February 9, 2007

“SHOW ME YOUR GLORY!”

Exodus 33-34

Today, we are looking at a rather intriguing and mysterious passage. Actually it is a continuation of our study of Exodus 33 and 34. Last week we looked at the passage from the perspective of the nation of Israel. We saw how they repented after their sin of worshiping the gold calf, and how through Moses’ intercession and the grace and compassion of God they were restored to their place as God’s special covenant people.

Today, I want to look at the same two chapters again, this time exploring the events from Moses’ perspective and his interactions with God. We looked at him in his role of mediator and intercessor last week. But in the midst of his intercessory prayers for the nation, Moses slips in an incredibly audacious request. It is found in Exodus 33:18: Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.”

This was the man who spoke with God in the burning bush. He had seen and experienced the power of God through the plagues in Egypt and at the Red Sea. He had stood at the foot of the mountain and watched the lightning flash and the fire of God’s presence descend upon the mountain. Not only that, but this is the man who had boldly gone up on the mountain and into the cloud to meet with God when all the rest of the nation had been told to stand back. This was the man, the Scripture tells us, to whom God spoke intimately as a man speaks to his friend. Yet the more he experienced of God, the more he hungered for him. In Exodus 33:13, he prayed, “If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you.” Now this bold request: “Show me your glory.”

Moses knew God, and had experienced him in ways no other human being had. In fact the summary of the Old Testament is that between Moses and the coming of Christ, there was no one “like Moses” who knew God the way Moses did. Yet he still asked for more. I think it is a principle of spiritual life that those who know God best have the greatest appetite for him.

I have been reading a little A.W. Tozer book in my devotional reading. Tozer was a preacher of the last generation who knew God in a way few others do. A paragraph I read this week says this: “Oh, how I wish I could adequately set forth the glory of the One who is worthy to be the object of our worship. I do believe that if we could be made to see His thousand attributes and even partially comprehend His being, we would become faint with a yearning desire to worship and honor and acknowledge Him, now and forever.” This was Tozer’s longing. It was Moses’ heart cry as well. To know God is to want to know him more. “Show me your glory!”

So, how did God respond to Moses’ request? What did Moses see? Actually it is more a case of what Moses did not see. (Read Exodus 33:19-23)

In other words, God told Moses that if he were to look directly at the glory of God, at “God’s face”, he would die. It was more than he, as a finite and sinful human being, could possibly take in without being destroyed.

 I remember as a boy there was a solar eclipse over the area of Africa we lived in. We were all excited to see this once in a life time event. But I also remember that we were clearly and sternly warned not to look directly at the sun – or we could become blind from the brightness of the sun’s rays. Just as the human eye cannot bear the brightness of the sun without damage, so the human eye is incapable of seeing directly the glory of God.

But God does promise to give Moses a closer, more intimate glimpse of himself. He will be permitted to see God’s glory from behind, like seeing the train of the bride’s gown, without actually seeing the bride herself. And so Moses went up on the mountain to the place where God had instructed him to stand.

Let’s pick up the story in Exodus 34:4-8. (Read)

Two things strike me as I read that. First of all, Moses asked to see, but there is not one word of visual description in these verses. They are all words of speaking and hearing. There is no description of color or shape or light or dark, or any other visual perception. There is only a record of a voice speaking.

The second thing that strikes me is that Moses asked to see God’s glory, but what God did was to describe his character and his attributes. That seemed a bit of a puzzle to me. But then as I thought about it, the truth dawned on me: God’s character is his glory! Let me say that again. God’s character is his glory. To see God in his glory is to perceive him in his glorious attributes. I believe Moses’ request, “Show me your glory,” is parallel to his earlier request in 33:13, “so I may know you.” To know God is to know his attributes and to know his attributes is to see his glory, because his character is his glory. And it is all summed up in his name. That is why God said, “I will proclaim my name, Yahweh, in your presence.” And so, in answer to Moses’ request to see God’s glory, God declares his name: Yahweh, Yahweh, and then lists his attributes.

And what wonderful attributes they are: He is compassionate. This is a quality that is called out of the strong by the weak and vulnerable. It is what stirs in a father’s heart when he stoops to pick up his sobbing child.

He is gracious, extending favor and kindness to the undeserving.

He is slow to anger. In other words he is patient. It doesn’t say he will never become angry, for that would deny his holiness and justice, but he is patient, giving ample time for repentance and a change of heart.

He is abounding in love and faithfulness. This word for “love” is the strongest of the Old Testament words for love. It is translated differently in different contexts and by different translations. My Hebrew professor used to translate it as “loyal love.” This is the Old Testament “agape”, the unconditional love of God for his covenant people. And it is linked with his faithfulness.

The phrase “maintaining love” in verse 7 is a repetition of this same word. In the Hebrew idiom, God is said to actually “guard” or “protect so as to keep safe and strong” his love for his people.

Out of his love and compassion and grace, he forgives wickedness, rebellion and sin. In those three words, we have spelled out the three most common words in the Old Testament for sin – our disobedience and failure and rebellion which breaches our relationship with God. God is willing to forgive them all. And yet, he does all of this without abandoning his justice and righteousness.

This is not a complete list of God’s attributes. There is no mention here of his wisdom or his omnipotence, or his omnipresence, or even his holiness. But it is a great list to start on as we get to know God. These are the attributes that are most in the foreground in God as a relational God, God as he relates to his people. Over and over in the Old Testament, as the people of God came to him in prayer and in need, they started here. These are the attributes that caused them to feel that there was hope in praying to him. “O God, we come to you because we know that you are compassionate and gracious and slow to anger and abounding in love…”

Moses asked God, “Show me your glory,” and God showed him his character. God’s glory is his character. These two cannot be separated. We are not told what Moses saw but we know what he heard, and when he heard God’s voice, he bowed to the ground and worshiped. It was enough for him, and more than enough, to be in the presence of such a God! Visual pyrotechnics could wait for another time and place. It was enough to know and be close to the heart of God, to know his nature, his character and to worship at his feet.

There followed an extended time on the mountain, during which God rewrote the Ten Commandments and spelled out many other details of the covenant. But as we continue to follow the theme of Moses in his relationship with God, I want to fast forward to the end of this period, when he came down from the mountain. We read that account in our Scripture reading this morning (Exodus 34:29-35). When Moses came down from the mountain his face was radiant. It was shining. Beams of light shone out from his face, like a mirror reflecting the bright rays of the sun.

Every morning in our flat, we get the bright light of the sun in our front windows. We get this bright light, in spite of the fact that our flat faces west and north. How do we get the morning sun, if our flat doesn’t face east? We get it because at just the right time and the right angle, the sun reflects off the glass of the building across the street from us, and our apartment is filled with light. That is what Moses’ face was like as he came down from the mountain.

He wasn’t aware of it. He hadn’t looked in a mirror. But it was so dazzling that Aaron and the people were afraid to approach him. He had to call them back and reassure them to get them to come near. After he talked to them and related what God had said on the mountain, he then put a veil over his face. And for the many weeks after that, this was the pattern. When Moses was in the presence of God, he took the veil off. When he came out of God’s presence, his face was shining. He would relate to the people what God had said, then he would put the veil over his face until the next time he went into God’s presence.

In these events, I think we are given a natural progression, a natural rhythm of the spiritual life with three cycles. I would summarize them this way: Behold the glory. Worship the glory. And finally, reflect the glory. While this is clearly an Old Testament/Covenant story, I believe the same progression, the same rhythm of the spiritual life applies to us under the New Covenant.

Behold the Glory! Moses went up on the mountain to see the glory of God. Where shall we go to see his glory? I must admit to a change in my thinking as I meditated on this truth. When I first read through this account in Exodus and thought about it as a preaching text, my first thought was to ask a challenging question: How many of us are brave enough to ask what Moses asked? How many of us would be bold enough to say to God, “Show me your glory!” And then I was going to go on to challenge us all to seek deeper and more intimate experiences with God. I still think that would make a pretty good sermon!

But the Holy Spirit brought me up short in my thinking. He directed me to a passage in the New Testament, when one of Jesus’ disciples made what must have seemed to him a very bold and “Moses-like” request. His name was Philip and in John 14:8 he said, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.”

How did Jesus answer him? “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father.” Don’t you get it yet, Philip? I and the Father are one. If you have seen me, you have seen him!

But what about the glory? Look at John 1:14: The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John goes on in verse 16-18: From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father’s side, has made him known.

If we would behold the glory of God, we need only to look at Jesus. Paul says it this way in II Corinthians 4:6: For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ. Did you get that? The light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

The first step in the cycle: Behold the glory! And today, we can find that glory, the glory of God himself, revealed in Jesus Christ who has come to make the Father and his glory known on earth. A great place to start your quest, or to refresh it if it’s gone stale, is to read and reread the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ earthly life. You will find God’s character there displayed on a human stage. And remember, God’s glory is his character. His character is his glory. Behold the glory!

The second step: Worship the glory! When God passed by, Moses bowed down in worship. It is interesting to read the New Testament and see how this light dawned on the disciples in the closing chapters of the Gospels. They believed he was the Messiah, but as he appeared to them in his resurrection body, and the implications of it all dawned on them, one after the other bowed in worship. When Thomas, the doubter finally believed that it was Jesus who stood before him, he said it so simply: “My Lord and my God.”

If we understand and believe that Jesus is God in the flesh, the only logical response is to bow in worship. The glory of God calls us to worship just as it did Moses. And that glory is found revealed and focused in Jesus. Worship the glory! And the New Testament calls upon us to express that worship with a sacrifice: Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God – this is your spiritual act of worship. (Romans 12:1)

And then there is a final phase in the cycle. Reflect the glory. When Moses came out from the presence of God, his face beamed with light. To see this truth in its New Testament context, turn to II Corinthians 3:7-11. (Read)

Paul here pays tribute to the glory of the Old Covenant, but then states strongly that the glory of the New Covenant is far superior. And his emphasis is that the Old Covenant had a glory that faded, but the glory of the New Covenant lasts forever.

To make his point he goes on to talk about the veil that Moses wore. The question before us is, “Why did Moses put on a veil?” The first and most obvious answer was that the glory of God reflected in Moses’ face was so bright that the Israelites could not look at it. I think that was part of it. And if we only had the Exodus account, we might conclude that was the whole reason. But Paul points out another reason for the veil in verse 12-13: Therefore since we have such a hope, we are very bold. We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away.

Moses wore a veil, so that the Israelites could not watch the glory fade! It is clear when we look back at the Exodus account with this in mind. He would go into God’s presence without the veil. Nothing between him and God. He would come out of God’s presence unveiled and relate to them the words of God which he had received in the presence of God. When he was done speaking he would put on the veil, so the people would not see the glory of God reflected in his face fading away. That is the fading glory of the Old Covenant.

But what about the glory of the New Covenant? (Read II Corinthians 3:17-18)

We, too, are called to reflect the glory of the Lord before the world. But here is the exciting truth. While the glory on Moses’ face would fade away, we now have the Spirit of the Lord living within us. There is no need for a veil over our faces, because the glory of the Lord in the believer’s life is not fading. It is growing brighter, day after day, from glory to every-increasing glory as we are transformed into Christ’s likeness by the indwelling ministry of the Holy Spirit. That is our calling: to reflect the glory of the Lord by being transformed into his likeness, by becoming like him in character. And remember, his character is his glory. His glory is his character. As we become like him in character we reflect his glory in ever increasing measure.

I mentioned a few minutes ago, the sunshine that floods our apartment in the morning – even though our apartment faces away from the rising sun. You and I live in a word that faces away from the rising sun of God’s glory. If they would see the light of the glory of God, it will be through the reflected glory of your life and mine, as our lives are transformed by the Spirit of God.

Behold the glory in the face of Christ. Worship the glory by bowing before him and giving your life as a living sacrifice. Reflect the glory by being transformed into his image.