Charles Spurgeon Commentary Exodus 3

Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father in law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

It must have been a great change for Moses, after forty years in the court of Pharaoh, to be spending another forty years in the wilderness. But it was not wasted time; it required the first two periods to make Moses fit for the grand life of the last forty. He must be a prince, and he must be a shepherd, that he might be both a ruler and a shepherd to God's people, Israel. He must be much alone; he must have many solitary communings with his own heart; he must be led to feel his own weakness. And this will be no loss of time for him; he will do more in the last forty years because of the two forties thus spent in preparation. And it is not lost time that a man takes in putting on his armor before he goes to battle, or that the reaper spends in sharpening his scythe before he cuts down the grain.

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 (Exodus 3:2).

How near God seemed in those ages when he could be beheld in a bush or sitting under an oak! And is he not equally near to us if we are but prepared for his presence? Surely pure eyes are rare, or sights of God would be more frequent, for the pure in heart shall see God (Matthew 5:8).

And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the LORD saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

God is not to be viewed by curiosity; he is not to be approached by presumption. A holy trembling well suits the man who would commune with the most holy God. We are not fit for communion with God without some measure of preparation. There is something to be put off before we can behold the Lord.

Now Moses kept the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: and he led the flock to the backside of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, even to Horeb.

There is nothing dishonourable about common trade and matters of business at all. Here is a shepherd who keeps his flock, and God keeps him and reveals Himself to him. When God wants a man to lead His people, He seeks him not among idlers, but busy, active men, and God was pleased to show Himself more to Moses as a shepherd than He had ever shown Himself to him as a prince in Egypt. I find no glowing Deity in the halls of Pharaoh, but I find the consuming fire manifested in the lone wastes of the desert of Sinai.

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.

It might well say, "Behold." I have seen a bush set alight by a match. It blazed in a moment, but it was gone in another moment. It burned up so fiercely and hastily.

But God was pleased to make a poor, consumable bush to be the unharmed place of his abiding. He dwells today in the human person of the Saviour. The Godhead is in Christ.

He dwells today in the church, which might well enough be consumed by his presence; but it is not consumed.

He can come and dwell in my heart and in yours tonight, and yet we shall bear the presence of Deity until the hour of our death.

He has a way of so throwing himself into our feebleness that it becomes strong, and what might otherwise have been destroyed is even preserved by his presence. The bush burned with fire, and was not consumed.