Exodus 33:12-23
I was six months away from graduating from seminary in the summer of 1986. I had grown up in the Southern Baptist Church, and my local congregation was anything but typical. We had women deacons as long as I could remember, and a woman associate pastor who had been hired when I was in college. When I went to seminary, I enrolled in the school of religious education, planning to become a youth director. That lasted exactly one semester; then I transferred to the school of theology, enrolling in the pastor/teacher track. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with the degree, but it was where I felt God leading me.
I got a job working as director of Christian education and youth at Watkins Memorial United Methodist Church in 1984. The pastor there encouraged me to consider becoming a pastor. To be honest, I hadn’t considered seriously the idea of being a pastor; I didn’t know of a single woman pastor in the Southern Baptist church at the time. But he gradually gave me more and more “pastoral” tasks to do, such as visiting people in the hospital and nursing homes, and preaching once a month at the 8:30 service. I was ordained over the Thanksgiving break in 1984 and then was allowed to help serve Communion. I began to feel that pastoral ministry was, in fact, my calling. But I knew that I couldn’t possibly find a church in the Southern Baptist denomination that would hire me as pastor. So began months of soul-searching. I was torn in so many directions. I wanted to remain true to the denomination that I had been born and raised in, and yet I wanted to be true to the calling that I felt I was receiving from God. As the months went by, and graduation came closer and closer, I was having trouble sleeping and had headaches that only went away with muscle relaxers. It was the most stressful time I had ever experienced.
I can relate to Moses out there by Mount Sinai. He was stressed out, too, I’m sure. He had been up on the mountain to meet with God to receive the covenant law, but the people had grown impatient when he was up there for a long time. So they had convinced Aaron to make them an idol, a golden calf, that they began to worship. Moses came down the mountain with the stone tablets on which God had written the Ten Commandments to find all sorts of revelry and idol worship going on. He was so angry that he threw down the tablets and broke them into pieces. After punishing the people for their sinfulness, God told Moses to get them started again on their journey to the Promised Land. But God would no longer accompany them in person; instead, an angel would go with them and protect them.
Moses was not happy with this arrangement. He knew that it would be a difficult thing to lead these stiff-necked, stubborn, impatient people on the rest of their journey to the land God promised to give them. And Moses knew that the only way to make it work was if God was with them, in person. He wanted some reassurance from God and so he pleads with God to go with them. God finally agreed that his Presence would be with the people, and Moses replied that if God’s Presence didn’t go with them, then the people should not move forward at all. And God repeats his promise to go with the people.
Then Moses asked for a more personal kind of reassurance. Moses asked God, “Show me your glory.” Moses knew that without God, he could do nothing on his own. And he wanted an intense experience of God, a “mountaintop experience,” that would give him the courage and strength and spiritual energy he needed to complete the journey. “Show me your glory.” Let me see you, God. Let me be sure you are really there. Prove to me that you are who you say you are.
You’ve never asked God for something like that, have you? Of course you have! I think every person, at some time or another, wants evidence that God is real, that what we believe about God is true. We want God to show himself to us. We need to see for ourselves. We’re no different from the disciple Thomas, who refused to believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead until he saw him for himself, saw the wounds made by the nails and the spear. We sometimes feel that we need to see to believe. And we ask God to show us his glory, to show us himself.
During these months of pandemic, perhaps we have needed some kind of reassurance from God even more than we might otherwise. There are so many things that are disturbing, frightening, challenging, and tests of our faith. We wonder why bad things happen to good people, why God allows evil into the world, why God doesn’t stop the pandemic miraculously. We ask big questions and get no satisfactory answers. Maybe because there are no answers that would satisfy us. And so we feel the need to say to God, “Show me your glory.” Let me see you. Prove to me that you are real, that you are here with me.
God agreed to Moses’ request. He said that Moses would, indeed, be allowed to see his glory. But there were some restrictions. Moses would be allowed to see God’s glory, but not God’s face. No one could look on the face of God and live. And so God would hide Moses in the cleft of a rock while his glory passed by, and would cover Moses with his hand, and then allow Moses to look at his back. And, presumably, that was enough for Moses.
Can you imagine that? Can you imagine being allowed to see God, even if it were just God’s back? Can you picture God’s glory? It’s hard to do, isn’t it? The almighty God, the Creator of the universe, the all-powerful One. What would God look like? Could our eyes and minds and hearts even take it all in?
Well, during that summer of 1986, I went to the church to pray one afternoon. I sat in a pew about halfway down, closed my eyes, quieted the voices in my mind, and opened myself to God’s presence. I don’t know exactly what I prayed, just that God would help me figure out what to do. Should I stay in the Baptist Church and work as a youth director? Should I leave the Baptist Church and become a United Methodist pastor? What was the right thing? What was God’s will for me?
In the stillness, I never heard a voice or got a direct answer to my prayers. But what did happen was incredible. I felt myself surrounded by a powerful, bright light. It was a warm light, comfortable and comforting. I was aware of the intense love of God for me and was reassured that God was, in fact, with me. I wasn’t in this alone. God was going through my journey with me. And while I didn’t get an answer as to what I should do that day, I did find the assurance that I would eventually know what to do. And my answer came a little later, on a fall afternoon spent in the park. But for now, the fear stopped.
I don’t know if you have experienced the glory – the presence – of God in that kind of way. It’s the only time in my life I have been in that light. But once was enough. I will never forget what it felt like to be surrounded by the glory of God. And I have never forgotten that God will always be with me. And that is enough to help me go on with my life’s journey, no matter where it has led me in the past or will take me in the future.
Moses asked for an experience of God, and God gave him that experience. And Moses was able to go ahead and do the things that God asked him to do. He led the people to the Promised Land.
When we experience God’s presence in powerful ways, we find that we are then able to go ahead and do the things that God calls us to do. Don’t be afraid to ask God to show himself to you. And remember that God does that in many ways. It may be in the beauty of an autumn afternoon. It may be in the words of a hymn or a verse of scripture. It could be in the advice of a friend or loved one. And it could be in a warm, bright light during prayer.
“Show me your glory.” Thank you, God, for answering my prayer, for answering our prayers, and letting us know that you are here.
