Little Bottle in the Sea

Why am I here?

Have you ever pondered this question?

The answer is quite simple. There are two reasons: God made you and He loves you. For some, this response and its simplicity is a source of great peace. But for others, this answer creates many questions: Who is God? How do you know He made me? How can I know He made me? Why does He love me? If He loves me and if He is God why is there so much trouble in my life? Why does life hurt? Why do I feel alone? Why do I have no hope? Why? Why? Why? Before any of these questions can be explored and answered, we must start with the first question: Who is God? For the answer to this question will help you grasp the statement, “God made you and He loves you.”

If I were to write a thousand pages on who God is, it would not be enough. There are no human words sufficient to explain who God is. So instead, that I might introduce you to God, I will tell you a story about a man who had the privilege of meeting God.

There was a man named Moses, who was born a Hebrew but raised as the son of the daughter of Pharaoh. Many have speculated that he was even raised as a prince of Egypt. One thing is sure, while Moses was not a Hebrew slave, as the rest of the Hebrews in Egypt were, he knew he was Hebrew.

One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. Looking this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?”

The man said, “Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “What I did must have become known.” When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian. (Exodus 2:11-15a NIV)

In Midian, Moses met his wife and became a shepherd. From the palace of Pharaoh to the sheep fields of Midian, this was the journey of the life of Moses. But the journey was not over, it was just getting started.

After many years passed, the Word of God tells us the people of Israel called out to God for help because of their state of slavery. The people of Israel were in bondage, and they desired to be set free. So they asked God to send a deliverer. God had just the right man for the job. Who better than a man who was raised by Pharaoh’s daughter to go back to Pharaoh and demand that the people of Israel be set free?

Now if you don’t know the story, you may be thinking that God came to Moses in splendor and glory to tell Moses about the task that was planned for him. Well, sometimes God comes in splendor and glory, and sometimes He comes as a burning bush. But this was no ordinary bush. This was a bush that burned but was not consumed by the fire. Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.”

When the LORD saw that he had gone over to look, God called to him from within the bush, “Moses! Moses!”

And Moses said, “Here I am.”

“Do not come any closer,” God said. “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” Then he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob.” At this, Moses hid his face, because he was afraid to look at God.

The LORD said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. So now, go. I am sending 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 will be the sign to you that it is I who have sent you: When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you will worship God on this mountain.”

Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is His name?’ Then what shall I tell them?”

God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” (Exodus 3:3-8a, 9-14 NIV)

The account of how Moses met God reveals much about who God is. First, God rarely, if ever, comes to you in a way that you think He will or should, but God will always come to you in a way that is right for you.