WILDERNESS TRUTHS FOR MODERN TIMES-31
TEXT: "And it came to pass, when Moses came
down from mount Sinai with the two tables of testimony in Moses' hand, when he
came down from the mount, that Moses wist not that the skin of his face shone
while he talked with him."
(Exodus 34:14)
I. IMPARTATION
A. If
God stops us in our tracks, apart from correction, it may be for a time of
impartation. The impartation in this
verse is the glory of God.
B. Impartation is the reason for God's drawing
us unto Himself. He desires us to wait
in His presence for the purpose of impairing His glory and power. He must accomplish this impartation in order
to express Himself to others through the one receiving the impartation. A minister who waits in His presence before
the service, carries God's glory and power with him into the service. During the service, that impartation is
manifested.
C. In Exodus 33:18-23. Moses expressed his
desire to see the glory of God. He
said, "And he said, I beseech thee, shew me
thy glory." (Exodus 33:18)
If this becomes the
prayer of our heart, we may have to be brought to a standstill in order
to have our prayer answered. Be still
and know Him!!
D. God responses to Moses' prayer; "And
he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the
name of the LORD before thee; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious,
and will shew mercy on whom I will shew mercy." (Exodus 33:19) It took more than Moses' natural vision to
see the qualities of God. It is one
thing to see the manifestations of God's mercy, love, grace, etc. and quite
another thing to see the qualities themselves.
Remember, we are moving toward Jesus (being conformed into His image)
and not the provisions and wonderful works of Jesus.
E. If our prayer is to see the invisible, then
we must expect God to bring us to a halt and bring us apart from some natural
and spiritual involvements. Moses was
separated from all natural involvements.
He did not eat, drink, or sleep.
God actually waited six days for Moses' body system to be cleaned out so
that Moses would not have to excuse himself for nature's call.
F. That which is impossible for man to see, will
be brought by God to man's spiritual vision.
The unseen beauty of the Lord will be seen with the eyes of man's
spirit. We have eyes in your
spirit. When our body falls to the
ground dead, our spirit will not be blind.
We will then see more than we ever saw with our physical eyes.
G. Moses actually saw God's form. "And
he said, I will make all my goodness pass before thee, and I will proclaim the
name of the LORD before thee." God promised Moses. In the fulfillment Moses saw goodness in
form, and heard its identification.
Moses was not able to explain what he saw. It is beyond language, Paul testified of
this; "How that he was caught up into
paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to
utter." (II Corinthians 12:4)
H. It is so far above the natural that there is
nothing in the natural realm to which it can be related. And it happens in the wilderness!! It does not happen in green pastures. It does not happen every day. Most of the time God works with us on lower
levels. In fact, Scriptures is in the
lower form, even in the natural and physical form. That way, we all have opportunity to see His
goodness.
I. Things of God must be reduced for us
children. Otherwise we would never grow
into wise adults. So God must say,
" I am your Banner; I am your shield; I am the Lord Who supplies all your
needs." Almost everything from God
moves in this level so that we ALL can grasp His truth.
J. Hidden in the lower level language is the
spiritual sublime. God will bring is
through and beyond the lower level into the unknowable. He will transcend all that is high and noble
in our culture and language, and bring the unknowable to the heart of man. He will instill within man such mysteries of
the Kingdom of God that man is at a loss to explain them. But that which man cannot speak will be
communicated as light flowing from that life.
K. That which God has shared of Himself will be
manifested in that human life and seen and felt by others. The Love of God, His mercy, the grace of God,
His faithfulness, cannot be translated into terms. But God's qualities can be translated into a
life. That which is not understood and
not able to be known by the human mind is expressed by a life. Jesus, the character, in the Greek, meaning
"impression," of God, becomes the greatest example of this.
L. Language and man's mind will limit
communication of God's glory. The inner
spiritual being of man breaks through this limitation. But even with this breakthrough, the glory of
God is still limited to man. The reason
for the limitation is that man, in all of his spiritual qualities, is finite
and God is infinite. Man does not have
the capacity to contain the capacity of God.
II. PARTING
THOUGHTS
A. God will give in relationship to our ability
to hold His things. Strong meat will
kill an infant, just as revelation was Adam's downfall. He was not able to handle all that the tree
of knowledge of good and evil brought to him.
Even Jesus said; "I have yet many things to say unto
you, but ye cannot bear them now."
(John 16:12)
They were not able to walk under such a load; they
could not carry nor sustain such sublimeness.
Moses in his limitations, would not be given such a fullness of God as
to render him inoperative. Little by
little God brings the infants into the strength to sustain heavier revelation.
B. Revelation is progressive. This progressiveness can be seen and traced
in the Bible from Genesis through Revelation.
The revelation of God to man is like an ascending stairway, one step up,
next step up, the next step up, and on it goes, one a step at a time. This method is not suitable to man. This is why God said to Moses in so many
words, "you will see only so much at this time, and no more." "Now I know in part" as Paul said in
Corinthians; "For now we see through a glass,
darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even
as also I am known." (Corinthians
13:12) We are to be content to have something which is a mystery, without
pressing to know which God has no intention of revealing at this time.
C. As it is to our advantage to know certain things, it is to our advantage not to know certain things. The unknown things will be revealed to us when we are in the proper place in God, and with the suitable strength to receive and properly carry them.
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