Listen

Then Moses went up the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. The Lord’s glorious presence settled on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days. On the seventh day the Lord called to Moses from the cloud. To the Israelites, the Lord’s glorious presence looked like a blazing fire on top of the mountain. Moses entered the cloud and went up the mountain. Moses stayed on the mountain for forty days and forty nights.

Exodus 24:15-18

Think

Mountains and clouds and fire — they’re all beautiful. They’re all mysterious. They’re all a little dangerous if you don’t take care around them. And they’re all part of the way the Bible tends to talk about human encounters with the glorious presence of a holy God.

Church words like “holy” and “glorious” sometimes don’t mean a whole lot to us. What does it really mean that God is holy? What’s glorious about it?

As you reflect on this story of Moses meeting with God to get instructions about how to go about loving God and loving neighbor, spend some time thinking about mountains, clouds, and fire and how these parts of creation might help us understand who God is.

Also spend some time thinking about how this story is all about a holy and glorious God being present with people. God may be breathtakingly beautiful, incredibly mysterious, and a little bit dangerous — but God also wants to be with us.

Rebecca Poe Hays

Pray

Holy and glorious God, you are beautiful.

I don’t understand you all the time. Sometimes I’m scared.

But thank you for always being with me.

Amen.

Go

Your genuine faith will result in praise, glory, and honor for you when Jesus Christ is revealed. Although you’ve never seen him, you love him. Even though you don’t see him now, you trust him and so rejoice with a glorious joy that is too much for words.

1 Peter 1:7b-8