The Weight of Glory

Introduction

In Exodus 33:13, from our text for last week, you may recall that Moses petitioned God “let me know Your ways that I may know You”. In the life of a Christian one of the greatest pursuits of our lives should be to know God, the whole of the trinity, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, to know Him more fully, to understand Him more deeply, and in that pursuit we are transformed. Paul describes it this way in 2 Corinthians 3:18 “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.” Earlier in verses 14-16 Paul explained that for those who have not turned to the Lord Jesus the reading of the old covenant is done with veiled faces. The reality being that those who are not saved by faith in Jesus Christ cannot see and understand the truths of scripture.

As we plumb the depths of scripture searching for the truth of God, the knowledge and understanding of God, as we study the life of Christ, God’s redemptive plan, we begin to see and understand what are called the attributes of God or the distinguishing characteristics of God. These attributes are what makes God, God and please understand here that when I say God, when we use this term, we are making a statement that covers the trinity. Each of these attributes are true of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. The 1689 LBCF contains the following in chapter 2 paragraphs one and 3:

Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century II. God and the Holy Trinity

2:1 The Lord our God is one, the only living and true God. He is self-existent and infinite in being and perfection. His essence cannot be understood by anyone but Him. He is a perfectly pure spirit. He is invisible and has no body, parts, or changeable emotions. He alone has immortality, dwelling in light that no one can approach. He is unchangeable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, in every way infinite, absolutely holy, perfectly wise, wholly free, completely absolute. He works all things according to the counsel of His own unchangeable and completely righteous will for His own glory. He is most loving, gracious, merciful, and patient. He overflows with goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin. He rewards those who seek Him diligently. At the same time, He is perfectly just and terrifying in His judgments. He hates all sin and will certainly not clear the guilty.

Confessing the Faith: The 1689 Baptist Confession for the 21st Century II. God and the Holy Trinity

2:3 This divine and infinite Being consists of three real persons, the Father, the Word or Son, and the Holy Spirit. These three have the same substance, power, and eternity, each having the whole divine essence without this essence being divided. The Father is not derived from anyone, neither begotten nor proceeding. The Son is eternally begotten of the Father. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. All three are infinite and without beginning and are therefore only one God, who is not to be divided in nature and being. Yet these three are distinguished by several distinctive characteristics and personal relations. This truth of the Trinity is the foundation of all of our fellowship with God and of our comforting dependence on Him.

As we have worked through the book of Exodus and in our other studies we have talked about many, if not all of these attributes, and we strive to develop a deeper understanding each time we speak of them, however, there is one concept regarding God, that we see mentioned frequently throughout scripture, and that we speak of much that is often not pressed into and understood as it should be. This concept is wrapped up in one word that is used in either the Hebrew or the Greek roughly 368 times throughout both the Old and New Testament. The word or concept that I am speaking of is glory. As Moses progresses beyond the initial petition he brought before God, namely that God would grant them grace and once again dwell within the midst of the people, he proceeds with another petition. Our text for this morning provides Moses’ request and God’s response. Within this response we get a true picture of the glory of God. Our text for today comes from Exodus 33:18-23, please take your copy of God’s word, make your way to that place and having found your place...

Text

Please stand in reverence for the reading of God’s Holy, Inerrant, Infallible, Authoritative, Sufficient, Complete and Certain Word:

Exodus 33:18–23 LSB

Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!” And He said, “I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and I will proclaim the name of Yahweh before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.” But He said, “You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!” Then Yahweh said, “Behold, there is a place by Me, and you shall stand there on the rock; and it will come about, while My glory is passing by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. “Then I will remove My hand, and you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.”

Our prayer this morning is adapted from several puritan prayers found in “Piercing Heaven: Prayers of the Puritans”

O Lord our God, having heard Your holy Word, we now bow our hearts before the throne of grace. Merciful Father, lead us not into temptation, nor suffer us to fall under the assaults of the wicked one. And if in Your wise providence You permit us to be tried, grant that we may not consent to sin, but stand firm in the strength of Christ our Redeemer. Keep us as Your people—afflicted at times, yet never abandoned; tempted, yet never overcome by temptation. Uphold us by Your Spirit, that we may endure and glorify You in faithfulness.

Establish Your kingdom among us, O Lord. Extend the scepter of Christ in our hearts, in this church, in our homes, and in our community. Let Your truth advance, Your gospel flourish, and Your glory be known. For Yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever; and You will not give Your glory to another. Revive what may be weak among us; strengthen what is faint; restore what is broken; and cause Your praise to rise from our lips and our lives.

Blessed Jesus, we can add nothing to Your glory, yet we delight that You reign in majesty. Unite us more fully to Yourself, the true Vine, that we may bear fruit pleasing to You. Remove every veil of unbelief, every shadow of doubt, every dullness of heart. Grant that in this hour we may behold You through Your Word, delight in You as our life and salvation, and follow You with steadfast obedience.

Prepare us now to hear Your preached Word. Speak, Lord, for Your servants listen and we ask these things in the blessed name of our Lord and Savior Jesus. Amen.

The Petition

Our text this morning opens up with a request by Moses to be “shown the glory of God”. Before we dig into the response of God and the truth that it foreshadows we need to take a few moments and do our best to understand exactly what is meant when scripture says the glory of God. If I were to ask each of you to take a few moments this morning and jot down a definition of the glory of God, I wonder what you would write. Have you ever contemplated what the glory of God is, exactly, and how it affects you daily? To start, let’s look at the language we find in this passage.

To begin with the word that we are translating into the English glory is a noun. In English, the noun glory carries with it many different definitions:

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Eleventh Edition) Glory

1glo•ry \ˈglȯr-ē\ noun

plural glories [Middle English glorie, from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French, from Latin gloria] 14th century

1 a: praise, honor, or distinction extended by common consent: RENOWN

b:

The truth of the matter however, is that these definitions fall woefully short for what is actually being described here in Exodus 33 when Moses requests to see the glory of God. The Hebrew word, behind the English, is the word kabod (khavod with long o pronunciation). This word is a derivative of the root word kabed (kha-ved long e). The root word and all of its derivitaives (words formed from the root) are found 376 times in the Hebrew bible. Literally this word means heavy and is found only twice, once in connection with the death of Eli (1 Samuel 4:18) and again in connection with the hair of Absalom (2 Samuel 14:26). While the literal use of the word is only found twice there are multiple uses of its derivatives. The specific use that we are concerned with this morning however is found forty five times in the Old Testament and is used in connection with a visible manifestation of God. This is where we see the word begin to truly take on shape and significance. In fact, according to the Theological Workbook of the Old Testament the force of the use is “so compelling that it remolds the meaning [of the Greek word that is translated doxa]”.

As we have worked through the instructions regarding the Tabernacle we have encountered this particular word at various points. These points begin to generate for us a picture of what this word is truly trying to describe. Most often it is directly associated with the holiness of God, but we also see it associated with the various attributes of God. Ultimately the picture that is painted for us is best described as “the radiant unity of His (God’s) whole being revealed and rejoiced in” or as Paul writes in Romans 11:36 “For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen.”

If we expand this one sentence we get a much clearer picture of what it truly means when we talk about the Glory of God. Expanding this we get a multi-leveled understanding of God’s Glory. First we see that the glory of God is God, Himself, as the radiant fulfillment of all His perfections. Secondly we see that it is the public manifestation, acknowledgement and enjoyment of that fullness. Both of these, however are not complete in and of themselves until we understand that they are both centered in Christ, administered by the Holy Spirit and result in the praise of Almighty God. As we continue in this passage we will expand further upon this in a few moments.

The Response

For now, however, the reason that it is necessary to begin to fathom the realities presented to us in this phrase are found as we begin to unpack God’s response to Moses. What we see demonstrated here in verses 19-23 are God’s description of how He will reveal this glory. It is necessary to keep in mind that these events are not occurring here in chapter 33, we will see the actual fulfillment of His response in chapter 34. As Moses has made His petition, so now God provides an answer.

I think that it is important to note here that God answers Moses verbally prior to the actually action that grants the request. If you will recall there have been multiple times within this passage that our attention has been drawn back to the close relationship that God shared with Moses. We were told in verse 11 that Yahweh spoke to Moses “face-to-face” as one friend to another, in verse 14 we see Yahweh declaring that He will go with Moses, it was Moses that was willing to go outside of the camp because the presence of God was more important to him than anything else.

As we look to the answer we see here that God give Moses three positive ways in which His glory will be shown and a fourth that contains something of a negative, we will come back to this one. The first three positive demonstrations of God’s glory that, (1) He will show all of His goodness, (2) He will proclaim His name, and (3) He will display His autonomy which further demonstrates His sovereignty.

The key to understanding this passage is that while these things are listed separately, in reality each of them are part and parcel of the whole of God’s glory. His goodness is His glory, His name is His glory, His sovereignty is His glory. Scripture attests to each of these in multiple places:

Goodness:

Psalm 25:8 “Good and upright is Yahweh; Therefore He instructs sinners in the way.”

Psalm 34:8 “O taste and see that Yahweh is good; How blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him!”

Psalm 100:5 “For Yahweh is good; His lovingkindness endures forever And His faithfulness, generation unto generation.”

Psalm 119:68 “You are good and do good; Teach me Your statutes.”

Nahum 1:7 “Yahweh is good, A strong defense in the day of distress, And He knows those who take refuge in Him.”

Jeremiah 33:11 “the voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the voice of those who say, “Give thanks to Yahweh of hosts, For Yahweh is good, For His lovingkindness endures forever”; and of those who bring a thank offering into the house of Yahweh. For I will return the fortunes of the land as they were at first,’ says Yahweh.”

Lamentations 3:25 “Yahweh is good to those who hope in Him, To the soul who seeks Him.”

Mark 10:18 “And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.”

We see as we study the goodness of God, that like His glory it is not in and of itself a specific attribute but rather a the unity of all His attributes. Similarly we look to scripture regarding God proclaiming His name:

Isaiah 48:9–11 ““For the sake of My name I delay My anger, And for My praise I restrain it for you, In order not to cut you off. “Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction. “For My own sake, for My own sake, I will act; For how can My name be profaned? And My glory I will not give to another.”

Psalm 8:1 “O Yahweh, our Lord, How majestic is Your name in all the earth, Who displays Your splendor above the heavens!”

Psalm 72:9 “Let the desert creatures kneel before him, And his enemies lick the dust.”

Psalm 102:15 “So the nations will fear the name of Yahweh And all the kings of the earth Your glory.”

Deuteronomy 12:5 ““But you shall seek Yahweh at the place which Yahweh your God will choose from all your tribes, to establish His name there for His dwelling, and there you shall come.” Deuteronomy 12:11 “Then it will be that the place in which Yahweh your God will choose for His name to dwell, there you shall bring all that I am commanding you: your burnt offerings and your sacrifices, your tithes and the contribution of your hand, and all your choice votive offerings which you will vow to Yahweh.”

John 17:6 ““I have manifested Your name to the men whom You gave Me out of the world; they were Yours and You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word.”

Again, we see that the name of God is not a single attribute, but a unity of all of His attributes, encompassing all that He is and placing it on display before us.

Unlike His goodness and His name, the Sovereignty of God is an attribute, but it is an attribute that binds. Again if we look to the summary of our beliefs that serves as our confession, the 1689 LBCF and we study the first paragraph of chapters 2, 3, and 5 we see that the sovereignty of God is not merely an attribute that is by and of itself an attribute, but one that is truly a manifestation of His omnipotence, wisdom, holiness, justice, and immutability as He absolutely rules over all things absolutely.

Psalm 103:19 “Yahweh has established His throne in the heavens, And His kingdom rules over all.”

Psalm 115:3 “But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases.”

Daniel 4:35 ““And all the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, But He does according to His will in the host of heaven And among the inhabitants of earth; And no one can strike against His hand Or say to Him, ‘What have You done?’”

1 Chronicles 29:11–12 ““Yours, O Yahweh, is the greatness and the power and the glory and the victory and the majesty, indeed everything that is in the heavens and the earth; Yours is the kingdom, O Yahweh, and You exalt Yourself as head over all. “Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might; and it lies in Your hand to make great and to strengthen everyone.”

Isaiah 46:9–10 ““Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things which have not been done, Saying, ‘My counsel will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’,”

Ephesians 1:11 “In Him, we also have been made an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of Him who works all things according to the counsel of His will,”

2 Timothy 1:9 “who has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given to us in Christ Jesus from all eternity,”

Matthew 10:29–30 ““Are not two sparrows sold for an assarion? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. “But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.”

And the final, but certainly not the least, of our sample list.

Philippians 2:9–11 “Therefore, God also highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

It should be evident based just on this sampling of scripture that God has not only done this thing which Moses asked but has also provided us with the same proclamation. In His word, His goodness passes before us, His name is proclaimed over and over and the truth of His sovereignty shines forth as a beacon to those who but will simply come to the word. Recall back to verse 13, Moses cried out to God for Him to show Moses His ways, here He has cried out for God to show him His glory. As Christians does your soul cry out to God, show me Your ways, show me Your glory, if so, it is no further from you than the pages of the very word of almighty God. Spurgeon, preaching on July 3, 1881 at the Metropolitan Tabernacle stated:

The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, Vol. XXVII The Swiftly Running Word (No. 1,607)

If you wish to know God you must know his word; if you wish to perceive his power you must see how he worketh by his word; if you wish to know his purpose before it is actually brought to pass you can only discover it by his word.

But Not My Face

The final statement of God in His response to Moses deals in the negative. After proclaiming to Moses all of the ways that His glory will be revealed, He says to Him, Exodus 33:20-23

Exodus 33:20–23 LSB

But He said, “You cannot see My face, for no man can see Me and live!” Then Yahweh said, “Behold, there is a place by Me, and you shall stand there on the rock; and it will come about, while My glory is passing by, that I will put you in the cleft of the rock and cover you with My hand until I have passed by. “Then I will remove My hand, and you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.”

The use of the term face, here does not denote a literal human face, but is once again an anthropomorphic term that helps us to understand the idea that is being expressed. Ultimately, what God is saying to Moses is that he cannot see the fullness of His glory. To expose him to that would, as pointed out in verse 20, be a death sentence. Since our conversation has been centered around understanding His glory and we defined that glory as a unification of all of the attributes of God or as the Lexham Survey of Theology describes it:

Lexham Survey of Theology God’s Glory

God’s glory is the manifestation of the perfection of all of his attributes. The doctrine of the glory of God emphasizes his greatness and transcendence, his splendor and holiness. God is said in Scripture to be clothed with glory and majesty (

The reality that the full, unveiled display of God’s glory would bring death to Moses—or to any sinful creature—carries tremendous weight for us. It reminds us that we must cultivate a right view of God and His glory: a view anchored in Scripture, acknowledging Him as the Almighty, thrice-holy Lord whose majesty cannot be presumed upon by fallen man. Yet, as sobering as this truth is, it is not the ultimate point of this passage. Rather, this limitation serves to heighten our understanding of what is truly at stake and what God is graciously revealing. Moses cannot behold the fullness of God’s glory and live—not because God hides Himself arbitrarily, but because sinful humanity cannot stand before unmediated holiness. And here, in this very truth, the text presses our eyes forward. It preaches to us that a day must come when God’s glory will be seen in fullness, not unto destruction, but unto salvation; not veiled in passing shadows, but revealed in the face of One who can truly make God known without consuming us. Thus Exodus 33:20–23 does not merely reveal a prohibition—it unfolds a promise, directing us toward Christ, the One in whom the glory of God is perfectly manifested and by whom sinners may behold that glory and live.

Fulfilled in Christ

In the introduction the gospel of John we see displayed before us the gradual revelation of the truth of the identity of Christ. Sinclair Ferguson stated “John himself doesn’t record all the big moments in Jesus’s life that the other Gospel writers do, probably because he knew they had already recorded them. But as John Calvin says so well, the other Gospels show us Christ’s body—they tell the story—while John shows us His soul.” It is within this framework that John reveals the following in John 1:14 “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.”

The words “and we beheld His glory” refer back to what Peter, James and John witnessed as they went up with Jesus on a high mountain. Matthew 17:2 records the following “And He was transfigured before them; and His face shone like the sun, and His garments became as white as light.” . The implication however is that this event, what they witnessed on the mount of transfiguration, and indeed the entire life of Christ Himself serves to the full and complete glory of the Father.

What stark contrast we see between the Mount of Transfiguration and Moses being hidden in the cleft of the rock, sheltered by the very hand of God from the deadly brightness of divine majesty. With those two pictures in mind our eyes are drawn forward across redemptive history and the longing that is demonstrated by Moses in Exodus 33 finds its satisfaction and its fulfillment in the Incarnation—where God does not merely pass by a man in mercy, but comes to dwell among men in grace and truth. What Moses could not see fully and live, the saints now behold savingly in Christ. The veil that once shielded man from glory has, in the fullness of time, been removed and that glory that was hidden —holy, perfect, and mediating, is revealed in Christ for all who believe.

“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14).

Here is the wonder of the Gospel: in Christ, God no longer shields His glory to protect us; rather, He reveals His glory to redeem us. The Shekinah that rested above the mercy seat walked among sinners, touching lepers, calling disciples, stilling storms, forgiving sins, and raising the dead, and He still lives, and by grace through faith saves even the most wretched of sinners. What Moses experienced in shadow and passing glimpse, the apostles saw in living color. And because the Word became flesh, the glory that once meant death now brings life—“full of grace and truth.” As John Calvin notes, God did not “lay aside His majesty,” but clothed Himself in flesh so that “His glory might not destroy us, but rather illumine us unto salvation.”

Paul echoes this same truth when he proclaims, “For God, who said, ‘Light shall 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 Christ” (2 Corinthians 4:6). The God of Sinai, the God who speaks light into darkness, is the God who speaks life into dead hearts. The radiant glory that Moses was shielded from is now revealed—not in blinding terror from atop Sinai, but in gentle, sovereign grace from the pierced Lamb of God. As John Owen writes, “The beholding of the glory of Christ is the chief remedy against all the temptations of Satan, the chief support under all afflictions.” We do not behold mere reflected majesty—we behold God Himself shining forth in the Son.

From Sinai to Calvary it was not the nature of God’s glory that changed, but rather the means by which sinful man approached that glory. The full, blazing glory of God did not cool in the New Covenant; rather, God, Himself, stepped out of eternity in the form of the Incarnate Word and, Christ our holy mediator,— is our Rock cleft for us, in whom we are hidden, covered, and kept. As the 1689 London Baptist Confession testifies, the Son is the One “by whom all things consist,” the exalted Redeemer who reveals God's glory and secures our access to it by His blood (1689 LBCF 8.2, 8.5).

Thus, the progression is clear. What Moses was unable to see fully, what we currently see only by faith in Christ through His word, we will one day witness in the resurrection. John writing to the church in 1 John 3:2 writes “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not been manifested as yet what we will be. We know that when He is manifested, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.” He would add to this from the Revelation that he received on Patmos when he is blessed with the vision of New Jerusalem, Revelation 21:22–23 “And I saw no sanctuary in it, for the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb are its sanctuary. And the city has no need of the sun or of the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God has illumined it, and its lamp is the Lamb.”

Here is covenantal fulfillment—shadow to substance, promise to Person, passing glimpse to unveiled vision. The God who once concealed His glory lest man perish now reveals His glory, fully in Christ, so that man might live by faith. And we live because Christ stands where Moses could not, endured the fullness of divine wrath in our stead, and now gives us eyes to see the beauty of God without fear of being consumed—only purified and transformed 2 Corinthians 3:18 “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit.” .

Conclusion

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, what began on the heights of Sinai finds its consummation on the hill of Calvary and the empty grave as our Lord was crucified, died, was raised, and has ascended. Moses, the mediator of the old covenant, could only glimpse the trailing edge of the Divine majesty, hidden in a cleft of the rock and covered by the very hand of God. We, however, who are united to Christ by grace through faith, behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. In Him the goodness of God shines without dimming, the name of God is proclaimed in power and grace, and the sovereignty of God is displayed in redemptive triumph. The glory that once meant death to sinners now means life, transformation, and everlasting joy for those in Christ. God’s glory has not changed—His mercy has not weakened, His holiness has not faded, His justice has not mellowed—but the Mediator has come, and in Him the radiance that once killed now heals, the light that once condemned now saves, and the fullness of His glory that once was veiled is now revealed.

So the question presses upon us: do you behold His glory by faith? Not merely admire the thought of it, nor acknowledge it in passing, but truly see and savor the glory of God in Christ? For to see Him is life eternal, John 3:3 “Jesus answered and said to him, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”” ; to refuse Him is to stand outside the cleft, exposed to the full, unbridled Glory of God without a mediator. Dear soul, are you content with a passing knowledge of God, or does your heart—like Moses—cry, “Show me Your glory”? That cry finds its answer only in Christ. How will you respond to Him today?

Closing Prayer

Our holy and sovereign God, before whom angels veil their faces and mountains tremble, we bow in humble awe. We confess that in our sin we could not endure the brightness of Your glory; we are unworthy to stand before You on our own. Yet in Your boundless mercy You have given us Christ, the radiance of Your glory and the exact imprint of Your nature. In Him we behold what Moses longed to see. Forgive us for treating Your glory lightly, for preferring lesser things, for being satisfied with dim reflections when the face of Christ is set before us in the gospel. O Lord, strip away every veil of unbelief, pride, and self-reliance. Hide us in the Rock of Ages. Grant us eyes to see and hearts to love Your glory in Your Son, and transform us from glory to glory by the power of Your Spirit. Make us a people who tremble at Your holiness, rejoice in Your mercy, and boldly proclaim Your majesty. To You be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus, both now and forever. Amen.