Though he had been set aside since infancy for a special purpose, the Moses we meet in the reading from Exodus today seemed a little lost. He was a fugitive and a “resident alien” in a foreign land and needed a job. All that of course was about to change—he would find his mission and return to his people—but though he knew he was in the presence of God, he still had some reluctance—not the last Israelite prophet to feel that way.

Let’s just say it out loud: This is a weird grouping of readings we’re invited to consider! We’ve got a bush that’s burning and also not burning. We’ve got a rock that migrates all around the desert and is the Christ. And we’ve got a fig tree that doesn’t produce figs. What are we to make of this biblical collage?

About that time some people came up and told him about the Galileans Pilate had killed while they were at worship, mixing their blood with the blood of the sacrifices on the altar. Jesus responded, “Do you think those murdered Galileans were worse sinners than all other Galileans? Not at all. Unless you turn to God, you too will die.

Not long ago a professor at a Christian college created controversy when she expressed her solidarity with Muslim students by wearing a hijab and stating that Christians and Muslims “worship the same God.”

As we begin the remembrance of our Lord’s Passion, we call to mind the failures and sins from which he saves us.

“I AM sent me to you.” An apparently not-quite-ready-for-prime-time Moses was wondering if the whole thing about leading the Israelites to salvation was going to work. There he would be, an unknown appearing out of nowhere claiming God had sent him to lead God’s—and his—people out of slavery.

Jesus . . . was making his way to the heights of the Cross, to the moment of self-giving love. The ultimate goal of his pilgrimage was the heights of God himself; to those heights he wanted to lift every human being.