Our scripture lesson this evening is taken from Exodus chapter 3. Let us turn to Exodus chapter 3, please. I thought this morning I went a little bit long, but somebody has placed two mints here today. So we get a two-mint sermon tonight. I guess Dave doesn't think I preached long enough. Thank you. So, Exodus chapter 3, it's a familiar story. I'm sure everyone knows the story of Moses' call and the burning bush. And I think it has a great message for us and for our mission, this passage. We'll read the first 15 verses of Exodus chapter 3. I have page 59, I believe that's page 59 in the few Bibles. Let us hear God's word. Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. Moses said, I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned. When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, Moses, Moses, and he said, here I am. Then he said, do not come near. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground. And he said, I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their suffering. I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of the land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppressed them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh, that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. But Moses said to God, Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt? He said, But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you that I have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain. Then Moses said to God, if I come to the people of Israel and say to them, the God of your fathers has sent me to you, and they ask me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. God also said to Moses, say this to the people of Israel, the Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, has sent me to you. This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all the generations. Boys and girls, how would you like to go fight some wild animal, a venomous snake, armed with just a name? How would you like to go and do battle with a pharaoh, armed with just a name. But indeed, this is exactly what God has told Moses to do, to go and free his people from probably the most powerful nation at that time, armed with just a name. Well, just. We'll see it's not just a name. God reveals himself in this passage in a way important for us, for our calling as God's people in this world, and especially as we think about missions. First of all, let's see that God reveals himself as the God of his covenant. He says, I am the God of your father Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. You know, God has revealed Himself as a God who makes covenant with His people. Covenant. Formal relationship. A relationship that is bound by an oath. A relationship that is a formal, serious relationship. And God bound Himself to His promise before Abraham by Himself passing through the parted animals, You remember when he caused Abraham to fall into a deep sleep and the burning oven passed through the animals, God taking upon himself the curse if he did not fulfill his own promises. And Hebrews reminds us that God didn't have anybody greater to swear by, and so he swore by himself. We cannot know the true God apart from knowing him as the covenantal God. Now, covenant brings to our mind several important things. Covenant talks about history. God makes covenant with real people in real places at real times. We read of real stories that happened in this world. God is the God of this world. God is the God of history. Of course, He's beyond this world and He's beyond history. But He is certainly involved in this world. You know, modern religion in America and in the West as a whole is becoming more and more mystical. People, through their pursuits, spiritual pursuits of yoga, meditation, Buddhism, and other sorts of exercises, seek through mystical religion to remove themselves from the nitty-gritty existence in this world. Why? Because this world has problems and grief and tribulation. And one way to forget that is to put yourself in trance and pretend that it's all illusion. Of course, unfortunately, some versions of evangelical religion are emphasizing, over-emphasizing so much the experiential, the emotional, the sentimental, the mystical experiences over following Jesus Christ in the midst of this life. Well, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is the God of this world. He is the God of our lives here and now, right where we are found. And God reveals himself to Moses in this way. I'm the God of covenant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, real people who lived in real places. God's plans are realized, are fulfilled in history, not in some moment of ecstasis. Secondly, when we talk about God, the covenantal God, we talk about the God who promises. God had promised Abraham. He had made promises to Abraham. And when God comes to Moses now, he presents himself as the God of Abraham, the God who had promised the patriarchs. He would make a great nation of Abraham, and he would bless all the families of the world through Abraham. When we talk about God, the covenant of God, we're talking about a God who makes promises, and he fulfills them. Thirdly, God reveals himself as a holy God. He reveals himself as a holy God. He says to Moses, take off your sandal. This ground is holy because my presence is here. In Moses' first encounter with God face to face, you know, God puts the brakes on mere curiosity, on mere human curiosity, doesn't he? Boys and girls, how many of you have seen maybe a turtle in the grass or a big toad or something, and you go over to see what that's like out of curiosity? Well, that kind of curiosity is okay with toads and turtles, but not with God. You know, there's a lot of people today who go to churches out of mere curiosity. they hear of a church which does such and such a thing or a preacher which is so and so, and they go just like a child going over to see a toad. They go out of curiosity. Well, before God tells Moses to go, he says, stop. God's going to tell Moses to go, but first of all, he says, stop. And sometimes we need to hear this same message, don't we? Oh, I'm probably like a lot of you. We're active people. We like to do things. We like to get up on Monday morning and we got our job to do this week. And we like to work. We like to have a plan. We like to have a strategy. We like to see results. The first thing God told Moses was to stop. And how different this is from the announcements and the invitations that we incessantly hear today to try out Christianity, try out Jesus, the God of the Bible says, stop. Stop. This whole matter of religion, this whole matter of being my people isn't about what you're going to run off and do. Stop and take off your sins. God, first of all, commands reverence. He first commands reverence. Secondly, we see in verses 7 and 8 that the God who is holy and the God who commands reverence is also the God who promises and fulfills his promise. I have seen the afflictions of my people. I have heard their cries. I know their sufferings. I have come down to deliver them. Have you ever made a promise that you couldn't keep? Probably. We make promises that we maybe intend to keep, but we end up not being able to keep it. God has never made a promise he couldn't keep. God had told Abraham 400 years earlier that his descendants would go to Egypt and live for 400 years, but then God would bring them out. And now God tells Moses he's about to fulfill a promise he'd made 400 years earlier. People of God, it is important to remember that the God who requires reverence in his presence is also the God who is powerful. He's powerful enough to keep His promise to save His people even after 400 years. And this is important for every boy, girl, man, and woman present today. Because the gods that humans invent may be gods that make us feel good momentarily. Of course they are, because they're gods made in our own image. We fabricate gods for ourselves, for our own self-interest. The idols that men make are gods that make us feel good because we make them in our own image. But they aren't the God who promises and fulfills His work even after 400 years. The God of the Bible is the God who says, I've seen the misery of my people, I've heard them crying out, and I've come to rescue them. Don't you want a God like that? I do. God requires us to reverence Him as the Holy God, yes. But He is the God who hears and saves His people. And we know that it was in perfect form in Christ Jesus where the righteousness and the mercy of God are embraced. God maintains His righteousness in Christ. Our dear Savior, the Son of God, fulfilling the righteousness of God. And God shows His mercy and love to us by giving Him for us. You see, this story about Moses is not a story that, well, you know, Moses finally trusted God and he went to Egypt and Moses could do it and so can you. That's not what this story is about. This story is about a righteous and holy God who comes in mercy and love and redeems His people. Now, these two aspects of God, the covenant God, are important for the cause of missions. We are tempted to sort of file off the rough edges or the hard edges of what we think are the gospel. Maybe water down the claims of God's holiness in order to attract people, to make the message more palatable to sinners. But the Bible teaches that God can't be split in two. It is the holy, almighty God of the Scriptures who is also the God who hears His people and saves them. God's holiness cannot be separate from His love and His grace. It was the same Jesus who cast out demons and who condemned the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. that same Jesus who wept over Jerusalem and he wept and who wept at the side of the grave of Lazarus. You know, I was sort of taken aback. I talked about the Quito prison this morning. And I was sort of taken aback when I was with the brothers inside the prison because they all were just open with me about what they'd done, what their crimes were, and how many years they were in prison. I visited prison here in the States and it's kind of like an unspoken rule that nobody talks about what their crime was. And here's all these guys coming up to me and saying, you know, I participated in a bank robbery and someone was killed and I'm in for 18 years. And other things. But see, these guys were all disciples of a Reformed chaplain. And they didn't have any problem with admitting that before God's holiness, they were sinners. They had offended God. They didn't have anything to hide. And it was sort of amazing to hear them talking and sharing their testimony. And more than one said to me, Out there, I was a free man. But God in His providence allowed to happen what happened because in here, I'm truly free. I found God's grace and I found salvation. Getting back to the passage, Moses had a dilemma. He had a problem. Moses had feelings of personal inadequacy. And apparently he had some doubts about this whole matter. He had some questions about God's ability to carry out what he was sending him to do. What was at stake here? Verse 13, Moses asks, he says, If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you. And they ask me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? What is at stake here? Two things. The authority of God and the ability of God. Moses is questioning God. And behind all this, there's a question in Moses' mind. The authority of God. Who? What's he going to tell the people who sent him? The ability of God. Now, in the world of the Israelites, of course, We know a polytheistic world. There were many gods. Some were of higher rank than others because religion was closely tied to politics, the stronger nation. It was assumed they had stronger gods. And they were all identified with a name. They all had names. You know, we're moving today in our world much more so again to a polytheistic world. We hear more of Allah, New Age gurus, Buddha, and so forth, different messiahs. Moses wanted to have an answer to the people when they asked, well, who, which God has sent you? Also, Moses needed to know about God's ability. Could God do what he said he could do? Now, we must ask ourselves, were these questions valid questions? Well, in one sense, they are. In one sense they are, but in one sense Moses' questions were probably mixed with the human tendency and desire also to domesticate God and to give him our categories and our qualifications. I believe that Moses had become over the years in some way desensitized, numbed, if you would, to God, to his power, to his glory. Haven't we all tried to manipulate God by trying to know something about him? Well, God must like something, and so we'll make a deal, sort of. And if I do this, then God will be obligated to do that for me. Well, whatever the implications behind Moses' question, God's answer is short and to the point. Verse 14, God said to Moses, I am who I am. Now, this is the most direct and strict identification that human language can communicate with regard to the identity of anyone. Nothing more, I am. Nothing whatsoever that would help humans control God. God identifies himself as I am. What if you met a person and you were presenting yourself and you said, hi, I'm Bill Green. What's your name? And the person responded, I am. And you wait, I am who? But they never say, I am anything else or anyone else. I am. You know, there's only one being in the universe that could say that, and that's God. And after 3,500 years, that name still sends chills down our spine, doesn't it? It should. I am. What does this name communicate? Well, theologians have wrestled with all that it communicates, and you can ask your professors here, Professor Vinay and other Hebrew experts, and what that name communicates. It clearly communicates several things that are very obvious. God is self-sufficient. He's not dependent on anything in his creation. He's the I am, the first and the last. He is the I am. No one may attribute to him anything. He will tell us who he is. He will tell us his will. He will reveal to us. You know, there's a lot of people that have said to me over the years, Well, for me, God is this way, or as far as I'm concerned, God wouldn't do this, or God's not like that. And many people think that they have the right and the capacity to simply pontificate about who God is, what He's like, and what He would or wouldn't do. Well, that's certainly not the idea we get from this passage. Moses is asking for an identification. What can we attribute to you, God? God doesn't allow that. God declares himself to be the absolute self-sufficient God. Theologians talk about God's aseity, his being in himself. He is self-defined. He is self-sufficient. We cannot manipulate him. We cannot define him. he will reveal himself to us. He is also the all-powerful God. Tell them the I Am has sent you. He is the all-powerful God. Now, God is, there's a lot more we could say about this, but we're not going to say anything else. We've said enough, sufficient, because what we can understand through this is that God's self-revelation is sufficient for God's salvation plan. God's self-revelation, His revelation to Moses and His revelation to His people, Moses needs to know that's sufficient. That is sufficient for me to follow God, to obey God. I know God is going to do what He said He's going to do, and this is all He's going to tell us, but it's enough. It's sufficient for us. You know, Marvin Briseño voluntarily took his family, his wife and three children, 15 years ago to live in Los Cuadros. Some of you know about Los Cuadros in Costa Rica. It's about five miles away from our place. It's a low-class neighborhood filled one of the most violent, drug-ridden neighborhoods in San Jose, Costa Rica. We had a little mission work there. And Marvin Briseño had been a leader, an elder in Nicaragua. He moved to Costa Rica, and he voluntarily took over that work. And he has now worked for 15 years in that neighborhood. Marvin Briseño just told me the other day, he's got six people in a pre-baptismal class. Marvin, in a neighborhood where shootings and knifings and separations and fights and everything you can imagine and then some more things go on, Marvin's little church celebrates weddings. It celebrates baptism. It celebrates fun times together. They celebrate Christmas with dramas. We have a little remodeled house up in that community and there's singing there, there's joy, and there is peace and grace and forgiveness coming to men and women in that community because Marvin is convinced and knows that the God who has revealed Himself is sufficient. He is powerful to do what He has promised to do. and he proclaims a powerful, almighty, self-sufficient, self-defined God who has revealed himself in Christ Jesus through his word. And God is fulfilling his work in that neighborhood. And it's a beautiful thing to see. Jesus Christ said that he came to seek and to save the lost. When he was asked if he were the Son of God, he said, I am. And furthermore, you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Mighty One coming on the clouds of heaven. The Jews understood that he was making himself one with Yahweh. They crucified him for blasphemy. He said, I am. I am the Son of God. I am one with the great I am. People of God, this is the God that we trust and this is the Savior that we hail. This is the gospel that we must proclaim. In Latin America, just as in the United States, there is great confusion over the message of salvation, over the essence of who God is and the Savior that He has given to us. I would like to suggest two things in closing. Firstly, that by our life, our living testimony, we give witness to the great I Am. Our lives, God calls us by our lives to reflect the holiness, the holiness that God revealed when he called Moses. Don't come any closer. Take off your sandals. Are you and I living lives that reflect our consciousness, that reflect that we understand and know that before we run off to do the things of our life, the busyness of our schedule, God first calls us. And he does that the first day of the week as we come here. God says, stop, take off your sandals, recognize who I am. And that same attitude and what we experience here should accompany us as we go throughout our week. By our living testimony, let us give witness to the great I am that we have been in the presence of God. Hopefully, our activities tomorrow through the rest of the week will give evidence that we've been here today. We've been in the presence of the great I Am. We've taken our sandals off, so to speak. We've rendered homage to the great I Am. Secondly, God calls us to fully trust His authority and His ability to do what He has promised. God, the covenant God, is able to save. He is able and powerful to save anyone who will trust in Jesus Christ. Let us do away with our timidity, with our fears, with our desire to be respectable. You know what Paul said when he was being criticized for anything and everything by the Corinthians? He said, if you think that I'm loco, crazy, you're right, crazy. If you want to call me that, crazy, with regard to Christ and the gospel. I don't care if you call me crazy, Paul said. I don't want to know anything else but Christ crucified. Well, let us also, people of God, fully trust the authority and the ability of God to do what he said he will do through his people. Let us do away with our timidity and our fears. This God has sent forth his church to announce the gospel. Let us not grow comfortable. Let us not grow lax. The apostle tells us that the time is short. The night will come when no one will work any longer. And I wish to give one last reminder before my wife and I leave Escondido once again. I wish to remind you of the tremendous mission field of Latin America. And I wish to ask for your prayers and your efforts on behalf of that mission field. There are still places in Latin America that have not heard the gospel. remote areas in Mexico, in the Amazon area that still have not heard the gospel. There are millions in this vast continent that are still bound to ritualism in a Roman Catholic traditionalism. The largest city of the world lies just south of our borders, Mexico City, with all the tragic consequences of urban poverty and destitution, not to speak of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro and San Salvador and San Jose, Costa Rica. Only a church which is convicted and convinced by the great I am will have a message of hope and salvation for this people. Only a church that is convicted and convinced of the great I am of the Bible will get down on its knees, believing that God will use our prayers to bring in a harvest. Only a church that is convicted and convinced of the great I am of the Bible will give sacrificially and make missions a priority. God told Moses that he had seen the misery of his people, he had heard their cry, and he had come down to rescue them. I believe in that God. It would be you. Amen. Let us pray. Great God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the great I Am, we bow before you. We recognize, oh God, your self-sufficiency, your self-definition, your sovereignty, your greatness. We ask your forgiveness, O Lord, for the times we have sought to create our own God according to our own image. Tonight, Father, we take our sandals off in your presence. We recognize you for who you are. And we also humbly thank you, Father, that you are a God of mercy. And in Christ Jesus, you have shown how your righteousness and your mercy complement one another and are joined together. And so, O Lord, as we think of a lost world, we think of lost nations and lost peoples, O Lord, we confess this evening that you are merciful and that you are powerful to save men and women out of their sin, out of darkness, out of ignorance, out of bondage, and bring them into the light of the gospel and the knowledge of Jesus Christ. O Lord, use us. Use this church, O Lord. Use us who are here this evening listening to this word. Use us, O Father, to show forth your righteousness and your mercy in Jesus Christ as we go forth with a wonderful promise. Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved. Father, receive glory and honor. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.