A Bush Aglow

November 15, 2013

“Moses was amazed because the bush was engulfed in flames, but it didn’t burn up.  Moses said to himself. “Why isn’t that bush burning up?” (Exodus 3: 2, 3 NLT)  

These verses are taken from a familiar passage that describes the call of Moses.  I love this story because it is the greatest illustration in the Bible of what I call 4 Spiritual Secrets:

I’m not but He is.
I can’t but He can.
I don’t want to but He wants to.
I didn’t but He did.

Applying the Secrets to Moses, he was not the deliverer of God’s people from their awful slavery and suffering in Egypt.  God was their Deliverer.  Moses could not deliver them but God could.  Based on his objections we know Moses did not want to deliver those people.  God wanted to deliver them.  When the Red Sea parted and the people of God marched through on dry ground nobody had to tell Moses: “You didn’t do that.” He knew, “God did that!”

The primary detail in this story is often overlooked.  God got the attention of Moses when a bush burst into flame and was not consumed!  In the extreme heat of the desert this often happens, but a burning bush is always consumed in about five seconds.  The miraculous reality that the bush was not burning up moved Moses to turn aside and see how to be a vehicle of deliverance.

Epidemic addiction issues exist today that have millions looking for deliverance. There is also epidemic burnout among those who serve the Lord.  As servants of God we need to turn aside with Moses and see how to be a “Bush Aglow” on fire for the Lord, without burning up or burning out, as conduits of God’s deliverance.

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Posted by Dick Woodward

A Banquet of Consequences

May 7, 2013

“So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”  (Exodus 32:24)

After the greatest miracle in the Old Testament delivered the children of Israel from slavery in Egypt they went around in circles of unbelief for nearly 40 years.  Moses went up on Mount Sinai several times interceding for them with God.  While he was there the people became so corrupt they made a golden calf, which was an Egyptian idol for God.  They were going to return to Egypt behind this idol proclaiming that this God deserved the glory for bringing them through the Red Sea and out of Egypt!

Moses confronted Aaron who was the spiritual leader responsible for them.  He asked Aaron, “What have these people done to you?” I quoted the reply of Aaron.  While Exodus 32 tells us Aaron skillfully created the golden calf, his response to Moses was that he threw their gold in the fire and out came this calf!

Life is a banquet of consequences and every one of us must eventually sit down and eat the banquet we have accumulated.  Our capacity for following the example of Aaron is almost infinite.  We can rationalize until we convince ourselves that we put a lot of gold in the fire of life and somehow there came out this calf.  Denial (‘de Nile’) is not just a river in Egypt.  We often elect to swim in denial until we are far from reality.

We need to deny our denial, confess and be mature enough to accept the responsibility for what we have contributed to our personal banquet of consequences.

Will our choice be reality and responsibility or to swim in denial?

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Posted by Dick Woodward

A Definition of Humility

October 28, 2012

“By faith Moses… esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt… looked to the reward.”    (Hebrews 11: 23, 26)

No man has ever made a greater contribution to the work of God than Moses.  He gave the people of God their freedom when they were not free.  He gave them the one thing newly emancipated people need more than anything else: law and government.  Spiritually, he gave them the Word of God and worship.

A famous spiritual heavyweight named Dwight L. Moody summarized the life of Moses this way: “He lived 120 years in three periods of 40 years.  In the first 40 years he learned that he was nobody.  In the second 40 years he learned that he was somebody.  In the last 40 years of his life Moses and the whole world learned what God can do with somebody who has learned that he is nobody!”

Moses faced his greatest challenge when God called him to deliver God’s people from their awful slavery in Egypt. Moses had tried to do this on his own and failed, but God told him as He appeared in the burning bush: “You are not the deliverer.  I am.  You can’t deliver them but I can.” When the greatest miracle in the Old Testament happened God did not need to tell Moses: ”You didn’t do that.  I did!”

Have you ever tried to be the conduit of God’s deliverance from the slavery of addiction or sin in the life of another person?  When you do you simply must learn this definition of humility: you are not the deliverer.  God is.  You can’t deliver them but God can.  And if deliverance happens God is the Deliverer.

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Posted by Dick Woodward

A Prescription for Learning the Word of God

July 20, 2012

“… that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Lord.”   (Deuteronomy 8:3)

These words are taken from one of the great sermons Moses preached after the children of Israel were delivered from Egypt just before they invaded the land of Canaan.  They had wandered in a terrible wilderness for 40 years in which they suffered every imaginable hardship.  In this sermon God tells them through Moses that He was using all that suffering to make them know every word that He has ever spoken.

By devotional and personal application we can realize that this is one of the ways we learn the Word of God today.  God is our Mentor and He does His most effective mentoring when we are in difficult places.  While facing crises and challenges that overwhelm us God makes us know His Word.  Every adversity God permits or directs into our lives is redemptive and is an opportunity for us to let God make us know His Word.

God is fiercely committed to the proposition that we are going to grow spiritually into perfection or completeness and maturity.  The first chapter of the letter of James informs us that God’s trials should not be treated like intruders but welcomed as friends because they are sent from God.  He does this because He wants us to be perfect or complete and lacking nothing.  Jesus told us to be perfect even as our Heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:48).

So when those tough times come sit up and pay attention.  God has come to the front of the classroom and He is about to teach us His Word.

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Posted by Dick Woodward

A Common Currency

January 4, 2012

“So teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom.” (Psalm 90:12)

In this profound Psalm Moses gives us a wise perspective with which to begin a new year.  He writes of the brevity of our life span.  He states that God gives us seventy or eighty years of life.  Then he suggests a solemn prayer that God might teach us to number our days and gain a heart filled with wisdom.

A missionary was speaking to a primitive group of people.  Because some of the listeners had traveled for days or more than a week to hear him speak, when he concluded a message they would ask him to continue speaking.  After many hours had passed they asked him through the interpreter if he was wearing his god on his wrist because each time they asked him to continue he looked at his watch as if seeking permission.  We should not value time to the point that it is our god, but the thesis of Moses in this Psalm is that we should value time because we do not have very much of it.

With great fairness God gives everyone the common currency of 24 hours a day, 168 hours a week and 8,760 hours a year.  Since life is a short trip we should value that common currency and ask Him for the wisdom to know how to spend that time by the year, the month, the week, the day, the hour and the minute.

We wear timepieces because we value life.  Let’s ask God to give us the wisdom to know how He wants us to spend the time He gives us in 2012.

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Posted by Dick Woodward

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