Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Exodus 3:2
And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush [was] not consumed.
2. the angel of Jehovah ] The ‘angel of Jehovah,’ or, in E (Exo 14:19, Gen 21:17; Gen 31:11), ‘of God,’ is a temporary, but full, self-manifestation of Jehovah, a manifestation usually, at any rate, in human form, possessing no distinct and permanent personality, as such, but speaking and spoken of, sometimes as Jehovah Himself (e.g. v. 4a here, comp. with v. 2; Gen 16:10; Gen 16:13; Gen 31:11; Gen 31:13; Jdg 6:12; Jdg 6:14; Jdg 13:21 f.), and sometimes as distinct from Him (e.g. Gen 16:11; Gen 19:13; Gen 19:21; Gen 19:24; Gen 21:17; Num 22:31): cf. Gray, EB. iv., Theophany, 4. As Davidson remarks ( DB. i. 94 b , s.v. Angel), the ‘angel of Jehovah’ differs from ‘Jehovah’ only in being sensibly manifest: ‘the mere manifestation creates a distinction between the “angel of Jehovah” and “Jehovah,” though the identity remains.’ The angel of Jehovah is mentioned chiefly in the older parts of the historical books, J, E (never P), and the older narratives in Judges (Exo 2:1; Exo 2:4, Exo 5:23, Exo 6:11 f., Exodus 20-22, Exo 13:3-21).
a flame of fire ] A frequent form of the Divine manifestation (Exo 19:18, Exo 24:17; Eze 1:27; Eze 8:2; and in the ‘pillar of fire,’ Exo 13:21 f.). On the present occasion, however, the fire was not a ‘devouring’ fire, but only the brilliancy of fire. Cf. Hom. Od. xix.39 f. (Kn.).
out of, &c.] i.e. rising up out of the bush.
a bush ] only besides Deu 33:16 ‘the favour of him that dwelt in the bush.’ Properly, as Aram. shews (PS. 2671; Lw, Aram. Pflanzennamen, No. 219), the bramble bush, rubus fruticosus, Linn. (so LXX. , [Luk 6:44 ], Vulg. rubus), which however does not seem to grow in the Sin. Peninsula.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
The angel of the Lord – See the note at Gen 12:7. What Moses saw was the flame of fire in the bush; what he recognized therein was an intimation of the presence of God, who maketh a flame of fire His angel. Compare Psa 104:4. The words which Moses heard were those of God Himself, as all ancient and most modern divines have held, manifested in the Person of the Son.
Of a bush – Literally, of the bush or seneh, a word which ought perhaps to be retained as the proper name of a thorny shrub common in that district, a species of acacia.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 2. The angel of the Lord] Not a created angel certainly; for he is called Jehovah, Ex 3:4, c., and has the most expressive attributes of the Godhead applied to him, Ex 3:14, c. Yet he is an angel, malach, a messenger, in whom was the name of God, Ex 23:21 and in whom dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead bodily, Col 2:9 and who, in all these primitive times, was the Messenger of the covenant, Mal 3:1. And who was this but JESUS, the Leader, Redeemer, and Saviour of mankind? See Clarke on Ge 16:7.
A flame of fire, out of the midst of a bush] Fire was, not only among the Hebrews but also among many other ancient nations, a very significant emblem of the Deity. God accompanied the Israelites in all their journeyings through the wilderness as a pillar of fire by night; and probably a fire or flame in the holy of holies, between the cherubim, was the general symbol of his presence; and traditions of these things, which must have been current in the east, have probably given birth, not only to the pretty general opinion that God appears in the likeness of fire, but to the whole of the Zoroastrian system of fire-worship. It has been reported of Zoroaster, or Zeradusht, that having retired to a mountain for the study of wisdom, and the benefit of solitude, the whole mountain was one day enveloped with flame, out of the midst of which he came without receiving any injury; on which he offered sacrifices to God, who, he was persuaded, had then appeared to him. M. Anquetil du Perron gives much curious information on this subject in his Zend Avesta. The modern Parsees call fire the off-spring of Ormusd, and worship it with a vast variety of ceremonies.
Among the fragments attributed to AEschylus, and collected by Stanley in his invaluable edition of this poet, p. 647, col. 1, we find the following beautiful verses: –
,
.
‘
‘ , .
“Distinguish God from mortal men; and do not suppose that any thing fleshly is like unto him. Thou knowest him not: sometimes indeed he appears as a formless and impetuous FIRE, sometimes as water, sometimes as thick darkness.” The poet proceeds: –
‘ , ,
, ,
.
“The mountains, the earth, the deep and extensive sea, and the summits of the highest mountains tremble whenever the terrible eye of the Supreme Lord looks down upon them.”
These are very remarkable fragments, and seem all to be collected from traditions relative to the different manifestations of God to the Israelites in Egypt, and in the wilderness. Moses wished to see God, but he could behold nothing but an indescribable glory: nothing like mortals, nothing like a human body, appeared at any time to his eye, or to those of the Israelites. “Ye saw no manner of similitude,” said Moses, “on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb, out of the midst of the FIRE,” De 4:15. But sometimes the Divine power and justice were manifested by the indescribable, formless, impetuous, consuming flame; at other times he appeared by the water which he brought out of the flinty rock; and in the thick darkness on Horeb, when the fiery law proceeded from his right hand, then the earth quaked and the mountain trembled: and when his terrible eye looked out upon the Egyptians through the pillar of cloud and fire, their chariot wheels were struck off, and confusion and dismay were spread through all the hosts of Pharaoh; Ex 14:24-25.
And the bush was not consumed.]
1. An emblem of the state of Israel in its various distresses and persecutions: it was in the fire of adversity, but was not consumed.
2. An emblem also of the state of the Church of God in the wilderness, in persecutions often, in the midst of its enemies, in the region of the shadow of death-yet not consumed.
3. An emblem also of the state of every follower of Christ: cast down, but not forsaken; grievously tempted, but not destroyed; walking through the fire, but still unconsumed!
Why are all these preserved in the midst of those things which have a natural tendency to destroy them! Because GOD IS IN THE MIDST OF THEM; it was this that preserved the bush from destruction; and it was this that preserved the Israelites; and it is this, and this alone, that preserves the Church, and holds the soul of every genuine believer in the spiritual life. He in whose heart Christ dwells not by faith, will soon be consumed by the world, the flesh, and the devil.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The angel of the Lord; not a created angel, but the Angel of the covenant, Christ Jesus, who then and ever was God, and was to be man, and to be sent into the world in our flesh, as a messenger from God. And these temporary apparitions of his were presages or forerunners of his more solemn mission and coming, and therefore he is fitly called an Angel. That this Angel was no creature, plainly appears by the whole context, and specially by his saying,
I am the Lord, & c. The angels never speak that language in Scripture, but, I am sent from God, and, I am thy fellow servant, &c. And it is a vain pretence to say that the angel, as Gods ambassador, speaks in Gods name and person; for what ambassador of any king in the world did ever speak thus, I am the king, &c.? Ministers are Gods ambassadors, but if any of them should say, I am the Lord, they would be guilty of blasphemy, and so would any created angel be too, for the same reason. By a flame of fire was fitly represented Gods majesty, and purity, and power.
The bush was not consumed; which doubtless represented the condition of the church and people of Israel, who were now in the fire of affliction, yet so as that God was present with them, and that they should not be consumed in it, whereof this vision was a pledge.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
2, 3. the angel of the Lord appearedunto him in a flame of fireIt is common in Scripture torepresent the elements and operations of nature, as winds, fires,earthquakes, pestilence, everything enlisted in executing the divinewill, as the “angels” or messengers of God. But in suchcases God Himself is considered as really, though invisibly, present.Here the preternatural fire may be primarily meant by the expression”angel of the Lord”; but it is clear that under thissymbol, the Divine Being was present, whose name is given (Exo 3:4;Exo 3:6), and elsewhere called theangel of the covenant, Jehovah-Jesus.
out of the midst of abushthe wild acacia or thorn, with which that desert abounds,and which is generally dry and brittle, so much so, that at certainseasons, a spark might kindle a district far and wide into a blaze. Afire, therefore, being in the midst of such a desert bush was a”great sight.” It is generally supposed to have beenemblematic of the Israelites’ condition in Egyptoppressed by agrinding servitude and a bloody persecution, and yet, in spite of thecruel policy that was bent on annihilating them, they continued asnumerous and thriving as ever. The reason was “God was in themidst of them.” The symbol may also represent the present stateof the Jews, as well as of the Church generally in the world.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him,…. Not a created angel, but the Angel of God’s presence and covenant, the eternal Word and Son of God; since he is afterwards expressly called Jehovah, and calls himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, which a created angel would never do: the appearance was,
in a flame of fire, out of the midst of a bush; not in a tall, lofty, spreading oak or cedar, but in a low thorny bramble bush, which it might have been thought would have been consumed in an instant of time:
and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush [was] not consumed; this was not imaginary, but a real thing; there was
such a bush, and Jehovah appeared in it in this manner, and though it was all on fire yet was not consumed, but remained entire after it: reference is frequently had to it as a matter of fact, De 33:16. Artapanus g, an Heathen writer, had got some hint of it; his account is this, that while Moses was praying to God, and entreating the afflictions of his people might cease, he was propitious to him, and on a sudden fire broke out of the earth and burned, when there was no matter nor anything of a woody sort in the place: nor need this account Moses gives be thought incredible, when so many things similar to it are affirmed by Heathen writers, who speak of a whole forest in flames without fire, and of a spear that burned for two hours, and yet nothing of it consumed; and of a servant’s coat all on fire, and yet after it was extinguished no trace or mark of the flames were to be seen on it; and several other things of the like kind are related by Huetius h out of various authors: as to the mystical signification of this bush, some make it to be a type of Christ, and of his manifestation in the flesh; of the union of the two natures in him, and of their distinction of the glory of the one, and of the meanness of the other; of his sustaining the wrath of God, and remaining fearless and unhurt by it; and of his delivering and preserving his people from it: the Jews commonly interpret it of the people of Israel, in the furnace of affliction in Egypt, and yet not consumed; nay, the more they were afflicted the more they grew; and it may be a symbol of the church and people of God, in all ages, under affliction and distress: they are like to a thorn bush both for their small quantity, being few, and for their quality, in themselves weak and strengthless, mean and low; have about them the thorns of corruptions and temptations, and who are often in the fire of afflictions and persecutions, yet are not consumed; which is owing to the person, presence, power, and grace of Christ being among them;
[See comments on Ac 7:30].
g Apud Euseb. ib. c. 27. p. 434. h Alnetan. Quaest. l. 2. c. 12. sect. 10. p. 193, 194.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Here, at Horeb, God appeared to Moses as the Angel of the Lord “ in a flame of fire out of the midst of the thorn-bush ” ( , , rubus ), which burned in the fire and was not consumed. , in combination with , must be a participle for . When Moses turned aside from the road or spot where he was standing, “ to look at this great sight ” ( ), i.e., the miraculous vision of the bush that was burning and yet not burned up, Jehovah called to him out of the midst of the thorn-bush, “ Moses, Moses (the reduplication as in Gen 22:11), draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground ” ( ). The symbolical meaning of this miraculous vision, – that is to say, the fact that it was a figurative representation of the nature and contents of the ensuing message from God, – has long been admitted. The thorn-bush in contrast with the more noble and lofty trees (Jdg 9:15) represented the people of Israel in their humiliation, as a people despised by the world. Fire and the flame of fire were not “symbols of the holiness of God;” for, as the Holy One, “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all” (1Jo 1:5), He “dwells in the light which no man can approach unto” (1Ti 6:16); and that not merely according to the New Testament, but according to the Old Testament view as well, as is evident from Isa 10:17, where “the Light of Israel” and “the Holy One of Israel” are synonymous. But “the Light of Israel became fire, and the Holy One a flame, and burned and consumed its thorns and thistles.” Nor is “fire, from its very nature, the source of light,” according to the scriptural view. On the contrary, light, the condition of all life, is also the source of fire. The sun enlightens, warms, and burns (Job 30:28; Sol. Son 1:6); the rays of the sun produce warmth, heat, and fire; and light was created before the sun. Fire, therefore, regarded as burning and consuming, is a figurative representation of refining affliction and destroying punishment (1Co 3:11.), or a symbol of the chastening and punitive justice of the indignation and wrath of God. It is in fire that the Lord comes to judgment (Dan 7:9-10; Eze 1:13-14, Eze 1:27-28; Rev 1:14-15). Fire sets forth the fiery indignation which devours the adversaries (Heb 10:27). He who “judges and makes war in righteousness’ has eyes as a flame of fire (Rev 19:11-12). Accordingly, the burning thorn-bush represented the people of Israel as they were burning in the fire of affliction, the iron furnace of Egypt (Deu 4:20). Yet, though the thorn-bush was burning in the fire, it was not consumed; for in the flame was Jehovah, who chastens His people, but does not give them over unto death (Psa 118:18). The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had come down to deliver His people out of the hand of the Egyptians (Exo 3:8). Although the affliction of Israel in Egypt proceeded from Pharaoh, yet was it also a fire which the Lord had kindled to purify His people and prepare it for its calling. In the flame of the burning bush the Lord manifested Himself as the “jealous God, who visits the sins of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generations of them that hate Him, and showeth mercy unto thousands of them that love Him and keep His commandments” (Exo 20:5; Deu 5:9-10), who cannot tolerate the worship of another god (Exo 34:14), and whose anger burns against idolaters, to destroy them (Deu 6:15). The “jealous God” was a “consuming fire” in the midst of Israel (Deu 4:24). These passages show that the great sight which Moses saw not only had reference to the circumstances of Israel in Egypt, but was a prelude to the manifestation of God on Sinai for the establishment of the covenant (Exo 19 and 20), and also a representation of the relation in which Jehovah would stand to Israel through the establishment of the covenant made with the fathers. For this reason it occurred upon the spot where Jehovah intended to set up His covenant with Israel. But, as a jealous God, He also “takes vengeance upon His adversaries” (Nah 1:2.). Pharaoh, who would not let Israel go, He was about to smite with all His wonders (Exo 3:20), whilst He redeemed Israel with outstretched arm and great judgments (Exo 6:6). – The transition from the Angel of Jehovah (Exo 3:2) to Jehovah (Exo 3:4) proves the identity of the two; and the interchange of Jehovah and Elohim, in Exo 3:4, precludes the idea of Jehovah being merely a national God. The command of God to Moses to put off his shoes, may be accounted for from the custom in the East of wearing shoes or sandals merely as a protection from dirt. No Brahmin enters a pagoda, no Moslem a mosque, without first taking off at least his overshoes ( Rosenm. Morgenl. i. 261; Robinson, Pal. ii. p. 373); and even in the Grecian temples the priests and priestesses performed the service barefooted ( Justin, Apol. i. c. 62; Bhr, Symbol. ii. 96). when entering other holy places also, the Arabs and Samaritans, and even the Yezidis of Mesopotamia, take off their shoes, that the places may not be defiled by the dirt or dust upon them (vid., Robinson, Pal. iii. 100, and Layard’s Nineveh and its Remains). The place of the burning bush was holy because of the presence of the holy God, and putting off the shoes was intended to express not merely respect for the place itself, but that reverence which the inward man (Eph 3:16) owes to the holy God.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
2. And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him. It was necessary that he should assume a visible form, that he might be seen by Moses, not as he was in his essence, but as the infirmity of the human mind could comprehend him. For thus we must believe that God, as often as he appeared of old to the holy patriarchs, descended in some way from his majesty, that he might reveal himself as far as was useful, and as far as their comprehension would admit. The same, too, is to be said of angels, who, although they are invisible spirits, yet when it seemed good to the Almighty, assumed some form in which they might be seen. But let us inquire who this Angel was? since soon afterwards he not only calls himself Jehovah, but claims the glory of the eternal and only God. Now, although this is an allowable manner of speaking, because the angels transfer to themselves the person and titles of God, when they are performing the commissions entrusted to them by him; and although it is plain from many passages, and (37) especially from the first chapter of Zechariah, that there is one head and chief of the angels who commands the others, the ancient teachers of the Church have rightly understood that the Eternal Son of God is so called in respect to his office as Mediator, which he figuratively bore from the beginning, although he really took it upon him only at his Incarnation. And Paul sufficiently expounds this mystery to us, when he plainly asserts that Christ was the leader of his people in the Desert. (1Co 10:4.) Therefore, although at that time, properly speaking, he was not yet the messenger of his Father, still his predestinated appointment to the office even then had this effect, that he manifested himself to the patriarchs, and was known in this character. Nor, indeed, had the saints ever any communication with God except through the promised Mediator. It is not then to be wondered at, if the Eternal Word of God, of one Godhead and essence with the Father, assumed the name of “the Angel” on the ground of his future mission. There is a great variety of opinions as to the vision. It is too forced an allegory to make, as some do, the body of Christ of the bush, because his heavenly majesty consumed it not when he chose to inhabit it. It is also improperly wrested by those who refer it to the stubborn spirit of the nation, because the Israelites were like thorns, which yield not to the flames. But when the natural sense is set forth, it will not be necessary to refute those which are improbable. This vision is very similar to that former one which Abraham saw. (Gen 15:17.) He saw a burning lamp in the midst of a smoking furnace; and the reason assigned is, that God will not permit his people to be extinguished in darkness. The same similitude answers to the bush retaining its entireness in the midst of the flame. The bush is likened to the humble and despised people; their tyrannical oppression is not unlike the fire which would have consumed them, had not God miraculously interposed. Thus, by the presence of God, the bush escaped safely from the fire; as it is said in Psa 46:1, that though the waves of trouble beat against the Church and threaten her destruction, yet “shall she not be moved,” for “God is in the midst of her.” Thus was the cruelly afflicted people aptly represented, who, though surrounded by flames, and feeling their heat, yet remained unconsumed, because they were guarded by the present help of God.
(37) Calvin’s own commentary on Zec 1:8, will best explain this reference; there, also, he inclines to identify the chief of the Angels with the Son of God. “There were then, as it were, a troop of horsemen: but the Prophet says that one appeared as the chief leader, who was accompanied by others.” “There was one more eminent than the rest, and in this there is nothing unusual, for when God sends forth a company of angels, he gives the lead to some one. If we regard this angel to be Christ, the idea is consistent with the common usage of Scripture,” etc. — Com. on Zech. , pp. 31-33.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(2) The angel of the Lord.Heb., an angel of Jehovah. In Exo. 3:4 the angel is called both Jehovah and Elohim, whence it is concluded, with reason, that it was the Second Person of the Trinity who appeared to Moses.
Out of the midst of a bush.Literally, out of the midst of the acacia. As the seneh, or acacia, is very common in the Sinaitic region, we can scarcely suppose that a special tree, growing alone, is intended. Probably the article is one of reference, and the meaning is, the bush of which you have all heard. (Comp. Joh. 3:24.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
2. And the Angel of the Lord appeared unto him More literally, “And there appeared an angel of Jahveh (Jehovah) unto him . ”
In a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush Rather, “ the thorn-bush,” (bramble . ) Any personification or manifestation of God’s attributes is called his “angel . ” See on Gen 16:7. The , seneh, “thorn-bush,” or “bramble,” is a species of acacia, common in the Sinai peninsula, rising in tangled thickets, and having long, stout, and sharp thorns . It is here called the bramble definitely as the well-known desert bramble, or as the bramble of this divine appearance . Sinai was probably named from this seneh (senna) shrub, which abounds upon its sides and valleys . The shittah, or shittim tree, used so much in the construction of the tabernacle and its furniture, belongs to the same family .
And behold, the bush burned with fire, and was not consumed Better, And lo, the bramble was burning in the fire, and the bramble was not consumed . The common lowly bramble well typifies despised Israel in its servitude, and the fire that burst forth among the dry thorns and yet did not consume them, was the God who dwelt in Israel, under whose providence those afflictions came, which, though they burned did not destroy, because He, the change-less JEHOVAH, was in their midst. It is ever in the extremity of his Israel’s affliction that his voice is heard from the flame. The “great sight,” which faith only sees, is God’s loving tenderness, burning but to purify. This is the truth which, in the MEMORIAL NAME, breaks upon the soul of Moses after his long and mysterious trial.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Exo 3:2. The angel of the Lord In the note on Gen 16:7 we have delivered our opinion at large, concerning the Angel of the Lord, which, with the generality of Christian interpreters, we conceive to have been the Messiah, the Angel, or Messenger of the Covenant, It is very evident from this chapter, that the Person here appearing to Moses was no created Angel, but Jehovah himself, the second Divine Person in the Trinity; see Exo 3:4; Exo 3:6; Exo 3:14, &c. the same who conducted the Israelites in the wilderness, and that was Christ, according to St. Paul, 1Co 10:4. Fire was one of the emblems of the Shechinah, or Divine appearance; see Gen 15:17-18 and of the other appearances which follow in the course of the sacred Scriptures. This flame must have been exceedingly lambent and pure, for Moses to discover the bramble-bush (for so the original word seneh, signifies) unconsumed in the midst of it. The mount and the wilderness of Sinai are thought to be so called, from sene, on account of the brambles which abounded there.
Bush burned with fire, &c. Many interpreters have thought, that, as fire, in Scripture, is often used as an emblem of calamity, Lam 2:3; Lam 2:22 therefore, the bush burning with fire, but not consumed, represented, that however the Israelites might be distressed, yet their afflictions should not entirely consume them, nor make an end of them: God signifying by his appearance in the midst of the bush, that he was present with his people in the midst of their tribulations. The heathens, it is certain, had some notice of this history; see Eusebius, praep. Evang. lib. ix. c. 27. Dion Prusaeus too, Orat. 36 has something like this, where he says, “The Persians relate concerning Zoroaster, that the love of wisdom and virtue leading him to a solitary life upon a mountain, he found it one day all in a flame, shining with celestial fire; out of the midst of which he came without any harm, and instituted certain sacrifices to God, who then, he was persuaded, appeared to him.” This seems to be only a corruption of the present history.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
DISCOURSE: 63
THE BURNING BUSH
Exo 3:2-3. The angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. And Moses said, I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.
IF God have on some occasions revealed himself to persons, when, like Saul, they have been in the very act of committing the most heinous sins [Note: Act 9:4.], he has more generally favoured them when they have been occupied, like the shepherds, in their proper calling [Note: Luk 2:8-9.]. Moses was keeping the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, when God appeared to him in a burning bush, and gave him a commission to deliver Israel from their bondage in Egypt. By this extraordinary appearance God not merely awakened the curiosity of Moses, but conveyed to him some very important instruction; to elucidate which we shall,
I.
Shew what was intended by the burning bush
It was intended to represent the state and condition
1.
Of the Israelites in Egypt
[They were cruelly oppressed, and every effort was made to destroy them [Note: Exo 1:9-22.]. Nor had they in themselves any more ability to withstand their enemies, than a thorny bush has to resist the action of fire. Yet not only were they preserved from destruction, but they even multiplied in proportion as means were used to prevent their increase.]
2.
Of the church of God in the world
[The church, whose state was typified by that of Israel, has at all times suffered by persecution, though it has enjoyed some intervals of comparative rest. And, considering that all the powers of the world have been confederate against it, we may well be amazed that it has not been utterly consumed. But it has endured the fiery trial to this hour, and still defies the impotent attacks of all its adversaries.]
3.
Of every individual in the church
[The declaration that all who would live godly in Christ Jesus should suffer persecution, has been verified in every place and every age: the third part are, and ever will be, brought through the fire. And it is no less than a miracle, that, when the believer has so many enemies, both without and within, he does not make shipwreck of faith and of a good conscience. But the furnace, instead of destroying, purifies and refines him; and his very graces are perfected by the trials that endanger their existence [Note: Rom 5:3-5.].]
Having pointed out both the primary and more remote signification of this phenomenon we shall,
II.
Account for the miracle which it exhibited
Well might the sight of a bush burning, but not consumed, excite the astonishment of Moses: but his wonder would cease when he found that God was in the bush.
The person here called the angel of the Lord was Christ
[The angel expressly called himself The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob; which sufficiently proves that he could not be a created angel, seeing that it would be the most daring blasphemy in any creature to assume that incommunicable title of Jehovah: yet it was not God the Father: for St. Stephen, recording this history, informs us, that God sent Moses by the hand of the angel [Note: Act 7:30-35.]: consequently the angel was God the Son, and not God the Father. Indeed Christ, who is elsewhere called The angel of the covenant, was the person, who, in all the appearances of God to man, assumed the human or angelic shape; thereby preparing the world for the fuller manifestation of himself in his incarnate state. And it is on this account that he is called The image of the invisible God [Note: Col 1:15.].]
It was his presence with the Israelites that prevented their destruction
[He was in the bush, and therefore the bush was not consumed: so he was in the midst of his oppressed people; and therefore the Egyptians could not prevail against them. Christ was among them before he gave them any symbol of his presence; for it was he who rendered the assistance of the midwives unnecessary, and emboldened them to withstand the commands of Pharaoh. He was afterwards with them in the pillar and the cloud, protecting them from the Egyptian hosts, and stopping the progress of their enemies till they were overwhelmed in the sea. When, for the punishment of their sins, he refused to go with them, they were sure to be overpowered [Note: Num 14:42-45; Jos 7:4-5.]: but whenever he returned in mercy to them, they prospered and prevailed.]
It is that same presence that preserves the church and every member of it
[Christ has said, Lo, I am with you alway, even to the end of the world; and hence it is that the gates of hell have never prevailed against the church; yea, we are assured, they never shall prevail. We are also told that he dwelleth in the hearts of all his people [Note: Eph 3:17.], and is their life [Note: Col 3:4.] ; and that, whereinsoever they live and act, it is not so much they, as Christ in them [Note: Gal 2:20.]. It is by this consideration that he encourages them to go through fire and water, persuaded that no evil shall happen to them [Note: Psa 46:5.]. And to his continued interposition and support they must ascribe their preservation in every danger, and their deliverance from every enemy [Note: Psa 124:1-5.].]
Let us now turn aside and behold this great sight (let us turn from every worldly thought, and inspect this wonderful appearance, not with curiosity, but profoundest reverence); let us observe herein,
1.
To what state Gods most favoured people may be reduced
[Your afflictions may be heavy. But are any discouraged by reason of their great trials? Be it known that tribulation is the way to the kingdom; and all, who arrive there, have trodden the same path [Note: Act 14:22; Rev 7:14.]. Nor need we be alarmed at any fire that is kindled for us, since Christ will be with us in the midst of it [Note: Isa 41:10.], and bring us out of it purified as gold.]
2.
What they may expect at Gods hands
[In seasons of great trial we are tempted to think that God has forsaken us: but he never was more immediately present with the Hebrew youths, than when they were cast into the furnace; nor did he ever feel more love to his own Son, than in the hour when he cried, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Let us then learn to trust God, and expect that, when we walk through the fire, we shall not be burned [Note: Isa 43:2.].]
3.
What in the midst of all their trials should be their chief concern
[Moses in his valedictory address to the twelve tribes, congratulates Joseph on the good-will of Him who dwelt in the bush [Note: Deu 33:16.]. And most truly are they blessed who are thus interested in the divine favour. To them God is a wall of fire for their protection [Note: Zec 2:5.]: but to others he is a consuming fire for their destruction [Note: Heb 12:29.]. Alas! alas! in what a fearful state are they, who shall be cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, into a fire that never shall be quenched, and in which they shall continue unconsumed to all eternity! Oh! who can dwell with everlasting burnings [Note: Isa 33:14.] ? But, if we are reconciled to him in the Son of his love, we have nothing to fear: we have nothing to fear either in time or eternity: for, however painful our state in this world may be, he will support us with his presence; and in the world to come, we shall be for ever beyond the reach of harm, even in his immediate presence, where is the fulness of joy for evermore. Seek then his favour; yea, seek it with your whole hearts ]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
An angel means a messenger. Malachi was commissioned by the Holy Ghost to explain what a messenger is: Mal 3:1 . Compare this with Joh 1:18 . See a further account by our Lord himself; Luk 20:37-38 , and again Joh 8:58 . Reader! pause over this verse. Is not this an emblem of the Godhead dwelling in our nature? Is not God said to be a consuming fire? Heb 12:29 . And can anything more strikingly represent our nature than that of a poor bramble bush? Rom 5:6 . Was it not truly so when Jesus tabernacled among us! Phi 2:5-8 ; Joh 1:14 . And when the Lord Jesus in that nature bore divine wrath for his people, was it not like a bush burning with a mighty flame and yet unconsumed? Col 2:9-14 ; Isa 53:4-10 ; 2Co 5:21 . And is not the church of the Lord Jesus in all ages, like a burning bush from the fire of persecution; and yet surviving amidst the flames from his presence and supports. Joh 16:33 ; Isa 43:1-2 . Dearest Jesus! are not all the sweet and precious tokens of the Father’s love, through the eternal Spirit, made to us by thee in our nature?
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Exo 3:2 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush [was] not consumed.
Ver. 2. And the Angel of the Lord. ] Christ, that Angel of the Covenant, and of the great council.
And the bush was not consumed.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Angel of the LORD. Hebrew. Jehovah.(App-4). Genitive of App. (App-17): i.e. Jehovah Himself, Exo 3:4, then “God” (Exo 3:4). Compare Gen 18:1, Gen 18:13, Gen 18:17, Gen 18:20, Gen 18:22, Gen 18:33; Gen 19:1, Gen 19:24; and compare Gen 32:24, Gen 32:30 with Hos 12:3, Hos 12:4. appeared. Forty years after.
bush burned. Same lesson as the “furnace” of Gen 15:17,
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
angel
(See Scofield “Heb 1:4”).
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
The Burning Bush
And the angel of the Lord appeared unto Moses in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.Exo 3:2.
1. It was a very sharp descent from Pharaohs palace to the wilderness; and a shepherds life was a strange contrast to the brilliant future that once seemed likely for Moses. But God tests His weapons before He uses them, and great men are generally prepared for great deeds by great sorrows. Solitude is the mother-country of the strong, and the wilderness, with its savage crags, its awful silence, and the unbroken round of its blue heaven, was a better place to meet God in than the heavy air of a palace, or the profitless splendours of a court.
2. Among the desolate solitudes of Horeb, occasional fertile spots are to be found. A thin alpine turf covers the soil, whose verdure forms a delightful contrast to the awful sterility of the naked rocks around. A perennial spring oozes up in some shady cleft, and sends its scanty rill down the mountain-side, marking its course among the crags by a green streak of moss and grass which its life-giving waters have nourished. To one of these little oases Moses led the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, at the close of his sojourn in this secluded region. He had probably given up all thought of Israels deliverance, which had been the dream of his youth; and in the peaceful and monotonous occupation of a shepherd hoped to end his days. But God had a higher destiny in view for him, for which he had been insensibly trained by his meditative employment amid the solemn influences of the lonely hills. This was, unknown to himself, to be the last day of his shepherd life. The skill and fidelity which had been exerted in tending sheep were to find nobler scope for their exercise in guiding and training men.
I
The Preparation of Moses
1. In process of time the king of Egypt died, probably the great Rameses, no other of whose dynasty had a reign which extended over the indicated period of time. If so, he had while living every reason to expect an immortal fame as the greatest among Egyptian kings, a hero, a conqueror on three continents, a builder of magnificent works. But he has won only an immortal notoriety. Every stone in his buildings was cemented with human blood. The cause he persecuted has made deathless the banished refugee, and has gibbeted the great monarch as a tyrant, whose misplanned severities wrought the ruin of his successor and his army. Such are the reversals of popular judgment; and such the vanity of fame.
Nought but a gust of wind is earthly fame,
Which blows from this side now, and now from that,
And, as it changes quarter, changes name.
Renown of man is like the hue of grass,
Which comes and goes; the same sun withers it,
Whereby from earth the green plant raised was.1 [Note: Dante, Purg. xi. 1002, 11517 (trans. by Paget Toynbee).]
2. The children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried. Another monarch had come at last, a change after sixty-seven years, and yet no change for them! It filled up the measure of their patience, and also of the iniquity of Egypt. We are not told that their cry was addressed to the Lord; what we read is that it reached Him, who still overhears and pities many a sob, many a lament, which ought to have been addressed to Him, and is not. Indeed, if His compassion were not to reach men until they had remembered and prayed to Him, who among us would ever have learned to pray to Him at all? Moreover He remembered His covenant with their forefathers for the fulfilment of which the time had now arrived. And God saw the children of Israel, and God took knowledge of them.
3. While this anguish was being endured in Egypt, Moses was maturing for his destiny. Self-reliance, pride of place, hot and impulsive aggressiveness, were dying in his bosom. To the education of the courtier and scholar was now added that of the shepherd in the wilds, amid the most solemn and awful scenes of nature, in solitude, humiliation, disappointment, and, as we learn from the Epistle to the Hebrews, in enduring faith. Wordsworth has a remarkable description of the effect of a similar discipline upon the good Lord Clifford. He tells
How he, long forced in humble walks to go,
Was softened into feeling, soothed, and tamed.
Love had he found in huts where poor men lie,
His daily teachers had been woods and rills,
The silence that is in the starry sky,
The sleep that is among the lonely hills.
In him the savage virtues of the Race,
Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts were dead:
Nor did he change; but kept in lofty place
The wisdom which adversity had bred.
There was also the education of advancing age, which teaches many lessons, and among them two which are essential to leadershipthe folly of a hasty blow, and of impulsive reliance upon the support of mobs. Moses the man-slayer became exceeding meek; and he ceased to rely upon the perception of his people that God by him would deliver them. His distrust, indeed, became as excessive as his temerity had been, but it was an error upon the safer side. Behold, they will not believe me, he says, nor hearken unto my voice.
It is an important truth that in very few lives the decisive moment comes just when it is expected. Men allow themselves to be self-indulgent, extravagant, and even wicked, often upon the calculation that their present attitude matters little, and they will do very differently when the crisis arrives, the turning-point in their career, to nerve them. And they waken up with a start to find their career already decided, their character already moulded. As a snare shall the Day of the Lord come upon all flesh; and as a snare come all His great visitations meanwhile. When Herod was drinking among bad companions, admiring a shameless dancer, and boasting loudly of his generosity, he was sobered and saddened to discover that he had laughed away the life of his only honest adviser. Moses, like David, was following the ewes great with young, when summoned by God to rule His people Israel. Neither did the call arrive when he was plunged in moody reverie and abstraction, sighing over his lost fortunes and his defeated aspirations, rebelling against his lowly duties. The humblest labour is a preparation for the brightest revelations, whereas discontent, however lofty, is a preparation for nothing. Thus, too, the birth of Jesus was first announced to shepherds keeping watch over their flock. Yet hundreds of third-rate young persons in every city in this land to-day neglect their work, and unfit themselves for any insight, or any leadership whatever, by chafing against the obscurity of their vocation.1 [Note: G. A. Chadwick.]
4. When the hopes of his youth were dead, buried, and forgotten, when his fiery spirit was tamed into patience, and his turbulent passion stilled into solemn reposeat last, Moses came out of school. Then, but not until then, was he openly consecrated as Gods missionary to rescue the Israelites from their grinding bondage and their great despair; to organize them into a nation, to give them their holy laws, and to be their leader along a pathway of miracle to the Promised Land. Not a lesson had been left, not a moment had been lost, for he needed the weary discipline and gathered force of all those quiet years before he could obey his high vocation and do his great work well.
In darkness, underneath the January rime and frost, God is getting ready the royal glories of June. The flower that is to burst open to the sun at a certain hour six months hence, He has even now in hand. By silent and mystical touches He is already educating the tree to bear its autumnal clusters, and it is His ordination that there shall be eleven months of husbandry for one month of harvest. In the spiritual field you may trace the action of the same law. Man is often in haste; God never. We would give the largest measure of time to results; He gives the largest measure to preparations. We burn with eagerness to bring our instrumentalities into action, for we are apt to value that agent most whose work makes most show in a report, or whose life is longest before the public eye. He, on the contrary, often brings His most honoured servants through a long strain of trial and a long path of obscurity to fit them for some short service that is, after all, unknown to human fame; for a single word spoken in a breath, or a single deed, over and done in a day, may heighten the joy of heaven, and break into issues that will flow on for ever. Years may be needful to prepare you for saying Yes or No in some one critical moment, and many a man may be in training all his life for the work of lifes last hour. We sometimes try to reap in sowing time, but He never sends forth fruit until the season is fitted for the fruit, and the fruit for the season.1 [Note: C. Stanford.]
Look not thou down but up!
To uses of a cup,
The festal board, lamps flash and trumpets peal,
The new wines foaming flow,
The Masters lips a-glow!
Thou, heavens consummate cup, what needst thou with earths wheel?
But I need, now as then,
Thee, God, who mouldest men;
And since, not even while the whirl was worst,
Did I,to the wheel of life
With shapes and colours rife,
Bound dizzily,mistake my end, to slake Thy thirst:
So, take and use Thy work:
Amend what flaws may lurk,
What strain o the stuff, what warpings past the aim!
My times be in Thy hand!
Perfect the cup as planned!
Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same!2 [Note: Browning, Rabbi Ben Ezra.]
II
The Approach of God
1. When in this or in any other scene of holy story we meet with One who wears the supreme name, yet holds a subordinate office; who is God, yet sent by God; God, yet seen; God, yet heardwho is this Traveller unknown? Not the Divine Father, for he dwelleth in secret. Besides, in the economy of grace the Father is evermore the sender, the Son the sent. It must, therefore, be the Son. This thought is our only outlet from a maze of contradictions. Through all time, at first by His visits to our world as a celestial stranger; at last by His life as a man, Christ has been the angel of the Lord.
It would be absurd to seek the New Testament doctrine of the Logos full-blown in the Pentateuch. But it is mere prejudice, unphilosophical and presumptuous, to shut ones eyes against any evidence which may be forthcoming that the earliest books of Scripture are tending towards the last conclusions of theology; that the slender overture to the Divine oratorio indicates already the same theme which thunders from all the chorus at the close.1 [Note: G. A. Chadwick.]
Too often the term angel has for us a cloudy and indeterminate meaning; but we should resolve to make it clear. We are apt to use it as a term of race, and to distinguish the natives of heaven as angels, just as we distinguish the natives of earth as men. But it is in reality a term of office, simply meaning an envoy, a messenger, one who is sent. Doubtless any heavenly being who is sent on an errand of love to this globe is for the time an angel; but One there is above all others who deserves the name of angel. Sent not only out from the unknown heavens, but out from the very essence and depth of the unknown God; sent to reveal Gods heart; sent to translate the Divine nature into the conditions of human nature, and to make the Divine Being not only conceivable by that which is finite, but approachable by that which is fallen; sent to discover and accomplish the Fathers purposes of grace, and to fetch home to Him each lost and wandering childJesus is the Prince of Missionaries, the Envoy extraordinary, the Evangelist supreme, the angel whom all other angels worship, and round whose throne thunders at this moment the mingled music of a numberless company, ceasing not day or night to ascribe to Him all the glory of redemption.2 [Note: C. Stanford.]
2. Behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed. Here we approach a study in symbols. The vision of a bush burning with fire which did not consume it was full of symbolic meaning to Moses. What he saw outwardly with the natural eye, he was able to discern inwardly with the spiritual eye, because he was ready to see and hear what God would teach him.
Earths crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes.
A bush on fire with no human hand to set it alight, no fuel to keep it burningit was just a picture to Moses of what God could do with him, and a picture to the people of God for all time, of the grace of Him who is willing to dwell in human beings as lowly, as insignificant, as the little thorn bush on the Mount of Horeb.1 [Note: Mrs. Penn-Lewis, Face to Face, 39.]
It needed no great flame to reduce a bush quickly into a heap of white ashes. If, as in that arid region might well have been the case, the bush was scorched and witheredits leaves dead and limp, its branches dry and saplessthe flame would make all the speedier work with it. But the thorn was not consumed; no branch or twig or leaf was even scorched or singed; the flame played round it as innocuously as the sunset glory burns in a belt of wood. The Alpine traveller is familiar with one of the most beautiful sights of that beautiful region. At sunrise the serried pines projected against the sky on some mountain-ridge appear robed in dazzling brightness. The stems and branches lose their opacity, and shine with a transparent glory; while the leaves are burnished till they seem like angels wings or fragments of the sun itself. As harmlessly as the sunrise glows in the Alpine pines, so harmlessly did the mysterious flame envelop the bush in the desert, because the Angel of the Covenant dwelt in it. His presence restrained the devouring fire, as afterwards it held in leash the stormy winds and waves of Gennesaret. The law of nature was subject to the stronger law of the Divine will. He made His minister here a flame of fire, and the fire fulfilled His word.2 [Note: H. Macmillan.]
III
The Symbolism of the Burning Bush
Moses said, I will turn aside now, and see this great sight why the bush is not burnt. We must, like Moses, turn aside to discern the symbols which lie beneath the vision. The symbolism of the Burning Bush has been variously explained.
1. Some regard it as typical of the incarnation and the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. The thorny bush represents the humiliation and degradation of the Son of God when He came into our world and assumed the likeness of sinful flesh; the flame that enveloped it is an emblem of the intensity of suffering which He endured in our room and stead from men and devils, and from the Father Himself; while the fact that the bush was unconsumed shadows forth His triumph over all His sufferingsover death and the grave. In visionary form we have here pictured to us the altar, the victim, and the sacrifice of the great atonement.
2. But the Burning Bush has also been taken to represent the condition of the Church. It was exactly suited to the circumstances of the children of Israel at the time. It was the true likeness of their sufferings in the furnace of affliction in Egypt. The thorny bush was a fit emblem of their character and position. As the plant was stunted and depressed by the ungenial character of its situation, creeping over the barren rock, scorched by the sun, and seldom visited by the kindly dew and rain and breeze, its stems producing thorns instead of graceful leaf and blossom-laden branches; so the Hebrew slaves, in their dreary bondage, were morally and intellectually dwarfed, and developed, under the influence of these unfavourable circumstances, the baser and more abject aspects of their nature. The thorn in the wilderness recalls the primeval curse upon man; and we have in the sufferings of Israel a repetition of the sufferings of our first parents after their expulsion from Paradise. The same cause which produced the one produced the other. The thorns of Adams lot were the very same as those that stung the Hebrews in Egypt. And, by Gods appearance in the thorn bush, we have the great fact of redemption shadowed forth, that God Himself has gone with us into the wilderness to be the sharer of our doom while redeeming us from it. It is a striking thought that in the very thorn of mans curse appeared the shining Angel of the Covenant to bless him; that out of the very wood of the thorn bush, which was the symbol of mans degradation, was constructed the tabernacle which was the symbol of his exaltation through the incarnation of the Son of God.
Thou art burning on, thou ancient tree,
With unabated flame;
The fires of earth have beat on thee,
And thou art still the same:
Thou art not lessened in degree,
Nor tarnished in thy name.
Thou hast two sides of thy life on earth;
One has in dust its share,
It blends with scenes of pain and dearth,
It touches common care:
The other seeks a higher birth,
And branches arms of prayer.
Oh, Church of the living Lord of all,
Like Him to thee is given
A common life with those that fall,
And an upper life in heaven;
A being with the weak and small,
And a path where stars are driven.
Thy starlights glow shall put out the fires
That check thine earthly way;
The burning of thy pure desires
Shall burn thy dross away,
And in the love thy Christ inspires
Thou shalt endure for aye.1 [Note: G. Matheson, Sacred Songs, 138.]
3. Another aspect in which we may consider the parable of the Burning Bush is in the light it casts upon the nature of God. That light has been broadening and brightening from the time of Moses down even to our own age. Consider how God reveals Himself here, as the fire which burns, but does not consume.
(1) In the world of matter.To the careless eye it seems that the fire of decay is for ever burning up and destroying the material things we see around us; but science teaches us that this is quite false, and that there is no such thing as destruction possible in Gods universe. You may grind a stone to the finest powder and dissipate it to all the winds of heaven, but it is not in your power to annihilate the finest atom of it; it is conceivably possible to gather together all the infinitesimal fragments, when the weight would be found to be exactly what it was before its cohesion was interfered with. You may take solid iron and heat it till it becomes first soft as wax, then fluid like water, and next is changed into vapour; but by so doing you only alter its condition; you cannot destroy the least particle of it. The pool of water, when the sun has dried it all away, is not non-existent, it is only expanded into mist: it becomes part of the cloud which anon will descend again upon the earth in the shape of rain. The tree which after standing for centuries slowly dies and crumbles beneath the withering finger of decay, though it disappears from the visible universe, is not really destroyed; in the shape of carbon and silica and of various gases every particle of it is as certainly in the universe as ever it was, and will be worked up anew into flower and pebble and living thing. And so it is with all that is to be found in Gods creation. In his popular lecture on the burning of a candle, Faraday shows that when the candle has burnt to its socket and apparently been annihilated altogether, every particle of its constituent elements can be gathered together again and weighed and measured.
When Goethe makes Nature sing
Here at the roaring loom of time I ply
And weave for God the garment thou seest Him by;
and when Tennyson asks
The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plainsAre not these, O soul, the Vision of Him who reigns?
they are only putting into poetic form that which is a distinct truth of revelation. And if the material universe is thus a manifestation of God, science has made it abundantly evident that the fire which burns but does not consume, is the aptest possible symbol by which its nature, and the nature of the God who made it, can be set forth to Man 1:1 [Note: A. M. Mackay.]
(2) Amid the play of the forces that are in the world.Almost the most important truth which science has demonstrated is that which is known as the Conservation of Energy; it establishes the fact that force, like matter, is indestructible, and that it is a fixed quantity in the universe. To the uninstructed mind it seems that energy is always being not only dissipated but destroyed; but this is just as impossible as that matter should be destroyed. When the blacksmith strikes his anvil till his arm grows weary, the force expended is not lost; it has simply changed its form from animal energy to heat, as is proved by the anvil growing hot. The energy residing in the steam which drives our locomotives and our machinery existed in the shape of heat in the glowing fires which created the steam; and before that it lay for centuries latent or hidden in the coal, which was dug out of the bowels of the earth; and earlier still, long, long ages ago, it manifested itself in vegetable energy, for what is now coal was once living forest; and earlier still it was manifested in the heat of the sun, which was taken up into the growing trees: so that in one sense the light and heat which our fires give forth are just the sunbeams which have been for ages imprisoned and hoarded up for the use of man. And while we can thus trace backward the force which drives the engine, we can follow it after it has done its work. It is neither lost nor destroyed. It is dissipated into the atmosphere in the form of heat, and perhaps will next manifest itself in an electrical form, in the tempest which rends the air and wraps the heavens in flame. All this is not mere conjecture. Just as it can be shown by delicate experiment that the candle which has burnt to its socket is still in existence in its every atom, so it is shown by the dynamometer that force never is and never can be lost. There is always the appearance of the annihilation of energy; there is never the reality. Force also resembles the bush which Moses saw; it is ever burning, yet it is never consumed. And when we remember that all energy, as all matter, comes from God and is a manifestation of God, we perceive how truly the vision which Moses saw was a symbol of the nature and the mode of operation of the Great I AM who creates and sustains all things.
There is unity amid all diversity, persistence amid all the ebb and flow of the visible universe. Let us once truly grasp this truth, and we shall no longer be moved to melancholy by the reflection that change and decay in all around we see. We shall be able believingly to say to God
Though earth and man were gone,
And suns and universes ceased to be,
And Thou wert left alone,
Every existence would exist in Thee:
There is not room for Death,
Nor atom his might could render void;
Thou, Thou art Being and Breath,
And what Thou art may never be destroyed.
(3) In the sphere of life.Life, we know, comes from God. His is the Spirit which animates all living things; in Him we live and move and have our being. In fact, He is the Life: it is only when He letteth His breath go forth that the face of the earth is renewed, and men and the lower creatures are created. And of life we may make exactly the same statement as we have made of matter and of force: it is indestructible. It may change its form and its mode of manifestation: but it cannot be annihilated or destroyed. Life in the universelike matter and like forceseems to the uninstructed mind to burn to the socket and to go out; there seems to be such a thing as death: but in sober reality we may well accept the poets dictum that There is no death; what seems so is transition. Nature herself gives us a hint of this. In autumn there seems to be a final decay and dissolution, but it is only life disguising herself and going into hiding; spring shows that there has been no real diminution of the vital forces in our world, but probably rather an increase.
Nature gives us no such unassailable proof of the indestructibility of life as she does of the indestructibility of force and of matter. Rather, at first glance, she would seem to show us that the individual life can be destroyed, for we cannot trace it as we can the individual atom of matter and of force; its place in this world knows it no more. But this only points us to the fact that there is an invisible, a spirit world, which we cannot reach by our material senses. For the analogy of Nature will not let us for one moment suppose that life can really be annihilated. If science teaches one thing more clearly than another it is this, that there is Unity in Nature. If matter cannot be destroyed, if force cannot be destroyed, we may feel certain that neither can life. If it be objected that we cannot see what has become of the soul after death, it is a sufficient reply to say that neither could men in Moses time have known what became of material substances when they were burned with fire and disappeared from all human cognizance.
The flame may rise, the bush may burn
In deserts lone and bare:
There is no waste of any bloom
While God is present there.
The sun of human joy may set
Behind the stormy Cross:
While faith within the twilight kneels
There is not any loss.
Some homeless prayer may be at night
A wanderer on the moor,
But while it names the Blessed Name
It never can be poor.
(4) We find a meaning for the vision in history.This vision would teach Moses, and surely it should teach us, thatin spite of all appearances to the contrarythere is permanence underlying Gods purposes and will, and the love which informs those purposes. Moses may have heard of the promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, concerning their descendants, that they should become a great nation and should be a blessing to all the world. How had God kept His promises? The Israelites for centuries had been degraded and ill-used as hardly any other nation before or since. Would it not seem that God had changed His intentions and had forgotten to be gracious? But no, it was in appearance onlyas the bush burned but was not consumed. And now at last the time had come which was to explain the past and make glorious the future.
Let us believe that Gods will is unchangeable, and at the very moment of seeming frustration is completing itself. Exercise this faith with regard to any question that perplexes. It is not the will of our Heavenly Father that one of earths little ones should perish. He willeth that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. Believe that He will have His will. If it is written that our God is a consuming fire, it must be a fire that consumes only the chaff, only the evil in men. This is the meaning of all sorrow and discipline on earth, and I believe it will one day be seen to be the meaning of what we speak of as eternal punishment. So far as there is a spark of good left in a bad man, the fire of Gods love will burn, but not consume. Believe that Gods purpose will not be frustrated in the accomplishment of that one far-off Divine event to which the whole creation moves. And believe meanwhile
That nothing walks with aimless feet;
That not one life shall be destroyd,
Or cast as rubbish to the void,
When God hath made the pile complete.
Literature
Banks (L. A.), On the Trail of Moses, 33.
Campbell (R. J.), Sermons Addressed to Individuals, 207.
Davies (D. C.), The Atonement and Intercession of Christ, 162.
Gunsaulus (F. W.), Paths to Power, 9.
Liddon (H. P.), Bampton Lectures (Our Lords Divinity), 53.
Maclaren (A.), Expositions: Exodus, Leviticus, and Numbers , 19.
Macmillan (H.), The Garden and the City, 80.
McNeill (J.), Regent Square Pulpit, i. 97.
Neale (J. M.), Sermons Preached in Sackville College Chapel, iv. 251.
Norton (J. N.), Short Sermons, 305.
Parker (J.), The City Temple, ii. (1872) 51.
Peabody (F. G.), Mornings in the College Chapel, 2nd Ser., 95.
Penn-Lewis (Mrs.), Face to Face, 34.
Stanford (C), Symbols of Christ, 61.
Vaughan (D. J.), The Days of the Son of Man, 209.
Wilson (S. L.), Helpful Words for Daily Life, 197.
Woodrow (S. G.), Christian Verities, 34.
British Congregationalist, JulyDec., 1908, 102 (Jowett).
Christian World Pulpit, xliv. 20 (Mackay); lviii. 246 (Muir); lxvi. 267 (Cleal).
Fuente: The Great Texts of the Bible
angel: Exo 3:4, Exo 3:6, Gen 16:7-13, Gen 22:15, Gen 22:16, Gen 48:16, Deu 33:16, Isa 63:9, Hos 12:4, Hos 12:5, Mal 3:1, Luk 20:37, Act 7:30-35
bush burned: Gen 15:13-17, Deu 4:20, Psa 66:12, Isa 43:2, Isa 53:10, Isa 53:11, Dan 3:27, Zec 13:7, Joh 1:14, Rom 8:3, 2Co 1:8-10
Reciprocal: Gen 15:17 – smoking Gen 16:10 – the angel Exo 19:18 – in fire Exo 23:20 – Angel Exo 24:17 – like devouring fire Lev 9:24 – there came a fire Num 20:16 – sent an Num 22:22 – and the angel Num 22:32 – before me Jdg 2:1 – And an angel Jdg 13:6 – terrible 1Ki 19:12 – a fire Isa 54:11 – thou afflicted Zec 3:1 – the angel Mar 12:26 – in the book Luk 2:8 – abiding Rev 8:3 – another
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Exo 3:2. The Angel of the Lord appeared to him Not a created angel, but the Angel of the covenant, Christ, who then and ever was God, and was to be man, and a messenger from God to man. He, termed the Angel of Gods presence, (Isa 63:9,) had wrestled with Jacob, (Gen 32:24;) and had redeemed him from all evil, (Gen 48:16;) and afterward conducted his posterity through the wilderness, 1Co 10:4. These his temporary appearances were presages of his more solemn mission and coming, on account of which he is fitly called the Angel or Messenger. That this angel was no creature, appears from his saying, I am the Lord, a language which angels never speak; but, I am sent from God I am thy fellow-servant. In a flame of fire Representing Gods majesty, purity, and power, and showing that he was about to bring terror and destruction to his enemies, and light and comfort to his people, and to display his glory before all. The bush burned and was not consumed An emblem of the church now in bondage in Egypt, burning in the brick-kilns, yet not consumed; cast down, but not destroyed; for God was in the burning bush, was and always will be present with his people in their sufferings; Isa 43:2; Dan 3:25.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
3:2 And the angel of the LORD appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a {c} bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush [was] not consumed.
(c) This shows that the Church is not consumed by the fires of affliction, because God is in the midst of it.