Don’t Miss the Moment
by Adriel Anderson
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.”
Exodus 3:1–5
Even if you’re not from a church background, chances are you’ve heard of this story in some way, if only just the phrase “burning bush.” What Moses saw that day set off a chain of events in which he walked in God’s power, participated in miracles, and led an entire people group out of slavery and through a generation-long desert journey toward promise. And all of this started when he was . . . wait for it . . . eighty years old.
Moses began herding sheep—a second career after being a prince—in his forties, and forty years of herding sheep in the same backwater region hadn’t left Moses numb, bored, or world-weary. He stayed alert to his surroundings and maintained his curiosity. At eighty he was still willing to expend his time and energy to turn aside and investigate the abnormal. He kept his sense of wonder awake, and so he glimpsed the wonderful.
And Moses didn’t just observe the wonderful—he walked toward it. You see, when the Lord saw that Moses went to investigate, then the Lord called out to Moses. Moses was responsive to what he saw and responsive to God’s calling his name. At eighty years old, he didn’t believe the lie that his moment had passed or that his murderous past excluded him from a marvelous future. Instead, Moses took off his sandals and had a conversation with the living God that would change the course of his life and of history.
God is trying to have conversations with you and me. Even more amazing, if you follow Jesus Christ, the old is gone, the new is here. The fire of God has fallen on you through His Spirit, and YOU are now holy ground set ablaze. Like the burning bush, you are not consumed by the fire, but instead become an object drawing people to God. But unlike the burning bush, you are not fixed in one place. You are a temple on the move, changing the world as you go. You bring people to God and bring God to people. So don’t you dare grow bored with your life or believe that you are somehow excluded from being powerfully used by God. The stakes are too high.