Infinitely Knowable

Moses’ encounter with God in the burning bush. Today’s Old Testament reading is a very familiar story. And all of us probably have some sort of image in our imagination of what that encounter must have looked like. My imaginings are aided by the fact that I have seen the bush. Not still burning, of course, but cloistered with the Greek Orthodox monastery of St. Catherine deep in the Sinai desert at the base of Mount Sinai is a bush that pilgrims still visit. We might wonder which would be the greater or less likely miracle—that the bush burned without being consumed so many thousands of years ago or that it reportedly still lives so many thousands of years later.

It is easy to overlook what this story has to offer us today. We overlook its implications partly because it is so familiar; we know the story so well we do not pause to ponder its import. And, on the other hand, it seems so unlikely, how could it have any meaning for us today? Yet it does have some very interesting implications for our faith and our relationship with God, even today, in our own time.

For example, has it ever struck you as odd that Moses, as soon as he is aware of the burning bush, moves towards it? Even before the voice speaks to him, calling him by name. Moses, seemingly without a second thought, moves forward to explore. Something unknown, something completely unfamiliar, something new and mysterious and potentially fraught with danger. All alone in the desert with only a flock of sheep to help him if he finds himself in trouble, Moses goes in for a closer look. Moses welcomes and explores the mysterious. That’s a point about this story that we might bear in mind in our own lives, in our own time, in our own journeys of faith.

Interesting point number two is that once the voice speaks to Moses (and probably even before), Moses never seems to have the slightest doubt that this wonderful, frightening, unknown, new occurrence is a manifestation of God. Even though God has never spoken to him in this way before or come to him in this way before, Moses immediately accepts that this is God’s presence and God’s voice. Our past experiences of God’s presence should not limit our future expectations of God’s voice in our lives.

We might also learn from Moses’ apparent expectation that God will, indeed, speak to him regularly from time to time. Moses’ posture is one of expectation, anticipation; not suspicion or doubt. Moses’ question to the burning bush is not, "Are you really God?" Rather, Moses says to God within the bush what we might almost think of as a chat up line, "What’s your name? Tell me a little more about yourself. Help me get to know you better." As though Moses wanted to develop his relationship with God. Perhaps, following Moses’ example, we, too, might assume that God wishes to speak with us, frequently, and we should take advantage of the opportunities to get to know God better, "God, tell me a little more about yourself. Help me get to know you better."

It is a reminder that our spiritual lives can be so much more alive if we do remember that it is a relationship we are talking about. All of us, I expect, could do much more than we do to deepen and explore our relationship with God.

Why do we hesitate? One reason, I suspect, is fear. We only need the story of Moses and the burning bush to remind us that approaching God may be dangerous. Drawing closer to God draws us into unfamiliar territory. And it’s a place where we might get burned. It is definitely a place filled with power beyond our imagining. Ancient maps, from the early Middle Ages for example, showed the extent of the known world, ending in the west with the coastline of Europe. Beyond that shoreline, out in the middle of the limitless sea, were the words, "Beyond here dragons lie." They didn’t know, of course, what really lay beyond the horizon. Because it was unknown, it was fearful. Today we have charted the limits of the sea, but we will never chart the limits of God. To approach God will always be to enter into unknown territory, knowing only that in that place we are amid power much greater than our own. It is natural to be fearful.

Even more often, though, I think the fear that keeps us today from seeking out deeper knowledge of God is a more subtle, psychological fear. Not so much the fear that in speaking with God we will come face to face with a physical force of infinite power (although that is true.) The more real fear for many of us today is that if we really speak to God, if we really try to figure out who God is for us; it may actually affect our lives. Relationships (at least meaningful relationships) have a way of doing that. And, as relationships go, this one is a big one. If we really enter into this relationship, if we get close enough to God to really talk, it could affect our lives in a really big way. After all, look what happened to Moses. If we get drawn into this relationship with God, it might affect how we spend our free time. It might affect how we do our jobs, or even whether or not we do a particular job. It might affect how we treat our neighbor. It might affect our family life. It could affect how we spend our money. A real relationship with God might affect… disrupt just about every single piece of our lives. And that’s a fearful thing. Much easier, safer, not to get to close…

I can imagine a few other reasons people draw away from exploring a relationship with God. There are some people who do not ask God to share more of God’s self out of a sense of humility. This is the voice within ourselves and others that says, "It is not for me to know God’s ways. God’s being is a mystery too awesome to be known or understood. We are just put here to serve. God has told us all we need to know. It is not for us to pester God for more information." We do not seek to know God better because we presume we can’t or shouldn’t know more.

And then, of course, there are some people who don’t pursue a relationship with God because they just couldn’t be bothered, who are indifferent to the whole possibility. Oddly enough, some of those people sit in the pews on Sunday mornings. But still just don’t bother to make the effort to know God.

Fear. Humility. Indifference. All keep us from engaging God in conversation… learning more about who God really is in our lives.

The theologian Karl Rahner has described mystery as that which is "infinitely knowable." So we might speak of God. As that which is infinitely knowable. If nothing else, I hope you carry that phrase away with you this morning. God is infinitely knowable. God is knowable. The humility which might inhibit our approach to God is indeed false or misplaced. The stories of Scripture, the stories of the people of faith over the centuries and millennia, are stories of God revealing God’s self to people. God wants to be known in our world, in our lives and (I expect) is always seeking new ways, new opportunities, new voices through which to speak to us. God is knowable to us.

Infinitely knowable. Which is also to say that we will never know all there is to know. To stop short in our journey of exploration of God’s being is to limit God to the smallness of one human mind at one point in time. To turn away from an infinitely ongoing and deepening relationship with God is an act of either profound arrogance or profound apathy. God is infinitely knowable.

Moses is a wonderful example. Faced with the awesome and the mysterious, the previously unknown, Moses says, "I must turn aside and look at this great sight." His life was never the same again. Scripture tells us Moses went some pretty rough times, but he never walked away. We can only presume he didn’t want to; that once he entered into his own relationship with the infinitely knowable presence of God, Moses sought the journey ever further, ever deeper, ever closer to God’s presence.

He was just minding the flock of his father in law out in the desert when God spoke to him out of the burning bush. Moving closer, he said, "I must turn aside and look more closely at this great sight."

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