Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight (Ex 33:13). This request would be relatively trivial coming from any believer. However, it came from Moses, a man who chatted with GOD face to face, as a friend (vs. 11). A man for whom the pillar of cloud, which guided the people of Israel in the desert, would descend and stand at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting whenever he paid a visit to GOD – as a security guard would stand in front of the door to prevent intruders from entering the office of a high official during an audience (vs. 9). Finally, a man of whom GOD Himself had said: "Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the LORD make myself known to him in a vision; I speak with him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the LORD" (Nu 12:6-8). Amongst more than one million people, there was nobody else who had such a relationship with the LORD. If there was anyone who could boast to have found favour with God, it would have been him. Yet, this is the man who pleads and begs GOD to grand him favour. Which other favour? Favour to know His ways. Why such request? What’s so special about it?
Psalm 103.7 says that GOD made his ways known to Moses, and his acts to the people of Israel. What’s the difference? What advantage does one have over the other?
After speaking to the crowd, Jesus said to His disciples: "To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that 'seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand" (Lk 8 :10). There is a very good example of this in John 6. Jesus had just fed thousands of people. The disciples knew how the miracle had been performed. They knew that Jesus had taken five loaves and two fishes, blessed them, given thanks and then, started the distribution. The crowd only saw the food coming (the acts of GOD), but was clueless as to what had happened before (the ways of GOD). So, the crowd did not grasp the miracle and its implications (the divinity of Jesus). The proof of this lies in the fact that Jesus snubbed them later, saying: You are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves (Jn 6:26).
Children can live in a house for years, eat thrice a day, sleep, go to school or university, without ever knowing or caring to know how bills are paid and where the money for food and clothes comes from. They may not even know whether you rent or own your house. They see and enjoy your works/acts, but they do not know your ways. As they grow, if they care to understand, if they realise that they have to be about their parents’ business and start to invest themselves in the affairs of the house, your relation will change and the level of your conversations/intimacy will improve. The same applies to us in the spirit.
Moses had grown up. Before this incident, GOD had previously promised to send an angel before him to guard them on the way and bring them to the place that He had prepared. He had promised that His angel would go before them and bring them to specific heathen nations that the LORD was going to blot out for them (Ex 23:20-23). And Moses had not seen anything wrong with this proposal. However, later on, when GOD reiterated His promise - Depart; go up from here, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob… I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites etc. (Ex 33:1-2) -, Moses rejected the offer, saying: "If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here" (vs. 15). Moses had grown up and so must we. He no longer needed to enjoy all that GOD’s hand had to give; he now needed to understand how GOD operates: he was asking for spiritual understanding.
Paul told the Colossians that he was constantly praying for them to be filled with the knowledge of GOD’s will, in all spiritual wisdom and understanding (Col 1:9). So, there is a ‘foolish’ way and an ‘intelligent’ way to know (and thus, to do) the will of GOD. Jesus mastered the latter and could sum it in one principle: Doing only that which the Father is doing, and doing it likewise (Jn 5:19). Another way of saying: “I can reproduce what GOD does because I know His ways.”
Moses’ friendship with GOD and his exceptional favour did not stop him from wanting even more of GOD. In other words, even if the Bible teaches us about contentment (1Tim 6:6,8; Phil 4:11-12), when it comes to spiritual intimacy or knowledge, when it comes to knowing GOD more and better, contentment is tantamount to a deliberate refusal to grow.
Let’s thirst for GOD, and mostly, thirst to know Him. Make me to know your ways, O LORD; teach me your paths (Ps 25:4; 27:11 etc.).
Have a great week basking in His Presence and knowing more of HIM.
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