Do you identify with any of these statements?
I am happy when I have no family conflict.
When all my bills are paid, I feel better about life.
I feel relieved, my medical exam went well.
I am delighted when my parent’s leave me alone.
I was able to help out a good friend today, I feel very satisfied.
I was right, I was correct and everybody knows it - I feel good about that.
There are all kinds of things that can make us feel good aren’t there? Sometimes things that are…well…self centered, but still, they make us feel good don’t they? Other times the things that make us happy are very noble. Either way, all these things, whether self centered, or noble, produce temporary results – I can have a good day, a great day, but I know in the back of my mind, tomorrow trouble may be just around the corner. We seek this thing and that thing, but in the end, in the end, what is it that honestly, really matters?
Let’s look at our Scripture for today. The Hebrews for months have sought the things that made them feel good: Abundant food and water, safety and security, indulging in pagan revelry - each time they found the relief was only temporary. Now the Hebrews are again in crisis. Earlier in the chapter (Exodus 33) the people were informed, that because of their sin of creating in imaginary god, the golden calf, the presence of the Lord God would no longer be with the people. Suddenly they realize what life is about. All priorities are off the table, all plans are set aside, they go into a time of mourning, they step into a time of, “What Might Have Been”. Without the presence of God, they have lost their identity. They now realize that they had what they really wanted. They realize that without the Lord all their striving is for nothing.
A Sunday class that had was asked the question, ”In your time of discouragement, what is your favorite Scripture?¨ A young man said, “the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want Psalm 23:1¨. A middle age woman said, “God is my refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Psalm 46:1”. Another woman said, “In this world you shall have tribulations, but be of good cheer, I have overcome this world. John 16:33”. Then old Mr. Johnson, stood up and said with as much strength as he could muster, “and it came to pass, you will find that 85 times in the bible”. The class started to laugh a little thinking that old Mr. John was, well, losing it.
Mr. Johnson continued, “When I was 33 I lost my job with six hungry mouths and a wife to feed. We had no idea, how we would make it. At 41 my eldest son was killed overseas in combat. It knocked me down, I couldn’t believe I had lost a child. At 57 my house burned to the ground. We lost everything. At 60 my wife of 40 years got cancer. We cried together many a night on our knees in prayer. She died soon thereafter and I still miss her today. The agony I went through in each of these situations was unbelievable. I wondered, “where is God?” But each time I looked in the bible I saw one of those 85 verses that said, “and it came to pass.¨ I would stop thinking about what might have been, and I would realize once again, we are eternal beings, and this time we have here is temporary, I would then start to reflect upon what life will be through the person of our Lord Jesus Christ.
And it came to pass….What is it, in the end, that honestly, really matters?
We pick up the story at verse 7 where we see Moses walking into a tent called the Tent Of Meeting. Later, the Tabernacle would be inside the camp. But here, we have the Tent Of Meeting, and it is outside the camp. The people have found themselves in great disfavor with the Lord, He will not dwell with the people, so He demands that the Tent Of Meeting be set up outside the camp. This is a painful reminder for the people of how far they have become from God.
Moses would enter the tent with all the people standing, waiting in anticipation of Moses meeting with God. The tent is apparently empty with only Moses and the young Joshua inside. Notice, God meets Moses at the entrance, He does not go into the tent, Verse 9. God comes to talk, not to dwell. Remember the pillar of fire by night, and the pillar of cloud by day that lead the Hebrews from place to place in the desert? This is the cloud that comes down to the Tent of Meeting. Here God speaks to Moses, the people would worship God while Moses and God had a conversation. This must have been an awesome experience for the Hebrew people. If they had any doubt that Moses was the appointed leader by God, seeing the pillar of cloud meet with Moses and the voice of God accompany the cloud would erase any of those doubts.
I want to stop here and make a note for us. This description of God as a pillar of fire or a pillar of cloud, is in no way suggesting that God is finite or that God can be contained. Further, when we look in a few minutes at the description of the glory of God passing in front of Moses, this again is in no way even suggesting that God is somehow temporal, that God has a hands or a face like you and I. No, God is boundless, He is all powerful, He is all knowing, He is all present – which means that He is everywhere in the universe at once and He is everywhere in the dimension time all at once, past, present, future….all at the same time, God exists in time all at once. Here, we do not have God being contained in a limited space, we have God meeting Moses through a form that shows his power and majesty, but also allows Moses to not be overwhelmed by the complete incomprehensibleness of who God is.
So, in verse 11, when we read that God speaks to Moses face to face, it does not literally mean that God has a face, or that Moses is looking into the face of God, or that Moses is somehow seeing the fullness of God. This is a Hebrew idiom that suggests an honest and open relationship. This is NOT addressing the physical activity of conversation between Moses and God – This is addressing the relational activity between Moses and God. This is a relational term and not a term of description. We see in fact that Moses has a personal relationship with God. Moses can speak his mind without fear. Moses can ask what he will and in return Moses can expect openness and honesty from God.
God speaking to Moses face to face does not contradict Exodus 33:20-23, we’ll see the details of why in a bit.
So, Moses and God have this conversation at the entrance of the Tent Of Meeting. Moses brings before God a question of strength and favor. Moses has brought the people through thick and thin, and now they are on thin ice. Moses wants assurance that God will continue to work with them.
Moses, and finally the people, realize that everything that has happened in the past few months could never have happened without the power of God. I think they knew that all these amazing things were from God to some degree, but now, they have a great task in front of them, and now they fully realize how powerful God has been. Before they knew God, they thought everything they did was, well, everything they did. Now they see that what they do, is empowered by the hand of God. They see that without this empowerment, they will surely fail.
People can survive without the presence of God. They can raise a family, get an education, have a satisfaction with work, fall in love, create wonderful art…but in the end what is it that honestly, really matters?
When I was a student chaplain at a hospital in Philadelphia I spent a great deal of my time in the geriatric wing. The general routine was to start the shift by checking in with all the patients on the floor to see if anyone needed to talk or pray about things.
The women always wanted to talk, and the men, they were so predictable. On the first day I would stick my head in the door of a man’s room and say hello. We would have some small chit chat and then very soon, I would be ushered out to, “help someone in greater need”. On the second day I would stick my head in the door and I would get the wave, “doing alright son, have a good day”. Then, on the third day things would be different. By this time the men had taken the tests they came in for and had been given “the news” by their doctors, which usually was very bad news.
On the third day I always knew the visit to these men was going to be a long visit. I would stick my head in and say hello and the response was always the same – silence. Usually, they would be looking out the window or looking at nothing at all. I would pull up a chair, and just wait, in a few moments they would start talking.
You know, these men rarely talked about their illness, or even about the treatments ahead. They always talked about life, the things they did, both with great satisfaction and great regret. They would talk about this person and that person and finally….always, I mean always, they would wonder, that in the end, what is it that honestly, really matters?
Finally, God has the Hebrew’s attention. Finally, God has them where He wants them. Now they have to stop and consider: In the end, what is it that honestly, really matters?
Moses tells God his frustration: God has told him to lead the people, but now God will not go with them. In verse 13 we read Moses pray, “Remember that this nation is your people.” A better reading would be: The people as a nation, your very own people – this is a very intimate term and carries a meaning of being close rather than at a distance – that God is a close God, and not a God who holds His distance. Moses is claiming that God is a close God, relationally, and so when Moses asks for the Lord to teach him his ways, He is asking to know the character of God – will God come and go? Will God always stand by them? God’s answer in verse 14 is not translated well in the NIV. It seems to indicate that God is going to give Moses a vacation or such. A more accurate meaning would be that God’s presence will be with Moses so Moses should reduce his anxiety. This is all, relational.
It may appear to you that Moses is changing the mind of God, but in reality, God is walking Moses thorough his anxiety and allowing Moses to work through his fears so that Moses will arrive at a level of….greater faith and trust. God allows Moses and the people to have this fear. God wants the people and Moses to come to the conclusion that they cannot do anything without God. God wants them to struggle to arrive at this conclusion on their own – it is clear that if God tells them that they cannot do this on their own, they will not take it to heart.
Moses and the Hebrews, they fear departing Sinai, for Sinai has been the place where God’s presence has been most real to them. Some of this fear certainly has to do with the pagan idea that gods have a territory, that they have power within certain borders. They in fact fear that the power of God may not be effective in this new land they are about to enter and may be only effective in Egypt and the Sinai desert. So, yes, they want a promise from God that He will go with them, but both Moses and the people do not understand the character of God, and here is what this last section is about.
Moses asks, Ex. 33:18 “Now show me your glory.” Now here we have to be careful. A cursory reading may give us the idea that God is somehow temporal or can be somehow contained. When we read here that about God’s hand, face or back – it is not a reference to an image of some sort or a being with hands face and back, these are illusions to who God is. The word “glory” in Hebrew, in this context, is very close to the synonym for face / presence, and so the reference by God.
See, this is about the character of God, not the description of God. This is about who God is, not the beauty of God. Moses asks to know the character of God, the glory of God, this is about who God is. Remember, God describes Himself as – I am. There is no beginning, there is no end, there is nothing that can contain, there is nothing that can overcome, God simply, is.
“I will cause my goodness pass before you and will proclaim my name” (verse19) God will now show, and back up his promise to be present, and demonstrate his character. A better way to put this for our American English is, “I am about to show you what I am like”. Again, God is not showing Moses, Himself, but who He is, this is a recital of character. And so the glory of the Lord passes by Moses.
Notice God says that, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.” God chooses to reveal Himself, how He chooses to reveal Himself, and does not feel compelled to justify his actions. What does this mean? Is God somehow an amoral God? No, since we are humanly limited in our understanding of the things of God, there are some things that are just too difficult for us to understand. This is one of them. God does not feel compelled to justify his actions to us because we cannot comprehend the why of God. Do understand that, it is against the character of God to do evil, of any sort. So we must know that all that God does is good, but we, at this time are unable to comprehend or understand the why of God.
God, has Moses step behind a rock and then God only reveals himself, somewhat. God protects Moses from being exposed to His glory. Now, is this physical barrier of the rock going to stop the glory of God? No, but it shows that Moses cannot walk right into the full glory of God. It is explained that we as humans cannot see the full glory of God or we will die.
God’s glory is something mystical and bright beyond any light. It is described in the New Testament as His splendor. When we look at that passage we all are familiar with in Luke 2:9, the Angels go before the shepherds and what shines around the angels? Not the angels themselves, but the glory of God. The angels having been in the presence of God, reflect his glory. It is this reflected glory, this residue of glory that is so strong it frightens the shepherds. The shepherds are beside themselves, and they did not even come close to the glory of God, just what was reflected from the angels. So the glory of God is a very powerful thing.
Now, someday we will stand in the full glory of God, but then we will be protected because of the person of Jesus Christ. Jesus takes on our sin, the sin thing that corrupts us before God. We will experience God’s glory through the person of Jesus Christ and so we will be able to stand on the full glory of God.
The glory passes. Moses cannot know all the details about God – but he can know that God is good, merciful and compassionate. Moses experiences, not the sight of God, but the “I AM” of God. Here Moses is fully reassured, because he experiences the real character of God and then knows, God not only will not fail him, but that the character of God is only good and righteous. Moses can fully trust and follow God.
Let me bring this all together - What is it, in the end, that honestly, really matters?
We read in Is. 43:7 “everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made.” Did you catch that? “Whom I created for my glory.” God has created and called us, for His glory. We are not made to just do stuff. We are not made to just work hard at a job, have success, have a family and enjoy life. The reason I sat with so many men in the hospital who wondered what it was all for, was that they all had no idea that they were made for the glory of God. They were living for themselves, which in the end, when we sit down and reflect on life, in the end, brings us less than we bargained for.
We see Stephen in Acts 7:54-58 experiencing the glory of God.
Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit looks up to heaven and sees the glory of the Lord. Stephen, he sees more than a bright light, or some image, he sees, he experiences the character of God, the “I Am”. And at that moment, he knows, he knows, that there is so much more, than what most people think it is all about, Stephen knows that life is about serving the Lord Jesus Christ, servant the most high God, and everything else is secondary.
One day, each one of us will stand before God, we will stand in God’s glory and at that time, like Moses and Stephen, we will understand the character of God, who He is and how secure we are in Him. In that day, all the things we have done, all the things we have accomplished will be set aside as a secondary issue. What will matter, what will be primary, is a close relationship with Jesus Christ. This is our call – to know God, relationally, closely, far above anything else in our lives.
For God desires, most of all, a close relationship with us, like he had with Moses. Let us, pause, take everything of the table, and reset our priorities, for the glory of the Lord is awaiting us.
