Don't Pass by Your Burning Bush

Your preacher enters the pulpit. He clears his throat and says, "The Lord has spoken to me."
Do you?
A) Lean forward to hear what he has to say
B) Yawn, because he says this often without any proof
C) Grab your checkbook and put it out of sight because this generally means he is about to ask for money
D)Wonder who "lobbied" him to get the church to do something they wanted

Does God still speak? Are these statements, most often made up by preachers, just fairy tales? Or, are there "burning bushes" for God's people to stop and hear from Him?

Yes, God does still speak. Yes, many of the statements are fairy tales made up by preachers. Yes, there are "burning bushes" to stop and hear God speak.

So often preachers are pressured by the congregation to do something. They may not know what it is but they need to do something. So, many preachers look around for something to do. Often, they build a new building. Often, that building is a new sanctuary. They get "a word from the Lord" to convince the congregation that is what needs to be done.

I will admit that I have done this. It was wrong and I have repented. I didn't know what to do and doing nothing did not seem to be an option. The only answer was to "have a word from the Lord." It proved unfruitful to take the Lord's name in vane. I should have known better. I hope I never say God told me something when He really didn't again.

That does not mean that I have never heard from God. That does not mean that He hasn't gotten my attention so that I could tell the congregation something they needed to hear. Those have been precious times and I should never make them less so by mixing pseudo-revelation in with the true, God given revelation.

God gives us "burning bushes" which stop us in our tracks while we were minding our own business, and speaks His calling to do something we may have let die or never known He wanted us to do. He takes us beyond what we believe we are capable of to do what we could never do without Him.

Just like Moses, we offer our objections. We do not have the natural capability. No one will believe us. We are scared to try and fail so we are ready to fail to try.

I have had so many people tell me that they believed God had called them to do something (most often it was to preach) but they did what was natural instead. They kept at the same job in the same town they had always been. They shared their revelation with others but never did anything about it. They had a "burning bush" but they let that experience pass them by. They lived good lives but never the life that God planned for them.

This blog is not intended for you to try to have a moment of revelation from God. It is not an attempt to get you to produce a revelation. That is in God's hands. He stopped Moses without Moses wanting to be stopped. This blog is a cry for you to follow through on what God has told you.

You have already had a "burning bush." Doing nothing about it is just letting it pass by.

Exodus 3:2-3 (NIV)
² 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. ³ So Moses thought, "I will go over and see this strange sight--why the bush does not burn up."