Monthly Bible
Commentaries

September 2003

On the Road with God

Exodus 33:18-23
Then Moses said, “Now show me your glory.” And the Lord said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” Then the Lord said, “There is a place near me where you may stand on a rock. When my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft in the rock and cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will remove my hand and you will see my back; but my face must not be seen.” (Exodus 33:18-23)

Among the different figures the Bible presents to us, Moses has a special place. According to the account of his call (Exodus 3:1-12), he is the first to have understood how close God is to human beings. Moses’ life is changed when he learns that God is familiar with the suffering of his people who are slaves in Egypt and wants to give them a new future. The history of salvation begins, and it continues down to our day. God asks Moses to walk with his people in order to bring them out of the land of bondage. And so they leave, first crossing the Red Sea and then the desert, to go towards a land promised by God where they and their descendants can live a full life.

The Bible tells us that during this journey of liberation, Moses prays and talks with God as with a friend. One day Moses asks God, “Please let me see your glory.” He wants to see the full reality of God. The difficulties of the journey and the unwillingness of the people to keep going are painful. But realizing that God wants something so good for human beings, and seeing how God does not give up trying to bring it about in spite of all the obstacles, allows Moses to come closer to God himself. Who is in fact this God who is both so near and so mysterious? Moses wants to see.

How do the events of our life, the responsibilities we bear, change us and enable our existence to be more open to God?

God’s answer (33:19) helps us understand both his beauty and his mercy. God is infinitely beautiful and he is good in a way that is unique. God says that he will pass before Moses on the mountain, but that Moses can only see his back and not his face! Moses will see God by continuing to walk behind God on the road which God has opened, by looking at him, so to speak, from the back. God is truly present on the road that leads us to a free and full life.

01
Where do we see signs, perhaps very small ones, of God’s beauty and goodness?
02
God is truly present on the road he opens before us. How does this intuition shed light on my life?

Recent meditations