Show Me Your Glory

Introduction

I don’t know about you, but I like it when Mark does announcements. You heard him, he said, I was thin this morning. He’s as life affirming as my GPS. My GPS told me the other day, you have arrived. So I need those daily affirmations to get through life. I want to invite you this morning, if you will, to get your Old Testaments and go with me to the book of Exodus. Exodus chapter 19 is where we will begin this morning. We want to draw our lesson from Exodus 34. But to set the stage, we’re going to back up to where this story begins in Exodus chapter 19, and see the crescendo of this event in Exodus chapter 34 this morning. I think we probably all agree one of our favorite biblical characters, or certainly one of our favorite Old Testament characters, would have to be Moses, wouldn’t it?

Moses is a favorite character for several reasons. Number one is he is just so prominent in the Old Testament. He’s a favorite character because he is the lawgiver. In fact, the law of God would sometimes be referred to as the law of Moses.

I think we can relate to Moses.

Moses was an emotional and sympathetic person. Moses, like you and I, sometimes lost his temper. And that would get him in trouble. But Moses, just, I hope, like you and I, many times, rather than being angered at the behavior of his fellow man, pleaded on their behalf to God. Moses is certainly looked up to because of the special relationship that he had with God. He was a mediator between God and his people who would foreshadow the ultimate mediator, our Savior. He spoke with God, a very special priest-like relationship with God. And so God chooses this man to be the leader, the leader of his people, as he would establish them and began to fulfill the promises made to Abraham. And when we find this wonderful leader and sympathetic person, Moses, in Matthew chapter, or excuse me, Exodus chapter 19, it’s about three months after the exodus, the children of Israel are assembled in the wilderness of Sinai.

And they’ve seen a lot in the last several months, haven’t they? They’ve seen the grand demonstration of the power of God through those ten plagues against Egypt. They saw water turn to blood. They saw the land of Egypt and the people of Egypt decimated by frogs and lions and flies. They saw the cattle industry destroyed by the disease of cattle. And the Egyptian people themselves inflicted with boils. And not only was the cattle industry wiped out, but every other type of food was wiped out through an enormous hailstorm. And at God’s insistence, the lights just went out. And the sun did not shine.

Now God judges Egypt with the death of their firstborn. And through all of that, through one way or another, God has spared his people from those same afflictions. They stood at the brink and watched the Red Sea just open up and part. And they’ve crossed through on the dry land and stood at the other brink and turned and watched the Egyptian army being overwhelmed by that same miraculous water. They’ve been provided by God. At Mara, the undrinkable water became drinkable. And at Maribah, if that wasn’t astounding enough, at Mariba, water just spring forth out of a rock. When they got hungry, bread literally rained down from heaven. And quail just showed up, asking to be eaten. They’ve seen the mighty hand of God. And now they’re assembled around the mountain of God.

And God is going to appear and speak to them there. In Exodus chapter 19, read with me, verses 3 through 6, it says, And Moses went up to God, and the Lord called him to him from the mountain, saying, Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the house of Israel, you have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagle’s wings and brought you to myself. Now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to me above all people, for the earth is mine, and you shall be to me a kingdom of priest and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the people of Israel.

So their camp before the mountain of God. God descends upon this mountain in fire, so that the whole mountain is covered with smoke, and the mountain shakes because of the presence of God. The children of Israel again see, maybe even more up close and personal, the power of God demonstrated before them. And so they have a request. Look with me in Exodus chapter 20, beginning in verse 18. Now all the people, Exodus 20, verse 18, all the people witnessed the thunderings, the lightning flashes, and the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking, and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off. Then they said to Moses, You speak with us, and we will hear. But let not God speak with us, lest we die.

Moses said to the people, Do not fear, for God has come to test you, and that his fear may be before you, so that you may not sin. So the people stood afar off, but Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was. And so they were told not to draw near, not to touch the mountain of God, lest they die. And so God descends upon that mountain, and Moses ascends up the mountain to meet God on their behalf. And there God communicates with Moses. Moses, Aaron, Aaron’s two sons, who would be future priests, Nadab and Abaihu, and seventy elders from Israel go up into the mountain. Moses and Joshua, his assistant, go further up into the mountain, and then finally Moses alone ascends to communicate with God.

The text would say at one point in this narrative that those people who ascended the mountain with Moses, it says they saw God. Now we know that they did not see God in the fullest of senses, because the text would later say, if you see God, you’re going to die. So maybe they saw the demonstrations of God or in some sense experienced his presence because they did not in the fullest and truest sense see God. And so Moses is up in the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights, and God gives him the law. The statutes and the ordinances by which these people would live, the instructions for the tabernacle, and the items in the tabernacle, and the priesthood whereby they could worship God. And those laws were written on tablets of stone.

But somewhere in these proceedings, God says to Moses, go down. Because these people are transgressing the law that I’ve given them. So Moses goes down and sees them worshiping the golden calf that Aaron had made. Moses, as we famously know, takes those tablets of stones and throws them down and breaks them, maybe symbolic of the fact that they themselves had broken the law of God. Moses in his righteous indignation takes that calf, melts it down, grinds it up, and commands the people that are still on the side of God to take their swords and execute judgment against their fellow man. Moses goes back up into the mountain. And God tells him to cut two more tablets of stones, and he’ll write the law again.

But God says, But I’m not going with you.

1. Please Show Me Your Glory

I’m not going with you, because if I go with you, you may die. And Moses makes a request. He pleads with God to continue with his people. And God agrees. That as he had been with them before, he would continue to be with them on this journey. And Moses gets bolder in his request. Look in Exodus chapter 33. Moses has seen the grand demonstrations of God’s power, his might, his majesty. He has communicated with God directly. He has made a bold request already, and he gets bolder still when he says in Exodus chapter 33 again, verse 18. And he said, please show me your glory. Moses says, God, I want to see more. I want to see you and who you are. Moses wanted to know God in the most truest and fullest senses.

And so he says, show me your glory. And from what God says later, it seems that Moses is saying, I want to see you. See your face and behold your glory. But God replies in verse 19, I will make all my goodness pass before you. And I will proclaim the name of the Lord before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I’ll have compassion on whom I’ll have compassion. But he said, You cannot see my face. For no man shall see me and live. And the Lord said, Here’s a place by me, and you shall stand on the rock, and it shall be while my glory passes by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and I’ll cover you with my right hand while I pass by.

Then I will take away my hand. You shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen. So first God says, No, Moses, you can’t see my glory. You can’t see my face fully, because no man can do that and live. But he says, I’ll grant a different request. You can, what we might say, kinda see me. A glimpse of me as I pass by. But I believe that in the next chapter, albeit in a different way, God does grant Moses his request. Moses’ request was, Show me your glory. God says, I cannot answer that by showing you my face. But look in Exodus chapter 34, how he will show Moses his glory. And the Lord said, Exodus 34, beginning in verse 1, the Lord said to Moses, Cut two tablets of stone, like the first one, and I will write on these tablets the words which were on the first tablets which you broke.

So be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai and present yourself to me, and there on the top of the mountain, and no man shall come up with you. And let no man be seen throughout all the mountain, neither flocks nor herds feed before that mountain. So he cut two tablets of stones, like the first one. Then Moses rose up early in the morning and went up Mount Sinai as the Lord had commanded him, and he took in his hands the two tablets of stone. Then the Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. Let’s pause there. God said to Moses’ request, show me your glory, you can’t see my face.

2. The Glory of God Resides in His Character

But now he descends to Moses in the cloud on that mountain, and he proclaims his name to Moses. And I think in the verses that follow, we have God’s description of himself. And I think in these words, he showed Moses his glory. Because he’s going to tell Moses that my glory does not reside in my visage. It doesn’t reside in what you can see as powerful and bright as that might be. But the glory of God resides in his character, who he is, and how he deals with man whom he has created. And so in answer, I think, to the request, show me your glory. God says this. Exodus 34, verse 6. And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and by no means clearing the guilty.

3. I Am the Lord, the Lord God

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and fourth generation. Show me your glory. And God says, here’s who I am. This is my glory. He says, first of all, I am the Lord, the Lord God. Let’s look at those in reverse order. The word God from the Hebrew word el or Elohim simply meant deity. But before that he says twice, I am the Lord, I am Yahweh or Jehovah, the personal name for God, the way that God dealt, he was not just some distant deity sitting upon some distant unreachable, unattainable throne somewhere. He was personal to these people. And earlier in the book of Exodus, when Moses says, Whom shall I say sent me? God says, tell them Jehovah.

4. He Is Merciful and Gracious

I am. This speaks of the eternal existence of God. And so you see, I think Moses is being allowed through these descriptions to see the glory of God. I am God. And I am the Lord. The Lord. I am eternal. And I am your God. And he goes on to describe himself, and he says, I am merciful. That’s going to be integral to God’s relationship with his people Israel and with us today. The fact that God is merciful. This means that he is full of deep and tender compassion. Merciful is the idea of being able to be moved by the plight of those in difficulty. And that’s God. Turn over with me in Psalm 103. The psalmist, not surprisingly, will describe God and his glory. And use much of the same language that God uses to Moses to describe his own glory.

In Psalm 103, begin in verse 13, as a father, Psalm 103, verse 13, as a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear him. For he knows our frame.

As for man, his days are like grass as a flower over the field, so he flourishes. God being called our father, and by the way, he’s the one who called himself our father, evokes this type of relationship that he’s merciful to his children. Parents can relate to that, can’t we? Deedra and I have been blessed. Our children have been healthy. And so the medical procedures and doctors and hospital visits that we’ve had to make when our children were little were mild in comparison to some. But I’ll tell you about two. When our son was about two or three, he fell in a restaurant. Busted the back of his head wide open. So we took him to the emergency room in Dothan, Alabama, and they were going to sew him up, put stitches.

And as you might expect, a small toddler like that’s not going to sit still for such a procedure. And so they had to bind him on what’s called a papoose board. It’s just a stiff board with heavy velcro straps that just strapped him down. As you might imagine, he’s in pain, he’s scared, these strangers are strapping him down to this board. I don’t know, because I don’t speak toddler. But I think he said some wrong words in that emergency room. Procedure room. That was hard for a dad to watch. Even though I knew they were doing good for him, it was hot. It was hard to watch that. A few years later, our daughter would have a tonsilectomy. And I can tell you, I can’t imagine what it’s like to have a child with a true life-threatening disease.

Because I cried like a baby when they took my daughter back out of our hands to undergo a normal, easy procedure. And so God speaks to us in terms we can understand. He says, as a Lord, as a father pities his children, so the Lord is merciful to us. He is merciful and he is gracious. Mercy is the ability to be able to have compassion on those who are having difficult times. Graciousness is the ability to be able to have the power to do for those who are lesser than you. That’s the glory of God. Many times we may be moved by compassion and mercy, but we’re powerless to do anything to help. But our God both feels the mercy and has the ability, the gracious ability to be able to do something about it.

Look in the New Testament in the book of Ephesians. In Ephesians chapter 2. In speaking of our plight in sin and God’s reaching down to us as he descended to Moses on that mountain, God reaching down to help us in our plight. Look at the language. Verse 4. Ephesians 2, verse 4. But God, who is rich in mercy, he has described our plight as being dead in our trespasses and sins. But God who is rich in mercy. Because of his great love with which he loved us. Skip down to verse 7. He’s described as rich, but in verse 7 it says that in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace. He’s not just rich, he’s exceedingly rich. And so God sees our plight, and he has the ability, dare we say, the resources to reach down and do something about it.

5. Long Suffering, Abounding in Goodness and Truth

Because he’s gracious. And so he’s rich. He’s exceedingly rich. And Paul later in the Ephesian letter would say, so that he’s able to do abundantly, exceedingly abundantly above all that we might even imagine. It’s the glory of God. And he’s long suffering. Because he is merciful and gracious, then it follows that he would be long suffering. He will judge, as he will say at the end of this description of himself and of his glory, but he is slow to act upon his anger. Read the Old Testament and you learn that. Read just God’s dealings with these people and you learn that. Oh, he’ll judge. But he’s slow to act in his anger. His righteousness demands that the wickedness be dealt with. But he doesn’t hurry to punish his people.

He is long suffering and he is abounding in goodness. Abounding means the idea of having more than what is needed, more than what is normal, and he is abounding in goodness. Goodness is unfailing love and affection and kindness. God gives those blessings. So not only is he rich, exceedingly rich in his grace and mercy, but he’s willing to share that. Because he’s abounding in goodness. He is abounding in truth. Thy word is truth, Jesus would say of him later.

6. Keeping Mercy for Thousands, Not Clearing the Guilty

Because his very essence is truth. Not just truth in the sense that he doesn’t tell a lie, that’s certainly true. But truth in the sense that if he speaks it by virtue of who he is, it becomes truth. But also truth in the sense that he is true. He is reliable. He is dependable. That’s his glory. He says, keeping mercy for thousands. Now, at first glance, that may look like, and it may indeed mean that upon thousands of people. That God’s not, again, not stingy with this exceeding riches, that he doesn’t just give this mercy in grace. He’s not just abounding in goodness and long suffering to a couple people. He does it to thousands, and we would say thousands upon tens of thousands. But it may also mean this that he is keeping mercy for thousands of generations.

Look in Exodus chapter 20. And I think the language is there in Exodus 34, but let’s back up and look at Exodus chapter 20 at the language that he uses in the Ten Commandments. Exodus chapter 20 begin in verse 5, where it says, For you shall not bow down to them, that is any carved image, you shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I, the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me. Now God would later say that that doesn’t mean that they have inherited their sin. Ezekiel would point that out, but it does mean that the consequences of the punishment for that sin would affect not just the fathers who committed the sin, but it would be lasting for generations.

That was true of the captivity, wasn’t it, to use an example.

Guess who went with them? The children and the grandchildren. But notice what he says in verse 6. Yes, the consequences of sin will be felt for the third and fourth generation. But verse 6 says, but showing mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments. And so in that context, he’s just been talking about the punishment for sin will be felt for generations, third and fourth generations, but his mercy for thousands. And so is he talking about thousands of people, which would be good, but I think he’s talking about thousands of generations. And certainly that can be seen in God’s treatment of Israel. We’re still experiencing the blessings through Jesus Christ, the ultimate fulfillment to the promise to Abraham. Now thousands of generations later.

And that’s the glory of God.

Because his character, his glory is abounding in goodness and gracious and merciful.

Conclusion

God says, you need to understand this is also a part of my nature and a part of my glory is that I’ll by no means clear the guilty. Oh, I’ll forgive. I’ll abound in goodness and the riches of my mercy and the exceeding riches of my grace. But to those who refuse, I will not clear the guilty. They will be judged. So Moses says, God, show me your glory. God says, Moses, you can’t see my face, but I’ll pass by you. And you can see something. And Exodus 34 says, as he passed by. He said these words. And so Moses got to see the glory of God. And so do we. Will you pray with me? Our God. The powerful God who descended upon that mountain and spoke that law and the earthquaked.

We all in your majesty and your glory. We thank you for your dealings with men, for your dealings with Moses, and the plan that you put into motion to bring about our salvation. And we’re so thankful that you did in a way reveal your glory to him. And we’re thankful that that good servant of yours, Moses, wrote down these words so that we can see your glory. We’re so thankful you’re the God that you are. We’re so thankful, Father, that you are gracious and merciful, that you’re long suffering, that you’re abounding in goodness and truth, that you keep your mercy for thousands, and that you forgive our iniquity, transgression, and sin. And yet we’re reminded that you will not clear the guilty. Thank you for your glory.

Thank you for your word. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen. We’ll now be dismissed to our classes.