, "Hey, you have a baby? Let me see." And you're like, "Oh, no." Try to hide it. "It's a boy or a girl?" "A girl." You know? You can only do that for so long.

So the mom, now she's in a situation where she decides to put the baby in a basket. But think about that for a moment. I would just venture to assume, I'm reading between the lines, but I think Moses' mother was probably a godly woman. And she had to entrust her infant and consign him to the sovereignty of God.

Because I don't know what other parent would think it better to just put a baby in a basket in water. I can't imagine the night she was weaving the basket together to put him in. She must have been praying and crying her eyes out. You don't see the hand of God intimately in this?

So the baby goes by the reed in the water by the Nile. And the older sister, I don't know exactly how old she is. I'm assuming if Moses is like an infant, she can't be that old. So she's hiding in the reed, like watching, "What's going on over there?" And lo and behold, you know the Sunday school story.

The princess, the pharaoh's daughter comes with her maidservants and stuff like that. And typically it's like, "Oh yay, someone's going to find her." But I bet you the sister was thinking like, "Oh my God! Of all people, the pharaoh's daughter! We're so screwed." She's probably sitting there thinking like, "What in the world?

Let somebody else come." I bet you she was probably entertaining in her mind coming at me like, "No!" But what happens is the pharaoh's daughter takes the basket and if you read the story, it says in verse 6, "When she opened it, she saw the child and behold, the boy was crying and she had pity on him." You don't think God's hand is working in the heart of a young pharaoh's daughter who knows her father hates the Jews?

That she'd be willing to accept this male boy into their house? That's crazy! God is working. God's invisible hand is there. And then she says, "Ha! This is one of the Hebrews!" And she yells it out loud. She identifies it like, "It's a Hebrew boy!" And then what's crazy about it is the young sister, who again I think is probably young, she has the courage.

"I think God's hand is working. Did you say Hebrew?" She jumps into the scene and it's this comedic scene. It's like, "Hey, did you say Hebrew? Do you want me to get a Hebrew lady to come and nurse this boy for you?" You know, that's what she asks. And sometimes I keep forgetting this little detail.

But the sister goes and gets Moses' mom, brings her over and is like, "Here's a Hebrew lady! Look at that!" And then the princess goes, "Good. You nurse this boy until he's grown up. I'll pay you." That's what she said. She's like, "I'll give you wages." Verse 9, "The Pharaoh's daughter said to her, 'Take this child away, nurse him for me, and I will give you money.'" And I can just imagine the mom, the emotional rollercoaster.

She just put her baby in a basket. She probably turned away crying. The sister's sitting there watching. And then the sister jogs over and is like, "Someone found the baby!" "Who is it?" "The princess!" "Oh my God!" And then next thing you know, the princess is like, "I'll pay you.

Take the baby." How do you keep a straight face like that? You know, in a moment like that. And you realize, God is so sovereign. He's not just kind of sovereign. So perhaps somebody in the midst and thick of their pain and their agony, feeling oppressed, might look at God and say, "Maybe a little too late, God.

Too little, too late. Did you forget about me? Were you hearing? Were you listening? Did you watch? But remember, God is so precisely and so intimately involved in every single one of our lives, amen? We have to have this perspective about God. Because God is going to then raise up this boy for a great momentous occasion in all of history, in which He exhibits His power and His might, and the nation of Israel shows His glory and delivers them.

And what's really interesting about it is, if I ask the question, "Who is the greatest human being in the Old Testament?" And clearly, it's Moses. It's Moses. Because Moses is going to be the key figure who's going to be used to deliver these people. And then Moses is going to be the key figure who's going to receive the law and represent the law and judgment over the people.

He was placed as judge over them. Then he was going to be a mediator of that covenant contained in the law towards the people. And he was going to be the prophet. He was going to be the prophet who speaks on behalf of God towards the people. And then he was going to be the prophet who speaks on behalf of the people, pleading, pleading on behalf of the people to God.

And so scripture calls him the prophet. And what's more, the nation of Israel later on is going to see Moses in this high and exalted light, where they believe truly he is the servant of God. The Jews see him as the epitome of leadership. Perhaps how we would talk about maybe Reagan administration.

Some people see that administration as the best thing ever in American history. Or if you just think about sports, and the guy who is the greatest of all time in that sport, he is a Jordan of basketball, he is to the Jew like that. God is intimately raising him up, preparing him.

And what we experience in the burning bush account is God mightily introducing himself to Moses so that Moses can see the glory of the Lord. Let's continue looking at this story then. Let's continue looking at this story. If you look over in chapter 3, I'll read the beginning verses again.

And it says, "The angel of the Lord appeared to him," Sorry, sorry, verse 1, "Now Moses was pasturing the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and led the flock to the west side of the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God." Just as a side note, that mountain is going to be really important, because that's where the people are going to worship, that's where the Ten Commandments happen, that's where so many things happen in the history of Israel.

But continuing on, it says, "The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a blazing fire. From the midst of a bush he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed. So Moses said, 'I must turn now aside and see this marvelous sight, while the bush is not burnt up.' When 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.'" This is an amazing story. Moses has now been a shepherd for 40 years. You know, I've had some pretty repetitive, mundane jobs in my life. I'm a pretty young guy, but I've had different jobs.

I've had property managing, I've done bathroom repair, I've done call center, telemarketing, sales rep, I've done teaching, all this stuff. But one time, I did data entry. And data entry is so much fun. It's just like, I print out a piece of paper, and then I just tag this line goes in that box, and that line goes in that box, and I did that like 8 hours a day for like 6 months straight.

It was one of those moments where you just like autopilot, you just start zoning out. But then, I started reading about shepherding, and shepherding is a really interesting thing because it's like parenting, but then sometimes it's a lot like data entry. You just follow the sheep around as they eat the grass, and then if there's not enough grass, you just push them a little further.

And then you bring them back home, and tomorrow it's the same thing the next day. You do realize that, right? He did that for 40 years. For 40 years, he's just shepherding the sheep, just walking in the wilderness. And then one day, he sees a bush burning. Miraculously, one day, he sees this bush burning and says, "Oh my goodness, I need to go see this site." And what's really interesting about this is that as you look at this site, there's so many things to study.

I started preparing this sermon a little while ago because I'm actually doing my devotions to the book of Exodus, and there's just like so much to study. The bush, what does it symbolize? Why is the bush not burning up, and what does that mean? What is the significance and relevance of that?

And did you notice that in the bush was the angel of the Lord? Who is that? Did Moses see a figure like a man in there? Or did he see just a bright blaze of glorious light, and it was this big thing, and it was in the midst of this bush?

And what was it, and what did that represent? And why was it the angel of the Lord and not like, and God himself? There's so much to study. But what we know is, Moses tried to come close, and clearly the voice of God came out. And I just want you to, again, keep picturing the whole scene and the narrative with me.

Moses in his mundane life is just shocked and floored by a completely supernatural, miraculous thing that's happening. And it wasn't like, "Moses, come over and see this thing." It wasn't like that. It was just like if a little toddler is up on a stool or trying to climb up on a stove, and he's about to put his hand on a stove, and the mom comes in, and it was like, "Moses!" It's like, "Stop!" Right?

And that's what's happening in this scene. And Moses says, "Here I am." And in the next verse, God calls out, and he says, "Do not come here. Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground." And that is where I want to keep my emphasis today.

That God is teaching Moses something very profound about who he is that's going to affect everything about where he is, what he's doing, and everything beyond. Verse 6, "And he also said, 'I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.' Then Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God." Wow!

I have so many questions about this passage. But very clearly, this passage is so significant to all of Scripture. Jesus talks about it, the Apostle Paul talks about it, it's in the Gospels, it's in the letters, it's everywhere in the Bible. Because again, God is preparing Moses for a tremendous task.

To proclaim the glory of God and draw out all of his people in a great and mighty deliverance. And again, although I have many, many questions, I want to focus on this idea that what God is teaching him in relation to his holiness is where I want to focus our attention.

And what I want to say is this, clearly from just reading the passage, we can recognize the ground on which Moses walks is holy. What is God teaching him is that God is holy. But what we need to ask is to what degree and to what extent is that holiness?

So I'm going to focus on those two elements. To what degree and to what extent is this holiness to which God is revealing? And what I want to first say is this, that clearly God is showing Moses a great and grand picture of himself in his holiness. But I'm going to admit just at the forefront here that there's a sense to which I cannot articulate exhaustively what God is showing him.

Because what God is showing him is his glory, it's his splendor and his majesty, summarized in a concept of holiness. You know that, right? Like his holiness includes so much. Everything from his power, his sovereignty, right? His providence and everything about him is contained in all of that. And what he is showing him in his blaze of glory is all of that at once.

And so I can go down with you many times in scripture when God wants to reveal his Shekinah glory, his manifest, exalted glory, he comes out in a blaze of fire. Genesis 15, when God shows up with Abraham and he's creating that covenant, God moves through the pieces. The bloody scene of the animals cut in half, God moves through as a furnace of fire, burning hot oven, right?

And later on what you're going to see is that when God appears to the people on the mountain, burning fire. When God appears in the Temple of Solomon, burning fire, God wants to reveal his glory and his holiness. But the degree of this holiness is what we have to look into.

And one of the questions I can ask to look at this degree is, yes, I could ask what is the fire and what is the tree and how come it's not burning and what does that represent and who is the angel? And there's so many questions, but I ask this question.

The interaction between Moses and this burning bush. What did Moses see that made him react in that way? What would make a grown man who is a veteran of the wilderness, he's walking through the Sinai, wilderness of Sinai, in the Sinai Peninsula and he's been doing that for 40 years.

He is previously of royal, like, royal culture. So he's probably one who is sharp. He's probably one who could be authoritative. He's probably one who is just stronger, you know, better capable even in battle. But here is this grown man who is a family man, a veteran of the field, looking at something.

But what would make a grown man hide his eyes in fear? As if a little girl who is watching a horror movie and says, "I can't just see this anymore." What would make a grown man do that? It is the picture of the Almighty. It is the picture of God.

When he sees this fire, and not only when he sees the fire, but when it's revealed to him that it is God, then he cannot look. You see that? There's a passage in 1 Timothy 6, verse 16, it says, "He who is blessed and the only sovereign, the King of kings, Lord of lords, who alone possesses immorality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one can see or has seen, to him honor and eternal dominion.

Amen." To what degree is God holy? We ask that question, reminded in this passage, this degree perhaps cannot be quantified, I can't say 10 feet deep. But it is such in which it is unapproachable, it is such in which it is unperceivable, immeasurable. But what's more, I want to remind you, I keep making this contrast, Moses in the eyes of the Jews is the epitome of Jewish leadership.

Moses in the eyes of the Jews is the epitome of Jewish law. He is the leader. I mentioned to you earlier that he is going to be the prophet, he is going to be the judge over the nation of Israel for that time. He is going to be the meteor of the covenant.

But I ask you this question in another way. Who is God? And how holy must he be that his first advice to Moses is, "Don't come close." How holy must he be that in his loving words to Moses, as he calls him by name, "Moses, Moses." That his advice and his sparing words to him is, "Don't you dare draw near, lest you die." How holy must he be that Moses encountered a near death fatal experience, not at the face of a gun, but at the face of a bush.

It is not the bush, it is not the ground, it is the holy God in his presence that now jeopardizes Moses' life. But the question is, how holy must God be that his holiness emanates to that degree. You even look at the manifestation of his glory and you die.

You tread on the ground upon which his presence dwells and you die. And God's advice to him is, "Take off your sandals and bow. Have reverence and worship." Now that is quite amazing, isn't it? And perhaps some of us are thinking, "Wow, what an amazing experience that Moses had." And sometimes we wish, "I wish I had that kind of sight into God." "I wish I had a Saul to Paul conversion." "I wish I had a knock me off the horse, get me on my back and my eyes, I realize it's scaly, literally." "Pastor Paul has eyes like scale and he's supposed to realize, 'Oh my gosh, I'm a blind man.'" "And then he prays for them and he has people pray for him and his scales are removed and he sees the light." Some of us want that kind of experience.

Here's a convicting thought. All of the nation of Israel had it. Turn your Bible over to Exodus chapter 19. Here's another story that I sometimes have heard when I was younger and sometimes I see as a Bible story in Sunday school. And I realize it's only a small caricature of what really happened at the giving of the Ten Commandments.

The giving of the Ten Commandments. Go over to chapter 19 verse 12. God is preparing the nation to receive His commandments and His law. And if you look over at chapter 19 verse 12, in preparation, they're at Mount Sinai, the same mountain as Mount Hor of the mountain of God.

And verse 12 it says, "You shall set bounds for the people all around, saying, 'Beware you do not go up to the mountain or touch the border of it.' 'Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death. No hand shall touch him, but he shall surely be stoned or shot through, whether man or beast.

He shall not live.'" Whoa. Right? The preparation for the receiving of the law was prefaced with such a great and severe warning. Should you come near this mountain into the presence of God, you will surely die. No question about it. And if you look at verse 16 through 19 it says, "So it came about on the third day, when it was morning, that there were thunder and lightning, flashes, a thick cloud upon the mountain, and a very loud trumpet sound, so that all of the people who were in the camp, they trembled.

And Moses brought the people of the camp to meet God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. Now Mount Sinai was all in smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain shaked violently.

And when the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him with thunder." That's pretty crazy stuff. If you've ever seen pictures of a volcano erupting, and the kind of billow of black smoke, and there's thunder and lightning that's ripping through the skies, and the ground is shaking because of the volcano, I mean, this is like that and more.

And everybody who is around the mountain experiences it. And what's interesting is, chapter 20, the word of God comes in verse 1, "The God spoke all these words, saying, 'I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.'" Doesn't that just give you a better picture of those commandments?

If you've read it in some kind of rote, mechanical form, here are the Ten Commandments, these are the words of my God, "I am the Lord your God," and you memorize it like that. But then when you imagine these words coming forth from a mountain covered in black smoke and fire and lightning and people trembling all around, and the ground is shaking, it's a different picture, right?

Different picture. To the degree that if you look over in verse 18, "All the people perceived that the thunder and lightning flashes and sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood at a distance." And look at what they say, "And when they said, then they said to Moses, 'Speak to us yourself, and we will listen, but let not God speak to us, or we will die.'" "Or we will die." "And Moses said to the people, 'Do not be afraid, for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear of him may remain with you, so that you may not sin.'" Here's an application for us.

Perhaps we want that kind of experience, the knock me on my back, the blazing glorious fire in a bush, something miraculous. Although in the moment all the people clattered together, they said, "Yes, God, we hear you, we are afraid, and we will obey you." You know what happened. But for us, we're grateful because we get this picture of God without having to tremble at his feet like we're going to die.

But rather, we get to see this picture of God through the safety of the blood of the Son covering us. Through the entrance into this holy, this unapproachable light through the grace of Christ. And we're able to see this by faith. But there's still a sense as to, as Moses encountered God in this glorious light, we too worship the exact same God who is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

And so there's a sense to which when we gather here, we say, in here as we worship collectively, corporately, there is the presence of God. Because we are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Because we are being built up into a dwelling place of God. Then we in our worship need to reflect the holy presence of the Lord.

There is a threshold, you guys. There is a threshold. There is a threshold that keeps the unholy and holy. There's a threshold of the common and the uncommon. That is, that thing that is unsanctified and the thing that is sanctified. And there is a threshold when we come into this place.

This is not the same as when you walk into a movie theater. Now you might be thinking, we're in the New Testament. This building is nothing. Absolutely right. But we are here together worshiping. Calling on the name of the Lord to bless us. To be with us. So that we might experience Him corporately.

And I want to dare say, you know, there are a couple times when I've counseled young people who truly had a wonder. Who truly had a sense of the divine. And they automatically realized, I'm so far from Him. And they would tell me that they would stop at the doors before they would enter and wonder, can I even come into this place?

Do you realize that that kind of mentality is actually right and appropriate? But what's true is, thanks be to God because we have an answer to that question. Previously in this time of Moses, the question of can we enter is a no. Do not come any closer. But let's be grateful that in Christ the answer is a resounding yes.

Enter by the blood of the Lamb. Amen. But there is a point for us to see that again. The depths, the depth. The depth and the kind of chasm that exists between the Holy God and man. It is to the degree that at that time when Moses is encountering God's glory with the bush, it is unapproachable.

But what's more, I want to make mention of the second fact. We talk about the degree of God's holiness in this burning bush account, but I also want to talk about the extent. Okay, and I'll make this point a little bit shorter. We want to talk about the extent of God's holiness.

You see, I am trying to paint this picture for us right now. Where there is this exalted view of God. He is sovereign, precisely and intimately sovereign and has all things in control. And that contributes to His grandiose holiness, His majesty. Okay, and His then sovereignty and majesty extends and pervades to every other attribute of who He is.

His might and power, His strength and glory. He is holy. And I want to just show you the extent of His glory and majesty by showing you that there is absolutely nothing in terms of the extent of His reach. There is nothing out of His control. There is nothing out of His sovereignty.

There is nothing out of His holiness. If you actually look in the book of Genesis, go over to chapter 15. And this is kind of wild to think about. I mentioned to you earlier that to a significant figure, Abraham, God revealed Himself in chapter 15 as the burning, smoking oven, the fire.

But if you look over in chapter 15 starting from verse, let's say 12. I'm going to read this quite quickly and it says, "And now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram. And behold, terror and great darkness fell upon him. God said to Abram, 'Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and where they will be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years.

And I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and after they will come out with many possessions. As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace. You will be buried at a good old age. Then in the fourth generation, they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.'" What?

He almost, by the, to the T, predicted exactly what was going to happen. And all of the nation is there crying out, "God, are you there? Are you for us or not? Where are you? Do you care?" God has predicted every single thing that would happen to even the judgment that would happen to their oppressors.

I'm talking about the extent. The extent of God's power and might. For you see, when we see that, and we go back to the book of Exodus, we go back to the book of Exodus chapters 3, and we read about God's grace, all of a sudden it has deeper meaning.

It has so much more meaning. Read with me in chapter 3, verse 7 through 9. And he says this, "And the Lord said, 'I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have given heed to their cry because of their taskmasters, for I am aware of their suffering.

So I have come down to deliver them from the power of the Egyptians, and to bring them up from that land to a good and spacious land, to a land flowing with milk and honey, to a place of the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites and the Pezrites, Hivites and the Jebusites.

Now behold, the cry of the sons of Israel have come to me. Furthermore, I have seen the oppression with which the Egyptians are oppressing them.'" So then in verse 10 he says, "Therefore come now, I will send you to Pharaoh so that you may bring my people, the sons of Israel, out of Egypt." Do you see what I mean when it gives more meaning?

Let me make sense of that sometimes because there are times. There are times in which we are not strong and courageous, but we are weak and we are afraid. And there are times in which we are in anxiety, there are times where we're just, "I'm not sure what I'm going to do, I'm not sure what can be done." And I don't know if you are in that kind of situation right now, but listen to me here.

Just really be careful when I say this, okay? If all you heard in that message is, "Don't worry, God loves you," you have not heard enough. Okay? I'm trying to be as careful as my words right now, but that has not enough meaning for you. What I hope to show you is that today was not a point about, "Hey, here are three things to do." It's a point about a perspective on God.

It is not just a man with a good intention who loves you in the midst of your pit, in the midst of your suffering. When you are crying out, when you are in tears, when you feel oppressed, if you are being persecuted, when God says, "I hear, I see, and I am going to come to you," don't think it is just some kind wishes of a nice man.

It is a mighty God who is sovereign precisely and intimately. It is a holy God who has depth and breadth beyond what we can measure or imagine. He is the one who says to you, "I hear, I see, and so I come." We don't just have a good intending holy man who comes to try and save us.

Do you see my point? And so if all you've heard is, "In the midst of my suffering, God just loves me," okay. But realize this is the God who has everything in His control to the degree that it is the control of one man and everything pertaining to his life, to one nation, to the rest of humanity.

God has declared the beginning and the end. God has declared all things. There is nothing in existence that exists apart from Him. And one of the profound facts of the burning bush is as it ascribes to His aseity, He is a self-existing God who needs nothing and therefore can be the source of life for all.

This is the God whom we serve. This is what Moses needs to obey. Unfortunately, we are going to learn, this is part one of a two-part sermon. Next week we are going to think about Moses who says in verse 11, "But who am I? Who are you?" That wasn't the question, Moses.

But it is to our fault that many times when I am fearful, when I have anxiety, when I sit here and truthfully speaking, the concerns of the church, yes, it's upon me. And sometimes the concerns weigh heavy upon me. Sometimes I'm a deep thinker and thoughts just don't go away easy.

I wake up at night and I'm just concerned. When I am like that, when I am overwhelmed, is it not because we frequently lose confidence in the Almighty God? Right? Is it not because we've kind of lost sight and we ask, "Well, who am I? What can I do?" And we'll talk about that more later, but I want to conclude with that thought.

What Moses needs in order to be prepared for this great calling, I know you feel ashamed, I know you ran away from me, I know you've been 40 years removed, but I want you to go back and talk to the leaders of Israel and I want you to bring them out.

What Moses needs to hear to do that is this God Almighty who sends you and is with you. What you and I need to hear to obey is a picture of God who is Almighty, who is sovereign and holy. What the nation of Israel needed was that picture of God giving them the law on the Mount of Horb, the Mount of God.

We all need this great and grand, large picture of God because this is reality. I believe in every fight, every struggle in life, whether it's avoiding my pride or avoiding all the isms of legalism, liberalism, and whatever it may be, materialism. I need a greater picture of God. I need to know that my hand, sorry, my life is in the hand of God Almighty who is sovereign, holy, and good.

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the grace to be with you.