I want to start this morning with an eye test. If you’re wearing glasses, take them off. Cover or close one eye and look at the eye chart (projected onto the wall). How far down the chart can you read? Now try your other eye. If you can make out the letters right above the red line at the very bottom of the chart, you have 20/20 vision. If not, you better get glasses or update your prescription.
While a pair of glasses will help you see an eye chart more clearly, what can you do if you want to see God more clearly? Squint like so many people without glasses do when reading the menu board at McDonald’s? That’s not going to help you see God better, nor will laser surgery. If you want to see God more clearly then open your ears! That’s what Moses learned in our sermon text today. I invite you now to open your ears so that by the end of the sermon you too may see your God and your Savior more clearly.
Our sermon text is a continuation of the true story from last week. We heard how the Israelites made a golden calf and worshipped this while Moses was on Mt. Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments. After destroying the idol and sending his fellow Levites out into the camp to punish those who had continued to worship that false god, Moses climbed Mt. Sinai again to plead forgiveness for the Israelites. God did forgive them, but he also said: “Go up to the land flowing with milk and honey. But I will not go with you, because you are a stiff-necked people and I might destroy you on the way” (Exodus 33:3).
Moses was alarmed at these words and so were the people. While God had promised to send an angel to accompany them, he said that he himself would not go with the Israelites. Think of your reaction if moments before surgery to remove a brain tumor, you found out that the world-leading specialist and veteran brain surgeon was not going to perform the procedure as planned because he decided to stay home that day. Instead a first-year medical student was rounded up to step in and try the surgery for his very first time. Would you allow that man to cut you open? No. And so we’re not surprised to hear Moses plead with God: “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. 16 How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” (Exodus 33:15, 16)
Moses understood something that we often easily forget. Without God we are nothing. Moses knew his limitations as a leader. He knew that the only reason he had been successful in getting the Israelites out of Egypt was because God had been with them. How else would Moses have gotten two million people across the Red Sea before the Egyptian army had ground them into the dirt with their combat sandals as if they were nothing more than a bunch of ants? No, if God wasn’t going to go with them to the Promised Land, Moses would rather stay right there in the wilderness. Better a wilderness with God, than a paradise without him.
Ah, but that’s not what I usually think. If it was, I wouldn’t be envious of those whose life is filled with money and toys, though empty of genuine faith in Jesus. There’s a part of me that thinks life would be fine, just fine if I only had what they had. That’s why I dream of suddenly striking it rich. And I also start to wonder, “Really just how valuable is the Bible?” It’s not like I can feed it to my family or fly it to the beach on vacation. “And what about Sunday worship?” It’s not like it fills my life with experiences that I’m eager to share around the water cooler on Monday mornings while friends are talking about their trips to the lake. Maybe we’ve been fools for not chasing after a fun life because we’ve been too busy spending time here at church? Thankfully Moses’ words are like a hand that grabs the back of our shirt to keep us from taking that fatal step off the edge of a cliff towards riches and joys that are nothing more than a fleeting mirage. A wilderness with God is really better than a paradise without him because those who continue to walk with God through the wilderness now will arrive at a paradise that will never be destroyed unlike any so-called paradise here on earth.
Of course if we could only see God more clearly, we wouldn’t be tempted to chase after worldly riches and power. If we could see God clearly, we would be better able to handle life’s challenges. But we do see God clearly when we open our ears! Listen to how Moses drove home this truth. “If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you” (Exodus 33:13a).
“If you are pleased with me…” A sixteen-year-old might also use that kind of language to get something from his parents. “If you are pleased with me, you’d let me borrow the car.” A girl might say to her longtime boyfriend, “If you really love me, you’d buy me a diamond ring and promise to marry me.” Moses starts the same way when approaching God, but he doesn’t ask for riches or for power. Instead he asks God to teach him his ways so that he would continue to find favor with God! Brothers and sisters, we would do well to model our prayers after Moses’ example here. That’s because the better we know our God the better we’ll see how he does richly and daily provide for us. We’ll also see how we don’t need to win the lottery to get rid of daily worries. God has already said he will give us our daily bread. And we don’t need to worry about the next doctor’s appointment because Jesus has shown that sickness and death only lead to an eternal life free from sin for all those who believe in him. If you want to become more confident and more secure, don’t keep dreaming of striking it rich, just open your ears to God’s Word as Moses was eager to do!
God was overjoyed at Moses’ request and said: “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name” (Exodus 33:17). Wouldn’t you love to hear God say that of you? That he is pleased with you and knows you by name? But of course God is pleased with us for the sake of Jesus and he does know us by name because he himself called us by name in holy baptism. Therefore like Moses we can be bold in our prayers. Look at how bold Moses was. He said to God: “Now show me your glory” (Exodus 33:18).
If you’re on a tour of the White House led by the president himself, would you say midway through the tour: “Show us your bedroom, Mr. President”? I don’t think you would. The president’s bedroom is his sanctuary. Not even his advisors get to meet the president there. So when Moses said, “Lord, show me your glory!” doesn’t that come off as being a bit cheeky? How did God handle this bold request? Like he handles every bold request from his children. He offered Moses something better than for what he had asked. Here was God’s alternate plan. “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence...[Y]ou cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live…There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. 22 When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen” (Exodus 33:19-23).
Moses wanted to see God more clearly than he already did and God was not going to deny this request, he just would answer it in a way that was best for Moses. God would pass in front of Moses as if on parade, but Moses wouldn’t see a thing except for God’s receding footsteps. Why not? Because God would be shielding his servant. Had God not done this, the sinful Moses would have been destroyed by God’s glorious presence as surely as a piece of straw will turn into ash when tossed into a blazing fire. But Moses would come to see God more clearly through this encounter. He would do so by opening his ears to what God proclaimed about himself as he passed by Moses.
Friends, if you want to know what God is like, stop asking for visions and miracles and instead open your ears to the Word of truth he has already given to you in the Bible. From the Bible you’ll learn about God’s righteousness and how he hates and must punish it. Although this world says that there is no right or wrong, God disagrees. But from the Bible you will also learn of his grace. This God forgives sinners. How can he both punish sin and love sinners? These truths are brought into clear focus at the cross. There we see God’s hatred for sin as he punishes his Son for the sins of the world. And at the same time we see God’s love, for he punishes his Son so that he doesn’t have to punish us. Jesus is like that hand of God that shielded Moses from God’s white-hot holiness as he passed in front of him, for Jesus too shields us from God’s white-hot holiness so that we are not destroyed because of our sins.
Sure, we’d love to see God in all of his glory, but in our sinful state right now we wouldn’t be able to handle it just as our eyes can’t handle looking directly into the noon-day sun. But one day we will get to see God in all of his glory. In heaven we will get to look directly into God’s face because we will be completely righteous just like he is. But until then we will be content, no, we will be eager to look at God and learn about him by opening our ears to his Word just as Moses did. Amen.
SERMON NOTES
What notable events preceded today’s sermon text?
Why was Moses so alarmed when God said that he would only send an angel with them the rest of the way to the Promised Land?
Explain: A wilderness with God is better than a paradise without him.
Moses knew that without the Lord he was nothing. How do we often fail to acknowledge that truth with our actions?
What two favors did Moses ask of the Lord in our text?
How is Jesus like the hand of God that shielded Moses on Mt. Sinai?
