The Call

1 Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb. 2 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. 3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. 4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. 5 And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

The Mountain of God

Exodus 3:1 KJV 1900

1 Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

A desert place

In our opening text,

We find that Moses is in a desert place.

A desert represents a place of desolation

A place where life is often incapable of growing and flourishing

A stagnant place

A dry and barren place

This is the kind of place you find yourself in

When you are called of God

But you are not currently heeding that call.

A desert place

The land between your calling, and your destiny

If you are not careful,

You can easily die in the desert

There isn’t much life sustaining resources there

There is little food

And there is even less water

The desert is not the place you want to dwell

Not if you intend to thrive

Midian

Moses isn’t just in any desert

Moses is in a Midianite desert

And he is living with a priest of the Midianites.

The Midianites can be traced back to Abraham’s second wife

The one we often forget about

And perhaps for good reason

Keturah was her name

And Abraham married Keturah after Sara died.

Unlike Sara, Keturah gave Abraham many sons

But Issac was the son of promise

And like Abraham’s first son Ishmael

His sons from Keturah would cause his children problems in the future.

We find that the Midianites often paired up with the Moabites against Isreal

The Moabites came from another relative of Abraham

That Nephew lot, who had two sons from his two daughters

After his wife became a pillar of salt

Moab and Midian

The son of Lot and the Son of Abraham

They didn’t follow the one true God

That is why you hear God referred to as

“The God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob”

He was not the God of Moab, Midian, or Ishmael

There was a separation that took place

through a promise made to Abraham, Issac, and Jacob

God commanded Israel to treat the Midianites as adversaries and to destroy them because of the Midianites’ attempts to undermine worship of Yahweh in Israel.

Midianites conspire with Moab to have Balaam curse Israel. (Num 22–24).

And Later, Cozbi, the daughter of a Midianite leader,

Engages in sexual relations with an unnamed man from the tribe of Simeon

As a form of Baal worship

The false God of Fertility, Crops, and Rain

That act, caused a plague to come upon Isreal in Numbers 25,

Killing 24,000 in Isreal,

And God’s Priest ended the plague by putting a Javelin through

The Israelite man and the Midianite woman.

Theologians have noted that this act in Numbers 25, in the context of the Baal worship at Peor,

is considered to be part of the broader spiritual contamination of Isreal

deliberately engineered by the Midianites and Moabites

Perhaps that is why Abraham wisely sends the Sons of Keturah to the east country

Just before Jacob his grandson is born

The one that would be called “Isreal”

Genesis 25:6 KJV 1900

6 But unto the sons of the concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward, unto the east country.

Hopefully that sheds some more light on our text

It just mentions in passing that Moses was living with a Midianite priest

Who would have worshipped Baal

And Moses didn’t just spend the night there

He married one of the priest’s daughters

and he lived there for 40 years in the desert of Midian

This is what the adversary does to people called of God

First, he tried to kill Moses as a baby

and, I could preach a while on that

The devil always goes after the kids with a promise

He went after Able

He went after Joseph as a child

He went after Moses as an infant

He went after Jesus as an infant

But if he doesn’t successfully take you out when you are young

The next thing the devil does is lead you into the desert

Somewhere far away from your destiny

Where you can be distracted by the daughters of a Midianite priest

and before you know it,

40 years have passed

And you wonder if you even have a purpose anymore

The Mountain

But one day while you are in the desert

You’ll see a Mountain in the distance

And I believe God is always trying to get his people from the desert to the mountain

And in our text, it says that Moses led his flock to the backside of the desert

and then it says, he came to the mountain of God

Exodus 3:1 KJV 1900

1 Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

And this is how it often happens

God gives you a Purpose and Calling

The devil tries to kill you when you are young

Then the devil leads you to a desert place

But when you are just going about your business in the desert

One day you find yourself at the base of the Mountain of God.

You probably didn’t even intend to go there

You’ve been distracted for years in the desert

And then out of nowhere

You find yourself climbing up a mountain

And God begins to lead you to higher ground

And in the mountain tops you can see farther

And it is there, on the Mountain of God

That you start to remember

I have a purpose

I have a calling

I was born for something more than dying in the desert

And while you were in that desert place

Distracted by the Daughter of a Midianite Priest

Which represents the things of this world

Which lure you away from God’s purpose

You stay distracted as long as you are in the desert

That’s why Abrham wanted Isaac and Isreal to be separated from Midian and his brothers.

Midian is a distraction of the world

but when you get to the Mountain of God

That is when God can do things to get your attention

Things that you would have ignored in the desert place

Where you were distracted

But things that now grab your attention on the mountain of God

The Bush that Wouldn’t Burn

The attention getter God used in our text was a burning bush in verse 3

But not just any burning bush.

A bush that was burning,

but not being consumed.

If that doesn’t get your attention

I don’t know what will.

Exodus 3:2 KJV 1900

2 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

Wake Up Calls

This burning bush represents what I call a wake up call

God sends them to us often

When nothing else seems to be getting our attention

The come in the form of storms

And they come in the form of trials

and they come in the form of tragedy

But rest assured

The wake up calls will come.

My mom and I visited a relative that had a heart attack a while back

He died on the way to the hospital

They were able to revive him when he got there.

But it was a close call

My mom told him,

You know this is a wake up call from God

And he replied,

I guess I’ve had a few of them lately

He proceeded to testify about many close calls over the previous 6 months

I said, maybe it is about time you answer the phone

Because, let me tell you something

The wake up call is not going to ring forever

If you keep ignoring it

Pretty soon, the phone will go silent

And that is a scary place to be in

When even God stops trying to get your attention

2 Peter 3:9 KJV 1900

9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.

It is not his will that any should perish

but that ALL come to repentance

That means, He wants you to answer the wake up calls in life

And not just as it pertains to salvation

But as it pertains to your purpose

There are too many laborers

Holding church pews down

That God has called to do so much more

But they won’t answer the call

There are many reasons why people don’t answer

And we will talk about those reason in this series

But for now, I just want to stress that when God calls

You need to answer

When God does something to get your attention

Don’t ignore it

Pick up the phone

And Answer the Call!

Turning Aside

Verse 3 says:

Exodus 3:3 KJV 1900

3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.

After 40 years of being distracted in the desert by the daughter of a Midianite

Moses finally “turned aside”

This turning aside is a pivotal moment in answering the call of God

It indicates that you changing directions

Like repentance is turning from sin unto God

This turning aside moment for Moses

Was turning away from 40 years of being distracted

To start the next 40 years of being used mightily by God.

We see a similar moment in many biblical characters

And I can point to that moment in my own life

I can also guarantee that if I passed the microphone

There are many in this room that could testify

About a time and a place where they “turned aside to see what God was doing”

When God does something to get your attention

You’ve got 3 choices

You can turn away intentionally ignoring it

You can miss it complete because of distractions in your life

Or you can turn aside and see what God has in store

Moses chose option 3

And, we will see the importance of turning aside in the very next verse

Exodus 3:4 KJV 1900

4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

Notice the order of operation here

God did not prematurely call Moses by name

God waited for that “turning aside” moment

And When the LORD saw that turning aside moment

Then and only then

Did God Called unto Moses

and He said, Moses Moses

I want to remind someone here

God knows you by name

He knows how many hairs are on your head

He formed you in your mother’s womb

And he knows how many days you have left on this Earth

If you have been waiting to hear from God

And all you hear is radio silence

There is a couple of things that could be causing the silence

You are in the desert place of Distraction, or

God is waiting for you to “turn aside”

Turning aside means putting something away that mean less than God’s purpose

Turning aside means laying down distractions

Turning aside means putting your eyes on Jesus

Turning aside means putting your focus on His will

Turning aside means taking another step in faith toward Jesus

Turning aside means to stop trying to fix your problems, and give them to God

Turning aside means strenghthening your commitments to church, to the kingdom, to prayer, to fasting, to reading your Bible and to witnessing

When you “turn aside” you are going toward your calling

And away from distractions.

When Moses turned aside,

THEN God called him by name

Moses Moses!

Exodus 3:4 KJV 1900

4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.

Here am I

Now that God has called you by name

It is time to respond

There are three responses once again

Ignore God and turn back to what you were doing

Tell Him no, I’m not doing that Lord, Or

Here I am

Moses chose option number 3

And simply said

“Here I Am”.

There’s something about phrase that is so simple

but it is so powerful

You’ve got to have the “Here I Am” moment if you want to be used of God

Genesis 22:11 KJV 1900

11 And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.

Genesis 46:2 KJV 1900

2 And God spake unto Israel in the visions of the night, and said, Jacob, Jacob. And he said, Here am I.

1 Samuel 3:4 KJV 1900

4 That the Lord called Samuel: and he answered, Here am I.

Acts 9:10 KJV 1900

10 And there was a certain disciple at Damascus, named Ananias; and to him said the Lord in a vision, Ananias. And he said, Behold, I am here, Lord.

Isaiah 6:8 KJV 1900

8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us? Then said I, Here am I; send me.

“The Here am I” moment is the moment you are ready to answer the call

“Here am I” means, I’m listening

I’m paying attention

I’m ready to go where you want me to go

I’m ready to do what you want me to do

I just want to take a minute to tell somebody

That your “Here am I” moment is coming

You’ve been beat up

You’ve been hurt

You’ve been distracted

You’ve been struggling

And tonight can be your night to say

Lord.. I’m here

I might be broken

But I’m here

I might be hurt

But I’m here

I might have a trouble past

… I might have been here before and left a hundred times

… I might have fallen 1000 times

… I might have anxiety

… I might have problems I can’t solve

BUT HERE AM I

Sometimes I have to remind the devil that too

You might have tripped me up yesterday

But I’m still here

I’m not quitting

I’m not backing down

I’m not going back to that desert place

I’m on the mountain of God

and God has called me by name

and HERE AM I

Holy Ground

I’m coming to a close

In the last verse of our text

After Moses turned aside

Then God called him by name

And Moses responded “Here I AM”

Then God says, wait

Don’t come close to me yet

Let’s read it again

Exodus 3:5 KJV 1900

5 And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

You see, Moses

You’ve been running around that desert place for 40 years

And to get close to me

Some things have to change

I know it isn’t popular preaching in 2024

But my Bible still says

Hebrews 12:14 KJV 1900

14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:

And in our text, the Lord says

I know you turned aside

And I know I called you by name

And I know you answered “Here am I”

But I need you to do one more thing for me

Take your shoes off

because you’re standing on holy ground

In the 19th century

The Southern Methodist Church began to preach holiness

And in what would become to be known as the Holiness Revival or Holiness Movement

There were reports of spontaneous miracles

Outpourings of the Holy Spirit

People speaking in tongues

And people falling on altars weeping uncontrollably

They only changed one thing

They followed Holiness

Holiness is not a list of rules to follow

Holiness is not a dress code

Holiness is not legalism

If you think holiness is legalism

Then you don’t have holiness

Holiness is a desire to please God

When Adam and Eve knew they were naked

They covered themselves with fig leaves

And the Bible says that God made them coats of animal skins

Your idea of holiness is never going to be the same as God’s idea of holiness

We are carnal

We are sinful

We are fallen

But when God’s Spirit begins to work in a person’s life

A person that turns aside, and says “Here I AM”

Then things begin to change automatically

True holiness is a change in your heart

It is a change from the inside

And when it happens you won’t complain when God says to take off your shoes

You’ll ask Him, what else Lord

What else do you want me to give up

What else can I do to please you

I don’t care what I have to do

As long as I get to stand on Holy Ground

As Long as I get to be in your presence!

Altar

Let’s All Stand

Some of us in this room are at different places right now

Some are in the desert of distraction

And God is calling you back to the Mountain of God

Some of us are on the Mountain

But you can’t hear God’s voice

and He is waiting for you to have that “turning aside” moment

Some of us have turned aside

We just haven’t said Here I AM Lord

Use me

And Some of us said Here I AM

But then God said

Ok, but first, take your shoes off

And “taking your shoes off” represents

Something that God is asking you to lay down

And it will always be hard to lay it down

Abraham had to lay his own son on the Altar

But God is going to test you to see if you really want to be close to him

Or if you’d rather have something temporary from the world more than Him

Where are you at tonight?

Are you in the desert place?

Are you on the mountain needing to hear him call your name?

Are you holding onto something that God wants you to lay down?

These Altars are open, and the live feed is ending now

It is just us in this room

Let’s all find a place to pray

The Call

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