A People of His Presence

A People of His Presence by Steve Montag

Everything God has been doing in these past weeks has been to prepare us for the harvest, to prepare us for His purposes.

Psalm 103 is a great psalm and there is a statement made in one of those verses that is often overlooked. Verse 7 says, “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel.” That verse contains a life or death truth in it. What the scripture is telling us there is that of all of Israel, the 2 to 3 million people that came out of Egypt, every one of them saw the acts of God. They saw the miracles; they saw the plagues God poured out upon Egypt in order to bring them out as a nation. They saw the wall of fire appear when they were trapped at the Sea of Reeds while God held the Egyptians up so that all night long the east wind could blow and split the Sea open for them. They watched God take off the chariot wheels and then drown them in the waters of the sea. They came to a place three days later call Marah, where the waters were bitter and they saw God turn the water sweet so they could drink it. They saw the miracles, the acts and wonders of God, just as many of you have witnessed the outpouring here, and their lives touched and changed.

But only Moses, only Moses, knew why God was doing those things. Now that’s a pretty sad commentary. Just one man out of 2 to 3 million; I’m certain there were a few more like Joshua who pressed in to what God’s purposes and plans were. “He made known His ways to Moses, His acts to the children of Israel.” I want to suggest to you right now that if all you want is to be a spectator, you can sit in these kinds of services right in the middle of the glory that’s here, but you’ll totally miss it unless you get past the experience and say, “God show me Your ways, make sense of all this for me, show me what you want do.”

What made the difference between Moses and the rest of the people? Was it because He loved Moses more than the people? No, the scriptures say that God isn’t a respecter of persons. Simply put, God doesn’t have favorites. The answer is, Moses had three things the people didn’t have: He had a faith, tenacity and a hunger. We need those three things!

Exodus, chapter 20 shows us how those things were at work in Moses’ life. Verse 18 to 21; Moses has gone up to receive the commandments, he’s on he mountain with God and it says, “Now all the people witnessed the thunderings, the lightning flashes, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking and when the people saw it, they stood afar off.” Here today, God is allowing us to experience a sense of awe about His Presence. There are a few men in the Bible that knew Him and had experiences where God showed up and they all fell on their faces like dead men. And when God breaks loose in this place, and the glory is fully unveiled and the essence of God comes in you won’t be able to stand in that Presence, you will fall on your face in that Presence.

It says, the people trembled and stood afar off and said, “ ‘You speak with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die.’ And Moses said to the people, ‘Do not fear; for God has come to test you, and that His fear may be before you, so that you may not sin.’ So the people stood afar off, but Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was.” That’s what Moses did.

There was darkness and thunder; it was intimidating and fearful. But there’s a faith that understands that when God shows up like that it’s not to wipe you out but to test you! Don’t be afraid of drawing near to that like Moses, because beyond the noise, beyond the lightning and darkness is where God is.

God wants to take you and me beyond just witnessing external acts of power. All of Israel saw that, but only one man knew why. And God doesn’t just want to reveal His power to us, He wants to reveal His ways to us and that takes faith. That’s a faith that understands that no matter what God is doing, no matter how fearful the presence is, no matter how hot the refiner’s fire gets, it’s not to wipe us out. It’s so we can draw near.

Exodus chapter 33 describes the people’s response. They didn’t want to draw near to God since they were intimidated by His Presence so they made their own god. See, you and I are created to worship-- we have an innate need to worship the Living God. And if you don’t worship the True God, you will make one to worship. That’s what Israel did. Moses drew near but Israel wanted something familiar to worship as they did in Egypt. Yet Moses went up to meet God--that was his tenacity. He wanted the people to know God. So many times the people rose up against Moses but he still wanted them to know the purposes of God. Moses had a faith and was tenacious but he was also hungry. This was key!

Verse 12-18 tells us that Moses interceded for the people of Israel as God had threatened to remove His Presence from them. In verse 13 Moses says to the Lord, “…if I have found grace in Your sight, show me now Your way, that I might know You and that I may find grace in Your sight.” We said earlier that God made known His ways to Moses. Why? Because Moses asked! God granted Moses and the people both His Presence and His rest.

What made Moses and the people of God different from all the other peoples of the earth was that God’s Presence went with them. God wants us to be a people of His Presence. In order to do that, we need to press in to where He is, go to where He is. He will make a way for us to be a people of His Presence.

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