Home

Our Church

Services of Worship

Our People

Coming Events

Getting Married at Holy Trinity

Youth

Sermons

Prayer Groups

Education

Articles of Interest

Parish Magazine

St. Augustine's

Anglican FAQs

Inspiration

Links

So that means that the events we heard about in tonights first reading – Moses standing / enquiring before the Burning Bush – must have taken place sometime before that.   This phenomenon marks God’s personal call to Moses to be the Deliverer, the Saviour, the one who would set the Israelite slaves free and lead them out of Egypt.   So lets imagine that somewhere around 1400 B.C., - that’s nearly 3 ½ thousand years ago - while Moses is taking care of his Father-in –Law’s sheep, he has this experience of seeing a bush which appeared to be on fire, yet was not consumed.  We know the story fairly well, don’t we ?              Moses goes closer to investigate but is told by a voice which appears to come out of the bush, not to go any closer – for he is in the presence of God, and the place where he is standing is Holy ground.  God tells Moses that He has seen the suffering of his people and that Moses will be the one who will go to Pharaoh  and demand, in the name of God, that he let them go.  Well Moses is no fool and he knows that Pharaoh will want to know who sent him. And when he says “God sent him” , Moses therefore needs to know something about this amazing God who has just confronted him.  In other words he needs to know the character and the nature of God.

            I had a young woman ring me up on Friday  who, when I answered the phone, hesitated a little, because she said she didn’t really know  how to put it, or what to say,  but that everything seemed to be going wrong in her life, and she wanted to know if God was punishing her for something.  In other words – she wanted to know “Is this what God does?”  -  is this what God is like?  We ask those questions too, sometimes, - don’t we?  

               It was common in Eastern lands – for a person to be given a name which described their character. Some of these were positive and complimentary – and some of these weren’t.  The name “Jacob” for example  - the son of Isaac – sounds very much like “cheat” , because he cheated his brother Esau from his inheritance. On the other hand Jesus gave Simon a new name – Peter – Petros – the rock – to describe the trust which Jesus had in his new character.  So asking a persons Name was a way of finding out their character – their nature; the qualities of their life!   And Moses wanted to know the character of this God who had just spoken to him, and was calling him to go to Pharaoh and demand the freedom of his people.  After-all, could Moses depend on this God who had spoken to him? 

            So God says to Moses – “Tell Pharaoh that “I am who I am”  or “I am – I will be” sent you!

.

Now to us,  that may not seem very helpful. But Moses understood.  Because the Hebrew word which Moses heard was in in fact a combination of two verbs. – “I am” and “I will be”.  Now in the Hebrew language this word is made up of just four letters – YHWH, and the most likely spoken form for this word  - adding in a few consonants – would be the word Yahweh.  ( By way of an aside, - often this word is translated “Jehovah” but this is more likely to be incorrect.)   So when Moses asks God’s name  - God replies  - “I am- I will be” has sent you.   Yahweh has sent you.

“I am” means I am always presently existing – I am always the same.- there was never a time when I wasn’t, and there will never be a time when I wont be! ! -   And “I will be” – means I will always be – always exist - the same as I always was.   So God is saying – “I am the One who never changes; will never be altered;  I am the One whose love is never diminished, whose strength never wavers or wanes. I am the one who never gets tired, who never gets sick or grouchy; I am the only reliable unalterable totally dependable One there is.      I am who I am!         I am “immutable” – to use a theological term! I am invariable, unalterable – I do not change!      God says  “I have every bit as much love in my heart for the world today as I did on the day I created this universe-  and I will continue to always love the world in that exact same degree.” Nothing you do can make God love you more – and nothing you do can make God love you less!

God says – “My love for you never changes, never wavers, never varies!”  

   That unchangeableness of God is the highlight of the story Jesus told of the Prodigal Son, isn’t it?  Regardless of what we do – God still loves us with unchanging and undiminished love.   Some years after Moses, King David was to write in one of his Psalms  - “The One who watches over Israel will neither slumber or sleep.”  God doesn’t need “time-out” from this world. He doesn’t grow tired of our prayers, or weary of keeping the world in its orbit! 

            Moses had revealed to Him that this God was not fickle like the man-made gods of the nations round about. This God didn’t need to be amused, or woken up, or humoured, or placated! God was God – and He was and always will be the same.   The Hebrew name –Yahweh -  and in English is translated as Lord -  is the same word which David later used when he wrote  “The Lord is my shepherd”.  We have an unchanging Shepherd – an unchanging Lord!

But we live in the midst of change , don’t we?   Everything changes. Our attitudes change. Our health changes; our opinions change; our hairline and our waistline changes. The person we married is not the person we married – we are constantly changing!  Our convictions change, our economy changes and our world changes. In the midst of that change - We need someone in our life who never, never changes.

            Lloyd Douglas – who wrote the best selling novel “The Robe”, when at College lived in a Boarding house. Across the passage way from him lived a retired, wheel-chair bound, music professor. Each morning, on his way out, Lloyd Douglas would visit the Professor, and when he entered his room, had the customary bright greeting of asking-  “Tell me the good news for the day?”     Whereupon the professor would reach across the table, take a tuning fork, strike it on the metal frame of his wheel-chair , hold it up to his ear and say -  “That - Mr.Douglas -   is Middle “C”.   The tenor down the hall sings flat! The piano upstairs is out of tune!  - but that is middle C.!  It was Middle C yesterday, it is middle C today; and it will be middle C tomorrow.” 

            You and I need a Middle C in our lives, don’t we?   . Someone who never changes;  because everything else does – doesn’t it!   

            And on this Trinity Sunday – we are reminded that this unchanging and unchangeable God is not just some distant God who only appeared to some lucky person  like Moses.   He also came among us and in the ultimate act, demonstrated His unchangeable love in Jesus Christ.  And not only that, but He has given to us His Holy Spirit whom we may have as an eternal and unchanging centre – a still point in our lives – who holds us firm, when everything else changes.  Yahweh, – “I Am – I will Be”, the Lord God,  is the eternal unchanging God who draws us to Himself tonight.

------------------------