About the Hymn
After the children of Israel have been enslaved for 400 years in Egypt, the merciful LORD “remembers” them, hearing their cry and initiating their deliverance. The deliverer will be a man named Moses, a Hebrew by birth and an Egyptian by upbringing and education.
As this hymn text begins, Moses is living as a shepherd in the wilderness, far from Pharaoh’s court. God speaks to Moses through a bush that, mysteriously, burns but does not burn up.
Those of us who know the story well might allow our familiarity to dilute how earth-shattering and life-altering this experience must have been for Moses. An unearthly flame, a voice in the flame, a command in the voice, a call in the command, a nation’s destiny in the call.
The text imagines Moses’ thoughts through a series of questions: What is this holy flame, this holy voice? What is this holy task God is calling me to take? And more important, who is this God? What is this holy name, “I AM”?
Though Exodus 4 tells us that Moses initially demurs, lacking confidence in his ability to fill the deliverer’s shoes, he does accept the calling. The mysterious flame of God that burned steadily in that bush now burns in his heart, and his flickering faith gains strength from the promise and the presence of the Name.
The final stanza asks a question Moses may not yet have had the clarity of faith to ask: Who is the greater Prophet, the greater Deliverer yet to come? As New Testament Christians, we understand that the pictures, promises, and prophecies of the Old Testament point ahead to this Prophet, Jesus Christ (Deuteronomy 18:15–19, John 5:46, John 6:14, Acts 3:22–26). The life, death, and resurrection of the Christ would break all sinners’ chains, and Christ himself would deliver all sinners from the godless wilderness and lead them to the eternal Promised Land.
The hymn should be performed at a flowing♩= ca. 72 with clear breaks between phrases.
Text
1. What is this holy flame
that lights the desert air?
Can this undying fire be God?
Come closer—do I dare?
What is this holy voice?
Deep secrets fill this sound!
He bids me take my sandals off,
for this is holy ground.
2. What is this holy love
that feels his people’s pain?
He hears the cry of Israel’s sons.
He’ll save them from their chains.
Whose is this holy task,
this calling in the sand?
He deems me the deliverer
though I am just a man.
3. What is this holy name
so deep, so high, so wide?
“I AM the one I AM,” he says.
“I never leave your side.”
What is this holy might?
For now this sacred flame
burns in my heart and gives me strength.
I go forth in the Name.
4. And yet, what holy pledge,
what promise glimmers still?
A greater Prophet soon will come,
a greater plan fulfill.
He is the Holy One
who breaks all sinners’ chains!
He ends their desert wandering
and brings them home again.
© 2017 Laurie F. Gauger
Lectionary Reading
Year A, Season after Pentecost, Proper 17 (22): Exodus 3:1–15
Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So 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—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. 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.’”
God also said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob—has sent me to you.’
“This is my name forever,
the name you shall call me
from generation to generation.”
Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
