I’ve been going through 40 days of contemplative prayer. If you have no idea what I just said…basically it involves reading a passage and waiting for a word or phrase to stick out to you and then meditating on that. Plus a lot of stuff about breathing and silence. I find meditating to be really hard. Reallllly hard. However, it has been helpful to identify a word, sentence, or image to constantly come back to anytime I catch my thoughts drifting off…which is ALL OF THE TIME. This week I was reading a passage in the book of Exodus. You know, The Prince of Egypt story. If you haven’t seen The Prince of Egypt, you need to. Seriously. Best. Soundtrack. Ever. The part in the movie where Moses encounters the burning bush has always made me laugh because God’s voice sounds absolutely ridiculous and the whole concept of God speaking through a plant on fire. I mean…what?

But anyway…I’m reading this story and I’m thinking okay, regardless of how strange this whole thing seems…what can I take from it? What nugget of wisdom can I hold on to? How does this apply to my life right now? What does this say about who God is?

So, I found myself pouring over this verse again and again:

“Though the bush was engulfed in flames, it did not burn up.” Exodus 3:2

The bush was on fire, but it wasn’t burning. It obviously got Moses’ attention and now it had mine.

And I thought, you know…

This is what faith does.

There have been times in my life where it seemed like everything was going up in flames. One thing after another, like a bunch of little Duraflame logs that won’t freaking die out. But I completely believe that the outlook I have, the spirit I possess, and the love that I give is because of my faith. It makes me who I am and influences who I’m becoming. So when my world is on fire, I don’t burn up. When you acknowledge something bigger and greater at work in you and through you…you can be engulfed in flames and come out refined rather than ruined.

The rather ironic thing about this is that in the next part of the story God asks Moses to go to Pharaoh and demand that he release the Israelites from slavery. And Moses is all like, “Uuuhh…me? I’m really bad with words. I think you should definitely ask someone else.” Moses knew he was a weird candidate. I mean the guy had to have had a serious identity crisis. Born a Jew. Raised a royal Egyptian. Married into a Midianite family. Not to mention the stuttering problem. So, he throws out excuses. He gets overwhelmed. His faith wavers. He doesn’t believe he’s the guy for this job. How many of us can identify with that mindset, right?

But it doesn’t matter. God wants to use us right where we’re at. And this was never about Moses, anyway. It was always about what God was going to do through Moses because of his choice to trust and have faith in the midst of what were going to be some really, really big flames.

Ok, ok…but back to this…