Engagement with I AM

This morning we are celebrating the baptism of a new member into the household of God.  Because of this we are using the service of Holy Baptism in place of our usual Lenten service that begins with the Penitential Order.  Baptism is the full initiation by water and the Holy Spirit into Christ’s Body, the Church.

However, before we come to the presentation of the candidate for Baptism it is fitting that we explore the mystery of God as we are led through our Lenten journey. 

In our reading from the Book of Exodus, we are told that God said to Moses, "I AM Who I AM."  He said further, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'I AM has sent me to you.' The LORD, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you: This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.”

God sent Moses to lead the people out of Egypt through the wilderness and to the promised land, “a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey.”  God said, “I have seen how the Egyptians oppress the Israelites, so 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.”

In his book, The Winter Name of God, James Carroll writes, “In an age when we are invited by so much that we experience to say “I AM NOT,” the response we most require from God is God’s name for all time: I AM.  The slavery which humiliates us, turning us into nobodies, is more subtle than Pharaoh’s, but nearly as dangerous.  It is the slavery of the all too easy embrace of death…. The work of Evil in our age, as in the Egypt-age of Israel, is the promulgation of I AM NOT.”

Carroll points to several examples of the work of Evil, including personal alienation from God, and the massive scale of genocide wherever it occurs.  It is also the promulgation of fear wherever it occurs.  I can only think about the surge in gun sales following the killings in Newtown, Connecticut.  The work of evil is everywhere that discrimination, bigotry, and disrespect for human dignity occurs.  We need to end the social climate that promotes violence and evil.  One important way of doing that is to reintroduce ourselves and others to God.

What is needed is our knowing that “the act of engagement is I AM.”  God’s name is the ultimate act of resistance against Evil and human degradation.  “The I AM of God is a name with which every human being…has some capacity to identify.  When we recognize the I AM in our midst, whether from ourselves or another, there immediately emerge possibilities for freedom and meaning that we did not see when overwhelmed with the I AM NOT.  Every enslaved community and every oppressed people has its tales about men and women who defied horror and spoke the affirming word, thereby enabling others to do so.”

(pp. 99-100)

Moses and the Israelites of the Exodus are journey models for us.  They are outward signs of the inward grace of our personal journey toward God, toward our acceptance of engagement with I AM.  Few if any of us will be confronted by the radiance of the burning bush and the direct revelation of God’s Name, but all of us must come to see the real vision of God’s presence in our lives.  The revelation of God came to Moses while Moses was in the midst of his daily activities.  In the midst of our daily activities we are called to liberate from oppression and bondage all the things we take for granted.

Our journey through Lent leads us deeper and deeper into the mystery of God.  God who is encountered in the burning bush that defies the natural order of things, and God who is patient and long suffering in waiting for his people to live according to his will.  We are held accountable for our acts of freeing people from bondage and oppression, in liberating the whole creation from all that prevents it from engagement with the Creator God who is I AM.  “I will be what I will be” and I wait for the world to be united in my love. 

This morning we are baptizing Avant Micat Kamara into the fellowship of Christ’s Church.  All of us, along with his parents and Godparents, vow to help our new Christian grow in the knowledge and love of God and to become a responsible member of his Church.  Our prayer is that Avant will live a life of grace and compassion, be sustained by the Holy Spirit, have a discerning heart, and embrace the gift of joy and wonder in all the works of God.  Amen.