Day 30 - Exodus 33-34 (What God Said About Himself)
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“Now the Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation." (Exodus 34:5-7)
In Exodus 33:18, Moses asks God, “show me your glory.” To a typical person reading that, it would be natural to regard Moses as impudent. Imagine asking God to show you His full glory? Even the angels who ministered before God continually has to cover their faces with their wings so as not to behold the glory of God! But wonder of all wonders, God complies with Moses’ blod request with one condition; read it for yourself below:
“But He said, "You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live." And the Lord said, "Here is a place by Me, and you shall stand on the rock. So it shall be, while My glory passes by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock, and will cover you with My hand while I pass by. Then I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back; but My face shall not be seen." (Exodus 33:20-23)
In our text above, God does just that and reveals His glory to Moses, except that he didn’t see God’s face. I have learned an important truth about God through this episode in Moses’ life; that is, that God is not offended when His children ask Him for anything - even showing His glory. It does not mean, of course, that God will grant us what we ask just because we ask. Right after Moses made his audacious request, God answered, “Then He said, "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 will have compassion on whom I will have compassion." (Exodus 33:19) God owes no one anything and He will show Himself to whoever He wants.
In my simple mind, I would think that what God said about Himself when He revealed His glory to Moses (which for me was the most amazing act God has done for one individual) carries a lot a significance and therefore merits our special attention. First, God says of Himself that He is merciful and gracious. Mercy is not getting what we deserve which is punishment for our sins - hell. Grace is getting what we do not deserve which is what believers get in trusting Christ as Savior - heaven.
God says He is longsuffering or patient. God’s patience is the reason why all non-believers who are still alive are still alive - God is still giving them time to repent. He is abounding in goodness and truth. God is not just good, He abounds in goodness and He IS truth as Jesus claimed in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth and the life.”
God says He forgives sins but by no means clears the guilty. God has solved the apparent dilemna of His two natures of being merciful and being just by becoming a human in the person of His Son Jesus and taking the punishment of death that we all deserved upon His own body as He hung on the cross.
So this is the God of the Bible as claimed by none other than God Himself. The question is: will you believe in the one and only true God as proclaimed by God or will you continue to believe in whatever god you may have made up in your mind? Your choice.
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