Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” 19 And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. 20 But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” 21 And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, 22 and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. 23 Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.” (Exodus 33:18-23)
The Context
As we saw previously, Moses has just pleaded with the LORD to not remove His presence and to go with Moses and the people, and have mercy upon them. Having found favor in God’s sight, the LORD says He will do what Moses has asked for. Yet, He will do it in His way.
Keeping in mind the context of this passage – Israel’s golden calf rebellion, God’s judgment, and Moses’ intercession for the people – I want to first consider God’s sovereign grace.
God’s Choice: “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy…”
In light of Moses pleading for mercy for Israel, God speaks a profound word of His Sovereign choice in the matter. Remember how Moses petitions the LORD. He pleads based upon God’s promises to Abraham, His covenant, His glory and name among the nations, and the fact that Israel is God’s people too. The question may arise then, “Is God obligated to show mercy to Israel? Does God owe grace to this people?” Most emphatically the answer to this is “no.” In the midst of Moses’ intercession, the LORD iterates to Moses His sovereign prerogative in showing mercy and in judging, saying in verse 19, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.”
Submitting to God’s sovereign choice is foundational in maintaining humility before the Lord when we plead and wrestle in prayer with Him. In no way does Moses, or do we, twist God’s arm or force His hand, or manipulate Him to do what we desire. Instead, we come humbly before Him, petitioning His sovereign mercy, asking if He will be gracious to give it, knowing it is His alone to give. In this statement, He is saying to Moses that He is not unjust for judging Israel as He did in their rebellion. He has committed no wrong against them. He has not broken His word.
And the reason for God’s decision to show grace or mercy is not based on anything outside of God, but it is because He will. He says, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will show mercy on whom I will show mercy.” God Himself is the reason. He shows mercy because He will. He gives grace because He will.
So as the Lord reveals His glory to Moses, it is this fact of His Sovereign grace that is the foundation for Moses experiencing the goodness of God and the presence of God on the mountain and in all His days. It is not the experience of a false Egyptian god or Canaanite god who can be manipulated with enough sacrifice or conjured up with the right meditation and ritual, or who can be wielded as a tool through inhabiting a carved idol. This is the experience of condescension, of a God who has mercy because He will, of a God who will give grace because He will. It is this fact of sovereign choice which is among those things that distinguishes Yahweh from all the other gods of Egypt and Canaan, or any other. He is sovereign and they are not. He shows Himself because He will. He has mercy because He will.
And the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, who showed His goodness to Moses on the mountain, is our God – the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is the God who in His sovereignty, has been good to us. Who has sovereignly given us mercy and shown us His grace through revealing Himself in Jesus Christ. We do not force His hand through any of these pagan means. Nor does our will require something of God. Nor do our religious works obligate Him. He gives mercy because He will.
So does this nullify Israel’s responsibility to keep the covenant and obey God? Does it mean that it’s okay for us to tolerate a little bit of sin in our lives? Of course not. The sovereign God of mercy also sovereignly gives His law to be obeyed and followed. We’ve seen the consequences of judgment in disobedience for Israel. We must obey God precisely because He is the sovereign over us. And when you receive His mercy and get a glimpse of His glory and taste His goodness, oh how you want to obey Him and please Him. How reprehensible the rebellion was to Moses whose face was radiant with the glory which passed before Him. When you see the glory of God you can’t bear the thought of sin, you see it for what it is, you hate the sin in your life. Like Isaiah before the throne of the Almighty was undone for being a man of unclean lips amongst a people of unclean lips! It does not compute to really know the sovereignty of God and then not care about holiness. The more you know His power, His might, His goodness, His election, His glory, then the more you see the severity of sin and the need to forsake it and walk humbly before Him.
Think about your own life. Have you grown lax in your walk with the Lord? Have you grown lazy in pursuit of holiness? Have you been tolerant of certain sins in your life? If so, then you need to know more of God’s absolute sovereignty, and mercy, and glory. You need to look long into the face of Jesus, by faith, and see where His searching eyes may burn away these sins in your life and put away your filth. This leads us now to God passing before Moses on the mountain.
God’s Revelation
Moses asks to see God’s glory. What a remarkable question. In His sovereignty, God says, “Okay, but not all of it, because even you can’t handle it, Moses.” Notice for a moment, the grammatical subjects, like the subject of a sentence, in the question and answer. Moses asks to see God’s glory, v. 18. But then God says in verse 19, that He will make all His “goodness” pass before Him. And that He will proclaim His name, “The LORD.” Then verse 20, God says, “But you cannot see my ‘face…’ Now, why does God talk about His goodness passing before Moses and Moses not being able to see His face? Moses asked to see God’s glory, not those things, right? But then God says in verse 22 that His “glory” will pass by. And then that Moses will stand in the cleft of a rock and God will cover Him with His “hand,” until “I” have passed by, God says. Then He says in verse 23 that Moses will see His back.
So what’s going on? Moses asks to see God’s glory, but then God uses three terms interchangeably to describe what will pass by: His goodness, His glory, and Himself. We learn here about the nature of God. Theologians have articulated it, such as is confessed by the framers of the 1689, that God is not made up of parts. God is not the sum of different things that make up God. So when Moses asks to see God’s glory, glory is not this thing in God that He can just take out and dangle it before Moses. Rather, when God shows Moses His glory, or His goodness, God is showing Himself to Moses. That is what is happening here. God is not showing Moses abstract characteristics, He is revealing Himself to Moses. God is good, God is glorious, and to ask to see His glory or goodness, is to ask to see God Himself.
Now, I believe that Moses knew this, at least to a degree. He knew what He was asking. I believe that when Moses asks to see God’s glory, He is asking to see God. Think about what we have just seen last week in the previous passage. God has just said that He will not go amongst the people for they are a stiff-necked people. And Moses has been pleading that God would be merciful and still go up amongst them. He has been asking for God’s presence not to leave them, but to be with them. And God has said in verse 17, “Okay, Moses, what you ask, I will do.” And Moses’ response is “Okay, but please show me. Please show me that you are here and your presence is with us.” So God is going to reveal Himself to Moses.
Naturally, the next question we might ask is, if God is going to show Himself to Moses, what exactly does Moses see – because God is spirit, right? He is the invisible God. No one has ever seen God. We have this language of His face, his hands, and his back. But God does not have a body, nor body parts. Did Moses just see nothing? Did He see white hot radiant colors? Or did He see a person? My argument, along with Reformed Baptists Doug Van Dorn and John Gill, other Reformed theologians such Geerhardus Vos and Herman Bavinck, and some church fathers such as Tertullian, is that Moses saw a person – the second person of the Trinity, as He was the pre-incarnate angel of the LORD. But, you might ask, hasn’t Moses already had interactions with this Angel of the LORD? Yes, He has. But the point is that He wants to be assured that God’s presence will still be with them, and wants to see that He is there. And it may be that even the interactions Moses has had with the angel of the LORD were all more veiled in some way. In the burning bush He was in the midst of the flame. After the Exodus, He was in the cloud. It’s as if Moses wants to see within the cloud, that God’s presence is there. And remember that this angel of the LORD, is called elsewhere, the “the Angel of my presence,” or the “Angel of my face.” So he wants to know if God’s presence is there.
Furthermore, God had said that in this angel is His Name. And what does God say He will proclaim when He passes by Moses? He says, “I will proclaim before you my name, the LORD.” But Moses already knows the name of the LORD. So you see, the name of the LORD is associated with the person. His name is in Him. He’s going to proclaim it – that’s His Word – and Christ is the Word, the Logos. And that is what is brought before Moses.
There is an important part of this argument which doesn’t jump out at us in our English translations, but which certainly does in the Hebrew. First of all, there is a bit of a riddle here in chapter 33. Back in verse 11, speaking of the tent of meeting, it says that Moses would speak to God “face to face.” Then here in verse 20 and 23 God tells Moses that he cannot see His “face.” So there is a bit of a riddle here. Moses spoke face to face as a friend with God, and yet could not see His face. Now, it may be that when Moses spoke “face to face” with God in the tent of meeting as friend, that that is a figure of speech. As God says in Numbers 12:8 speaking of Moses, “With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles…” So, many conclude that it just means God spoke clearly to Moses. However, Numbers 12:8 continues and God says, “…and he beholds the form of the LORD.” It’s God speaking there, and says when He speaks “mouth to mouth” or “face to face” with Moses that Moses also beholds the form of the LORD. And notice, the LORD speaks about the LORD, indicating another person of the LORD. This is fascinating. Now how did Moses speak with the LORD in the tent of meeting? The LORD would descend in the cloud. So, if there was a person of God that Moses spoke with “face to face” at the tent of meeting, that person was in the cloud, veiled. So when Moses asks to see God’s glory, God is basically saying, “I can’t let you see my face unveiled, as it were. But my back you can see.”
So back to the translation issue I mentioned. The Hebrew word for face in verse 11, 20, and 23 is “panim or paneh.” But when we see this word throughout the Old Testament it is not always translated as “face.” It is also often translated as “presence.” And it is the same word that we’ve seen previously in this chapter. In verse 14, it’s when God says “My presence/face/paneh will go with you…” In verse 15, it’s when Moses says, “If your presence/face/paneh will not go with me, do not bring us up from here.” So, when Moses spoke ‘panim to panim’ with the Lord and beheld the form of the LORD, it seems there is a person. Thus, when Moses asks that God’s “paneh” go with them, He is asking for His person – that is His presence. And if you need more, Isaiah 63:9, speaking of the Exodus, it says, “and the angel of his presence (paneh) saved them.” Do you see this? The “paneh” or presence or face of the LORD is the second person of the trinity. This is the same word used in Genesis 32:30 when Jacob wrestled with the angel of the LORD, and it says, “So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, ‘For I have seen God face to face (paneh to paneh), and yet my life has been delivered.”
Do you see this? Christ is the presence of God. He is the face of God. And in the incarnation He comes near to us in an even greater way, now not appearing in these veiled ways, but in the flesh, putting on human flesh, a view of Him that man could be able to look upon, and His name is called Immanuel, which means “God with us.” Jesus is God with us. And it is through His face which the glory of God shines. 2 Corinthians 3:18 where Paul is talking about Moses on the mountain says, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” And then 2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” It is Jesus, that God is revealed to man. John 1:14, “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” John 1:18, “No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is at the Father’s side he has made him known.”
Now, many commentators will simply say that the language of hands, face, and back is an anthropomorphism. Which just means that you apply human characteristics to God in describing things He does, even though He does not actually have body parts. Certainly, that is a real category of language in the Bible, but beyond what I have already labored to show you, the language here seems to shout of something more than anthropomorphism, especially when you consider the unfolding of this scene in chapter 34. Chapter 34, verse 5 says, “The LORD descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD.” The language here just reads far more historic than symbolic.
Furthermore, consider the multiple persons of the LORD that are present in chapter 34. “The LORD descended…and proclaimed the name of the LORD.” Or verse 6, “The LORD passed before him and proclaimed, ‘The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious…’” And then notice the language of Moses in verse 9, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us….” So the LORD declares the name of the LORD and Moses asks the Lord to let the Lord go in the midst of them. The same word is used here. It seems so clear to me that Moses is asking God to let the angel of the Lord go in the midst of them, who is the Lord.
Finally, consider the transfiguration of Jesus in the gospels. Jesus takes three of His disciples up the mountain and He is transfigured before them, radiant in glory. Matthew 17 says His face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light, and a bright cloud overshadowed them and from the cloud a voice spoke, “this is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.” And Moses and Elijah appear there with Him. Do you see the parallels of these events? There are shining faces, white light, and a voice from a cloud. As the disciples get a glimpse of the Lord like this on the mountain it is as if Jesus is showing them His identity, that He is the God who appeared to Moses, the angel of the LORD, now in flesh. Or it’s as if He’s going back in time and showing Moses that He is the Christ with whom He spoke with as a friend. With all the different things going on here, the imagery of the transfiguration, which corresponds to the Old Testament Angel scenes, identifies Jesus with the Angel of the LORD.
Listen to what John Gill says, “Much more, it is the glory of God, of which this goodness is afterwards interpreted, and may be understood of Christ himself, who is the goodness of God itself, is not only good, but the Lord’s good one, emphatically good; as he is called his holy one, so in him, he is presented and filled as mediator, with the blessings of his goodness, all are proclaimed in him, displayed through him, and communicated by him, and he is that glorious personage that Moses might be desirous of having a view of, and was favoured with, however, with a view of the divine goodness, as it is conspicuous in him, in what he is, and has done for his people, for God has shewn forth the exceeding riches of his grace and goodness in him: ‘and I will proclaim the name of the Lord before thee;’ his name and his nature, his perfections, and the glory of them, as displayed in Christ…”
God’s Covering
Now the LORD does not just pass by Moses and let Him see Him in His fullness, for Moses would die. Sinful man cannot handle such a sight of glory. Even John, in Revelation 1, seeing the resurrected Christ, falls down as dead. So what does God do? He sets Moses on a rock and in the cleft of the rock for covering and shelter. What a beautiful image this is of Christ. How Christ shelter’s us sinners from God, from being dead before His presence. But not only is this just a picture of Christ, it is directly associated with Christ, as God’s “hand” also covers Moses as He passes by. It is God Himself, doing what the rock symbolizes. It is God Himself who protects Moses from Himself.
This is a wonderful picture of the gospel that God saves us from God. We are sinners. We are a people of unclean lips. We cannot stand in the presence of God on our own, lest we die. But God has come to us in the person of Jesus Christ, and through His life, death, and resurrection for sinners such as us, He unites Himself to us, so that in Jesus, the hand of God covers us from death before a holy God of white hot purity and righteousness.
And this incarnate work of Jesus is far more amazing, as it brings about the end that one day, when we are brought before God, without sin, we will stand before Him and not die, but live forever. And as the apostle John says, “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.”
So let each one of us who know this Christ, our Lord and Redeemer, purify ourselves from every impurity. How petty, how little, how disgusting, every sin looks down there in the camp, when you are on the mountain with God, as it were. As Moses communed with the Lord on the mountain, let each of us endeavor to commune more the Lord, and seek His face, in prayer and meditation on His Word, that we might see our sin for what it is, confess it, repent, and turn from it, that we might all the more be ready to one day, see the Lord as He is.
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