Holy Ground

A bunch of favourites for me this morning – a favourite passage, a favourite song, a favourite verse and one of my favourite spiritual concepts – well worth getting up for on a dark, cold, windy October morning!

Firstly the passage –

Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, ‘I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.’

When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

And Moses said, “Here I am.”

“Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.”

Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.”

At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.  Exodus 3:1-6

Moses was getting on with his everyday life. God broke through into his reality. Moses noticed. He stopped and recognised God in the situation. He responded in awe and respect.

Now for the song – Be still for the presence of the Lord, the Holy One, is here – the first verse is based on this passage for sure –

Be still, for the presence of the Lord, The Holy One, is here.
Come bow before him now, with reverence and fear.
In him no sin is found, we stand on holy ground.
Be still, for the presence of the Lord, The Holy One, is here.

Because sometimes we need to take the time out and be still to realise the presence of God all around us. Here’s the verse –

Be still and know that I am God.  Psalm 46:10

Simple really. And maybe being still is the only way for us to know God in our busy lives. That’s one of the great things about church – not that God lives there and that we have to go there to meet him – but we are forced to sit still, leave all the jobs at home, respond to the music and words and focus on the presence of the Holy One.

But we do not have to go somewhere else to seek God – moving on to the spiritual concept now…….God is here. God is there. God is everywhere. God is in all things. Around here, Emmanuel means the school up the road, but more importantly, Emmanuel means GOD WITH US. God is always with us – around us, in front of us guiding the way and beside us holding our hand and behind us ready to catch us when we fall.

We all have those moments – Andy had one just now – when the power and beauty of nature overwhelms us and makes us stop and see God –

Amazing sky – it’s like a fire across the horizon. Isn’t it amazing?

Just like a burning bush.

And then there are those moments where something special is going on – it’s a normal meal or conversation or task and yet it feels weighted with significance. It stops being normal and becomes extra meaningful. We know something out of the ordinary has just occurred. In his book ‘What we talk about when we talk about God’, Rob Bell describes this kind of experience, this awareness of the importance of things as kavod, a Hebrew word which was originally a business term referring to the heaviness of something but which came to take on a more figurative meaning –

Kavod is serious – not in an overbearing, stilted kind of way but in a sacred, holy kind of way. The word is often used in the scriptures to refer to God’s glory – that which happens when the monotony is pierced, the boredom hijacked, the despair overpowered by your sense that something else is going on, just below the surface, something that’s bigger and wider and deeper and more powerful than anything you can begin to imagine. Something that reminds you of your smallness, frailty and impermanence. It’s that gut-level awareness you’re seized by that tells you, ‘Pay attention, because this matters.’ (page 114)

How cool is that? I love it. I love that as I start this day, I know I will encounter God somewhere at some point and it will take my breath away. Rays of heaven will pierce through the darkness. My friend Ruth calls these ‘life’s little sacraments’. I don’t have to go to church or study the Bible or sit in earnest prayer (although each of these have their place in my life – obv!) – but God is out there waiting to surprise me and bring me up short and make me smile and that makes this day full of unknowns and fears and anxieties a little more exciting – in fact, pretty mind-blowing!

So keep your eyes peeled today. God is longing to surprise you with your very own burning bush. He wants to connect with you today. Of course you can be like my friend who is an expert at explaining all this sort of thing away – ‘I thought God was speaking to me through your novel but soon managed to persuade myself that that was utterly ridiculous. There is no God anyway!’

Be still. Breathe. Savour the moment. And respond (nothing major like taking off sandals – more of a conscious recognition of what is happening).