Holy Ground

I do not like wearing shoes.

Now, I love shopping for shoes. I especially enjoy a good clearance sale at DSW and dreaming about how great I’ll look in some tall black leather boots, or red pumps.

But most of the time I prefer to be shoeless. As soon as I walk into the house, I take my shoes off so I can relax. Even when I’m at work you’ll often find me shoeless. It’s just more comfortable.

Maybe some of you have lived in or visited places where the norm is to take off your shoes when you enter someone’s home. In Japan, for instance, there’s a very specific shoe etiquette, no matter where you go--someone’s home, a museum, a temple--when you enter you’re expected to remove your shoes. I learned from one writer this week that the reason people remove their shoes is not only to keep their houses and floors clean, but also so they can relax and be themselves.

In today's reading from Exodus, God speaks to Moses through the burning bush and says, “Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” Then God lays out a plan for Moses. God says, ‘I’ve seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I’ve heard their cries. I know how much they are suffering. I want to get them out of Egypt and into a better land, a land I promised their ancestors, your ancestors--Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. So I’m sending you, Moses, to Pharaoh to bring my people out of their oppression in Egypt to a land flowing with milk and honey.”

I’ve always assumed the command to remove his shoes was to show respect to the Divine presence. That Moses needed to remove his sandals to honor the Holy One. But instead of bowing before God with awe and humility, as a shoeless man ought to do; instead of agreeing to God’s plan, saying “yes and I ask God to help and guide me,” Moses disagrees with God. He says, “I’m not ready. I don’t speak well enough, I’m not the right person.”

I wonder if this well-known biblical story could be read in a different way. God tells Moses to take his shoes off so he can be himself, to be open and vulnerable to what God has to say. “Come here Moses, sit down, relax. Let’s have a conversation about the plans I have for you. I need you, not Abraham, not Isaac, not Jacob. I don’t need someone with professional public speaking skills, or a medal of honor. I need you. Let’s talk honestly about this plan.”

God calls ordinary, flawed human beings to do great and holy work. We may not have a “burning bush” experience as Moses did--a clear divine voice coming from a miraculously burning, but not consumed, bush. But we do stand on holy ground in the presence of God, our feet figuratively bare, and we are invited to be open to God’s passion and share an intimate connectedness with the Divine.

For many, those sacred spaces are where we worship, surrounded by the beauty of the space, the people in the community and the moving music. Lots of people experience sacred space in nature--walking on a trail in the woods, sitting by the ocean or lake, or in the mountains. It’s easy to see sacredness in places of beauty.

Yet holy ground is also found in unexpected places and situations--our living rooms and offices as we worship together in a Zoom way. Birthing rooms or airports are holy ground when parents meet their children for the first time. Hospitals and homes are holy ground as people who are sick and dying are cared for with love and respect. Even on city streets as protesters gather demanding an end to violence and oppression.

These places are holy because God is there. God sees us when we are most vulnerable and hurting, in our sin and brokenness, and God invites us to take off our shoes, listen to their voice and see others who are suffering and broken too.

To be connected to God we must be connected to those who are suffering. In this story today we see a God who is fully engaged with the plight of the oppressed. God says, “I have heard their cry, I know their sufferings, I have come down to deliver them and to bring them up.” God is moved by their cries and God responds with action. At the heart of the Bible story of the burning bush is the beating heart of God--a heart that burns with compassion and justice for the oppressed of every time and place.

God calls you, just as God called Moses, to new and unimaginable opportunities, which may not feel sacred at all. Like Moses, we too might say, “I’m not ready. I don’t speak well enough, I’m not the right person. Pick someone else.”

Faith is not just about me and my relationship with Jesus. Getting behind Jesus, as Peter is commanded in today’s gospel, means following him into the heart of God’s passion for the people who are in bondage and setting them free.

God instructs Moses to tell Pharaoh, “Let my people go!” And on holy ground and in holy encounters today God calls us to do the same. Let my people go from racism, oppression, and disease. Let my people go from the exploding gap between the rich and the poor, from unfair and unequal working conditions. Let my people go.

God calls us to speak about unjust systems that oppress, even if we don’t feel equipped or well-spoken enough to make a difference. God calls us to stand with those who are hurt by violence and natural disasters, or who have no sense of belonging, even if we don’t know exactly what to do. God calls us to open our eyes and hearts to the pain and suffering of others. And (this is a really important AND) God calls us to take off our shoes--be vulnerable and open to the God who embraces us in our own pain and suffering.

“I am who I am” is God’s name. A professor I once had said that God is a verb. It’s a hard concept to wrap my brain around, but consider this; God is the one who always holds the action, is never stagnant or still. I AM loves. I AM restores. I AM forgives. I AM calls. I AM is with us whenever we find ourselves on holy ground.