Moses was a very faithful and highly favoured servant of God, of whom the Lord said, “My servant Moses…who is faithful in all mine house” (Num. 12:7). We are privileged to see God’s faithful servant in many aspects of life, from the time when he was born, adopted by Pharaoh’s daughter, prominent in Egypt, refusing all that Egypt offered to be identified with God’s people, spending forty years in the backside of the desert, then returning to Egypt to lead out the people of God after God had poured out His judgments upon Pharaoh and his land. The forty years spent in the wilderness were full of trials for Moses, but there was rich compensation in the intimacy he enjoyed with the God of Israel, having the peculiar privilege of communion with Jehovah in the holiest of all (Ex. 25:22). Another place of privilege that Moses had was on the mount with God, and there is much instruction for us in meditating on it.
On Mount Sinai (Exodus)
It was at “the mountain of God” (Ex. 3:1) that Moses first came to know the great “I AM,” when He appeared to him in the bush, and sent him to deliver His people from the hand of Pharaoh; and it was up this same mountain Moses ascended to hear God’s proposal of the law for Israel, “If ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant then shall ye be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people…ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation” (Ex. 19:3–6). Alas! the people not understanding their own inability to keep the law, said “All that the Lord has spoken we will do.” The blessings offered could never be obtained on the ground of law, but how blessed is the revelation that what could not be obtained by man’s efforts has been given to God’s people in sovereign grace (1 Peter 2:9).
From the top of the mountain the Lord again summons His servant Moses to come to Him, and he is charged to see that the people do not “break through unto the Lord to gaze, and many of them perish” (Ex. 19:21). Only Moses and Aaron were to be allowed on the mountain, the priests and the people were to be kept at a distance. This clearly shows that the law did not bring men near to God. There was a mediator and a priest between them and God, but the people were kept away from God. How very different it is in Christianity, for our Mediator has brought God near to us in grace, and in the company of God’s great High Priest we are brought into His presence.
When God spake to Israel all the words of the law from heaven, “all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking: and when the people saw it, they removed, and stood afar off” (Ex. 20:18). While the people “stood afar off…Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was. This is in marked contrast with the revelation of God in the Son, for now believers “walk in the light, as He is in the light” (1 John 1:7). Yet it is when Moses is in the thick darkness with God that he receives the divine instruction concerning approach to God in worship, the altar of earth that recognises what man is in his frailty, and the altar of stone from which man’s work is excluded, and where he is not to be exalted.
The next time Moses is called up to the mount he had with him “Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel,” to worship afar off (Ex. 24:1). Yet in this place of distance “they saw the God of Israel: and there was under His feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone,” and there they “did eat and drink.” Though at a distance from God, is there not expressed in this the desire of God to have men in nearness to Him to learn what He is?
From among the elders of Israel, and the priests, Moses is called to God’s immediate presence to receive the tables of stone on which He had written the ten commandments, and Moses was with God forty days and forty nights (Ex. 24:18). It was then that the Lord gave Moses His instructions regarding the construction of the tabernacle and its vessels, and concerning the garments and consecration of the priests. For Moses it was a great privilege to see the pattern of all that was to be made in Jehovah’s presence on the mount; for us how surpassing is the privilege to see the substance in Christ, and in what is connected with Him, in the presence of God in heaven.
At the end of those wonderful forty days with God how very distressing it must have been for Moses to hear Jehovah say, “God, get thee down; for thy people…have turned quickly aside…they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto…now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them: and I will make of thee a great nation” (Ex. 32:7–10). The meekness, dignity and unselfishness of Moses shine out in his humble and powerful intercession to God for His faithless people, pleading that Israel was God’s people, what the Egyptians would say if God came in to consume them, and reminding God of His promises to Abraham, Isaac and Israel. It was a noble address, and must have brought deep pleasure to God, for it had the effect of turning away His fierce wrath.
When Moses returned to the Lord he did not minimise the transgression of Israel, but used the same words to Him as he had spoken to the people. They had “sinned a great sin,” but he was willing to be a sacrifice for them if God would not forgive them (Ex. 32:30–32). Great affection for God’s people moved the heart of Moses to offer himself as a sacrifice, but only One could be accepted of God instead of others, none but He was without sin.
After the sin of Israel, “Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp,” and in speaking to the Lord made two requests, the first of which was, “If I have found grace in Thy sight, show me now Thy way, that I may know Thee, that I may find grace in Thy sight: and consider that this nation is Thy people,” and the second was, “I beseech Thee, show me Thy glory” (Ex. 33:13, 18). God, in His rich grace, granted these requests, answering the first with the words, “My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest” (verse 14); the second request is answered in verses 19–23, and granted in the following chapter.
Returning to God on the mount, Moses took new tables of stone that the Lord might write upon them afresh, and there the Lord passed by, proclaiming His Name, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth…and Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped” (Ex. 34:4–8). During another forty days and nights with God on the mount, Moses “neither ate bread, nor drank water,” receiving instructions for the people concerning their entry into the land of promise, and regarding the feasts. Coming from God’s presence Moses knew not that the skin of his face shone, so that he had to put a veil over his face while he spoke to the people. The people could not endure the glory belonging to the old covenant, but the glory of the new, which manifests the grace of God, shines unveiled in the face of Jesus.
On the Top of Pisgah (Deuteronomy 34)
Although Moses had been so faithful in all God’s house, he was not perfect, and his failure but brought out into relief the deep perfections of the Son of God as Man upon earth. Moses, “the meekest man in all the earth” failed in his strongest point, speaking unadvisedly with his lips under great provocation, but in doing so he disobeyed the commandment of the Lord, and failed in not sanctifying Jehovah in the midst of the children of Israel (Deut. 32:51). It was a deep sorrow for Moses to be forbidden to enter the land, as is seen in his mentions of the matter to Israel (Deut. 1:37; 4:21-22), but apart from his failure, it was impossible for Israel to enter the land under the lawgiver, as if they could secure the inheritance by their own efforts.
In rich grace, God said to Moses, “Get thee up into this mountain Abarim, unto mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, that is over against Jericho; and behold the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel for a possession” (Deut. 32:49); but the mount from which he was to view the inheritance of Israel was to be the place from which he was to pass from his labours into the presence of God.
It was not only that Moses saw the promised land, but “the Lord showed him all the land of Gilead, unto Dan…and the south, and the plain of the valley of Jericho, the city of palm trees, unto Zoar. And the Lord said unto him, This is the land which I sware to Abraham, unto Isaac, and to Jacob, saying, I will give it to thy seed: I have caused thee to see it with thine eyes, but thou shalt not go over thither” (Deut. 34:1–4). Here indeed is “the goodness and severity of God.” How wonderfully good that God, in patience and love, pointed out to Moses the different parts of the land, showing him all the east of Jordan, the northern lands, and passing through the different parts until the south and the lands surrounding the Dead Sea are reached. Looking back, Moses would realise that it was much better to look over the land from Pisgah’s heights with God, rather than tread the land on his own feet.
On the Holy Mount
If the Lord in righteousness denied Moses the promised land, the Lord in His goodness gave him something infinitely better when He brought him into the company of Jesus on the “holy mount.” On Sinai he had seen the back parts of Jehovah, but now he beholds the glory shining in the face of the Son of Man, when “His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was white as the light” (Matt. 17:2). What a sight for Moses, as for all who were on the mount, to see the supreme glory shining in the face of the glorified Man, and to have a preview of the coming kingdom.
Moses was not only an onlooker on the mountain that day, for, with Elias, he was associated with the Son of Man in His glory. God’s faithful servant will have his own place in the coming kingdom, but how blessed it was for him that day to see that he would be in a kingdom where God’s Man was supreme, even the One of whom he had said to Israel, “The Lord thy God will raise up to thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like to me; to Him shall ye hearken” (Deut. 18:15).
Matthew tells us that Moses and Elias were talking with Jesus on the holy mount, but Luke says, “Moses and Elias…appeared in glory, and spake of His decease which He should accomplish at Jerusalem” (Luke 9:30-31). What a privilege to be in the glory with Jesus, and to hold converse with Him concerning what lay before Him. Here was One who could enter into all the sorrows that Moses had concerning God’s people, knowing them in a deeper way than Moses, or any other, could have felt them, but who was also going into death to bring salvation within the reach of all men, and to glorify God regarding sin and dishonour it brought to His Name.
Moses had offered himself as a sacrifice to save God’s people from judgment, but Moses was in the company that day of the only One who could be accepted of God as a sacrifice for sin, and the subject of the conversation on the holy mount was concerning that wonderful sacrifice about to be offered.
After that wonderful conversation the bright cloud of the Father’s presence “overshadowed them,” and Moses and Elias entered into the cloud. How very much better was the Father’s presence than entering the land of Canaan, and how blessed to hear the voice of the Father proclaiming His delight in His Son. Wonderful as were the things that engaged Moses on mount Sinai, wonderful as was the vision of the land from Pisgah, these were not to be compared with the wonder of the holy mount enjoyed by Moses that day.
R. 9.5.68