Reflection for North Balwyn Uniting Church
18th of October 2026
Exodus 33:12-23
Moses said to the Lord, ‘… you have said, “I know you by name, and you have also found favour in my sight.” Now if I have found favour in your sight, please show me your ways, so that I may know you and find favour in your sight.’
Is it more important to know God, or to be known by God? Today’s reading from the Hebrew Scriptures closely follows last week’s story, in which the Israelites told Aaron to make a false golden god for them, to go before them because, ‘as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ What had become of Moses was that he was talking to the one true God who, the story tells us, became so enraged at the Israelites’ idolatry that God offers to make Moses the new Abraham – ‘Now let me alone, so that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; and of you I will make a great nation.’ Moses had to plead for the people, and he did succeed in convincing God not to wipe them out.
The Israelites have survived last week’s threat, but there have been consequences for their idolatry. Earlier, the Lord had promised to live with them: ‘And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them out of the land of Egypt that I might dwell among them; I am the Lord their God.’ (Exodus 29:46) But now God tells Moses, ‘Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey, but I will not go up among you, or I would consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.’ (Exodus 33:3)
Moses once again intercedes with the Lord for the stiff-necked Israelites. He asks of the Lord whom the Lord will send with him to bring the people to the land flowing with milk and honey. The Lord answers, ‘My presence will go with you’ – Moses, singular – ‘and I will give you’ – Moses, singular – ‘rest.’ But just as Moses was not willing to abandon the Israelites to God’s wrath after their idolatry, so he is not willing to be blessed by the Lord’s presence by himself. Twice in his response to God’s answer, Moses refers to ‘I and your people.’ Moses wants to be blessed not as an individual but as an Israelite, as one of the Lord’s people, those among whom the Lord dwells.
Once again, Moses convinces the Lord to change God’s mind. Moses points out that the Lord’s presence is the only thing that distinguishes the Israelites from the nations around them, ‘from every people on the face of the earth,’ and the Lord accepts Moses’ argument. The Lord will accompany the Israelites on their journey without consuming them because Moses has found favour in God’s sight, and the Lord does know Moses by name.
Now Moses makes his third request. The first two requests were for the people, but this last request is for Moses himself. The Lord has told Moses that he is known by name, that he has found favour in the Lord’s sight, but how can Moses be sure of this? Moses wants to know the Lord as he is known, and so Moses makes the shocking request: ‘Please show me your glory.’
Previously, we were told that ‘the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend.’ (Exodus 33:11) So maybe Moses is asking the Lord to show that things are still as they were before the idolatry of the golden calf. Or, maybe, when the Lord had previously spoken with Moses face to face, the Lord had veiled his glory, and Moses now wants the full revelation. Whatever the reason, Moses makes a request that must strike anyone who has seen the film Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark as utterly ridiculous.
The request may be ridiculous, but we can sympathise with Moses’ desire. Who among us does not want a clear, unambiguous sign that God is present, that God knows us, that God cares about us? Would we not all have liked to be with Peter, James and John on the Mount of the Transfiguration, when Jesus was transfigured before them, his face shone like the sun, his clothes became bright as light, and Moses and Elijah appeared and talked with him? (Matthew 17:1-2) We live in a time when God appears in quieter, more subtle ways, when we experience God’s presence through immanence more often than through transcendence.
In this, our experience of God reflects that of Moses, because the Lord does not reveal his glory to Moses. Unlike all the other times when Moses asked the Lord for something, this time the Lord’s answer includes a ‘no.’ Rather than the Lord showing himself to Moses in transcendent glory, God declares that he will reveal himself to Moses personally and immanently in what he does: ‘I will make all my goodness pass before you’.
Moses cannot return to a pre-calf existence when the fullness of God could be clearly seen. Moses has chosen to stand in solidarity with the rest of sinful and stiff-necked Israel, and so, like the rest of the people, he now needs divine protection to survive in God’s presence. The Lord gently protects Moses in the cleft of a rock and allows Moses to see only his back. God invites Moses into a relationship that has mystery as well as knowledge, a relationship based on faith as much as sight. And so, Moses becomes the model for all of us, faced by the mystery and hiddenness of the God we worship.
Yet, listening to the Lord telling Moses ‘my face shall not be seen,’ we remember the beatitude, ‘Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God’ (Matthew 5:8), and the author of the Gospel according to John rejoicing that ‘the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth.’ (John 1:14) We remember the Apostle Paul writing to the badly behaving church in Corinth of his hope that, ‘For now we see only a reflection, as in a mirror, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.’ (1 Corinthians 13:12) The author of the First Letter of John writes, ‘Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.’ (1 John 3:2) Not only have we already seen God’s glory reflected in Jesus, but Christian hope encourages us that the time will come when we see God face to face, see God as God is.
My favourite description of this hope comes not from the Scriptures but from a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson: ‘Crossing the Bar.’ It has been a while since we have had any poetry in a Reflection, so let me quote it:
Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar,
When I put out to sea,But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell,
When I embark;For tho’ from out our bourne of Time and Place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have cross’d the bar.
Our hope may be that we will see our Pilot face to face when we have crossed the bar. But in the meantime, while we cannot fully know God, we are already, as Paul reminds the Corinthians, fully known. And we are known by a God who names himself, ‘I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy,’ even when most angry and disappointed with people who decided to worship a false god made of gold. The Lord ends the story of the golden calf by renewing the covenant that the Israelites broke, giving them a fresh start and repeating for them the Ten Commandments that they will need to live as God’s people in God’s land. (Exodus 34)
We now know God only in reflection, only in part, but we also know God as loving and forgiving, gracious and merciful. How reassuring, how encouraging, that it is this gracious and merciful God who knows us by name. Amen.
