God's Vision for Us: Listening Before Leading

We have just heard a story that I suspect for

many, especially those who are not part of a

faith tradition before, would be a little bit

new or fresh. This story, the Transfiguration,

it's one of the stranger stories in Scripture.

We're going to turn to a different story that's

sort of on the opposite end of that spectrum.

My guess is that if I randomly stopped 100 people

out on the street, regardless of their own tradition,

whether they've ever been to church before or

not, and I asked them to name one Bible story,

I'm willing to bet that easily in the top five

stories that would be named, maybe the top story

that would be named is this story. From the book

of Exodus, the third chapter, it is the story

of the call of Moses. The call of Moses out of

the burning bush. So friends, let us continue

listening now for a word from God as we hear

these verses, Exodus chapter three, beginning

with the first verse. Moses was keeping the flock

of his father -in -law Jethro, the priest of

Midian. He led his flock beyond the wilderness

and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. And there

the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame

of fire out of a bush. And he looked and the

bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. Then

Moses said, I must turn aside and look at this

great sight and see why the bush is not burned

up. When the Lord saw that he had turned aside

to see, God called to him out of the bush saying,

Moses, Moses. And Moses said, Here I am. Then

he said, Come no closer. Remove the sandals from

your feet for the place on which you are standing

is holy ground. And God said further, I am the

God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God

of Isaac and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid

his face for he was afraid to look at God. Then

the Lord said, I've observed the misery of my

people who are in Egypt. I've heard their cry

on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know

their sufferings and I have. come down to deliver

them from the Egyptians and to bring them up

out of the land to a good and broad land, a land

flowing with milk and honey to the country of

the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Amorites

and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites.

The cry of the Israelites has now come to me.

I have also seen how the Egyptians oppressed

them, so come, Moses, and I will send you to

Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out

of Egypt. But Moses said to God, who am I that

I should go to Pharaoh and bring the Israelites

out of Egypt? And God said, I will be with you.

And this shall be the sign for you that it is

I who sent you. When you have brought the people

out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain.

Friends, this too is the word of God for the

people of God. Thanks be to God. Will you pray

with me? Gracious and loving God. draw near to

us now, quiet, whatever it is that is filling

our heads and hearts in this moment. Speak to

us, O God, in the quiet, that we might hear afresh

and anew your word, your word for the living

of these days. We pray these things for we know

that with you and you alone, O God, they are

possible for you and you alone are our rock and

our redeemer. Amen. I have a bad habit. I listen

to music all the time. Craig's office is right

next to mine, so he can probably attest to this,

that there is music playing in my office. Even

though I try and keep it quiet, I don't want

to distract others, but there's music playing

basically any time I'm not visiting with someone.

At home in the kitchen, Alexa's always playing

some playlist. Even when I'm going to sleep,

much to the chagrin of my wife, I am listening

to music. Even as I wrote this sermon, what am

I doing? I'm listening to music. We have a group

of friends who we have done vacation with every

summer for 12 or 13 years. These are two other

families who we met in seminary. And there's

a joke in that group that our vacation has not

truly started until Alan pulls out his Bluetooth

speaker and begins whatever playlist he has concocted

for that year. I remember the first time they

made that joke, though. It sort of stopped me

short. I hadn't really thought about how much

I listened to music, how much I seemed to not

like empty space. It stopped me short because

it forced me to confront the fact that I am a

little uncomfortable with quiet, I think. That

maybe, just maybe, I listen to things so that

I don't have to listen to things. Anyone else

have this habit? Right? How many of us are guilty

of this? I recently read a piece on the art of

listening. And one of the things it said was

that most of us are good at hearing, but really

bad at listening. Right? Usually when we're in

a conversation with someone, and I think we all

know that you can tell when you're in a conversation

with someone like this, where you're talking

to them, you're looking them in the eye, but

you can tell what's going on behind their eyes.

They're plotting their next move. You're plotting

your next move. What am I going to say as soon

as this story finishes? How am I going to defend

this piece of whatever they're saying I don't

agree with? We're always thinking about what

we're going to say, how we're going to say it,

maybe even how we're going to get ourselves out

of whatever conversation we are in. The author

of this piece said that to truly listen, to truly

listen is to shed your protective mechanisms.

Kind of like that. Whenever I'm in a conversation,

there's a little piece of me that's ready to

be defensive if I need to. To truly listen, the

author of this piece said, you have to shed your

protective mechanisms. You have to be present

with what you are hearing without necessarily

trying to control it. or to figure it out. So

Moses in the story that we've just read, Moses

is one of the grand characters of all scripture,

right? As evidenced in the fact that the passage

Millie read for us from Mark, who is it that's

up there on the mountain with Jesus? It's some

dead people and Moses is one of them up there

with him. He's that important. He's coming back

all these years later. He's this just foundational

character in the biblical narrative and he's

a flawed character. Moses, like David and like

so many others, he gets it wrong as much as he

gets it right. That's a recurring theme. That's

where grace enters because we all get it wrong

as much as we get it right. But here, Moses has

kind of a shining moment. His call story at the

beginning of Exodus chapter 3 is sort of this

Exodus 3 · chapter mention

moment where Moses is really at his best. And

one of the things that shines through most clearly

for me in this story is that Moses here is a

good listener. Let me explain what I mean by

that. It's been 40 years. So you turn from chapter

2 of Exodus to chapter 3, chapter 2, Moses flees

Egypt. Remember, he's born in chapter 1. He grows

up in Pharaoh's household against all odds. He

kills an Egyptian. He flees Egypt. By all accounts,

it's hard to really know the math, but in all

likelihood, 40 years has passed. Since Moses

fled Egypt. That's a long time. He's been in

Midian, this rural area, for 40 years. He has

been tending to his father -in -law Jethro's

flock for a long time. He knows the area that

he is leading these sheep. He knows it like the

back of his hand. Anyone here commute every day

on I -85? Or maybe Pine Street or 29, right?

If you have a terrain that you are familiar with,

it's easy to just get into autopilot. Anyone

else ever had the experience where you're driving

down 85 and then suddenly you just come to and

you realize you're like 20 miles further and

you have no recollection of anything that happened

in the last 20 miles? You just slip into this

go with it because it's so familiar. You know

the milestones. You know the ups and downs. You

know when I get to the airport, I'm about this

far away from my destination or vice versa when

you're coming home. That's Moses. He knows where

he is. And even here where he's pushing beyond

the wilderness, that's the phrase that is used.

He's beyond the wilderness, which when you are

a shepherd, sometimes you have to push beyond

what is familiar to find those green pastures

and that water for your flock. Even out there,

he is a good listener. And what I mean by that,

even out there in that familiar terrain, he is

open. He's attentive. Right? He's aware. He's

paying attention. He's noticing who and what

is right in front of him. If you've ever spent

time in the desert, there are a lot of dry bushes.

You don't notice any of them because you notice

all of them. But even out there amongst all those

bushes, in that familiar terrain, that I -85

of Moses' life, he notices the one thing that

is different. That burning bush. And the way

we know this is because he turns aside. Did you

catch that language? When I read that, it's been

a while since I read this story, and when I read

it again this week, that turn aside language

caught me a little off guard because when I heard

that, I thought Moses turned away from the bush.

That's what I think when I think turn aside.

He's avoiding it, a little bit like the disciples

do, in my estimation, in the transfiguration

story. This amazing thing is happening. This

otherworldly thing is happening. And they sort

of turn away from it. They get busy. They set

up their Bluetooth speaker and playlist and say,

we better do something, guys. Let's build some

dwellings for all these people. But instead,

what we read here is that Moses turns aside.

And when you read the passage, it says he turns

aside in order to look closer. And sure enough,

when I looked closer at the word that is translated,

turn aside, it's this Hebrew word, sir. What

it means is that you deviate from the path of.

It means you step off towards something new.

It's this movement of curiosity. It's this movement

of paying attention, right? Moses is stepping

off the familiar path in order to investigate

this thing that is a little different that he

has noticed in his surroundings. And then this

other remarkable thing happens because it's not

just Moses. who is listening. It's apparently

God who is listening as well. There's this phrase

in the passage where it says, when the Lord saw

that Moses turned aside, God called to him. Isn't

that interesting? I read someone writing about

this recently, and they said, I wonder how many

people walked past that burning bush and didn't

notice it. How many people were on that familiar

path? How many people were out there beyond the

wilderness and they see this thing and God is

just waiting for them to turn aside? But it's

only Moses who actually does. And when the Lord

sees that Moses turns aside, that is when God

calls to him. There's a notion in this passage

that good listening is the doorway to hearing

God's call. It is interesting to me when I think

about churches and ministries and leaders who

I admire, they all tend, or seem at least to

me, to have one thing in common. And the thing

they have in common is that they are all good

listeners. They are people who tend not to be

defensive, reactively. They tend not to be overly

controlling. They have a vision. They have an

idea of what they're trying to do, but they're

not coercive in trying to get it done. They're

comfortable in their own skin. They're comfortable

in the wilderness, and they're also comfortable

in their own backyard. They also are these people

who see a need, so they see that bush in front

of them that is burning but not consumed, and

rather turning to it and saying, wow, that's

an interesting need. Someone should really do

something about that. Instead, what they do is

they turn aside and they say what Moses says.

Here I am. There's a difference in those two

things. I don't know about you all. Sometimes

I walk through my house and I see needs and I

think, man, someone in this house should really

take care of that. That's not being a good listener.

I may even hear it, but I'm not listening. To

be a good listener in the vein of Moses is to

notice the need. and to turn towards it, to step

off whatever the path is that we are on, to investigate,

and then to say, here I am. Do you know people

like this? I think about stories like Clarence

Jordan and Millard and Linda Fuller. So these

were people who were off in the wilderness of

South Georgia, which really is a wilderness if

you've ever spent time down there, which I have.

They were out there in the wilderness of South

Georgia, and they saw people all around them

who were stuck in the cycle of generational poverty,

people who didn't have adequate housing. And

rather than saying, you know, someone should

really do something about this, they turned towards

it. They got curious. They investigated it a

little bit, and they ended up starting a fund

called the Fund for Humanity that we know today

as Habitat for Humanity. Or I think a pastor,

about a pastor in St. Louis. 1970s, a pastor

in St. Louis who looked around his congregation

and he saw just the sheer volume of need. There

were so many people in this congregation who

needed care and he could not possibly care for

all of them on his own. And he listened. And

he noticed people around him who had gifts for

listening. And so he thought, I could train these

people. to minister to others by listening to

their stories, to entering into their story with

them, and that's the birth of Stephen ministry,

a ministry that is all over the world, including

in our own congregation today. I think about

Juliette Gordon -Lowe on Girl Scout Sunday, same

thing. Notice, listen to the stories of people

around her there in Savannah, Georgia, and hear

all these years later. We see an amazing ministry

because one person said, here I am. And it's

closer to home as well. I think about our own

church. We had a witness season Sunday last week,

and we heard about Haiti Outreach Ministry. And

then on Wednesday, we heard a presentation about

a medical mission trip to Honduras, building

on our long legacy of service in the Dominican

Republic. All of these ministries, including

Cuba, all of this in one week. We had a team

in Cuba that just returned. All of those ministries

were born out of people who were paying attention.

Not just with their eyes, but with their hearts

and their ears, their souls. They were listening

in the way that Moses listens. We could go on

and on, cast, hand in hand, away, home, starting

this afternoon again here at our church, our

Thursday meal ministry. All of them, people who

notice, who listen, and who raise their hand.

Not, you know, someone should really take care

of this, but here I am. It's not lost on me either,

and I hope not on you. As I mentioned last week,

this whole sermon series is being born out of

this vision process that we as a church have

been about for the last year that we're about

to conclude. We'll present a report to our officers

later this month and then share that with the

congregation. But the cornerstone of that work

was listening sessions. That's not by accident.

That's us as a church. We didn't necessarily

have this language at the time, but that's us

turning aside, looking at each person who is

their own burning bush and saying, tell us what

it is you sense. Let us listen to where you feel

God is at work in this place. I was in a study

this week, and someone who was a part of those

listening sessions, and I know there's a number

of you, we had church members, much like Stephen

Ministry, wasn't led by staff, it was led by

church members who facilitated those over 40

conversations with about 250 people across our

church through the fall. One of them was serving

as a scribe, so their job was to just write down

what they heard in the listening session. And

his comment to the group was, you know, it's

really hard. To just listen and not say anything.

And it's true. It is really hard to be a good

listener. Right? Because we are people who prefer

distraction. I like my playlist while I make

dinner. We are people who like easy answers.

We are people who are told it is okay to choose

being heard over actually hearing. But friends,

what I'm convinced of is that what the world,

what the church, our church included, most needs

in these days are people who listen before they

lead. The rest of this series is going to be

the leading part. We're going to dig into the

different areas that we feel God might be offering

a vision for our church, where we move forward.

But before we get there, we first have to learn

to listen because that is the foundation of it

all. What the world most needs are people and

churches that get quiet enough to notice those

bushes that are burning without being consumed

and who, when the voice calls, will turn aside

and speak those simple but courageous words,

here I am. Now listen, I will confess that I

am not likely to turn my playlist off this week.

But I will commit to all of you, and Craig, you

can hold me accountable, I'll turn the volume

down a little bit. I'll try and make one more

space to just sit in that quiet. And I want us

to do the exact same. And we're going to start

that right now. We're just going to have a little

quiet before we move towards the beautiful sacrament

of baptism. And I want you to notice what...

I notice when I get quiet. It's not always comfortable.

But I want you to be willing to sit and just

go a little deeper and begin that hard but faithful

work, that critical work of listening before

we lead. Amen.