In the long bondage of Israel the God of their fathers had become to the most a name, a faint echo, an image ever growing dimmer. They were in a country where countless gods were worshipped, where the forces and products of nature in all their changes were adored. The very conception of Deity was polluted and degraded by being associated with creeping things and monstrous shapes. How wise then that God should be presented to them as "I AM." "I AM THAT I AM," the Being who is, as essential life, inscrutable and unchangeable, and who was also the God of their fathers. God is thus set very high and yet He is brought very near, near in a way to appeal to the heart. To us the two aspects of God possess the same importance and interest. Let us look at them in several different lights.
I. God is the Incomprehensible One, and yet is revealed in His intercourse with men. The conviction of God's unsearchableness lies at the root of all reverence and awe. Before the "I AM THAT I AM" our spirits lie in deepest adoration and rise into loftiest aspiration. But we need equally the other side. We need a God revealed in the essential features of His character, and it is in His dealings with men who feared and loved Him that He has made Himself known.
II. God is the Independent and Absolute One, and yet He enters into covenant and most definite relationship with men. He is the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. The great sea of His love has its channel and tides. His infinite love and mercy have their regular fixed ways not less than the sunshine.
III. God is the Eternal One, and yet the God of dying men. Every moment that we have of fellowship with the Eternal God assures us that for us there is no death. The thought of death only makes us cleave the more to the Eternal God.
IV. God is the Unchangeable One, yet the God of men of all different types and temperaments. He is the same Lord over all. Take these three patriarchs, so closely related in blood.
How different they were. Yet God was the God of all the three, for they all agreed in being seekers of God.
J. Leckie, Sermons Preached at Ibrox,p. 35.
References: Exodus 3:14. T. Arnold, Sermons,vol. vi., p. 156; Expositor,2nd series, vol. i., p. 12, 3rd series, vol. ii., p. 81; C. Kingsley, Gospel of the Pentateuch,p. 132; J. Travers Sherlock, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xx., p. 44; R. Heber, Sermons Preached in England,pp. 102, 124.Exodus 3:14; Exodus 3:15. Preacher's Monthly,vol. ii., p. 61.Exodus 3:19; Exodus 3:20. Bishop Armstrong, Parochial Sermons,p. 239. 3 Parker, vol. ii., p. 31.