Thorn Bushes and Liberations

Abstract

The decisive meeting in Moses’ life takes place during an ordinary workday. Moses was a stranger in that land who worked for a living. Just like Jacob at Laban’s, like many men of his time and ours. And it is during this humble and dependent work that the event that will change his story – and ours – occurs. Factories, offices, classrooms, fields and houses can be and are the site of the fundamental type of meetings in life, even of theophanies. The decisive events reach us in the places of our ordinary life, that is, while we are at work (work is also important because of this). We can participate in a thousand liturgies, pilgrimages, and do dozens of retreats and so have some wonderful experiences; but the events that truly change us happen in everyday life, when without looking for it or expecting it, a voice calls us by our name in humble places of living. While we are doing the dishes, correcting homework or driving a tram. Or as we are shepherding a flock, near the thorn bushes that are burning at the edge of the grasslands. The entire first part of the life of Moses is a story of normality. Biblical vocations are not spectacular, neither related to the extraordinary character or the merits of those who receive the call.