A worship service was held at 10.30am in the church on Sunday 30 August.  The service was simultaneously broadcast on the Church Facebook page.  For the next four weeks, you can catch up here.

The Bible passage is Exodus 3:1-15  and David led and preached. He spoke about the famous story of Moses and the burning bush, seeing it as an illustration of the fact that God is present in the whole of creation, and that God can’t be put in a box, or defined by labels, but says simply ‘I am who I am.’  Here’s the full text of David’s sermon:

Sermon

What if God has never been hiding?

What if there is so much more going on than a bush that will not burn up?

What if God has never been hiding?

What if we have just forgotten how to look?

We heard of this man called Moses who was looking after sheep in the land of Midian. For 40 years he had been a shepherd there: this was a place which he would have known every tree, every stone, every hill.

He might have been in this place dozens, hundreds – maybe even thousands of times. And yet, this day, he notices something.

The bush in front of him is on fire.

And the bush is not doing what fiery bushes tend to do: it was not burning up.

There are, perhaps, two miracles here.

One: that there is a weird, infinitely combustible bush.

The other: that Moses actually stopped, turned aside, and looked long enough to notice, instead of getting on with his busy day. And in that moment of quiet attention, God called him by name.

How many infinitely burning bushes have I walked past this week?

I wonder. How many infinitely burning bushes have I walked past this week while checking the notifications on my phone, or chatting, or rushing, or ordering a flat white, or stuck with the thoughts in my head?

God tells Moses to take off his shoes… God tells Moses that this is holy ground.

I wonder. Has this always been holy ground and Moses has just missed it?

A little earlier in the Bible there’s the story of Jacob, one of the founding fathers of the Hebrew people. Jacob is on the run, fearing for his life. He stops a while and, with nothing but a stone for a pillow, he sleeps and has a strange dream. He dreams of a stairway resting on earth with its top reaching heaven, with the angels of God ascending and descending upon it. He dreams of a promise of land, numerous descendants, divine protection, and a safe return to his homeland.

And when he awakes he says:

“Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.”

“How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.”

What appears to be run of the mill – a bush or an uncomfortable wilderness bed… can be awesome.

God is not just found in churches but in the world.

What if God has never been hiding?

What if we have just forgotten how to look?

God in Edinburgh’s melting pot?

I’m not long back from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival… a crowded sensory overload if ever there was one. Where else can you go to see a cancer researcher of Iraqi decent doing stand up comedy?

I also spent some time watching a Malaysian street performer juggling fire while playing a nose flute and balancing on a giant inflatable ball.

And no, I’m not going to demonstrate.

But, just as we heard about the Black Isle Show, the sheer diversity of the people who covered pretty much every inch of the Royal Mile, and their gifts, and their creativity, really spoke to me.

Perhaps because God is not just in a church, or a cathedral, or a bush, or in a forest, or in a wilderness.

What if God is in those busy streets and clubs and pubs and theatres and halls, but we’re just not looking long enough to notice it?

Too often we travel through life like a group of tourists sitting in a bus. The bus is moving through gorgeous countryside and through quaint villages, but the curtains of the windows are drawn closed. The tourists don’t see a thing and they’re busy quarrelling among themselves as to who will have the best seats.

Where is God?

Where is God?

I’ll be honest. There are times when I’ve wondered where God is and what he’s up to.

And yet there are times when I realise that God is bigger and more wonderful and more loving than I ever dared hope.

Not just that, but there are times when I realise that God is working all around us.

In Psalm 104, we read: “You send forth Your Spirit, creatures are created; and You renew the face of the ground.”

God didn’t just create! God is creating. God is renewing. God is active today, all around us. Paul writes in Colossians: “In Christ all things hold together”“.

Not held, hold.

Now, ever present, ever sustaining.

And noticing that changes everything. God is no longer distant. God is no longer disinterested. God is no longer completely other. But rather we find God:

With us.

Can you separate the dancer from the dance?

God does not merely create the world; God dances the world. Can you separate the dancer from the dance? They are not the same thing, but they are not two separate things either. God is in creation the way the voice is in the singer. If you would only stop and look at the dance, you would spot the dancer.

God has given us the capacity to notice – and when we do, everywhere becomes holy ground. Asda, the football ground, the schools, the Anchor Cafe next door.

The Anchor is not just a place for a bacon roll but it’s an altar of ordinary life with people drinking coffee and sharing tears and smiles and dodgy jokes and tensions and reunions.

What if this ground right here is holy ground… not particularly because it’s in a consecrated church but because Christ is in our midst: in the love and care and hospitality and creativity and wisdom and time we share with one other?

The Theatre of God’s Glory

The Reformer John Calvin did not shy away from the glory of the physical world. He described this entire universe as the magnificent “theatre of God’s glory.” Calvin insisted that wherever you turn your eyes, there is not even the tiniest corner of the universe that does not gleam with the radiant sparks of God’s wisdom, beauty, and power. From the vast sweep of the heavens to the smallest creature beneath a stone, creation is perpetually broadcasting the glory of its Maker.

But Calvin also identified our deepest problem: our spiritual vision is flawed. Because of our brokenness, our distraction, and our self-absorption, we look at the world with dim, clouded, superficial, hesitant eyesight. We walk past the theatre of God’s glory every single day without seeing the performance. We rush past the wonders of the earth and the beauty of our neighbours, completely blind to the sacred fingerprints left on everything.

But when we pause to look through the lens of the Spirit, our blurred vision is suddenly brought into sharp focus. The Bible does not teach us to look away from the world, but shows us how to finally see it as it truly is: a very good creation, deeply loved, continuously sustained, and being redeemed, by God.

When our sight is healed, the ordinary world comes alive. The great Quaker mystic George Fox had an incredible spiritual experience. After it he said the whole world was just the same… but it looked different… it gave forth a different fragrance.

Every living thing matters

We realise that because God actively sustains this universe, every living thing matters.

When we look through these spectacles of faith, we no longer see 50,000 children killed or injured in a war zone as mere statistics; we see precious humans made in the living image of God.

When we look at damaged habitats and vanishing species, we do not see numbers on a spreadsheet; we see our fellow creatures struggling under the weight of human neglect.

When we put on the eyes of faith, we begin to feel the world’s pain, celebrate its joys, and treat every step upon it with reverence.

When you truly love your neighbour, the frontier between you and the other is removed.

Their suffering becomes your suffering, their happiness becomes your happiness.

When we slow down,

and pause,

and wait,

We might just wake up and find God.

God defined

Which for some is a terrifying prospect! Many people have been told that God is someone to be afraid of.

The Sufi mystic and poet Rumi spent a long time meditating on the burning bush story. He reflected on the story when he wrote:

Take off your shoes and come! Do not fear my fire, for I am sweet water…”

When we dare to approach, when we dare to see the Holy Ground all around, we may just realise that the terrifying flame is actually the cooling, life-giving water of divine love and grace, inviting us to draw near, take off our shoes, and rest in the Divine Presence.

When Moses stood barefoot before that flame, he asked the question we all ask when confronted with mystery: “What is your name?”

Moses wanted to know God. But he also wanted a label. A definition. Something he could write down, put in a box, and easily explain to the people back in Egypt. I think we all do. Yet God replied simply:

I AM WHO I AM.

Present tense.

Active.

Pulsating.

Being.

God is saying: I am the giver of every breath you take. I am the life holding every atom of this planet together. I am in the love moving at the Anchor cafe, the creativity in Inverness Creative Academy, the wonder in Lochardil Woods, and the grace meeting you in your deepest exhaustion.

God refuses to be reduced to a concept or trapped within the walls of a building. God simply is, inviting us to wake up, take off our shoes, live our lives in the presence of God, under the authority of God, to the glory of God in the wonderful world God created.

This week, do not rush

So this week, do not just rush.

Look under.

Stop.

Pay attention.

Before Jesus laid down his life for the world, he gave his attention to whatever and whoever was before him. He took time in the mountains. In love, he noticed the overlooked, welcomed interruptions as holy inconveniences, and lingered long enough that people felt seen and heard by him.

As I remain in Christ, I slowly begin to realise that one of the simplest ways I can love today is by paying holy attention to the places and creatures and people God places in front of me

Because the voice speaking from the fire is still whispering over every inch of this earth:

“The ground you are standing on is holy. And I am with you.”

Amen.