Holy Spaces Have Holy Consequences

“Now, go, I will send you to Pharaoh to lead out my people, the Israelites, from Egypt.” (Exodus 3:10)

Many Christians end Moses’s story at the burning bush, encouraging us to “turn aside” to see the burning bushes all around us.  It is certainly an important message: stop and pay attention to God’s presence with us in ways we have not before.

However, seeing the burning bush is only half the story.

Moses does not have this incredible experience with God in the wilderness, post a photo of it on his social media saying #blessed, and then return to shepherding his sheep!  As we've seen, Moses has been paying attention to what's happening around him, how people are suffering, and instinctively acting against injustice. Now, God is showing up in a big way--blazing in the desert--to tell Moses the time has come to make an even more significant commitment.

This story is important because it marks a turning point for Moses - and for the people of God. What happens after the burning bush makes this story increasingly significant. His encounter with the burning bush gives Moses the courage to pursue what God is calling him to do next.

In Exodus 3:7-9, God says to Moses, “I have observed the misery of my people.” Not just, “Hey, have this moment of awe.”

God's call is for Moses, but it involves others.

Verse 7 notes that God continued speaking; God has more to add to the conversation on holy ground. God has seen the oppression of God’s people and desires to deliver them from their bondage. God is sending Moses to lead the process of liberation of God’s oppressed children. Seeing the burning bush leads Moses to discover what God is calling him to do next: to go back to Pharaoh to deliver the Hebrews from slavery in the land of Egypt.

What happens in the holy spaces of our lives should also have holy consequences in the world around us. Moses’ experience with God directly leads to action for and alongside God. Spiritual formation and working to bring about social justice cannot happen in vacuums – they naturally flow into and out of one another, fueling the fire and fanning the flame of the Spirit’s work and witness in our world.

As Richard Rohr points out, Moses’ burning bush moment is “the perfect integration of contemplation and action. His experience with God at the burning bush is immediately followed by a call that has social, economic, historical, and political implications” in the world around him. (Richard Rohr, “Liberation Theology,” Center for Action and Contemplation) Holy spaces demand faithful action.

If we think we can walk away from a burning bush unchanged, we need to look again. This is the challenge Rev. Ron Bell gave his congregation in St. Paul in the days following the murder of George Floyd in 2020. Rev. Bell served as pastor of Camphor Memorial United Methodist Church, located in the only and oldest Black neighborhood in Saint Paul. After the horrific incident when police officer Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds, protests and riots broke out across the Saint Paul-Minneapolis area. People across the country watched the news, many of them in complete shock at the violence, unrest, and chaos destroying the city. However, Rev. Bell rightfully called for us to “look again” at what was happening, and to look beneath the surface at why it was happening. He writes:

“My city is burning, but not in the way the media is showing. Did you see the fire, not the one burning down the precinct but the one burning in the hearts of the wounded in my community? The grieving mothers and grandmothers recalling the voice of our dear brother George Floyd, as he called for his mother, while taking his last breath. The burning hearts of we who wept, when our leaders refused to arrest the murderer of this wicked and inhumane deed? Did you see that fire?

Did you see the shattered glass, not those easily replaceable windows scattered in pieces on the ground under our feet? Instead, the shattered glass of expectation for justice, the shattered glass of respect for our humanity that our murderers continue to display, the shattered glass of hope as we watched our brother’s body lay, lifeless under the knee of his murderer. Did you see that glass shatter?

…I think you were so busy looking for a riot that you missed the gathering of the grieving. I think you were so busy looking for looters that you missed the lament and heartbreak of a community. I think you were so busy looking for trouble that you missed the tragedy of systemic racialized trauma on the bodies of black and brown people. Tonight, tomorrow, and even the next day I beg of you, look again.” (Ron Bell, “Do Not Look Away,” 29 May 2020.)

In what ways do we need to look again and heed the call for justice from the burning bushes in our world? They are not always hiding off the beaten path.  They often are right in front of us – bursting forth and fanning flames in this wilderness wasteland where we find ourselves. Perhaps it is the yard signs and posters crying out that Black Lives Matter, or the protester calling out in the streets, or the op-ed decrying how Black and brown communities get overlooked in conversations about the need for gun control. These could be the burning bush, beckoning us toward justice in our cities and world.

One of our friends and fellow church members, Missy Smith, is a social worker and community activist engaged in anti-racism work in Louisville. She shared that her burning bush is at the exit doors of the Louisville Metro Corrections Office. Each week throughout the protests after the murder of Breonna Taylor, Missy would sit outside and wait for people who had been arrested while protesting to be released from jail and help them find a safe way home. She shared how each person she encountered on this holy ground helped to fuel her passion for justice in our community. 

Rev. Ron Bell and our friend Missy combine holy attention with holy action in the world. They discern their next steps while standing on holy ground, testifying to the power of burning bushes to call us forward into God’s purposes. They suggest to us that these two aspects of spiritual life are woven into each other, almost without distinction.

We need to turn aside. We need to look again. But the work doesn’t end there; that is only the beginning. Burning bushes are calling all of us to join with God in creating a world where justice and love are abundant.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning once wrote,

“Earth's crammed with heaven, 
And every common bush afire with God;
But only he who sees takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it and pluck blackberries,
And daub their faces unaware.”

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Aurora Leigh (London: C. S. Francis & Company, 1857), 304.

We are so accustomed to ignoring what seems common. Are we ready to take off our shoes and get to work? Or are we, too, plucking blackberries, completely unaware of the holy ground beneath us and the holy call before us?

What are the burning bushes around you, and what are they calling you to do next?

**This essay is a slightly revised version of pages 48-51 in Hard and Holy Work: A Lenten Journey through the Book of Exodus, which I co-wrote with Mary Alice Birdwhistell.

A Benediction (Or Miscellaneous Thoughts)

Uncle Ishmael will be exploring the biblical book of Exodus in alignment with the Revised Common Lectionary. The lectionary begins on August 23 with Exodus 1 and concludes its journey through the book on October 11 with Exodus 32.

Here's a list of the Sundays and the Exodus scripture lesson:
August 30 2026 Exodus 3:1-15
September 6 2026 Exodus 12:1-14
September 13 2026 Exodus 14:19-31
September 20 2026 Exodus 16:2-15
September 27 2026 Exodus 17:1-7
October 4 2026 Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20
October 11 2026 Exodus 32:1-14