Yesterday when we were continuing our reflections on the name God revealed to Moses at the

burning bush, I was saying that knowing that he is I am is, in one sense, just the beginning.

It certainly was for Moses. If you were able to take a mental helicopter ride over the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible,

I think you'd share my amazement at just how much Moses learned in the next 40 years about

the character of God.

But Moses must have reflected often on the meaning of the dramatic experience he had at Mount Horeb.

What initiated it in the first place was the sight of a bush that was on fire but was not

consumed.

It must have taken at least a few minutes before it

dawned on him. Here was a bush burning, but apparently the fire was self-propagating. It was

in the bush, and yet the bush wasn't the fuel that kept the flame alight. In fact, the bush

was burning, but it wasn't burning up. A fire

was present in the middle of the bush, and yet the fire was completely independent of the bush

for its existence. This was a fire like no fire Moses had ever seen.

I suspect that the more Moses thought about this, the more he played and replayed the scene

over and over in his mind in later months and years, the more he understood what was happening.

It was as though I am, Yahweh, the Lord, was saying, Moses, there is none like me in heaven

or on earth. I am who I am. But I want you to know who I am, to understand as far as you

are able what kind of God I am is.

And so he created something like himself as a kind of picture, an acted parable of a God

who is absolutely independent, uncaused, in need of nothing, sufficient for himself, a fire who simply burns, uncreated fire.

And yet at the same time, he is the I Am who makes himself present in history and among his people,

...