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Renewing Your Mind
I AM: The Name of God
00:26:26
We do not have to guess about the identity and character of God. He has given us His very name. Today, R.C. Sproul homes in on that consequential moment when the Lord of all creation revealed His sacred name to Moses. For your donation of any amount,...
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- [00:00]
Nathan W. Bingham
God revealed himself to Moses in a burning bush.
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Dr. R.C. Sproul
So Moses has this momentary encounter with the holy. And the closer he gets, the more afraid he becomes. And when he hears the voice of God. And the voice of God sends him on a mission. Wait a minute. Who am I that I should go on this mission?
- [00:28]
Nathan W. Bingham
That's a common reaction through the Bible. Whenever someone encounters the holiness of God, their response is the same. They're filled with terror. I'm Nathan W. Bingham and it's good to have you with us for this Saturday edition of Renewing youg Mind. We're starting a new short series on Saturdays considering the name of God revealed to Moses at the burning bush. These messages are from a 10 part series from RC Sproul, Moses and the Burning Bush. If you'd like the DVD set and a copy of the companion book, you can request today's resource package when you give a donation in support of renewing your mind@renewingyourmind.org before midnight tonight. So how can an unholy people stand before a holy God? Jumping right into the middle of this series, here's Dr. Sproulder. Answer from Moses and the Burning Bush.
- [01:23]
Dr. R.C. Sproul
In this session we're looking at the implications from the event that is recorded in the book of Exodus of Moses. Encounter with God at the burning bush. That bush that was burning but was not consumed. God had spoken to Moses and said, I have seen the oppression of my people who are in Egypt. And I have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. Now there are three verbs here that I want us to get a hold of that tell us something about God. At first it says, I've surely seen the oppression of my people so that God sees what's going on. The second thing he says, I have heard their cry. So we know that the God who is revealed here is not blind, nor is he deaf, nor is he ignorant. Because he goes on to say, because I know of the sorrows that they have borne. And so then he announces to Moses the purpose of this divine visitation. He said, so I have come down to deliver them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up to the place of milk and honey and so on. And he said, come now and I will send you to Pharaoh that you might bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. Now the first thing that Moses says to God in response to this is a question. Moses question is this, who am I? All of a sudden, Moses apparently doesn't know. He is. He hears this mandate from God God is telling him to go on this mission in God's behalf and behalf of the people. Listen, who am I to do this? So the first thing that happened in his encounter with God was he became confused about his own identity. If you've ever read Calvin's Institutes, and if you answer that question by saying no, then I respond to you, shame on you. You're missing one of the most beautiful pieces of literature ever written on the things of God, second only to the Bible in terms of the majesty of this book. You need to read it and re read it, and then when you're done with that, read it again. But Calvin begins the Institutes by saying, we never know who we are until we first know who God is again. Remember in Isaiah 6, after Isaiah saw God high and holy and lifted up and heard the angelic chorus of the three times holy, what was his response? He pronounced a curse upon himself, saying, woe is me, for I'm a man of unclean lips, and I'm not alone. I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips. Because for the first time in his life, dear ones, Isaiah found out who God was. And at the same time, for the first time in his life, he found out who Isaiah was. And that's what Calvin is getting at. He said, if we just look at ourselves and then judge ourselves among other people around us and compare ourselves with each other, pretty soon we will have such an inflated view of our own greatness that we will address ourselves as only slightly less than demigods, that is, as long as our gaze is fixed to the earth. But if by chance we would lift our eyes to heaven, we would see the brightness of the sun into which we cannot gaze directly, for it would destroy us. But as soon as we consider what kind of a being God is, and immediately as the holy men of old did, we tremble as we are aware of our feet of clay and of our frames of dust. So Moses has this momentary encounter with the holy. And the closer he gets, the more afraid he becomes. And when he hears the voice of God and the voice of God sends him on a mission. Wait a minute. Who am I that I should go on this mission? And so God said, I will certainly be with you. He doesn't really answer Moses question as to who Moses is. He just said, don't worry about who you are, because I'm going to be with you. And this shall be a sign to you that I have sent you. When you have brought out the people of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain. Now we get to the crux of the matter. Moses said to God, indeed, when I come to the children of Israel and say to them, the God that your father says sent me to you. And they say to me, what is his name? What shall I say to them? So now you see where Moses is directing his interrogation. He's no longer asking the question, who am I? What's he asking? Who are you? What's your name? We started ligonier Ministries about 40 years ago. In the very early days of that ministry. I had somebody come and ask me the question, what are you trying to do? What's your mission? What's the purpose of this ministry that you've put together? And I told him, this is a teaching ministry to help ground Christians in the word of God and so on. And he says, well, what is it that you want to teach people that the people in this country don't know? I said, that's easy. Who God is. I said, I know that everybody in the world knows that God is. Because God has so clearly manifested himself to all of them in creation that men are left without excuse because his general revelation has pierced their minds. They know he exists, but they hate him. And I said, in a large measure, that's because they know he is. They don't have any idea who he is. And the fellow said, fine. He says, but what do you think is the most important thing that Christians need to know in this day and age? I said, that's easy. And he said, what? I said, christians need to find out who God is. I think the greatest weakness of the church in our day is the virtual eclipse of the character of God, even in our churches. Talked to a woman once with her PhD in psychology who was a member of a church on the west coast, and she was very angry. And she came to me, I said, what's the matter? And she said, you know, I go to church every Sunday, and I get the feeling that our minister is doing everything he can to conceal from us the character of God because he knows that if he really opened up the Scriptures and proclaimed the character of God as he's portrayed in the Bible, he's afraid that people would leave the church because they're uncomfortable in the presence of. Of the Holy. Moses wasn't the first person to hide his face in the presence of God. That started in the Garden of Eden with the flight into the trees by Adam and Eve, who hid themselves out of shame. And so Moses asked a question. Who are you? What's your name? If you even have a name, he'd all reveal himself. I'm the God of your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Well, I know that, but what's your name? Now, before we explore that question further, I want to relate another incident that I observed on television about 30 years ago, national television. There was an interview by David Frost of Madeline Murray o', Hara, the famous atheist, militant atheist. And in this interview, David Frost was fighting for the angels and debating with Madeline Murray about the existence of God. And she was getting more and more angry and more and more frustrated. So David Frost decided to settle the debate in the classic American way, by having a vote and counting noses. And so he put it to the studio audience. He said, how many of you people out there? There were about 30 people out there. She said, how many of you believe in some kind of God, some kind of higher power, something greater than yourself? Everybody raised their hand, and I waited for Madeleine Murray's response because I was sure I could predict what she would say. But she fooled me altogether. You know what she said? She said, well, what do you expect from the uneducated masses? These people haven't got out of their intellectual infancy. They are still, you know, brainwashed from the culture and this mythology of God. And she went on this tirade, insulting everybody in the studio audience. And that's not what I expected her to do. You know what I thought she would do? I thought she would turn the tables right there on David Frost. I thought she would go to the audience and say, well, let me ask you this. You believe in some kind of higher power? You believe in something greater yourself? Let me ask you this. How many people believe in Yahweh, the God of the Bible? The God who demands that you have no other gods in front of him? The God who sends men, women and children to hell forever and condemn people because they don't believe in this mythical Jesus? Because I wonder how the vote would have changed when all of a sudden the question was asked with more clarity. But it's almost an institution in our culture, in our nation, to describe God as a higher power, something greater than ourselves. What's that? The force be with you. What is this higher power? Gravity. Lightning. Earthquakes. Now, one thing about this nebulous, amorphous, nameless characterless power is that, first of all, it is impersonal. And second of all, and most important, it is amoral. See, there's an upside and a downside to worshiping a higher hour. A nameless, faceless force like gravity or cosmic dust or lightning or thunder. Here's the upside. To a sinner, a force that is impersonal and amoral makes no ethical demands on anybody. Gravity does not make judgments about people's behavior unless they jump out of windows six stories high. But even at that, there is no personal condemnation that comes from gravity or an earthquake. Gravity has no voice. It says nothing, it sees nothing, and it knows nothing. We could describe this higher force that is the God of our culture, like the three monkeys. See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Nobody's conscience is seared by gravity. If the higher power is impersonal and amoral, that gives you a license to behave any way you want to behave with impunity. But what's the downside? The downside is that there's nobody home out there. That this force means that in the universe there is no personal God, no personal redeemer. What kind of salvific relationship can you have with thunder? Thunder makes noise, thunder booms through the skies. But in terms of content, it's mute, it's tongue tied. It has no revelation, it gives no hope. And gravity has never been able to forgive anybody for their sins. And the first thing we see here in God's answer to Moses is so different from a comment I hear every week from the coach of the Pittsburgh Steelers. I listen religiously every week to Mike Tomlin's press conference, and it seems like after every game, the press corps asks him the same question every week. And it's like, you could just run the tape. I know what Tomlin is going to say to those reporters before he says it. He's going to say, well, my focus isn't what we did wrong last week. My focus is on the next game. He always says that. And I said, well, what about this and what about that? And every time he says, well, it is what it is, a redundancy, of course. But you see, that's that the name of the God of America. It is what it is. When God asked Moses for his name, he didn't say, it is what it is. He said, I am who I am. Yahweh, that's my name. And the very first thing that God reveals about himself in that name is that he's personal, that he can see, he can hear, he can know, he can speak. He can relate to those creatures he made in his own image. He is the God who brought up his people out of the land of Egypt. He's a God with a name, a God with the history. I taught a course in college many years ago on theology, and we were studying the names of God. And I was trying to illustrate the significance of the names of God and what they reveal about God's character to the class. And just at the beginning of the class, this girl, I'll call her Mary, walked in the room. And she walked in a strange, somewhat awkward demeanor. She walked in like this. And anybody that looked, or she really walked in like this could see the glittering diamond ring on her left hand. And I said, wait a minute, Mary. I said, do I see a diamond ring on your finger? She said, yes. I said, are you engaged? And she said, yes. I said, to whom are you engaged? And she pointed to her boyfriend in the back row. His name was John. She said to John, I said, well, congratulations. Do you mind if I ask you a question? And she said, what's that? I said, when you say you're going to marry him, I assume that you love him. Is that a safe assumption? She said, yes. I said, well, tell me, why do you love him? Friend of the whole class. I asked her, why do you love John? And she said, because he's so handsome. I said, well, yes, he is very good looking. But look at Bill back there. He was the escort to the queen this year. I said, homecoming queen. I said, don't you think he's good looking? Oh, yeah, Bill's very handsome. I said, well, then there's got to be something else about John besides that he's handsome. And she said, well, he's so athletic. I said, yes, he is. He's good. I said, but Bill's the captain of the basketball team. He's athletic, too. So why don't you love Bill instead of John? And she's starting to get frustrated now. She said, well, John's so intelligent. I said, he is. He's very good students. Of course, Bill's probably going to be the valedictorian of the clock. So you're not getting that. Mary, there's got to be something else about John that distinguishes him from Bill in your eyes and in your appreciation. Something unique to him that causes you to have this great affection. Now, don't waste the rest of the period. Let's name the child. Let's get on with it. What is it about him that makes you love him so much? And she really got frustrated. She said, well, I love him because I love him, because I love him because he's. Because he's John. And I said, yeah, see, when you wanted to come back to the crystallized essence of who he is and what he means in terms of your relationship and your personal history with Him. It all came back to his name. And that's why when we look at God, we know that His Name is wonderful. Because in that name he reveals manifold things about the excellency of his being and the perfections of his character. That's why the saints of old, if they said, tell us everything you know about God, they would finally say, yahweh, I am who I am.
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Nathan W. Bingham
And that's a name that doesn't leave any room for doubt. God is self existent, all powerful, and completely holy. Thank you for listening to Renewing youg Mind on this Saturday. I'm Nathan W. Bingham. Today's message from R.C. sproul was from his Logic series Moses and the Burning Bush, and throughout that series, Dr. Sproul shows us the meaning behind God's appearance in that burning bush and and for your donation today at renewingyourmind.org we'll send you the DVD set, unlock digital access to all the messages and the study guide, and send you the companion book to the series. Simply make a donation in support of Renewing youg Mind and the Global Gospel Outreach of Ligonier Ministries, and the DVD set and book will come your way in the mail and the series and the study guide will be unlocked in the free Ligonier app. This offer does end at midnight, so don't delay. Plus, as always, there's a global digital offer available for our global listening audience@renewingyourmind.org global. Although our renewing youg Mind live events in Australia later this month are at capacity, there's still room for events in October and November in the United States. So explore all upcoming events and spend an evening with other listeners and guest teachers. When you visit renewingyourmind.org to events and register for an event near you, I'd love to greet you. Well, it seems our world is obsessed with freedom and independence, but according to the Bible, we are dependent creatures. Next time, RC Sproul will remind us who we are and who God is, so make plans to join us next Saturday here on Renewing youg Mind.
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Dr. R.C. Sproul
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