In this sermon, the speaker reflects on the challenges and criticisms faced by Moses during his ministry. Despite the difficulties, Moses remained focused on the glory of God. The speaker emphasizes the importance of seeing God's glory in four specific occasions in our own ministry. The sermon also highlights the need to continually grow and not become complacent in our service to God.

I trust that all of you pastors are ready to preach tomorrow. Abraham kept going because he saw the city of God. Remember that the end of the journey is heaven. The reason for the ministry is heaven. The reason for the sacrifice is heaven. Nehemiah kept going because he saw the greatness of God. Joshua kept going because he saw and claimed the promises of God. And now I want us to deal with Moses, Exodus chapter 3. And the thing that helped Moses in all of those years that were so difficult was the glory of God. Moses, more than anything else, is connected with the glory of God. Now if Moses were interviewed on 20-20 or 60 Minutes or Good Morning America or Larry King Live, they'd have a bit of a problem with him. I can just imagine some interviewer saying, well now Moses, you've had a very, very successful career. Well, I don't know about that. I started off getting my picture on every post office bulletin board in Egypt. I had murdered a man, although I think that was in self-defense. I won't go into it now. But he killed a man. And more than once during my years as a leader, I wanted to quit. In fact, once I wanted to die. I said, Lord, if this is the way it's going to be, take me now. Now you've never said that, but Moses did. Well, I understand, Moses, that you had a very outstanding career. You were in the university in Egypt, and you were learned in all of the wisdom of Egypt. And I appreciated all of that, but they never taught me what I needed. Never told me how to open up a sea. Never told me how to feed two million people out in the wilderness. Never told me how to fight battles with the enemy. I learned things like how to make papyrus, and how to design a pyramid, and how to embalm people. Well, okay, if you had such a rough time, yeah, I had a rough time. They criticized me right and left. They didn't like the way I led them. They didn't like the way I fed them. They didn't like my wife. Yeah, they criticized me. I had a rough time. What kept you going? Your education? No. Your brother? Well, let's not talk about him. I'll tell you what kept me going, says Moses. I always looked for the glory of God. Now, there are four occasions in our ministry when we must see the glory of God. I want to list those four occasions for you, and then we're going to look at four events in the life of Moses that illustrate the occasions. You need to see the glory of God when the task seems too big for you. That's when you have to see the glory of God. We need to see the glory of God when the enemy is too strong for us, when the task seems too big for us, when the enemy seems too strong for us, when the people are too much for us. We've got to see the glory of God. And finally, when the reward seems too small for us, we've got to see the glory of God. Oh, I suppose we could ponder now for a few minutes on what is the glory of God. I think you know what it is. The glory of God is the manifestation of the sum total of all that He is. It's interesting to trace the glory of God in the Scriptures. The glory of God moved into the tabernacle, Exodus chapter 40, and then you get the first Samuel, the people sinned, and they wrote Ichabod. Remember that? Ichabod, the glory has departed. Then Solomon built a temple, and dedicated the temple, and the glory of God moved into the temple. And then they sinned. And not only does the glory depart, but the temple departs. When you read the first 12 chapters of Ezekiel, he describes the glory moving out of the temple. First it came out of the Holy of Holies, and it moved up over the threshold, and it moved over this way, and then off it went to the Mount of Olives. The glory departed. Then the next time the glory came to earth was at Bethlehem. Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward man. The word became flesh and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory. I like the way Gene Peterson paraphrases that. It's accurate. It's an accurate rendition. And the word became human and moved into our neighborhood. Some Christmas, I'm going to preach a sermon from that text, and I'm going to call it, There Goes the Neighborhood. And we took that glory and nailed it to a cross. The Lord of glory nailed to a cross. But hallelujah, He came forth from the tomb in glory. And now the glory of God is dwelling individually in His people. What know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, which you have of God? And God is dwelling among His people. He's building a temple for the habitation of His glory. And we're a part of that. And God still reveals His glory. We don't see manifestations of the Shekinah glory, as did Moses. But God still is glorified. There have been times, and there ought to be more of them, when we are just amazed. I stand amazed at what God has done. All you can say is glory! Glory. The psalmist says everything in his temple says glory. The earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea. So much for theology. Now let's look at the practical side of it. Exodus chapter 3. We need to see the glory of God when the task is too big for us. If you are in ministry, the longer you stay in ministry, the more God challenges you to difficult things. My favorite Old Testament prophet is Jeremiah. I have a small reproduction of Rembrandt or somebody did Jeremiah contemplating the ruins of Jerusalem. Now Jeremiah was a weeping prophet, and when you read the book, he had his ups and his downs. There are times when he says, Lord, you don't know how to run the world. I want to advise you a little bit on how you ought to run the world. There are times he's ready to quit. He was griping one day to the Lord, and by the way, be like Jeremiah. Tell God exactly how you feel. And you get up in the morning, you've got a headache, you've got a full day, you've had a lot of pressure, and it's awfully difficult to be honest and say, thank you, Lord, for this day. If you want to have your soul revived, just be honest with God. Say, Lord, I got a headache, and I'm going to go meet with a bunch of headaches. Be honest with God. Jeremiah was honest with God, and God said to him, Jeremiah, you've been running with the footman. It's been tiring you out. What's going to happen when I pitch you up against the horses? It's going to get harder, Jeremiah. See, as we run with the other joggers on the race of life, that builds us up, but we can't stay there, because we're not competing with them, we're competing with ourselves. So God says, okay, I've got to give you a little harder challenge. And so he brings along the horses. Now I've got to run with the horses. He says, if while you've been in the land of peace, you've had problems, what's going to happen when I send you down to the jungle of the Jordan? You see, if God doesn't give me additional challenges, I'll never grow. If God doesn't make me dissatisfied with what I've preached and what I've written, and the way I've managed the work, so that I do better, I'll never grow. You know, I meet these people who say, well, I've had 20 years experience. I'm sorry. They've had one year's experience 20 times. And they're not growing. And the only way children can grow is to be challenged. I had an uncle, bless his heart, who when he was in third grade, deliberately failed third grade, because he didn't want to go into fourth grade, because in fourth grade, he had to write with ink. And he didn't want to write with ink. Now there's a difference between writing with ink and writing with pencil. You can erase a mistake. With ink, you've got to think while you're doing it. And my uncle didn't want to write with ink. So he failed. Stayed in third grade. You can't stay in third grade the rest of your life. I mean, there comes a time you have to write with ink. Comes a time when you have to graduate, as I had to do, almost under pressure from a typewriter to a computer. All I know about my computer is how to turn it on and how to turn it off. Some of you people are experts. Our number two son works for AT&T or a branch of AT&T or whoever bought up this branch. And Lucent, he works for Lucent. And he designs the chips that design the chips. And I used to ask him, well, Bob, what are you doing? And he'd say, stop. He has people from China who call up to solve their computer problems. And they get an interpreter. Now, I can't even, whoever heard of bilingual computer? I mean, I can't do that kind of stuff. He can't. But I remember when the boy next door said to me, why are you writing these books on a typewriter once you get a computer? I'm too old to get a computer. Well, he said, it'll save you a lot of time and money. So I'll tell you what, if you get a computer in three hours, I can show you all you need to know to get started. So we did. And I bought myself a Nerf brick, so that when I got mad at my computer, I could throw it. But I had to graduate from running with the footman to running with the horses. Now, pretty soon I'll have to graduate into something else, I'm sure. Some folks don't want this. This is why, not always, but often, this is why we who are in ministry, instead of staying and growing, we go. And we look for a place just like the last place so that we can be comfortable. And I'll tell you, friends, we get comfortable in ministry, we lose our cutting edge. All of us have faced the task that's too big for us, because God arranges it that way. David went through the palace one day, and he heard one of the children crying, and he peeked in, and here was a four-year-old boy being weaned. And he was crying because he was being weaned. Mother doesn't love me anymore. He sat down and wrote a psalm about it. He said, Lord, I've calmed my soul like a weaned child. We all have to be weaned away from things. If you don't get weaned away from Mother, you've always got to be where Mother is. If you don't get weaned away from Mother, you never develop your teaching. God has to wean us away from the crutches that we lean on so that we'll grow. Now, this age and stage in life, that's not a welcome thought, but it's true. And I force myself to read something new and be with something new and go someplace new, just so I won't become a crotchety old man. Now, Moses, according to Exodus 3, was tending the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law. Imagine that. One of the stellar graduates of the university, learned in all of the wisdom of Egypt. He's taking care of sheep, the dumbest animal God ever made. Imagine that. God, allowing all those years of study and learning, and now for 40 years, he's taking care of a flock of sheep. God has odd ways of preparing people, because for the next 40 years, he was going to take care of a lot of sheep. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush. Now, the commentators have fun. What does this stand for, you know? The bush is Israel, and God is showing that Israel cannot be consumed, possibly. If you just turn the page over to Exodus chapter 24, verse 16 and 17, Now the glory of the Lord rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days, and on the seventh day he called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud. The sight of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire. Hebrews picks this up. Our God is a consuming fire. When you find the task is too great for you, see the glory of God in the bush. Now, God didn't send an angel to Moses. God didn't open up the heavens. God just simply put a little bush on fire. I think that little bush stands for Moses. And God is saying, Moses, you're about as weak as this bush, about as useful as this bush. But I'll tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to ignite you. I'm going to share my glory with you. And when I share my glory with you, you and I together are going to get this job done. Sometimes the Bible compares us to trees. He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. But here God says we're a bunch of bushes, just ordinary. All flesh is as grass. We're just a little bush. And it would grow and live and die except for one thing. The fire of God came upon it and did not consume it, but used it to reveal his glory. So the first lesson I have to learn is when the task is too great for me, I've got to see the glory of God in the bush. Now, what does that mean? God was saying to Moses, Moses, I can use you. Moses argued with God, who am I that I should go to Pharaoh? Well, that's not the point. You're just a humble bush, but I'll ignite you. Well, okay, I know who I am now. Who are you? What name do I use when I put it on my calling card? Well, just tell them that the I Am has sent you. But what if they don't believe? Don't worry about that. I'll take care of that. Well, I can't speak. Didn't I make your tongue? I thought Moses did pretty well in speaking. Whenever I read Deuteronomy, it's a masterpiece. And finally, God has to say, Moses, look, you want to depend on yourself? You're looking in the mirror. Don't look at the mirror, look at the bush. And look at the glory in the bush. I am the one who is sufficient, and if I call you, I will enable you. Now, keep a marker back there, and go over to 2 Corinthians. 2 Corinthians is the pastor's book. Anybody who's in Christian ministry, pastor's wife, missionary, whatever you may be, minister of the word, 2 Corinthians is your book. Paul opens his heart in 2 Corinthians and shares his suffering in God's adequacy. You start reading 2 Corinthians, you get to chapter 2 and verse 16, and Paul asks one of his important questions. And who is sufficient for these things? He says, we are to the unsaved the fragrance of death unto death. We are unto the saved the fragrance of life unto life. I mean, this ministry, folks, that we are in, is a matter of life and death. Now, we enjoy many things, we have fun, God wants us to. I believe there will be laughter in heaven, a holy laughter. He who sits in heaven shall laugh. But this is serious business. Who is sufficient for a ministry of the word, that if it is done the wrong way, could cause a person not to believe in Jesus? Who is sufficient for this matter of life or death? Well, we certainly aren't sufficient, but he gives the answer down in chapter 3, verse 5. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God, who also made us sufficient as ministers of the new covenant. So God was saying through Paul, just as Moses looked at the bush and said, boy, I'm like that bush. Then Moses had to look and see the fire on the bush and say, alright, the glory of God. Who is sufficient for these things? Well, according to chapter 3, verse 5 and verse 6, God makes us sufficient for our spiritual ministry. But don't stop there. Turn to chapter 9 of 2 Corinthians, verse 8, a verse many of you can quote. Not only is God sufficient for our spiritual ministry, but God is sufficient for our material needs. Verse 8, and God is able to make all things abound toward you, that you always, having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work. You know what that says? If God calls us to do a work, He'll supply what is needed. I like the universals in that chapter. All grace, all ways, all sufficiency, all things, every good work. Who is sufficient? God. God is sufficient for our material needs. Some of you are going through building programs. Some of you would like to go into building programs. You say, we're just a bunch of little bushes down here. But when God is ready to do something, He ignites those bushes. You just see the glory of God in the bush. God enjoys taking the weak things of this world and confounding the mighty. But it doesn't stop there. I know I speak to some people who have to deal with physical needs, either in yourself or somebody at home. So many of God's servants in history were not well. Charles Spurgeon sometimes had to preach with his foot up on a pillow because of pain. He would usually leave London somewhere in January and go to the south of France to regain his strength. He was not a well man. Campbell Morgan used to have headaches that were so difficult. He often had an osteopath. I don't think they called him that back in those days. He looked like a chiropractor or a work-to-work on his neck before he went into the service to preach. Many of God's servants, Wilbur Smith, the great bibliophile, brilliant New Testament scholar, spent most of his life operating with one eye. He couldn't see out of the other eye. If you have good health, hold on to it. Thank God for it. I mean, they've got medicine now that's so strong you've got to be in perfect health to take it. But there's some people who, in their bodies, it's a demand. And they say, God, I can't do it. But look at chapter 12 of 2 Corinthians. Here's our third sufficiency. God is sufficient for my spiritual needs and my material needs and my physical needs. And he said to me, my grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Sometimes God elects to heal. Sometimes He doesn't. But even if God doesn't give you healing, He gives you grace. And you can get the job done. So, when the task is too great for you, when the task is too great for you, see the glory of God in the bush. Just remember, you're just a bush. But when the glory of God ignites you, you'll get something done. Now, there's a second occasion when we have to see the glory of God. And for this we go to Exodus chapter 40. Exodus chapter 40. God gave to the Jewish people blessings He never gave to Rome or Egypt or any other nation. Paul lists some of those blessings over in Romans chapter 9. Who are Israelites to whom pertain the adoption? God never adopted the Romans, He gave the Jews. The glory! The other nations had temples. They had priests. They had altars. They had sacrifices. They had religion. But their temples were empty. When Moses erected the tabernacle, and later on when Solomon built the temple, that temple wasn't empty. Exodus chapter 40. And the cloud covered the tabernacle of meeting. And the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. And Moses was not able to enter the tabernacle of meeting because the cloud rested above it. And the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. Same thing happened to the temple. Now, you must remember this. Israel was surrounded by filth. When you read about the religions of the Canaanites and the other nations through which the Jews passed to get to Canaan, you think you're reading modern pornography. They're filthy. Wicked. There were religions where they offered their children to their idol. They had consecrated prostitutes, both male and female. Their religion was saturated with sex. And it was into this environment that God led His people. And He gave them some rules. He said, don't you study comparative religion. Don't you sit down with those people and say, now let's see, what have you got that we need? He said, tear down their altars. Wreck their temples. Don't go to their feasts. Wipe them out. Now, some of the people, the tenderhearted people, say this is awful wicked of God to want to destroy a whole society. Just go back and read what that society was like. By the way, we're getting close to it here in the world today. Now, here's Moses having to keep a pure people to help the mothers and daddies raise the boys and girls so they won't wreck their bodies. A teenager asked his grandfather, Grandpa, what did they wear in your day for safe sex? Grandpa said, a wedding ring. We don't have that today. In fact, we have to rewrite the wedding ceremonies. We're living in a cesspool of iniquity. Now, how can Moses help these people not to get involved with this crowd out here? Because everything within human nature wants to go down. You know what God did? He said, Moses, when you get worried about the enemy out there, just look at the middle of the camp. There is my glory. God put the tabernacle right in the middle of the camp, and over the tabernacle He put that cloud of glory. And so here's a Jewish boy who sees an attractive Moabitess girl. He's tempted to do something he shouldn't do, then he turns around and looks and he sees the glory of God. And he says, I'm different. I've got the glory. That's what Paul meant when he said, whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God. And God said to Moses, and He told the people, you are sanctified by this glory. What makes us different from the people of the world? Are we more handsome, more beautiful? Not necessarily. Not necessarily. Do we have more money than they have? Probably not. Are we smarter than they are? We can't prove that. What makes us different from the crowd out there? We have got the glory. Now, you say, I can hardly wait to get to heaven to be glorified. Dear friend, you are glorified. It just hasn't been revealed yet. The Lord said, whom He justified, them He also glorified. I am glorified now. It just hasn't been revealed yet. That's why Hebrews 8 says, all of creation, your garden and the backyard, all of creation is just waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God. When Jesus shall return and the glory shall be revealed. And so, God says to you and me, look, when the task is too great for you, My glory can use a bush. And when the enemy is too strong for you, and they are moving in on your fellowship, moving in on your family, it's the glory. The glory in the camp. Remind your congregation that when you assemble, the glory of God is there. Remind your family that when you meet together to pray, the glory of God is there. Remind your children that when they go off to school or work or wherever, they are taking with them the glory. So, when the enemy gets too strong for us, we need to see the glory of God in the camp. Paul had an interesting thing to say about this in 1 Corinthians 14. He had some problems with the Corinthian church because they were using their spiritual gifts as toys to play with and weapons to fight with instead of tools to build with. That's a dangerous thing. And he says in 1 Corinthians 14, he said, now look, you evangelical exhibitionists there in Corinth, you don't come to church to glorify God, you come to show off. We have some of that still today. And he says, suppose that an unbeliever comes in and you're fussing with each other, who's going to speak next, and you're speaking in languages that nobody can interpret for you, this man will think you're mad. Now look at the passage, 1 Corinthians 14.23, Therefore, if the whole church comes together in one place and all speak with tongues, and there come in those who are uninformed or unbelievers, will they not say that you are out of your mind? But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or an uninformed person comes in, he is convinced by all, he is convicted by all, and thus the secrets of his heart are revealed. And so falling down on his face, he will worship God and report that God is truly among you. He'll see the glory. That's the ultimate in worship, that there is such a sensing of the presence of the glory of God that even the unsaved fall on their faces. Charles Spurgeon reports in his autobiography that there were times at the Metropolitan Tabernacle in London when in their prayer meetings, the glory of God so moved in, nobody could talk. There was just a sense, an awesome sense of the glory of God. That would help us. So when you look at yourself and you say, the task is too big for me, see God's glory in the bush. When you look around and see all of the pollution, all the landmines out there, all the dangers, just remember the glory of God is in the camp. We have the glory. There is a third occasion when Moses saw the glory. And this you find in Exodus chapter 32. Do people ever bother you? John Cleese has a video up called, How to Irritate People. Most of the people who irritate me don't need any help. Moses' greatest problem, humanly speaking, was caused by the people he was trying to help. The more he did for them, the more they criticized him. When people are too much for you, you've got to see the glory of God on the mount. Whenever the people broke his heart, off he would go and talk to God. Exodus chapter 32, 33, 34. Moses is up on the mountain, getting his instructions from God, and the people are getting nervous. And so the elders come to Aaron, and they say, we haven't seen Moses for quite a while. I mean, it would be as though the pastor of a Calvary chapel vanished for two months, and nothing was heard. So the Jewish people who had a difficult time walking by faith anyway, came to Aaron and said, we haven't seen Moses around for a long time. Well, he's up talking to God. Well, we haven't seen him, we haven't heard from him. He's not giving us reports. So they asked Aaron to make them something they could see. And so Aaron gathered together the gold and made a golden calf. It was one of the idols they saw down in Egypt. And he declared a holiday. He was pleasing the people. He was giving them what they want. Now, that's a dangerous thing in ministry. We have to make people want the right thing. If you give people what they want, you may not give them what they need. It's a very delicate thing to say, alright, now we're going to arrange the service so that we can have evangelistic outreach and win people to Christ. Well, what are you going to minimize? What are you going to maximize? How are you going to arrange it? Numbers of denominations have gone right through their hymn book and taken out the songs about the cross. The blood. We sang this morning about the blood of Jesus. We're going to be singing about the blood of Jesus for eternity. Hallelujah! For the blood of the lamb that was slain. When John was up in heaven, he had this great worship service. He was singing about the lamb who was slain. But there are churches that won't sing about that. Some because they don't believe in what they call a butcher block theology. Others because they say, well, the unsaved will be offended. If you're going to preach the cross, you're going to offend somebody. You're going to offend somebody. So Aaron decided to have a popular religion that would please everybody. And you can do that. And God knew about it. And so in Exodus 32, verse 7, the Lord said to Moses, Go, get down, for your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. Now, consider the enormity of this sin. Who were the people that sinned? The folks that had the glory. Where did they do it? At Mount Sinai, where they saw the glory. When did they do it? After they'd been given the law. You shall not make any graven image. Why did they do it? Because they couldn't live by faith. They had to have something they could see. God says to Moses, here's one of the temptations you're going to face. Verse 10 in Exodus 32, Now, therefore, let me alone that my wrath may burn hot against them, and I may consume them. And Moses, I'm going to take you and make a new nation out of you. That's always the temptation every leader faces. At some point, at some point, God will test you. Now, of course, He wasn't going to do that to Moses, but He's testing him. Moses, are you more concerned about yourself or your people? Moses, I'll make a great nation out of you, and let's just wipe out this crowd down there. Would the new nation have been any different from the old nation? Probably not. And Moses wouldn't do that. Moses pleaded with the Lord. It's not like Paul. Paul says, I am willing to go to hell for the Jewish people. Romans 9, 10. Paul was an amazing fellow. He wrote to the Philippians, I'm willing to stay out of heaven for your sake. He says about the Jews, I'm willing to go to hell for their sake. What do you do with a man like that? And Moses interceded for them. He said, these aren't my people, they're your people. If you destroy them, what are you going to say to Abraham? Abraham's there with you. You're the God of Abraham. Are you going to say, Abraham, I broke the covenant? What are you going to say to Isaac? What are you going to say to Jacob? I broke the covenant? God said, that's the answer I wanted to hear. Moses went down, disciplined the people, and then he went back up and prayed for them. Prayed for them. I like to contrast two people, Elijah and Moses. In both cases, they felt the people had failed. On Moses' case, they had failed. Elijah thought he was the only one. You have to watch out for the Elijah complex. I'm the only one left. Who was the preacher who preached a fine sermon and got in the car to go home and waited for his wife to compliment him and she didn't say anything so funny? He said, you know, there aren't many great expositors left anymore. She said, well, there's one less than you think. So, Elijah goes up on the mountain. Elijah goes up on the mountain complaining. Don't ever go up on the mountain complaining. I'm the only one left. I'm the only one true to Your Word. It's all going to die with me. Moses went up on the mountain interceding. Moses saw the glory on the mountain. He said, oh, show me Your glory. You see, folks, our people are going to fail us just like we failed them. Read about the people that worked with Paul. Demas has forsaken me having loved this present world. At my last defense, nobody stood with me. But the Lord stood with me. And there are times when you feel like you're the only one alone. And Moses goes up on the mountain and says, don't destroy them. Love them. Forgive them. They are Your people. When people are just too much for you, see the glory of God up on the mountain. Because one day, God is going to be glorified in His people. We don't see it now. But it's going to happen. Ephesians chapter 1, Paul tells us why God has His plan of salvation. Three times, for the praise of His glory. For the praise of the glory of His grace. For the praise of His glory. Why does God save people? Not to solve their problems. Why does God save people? To make the world better? We hope. You know why He saved you? For the praise of His glory. And the preacher and the missionary and the pastor's wife, when our hearts are broken, when our children fail, when our people fail, let's not go up on the mountain like Elijah and gripe and complain. No, no, let's go up like Moses and say, show me your glory. Oh God, if I just see your glory, I can keep going. I can keep going. Because I know one day, the earth is going to be filled with the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. So, when the task is too great for you, see God's glory in the bush. When the enemy is too strong for you, see God's glory in the camp. When the people are too much for you, see God's glory on the mount. Now there is a fourth occasion. When the rewards seem too small for you, you've got to see God's glory in the faith of the Lord Jesus. Do you ever stop to think how Moses moved off the scene? Let's suppose that Moses had a contract with ABC Capital or somebody. Suppose he had a contract and they say, well, it's about time for Moses to move off the scene. Okay, we'll take care of it. First, there's going to be a big ticker tape parade in his honor, a great big banquet in his honor, and we'll bring in all the best we can bring in. And then we'll arrange for God to do some mighty miracles and then a chariot will come down and pick Moses up. That's not what happens. You'd think that all that Moses had done for God, his exodus would have been a stellar event. It wasn't. One day God said, Moses, let's go up here on the mountain. Yes, Lord. Moses left the camp after making that long speech in Deuteronomy, went up in the mountain. Now Moses said, I'm going to show you the land. You're not going to go in it yet, but I'm going to show it to you. Moses wanted to go into the Holy Land. He begged that God would send him to the Holy Land, let him go into the Holy Land. God said, no, no. It would ruin the book of Hebrews. So we'll just leave it. Don't say anything more about it. And so Moses lifted up his eyes and he saw. He saw the land that he loved so much. And then God put him to sleep. Television crews weren't there. No pallbearers. God just put him to sleep and God buried him. What a way to go. After all you have done for the people. Some years ago, I had the rare privilege, it's only happened once, I had the rare privilege of sharing a meeting with Dr. W.A. Criswell, whose ministry we all admire so much. And at this meeting he told a story which perhaps you have heard or used. It impressed me. If you have heard it, bear with me. At the New York Harbor, a great ship came in and on that ship was Theodore Roosevelt. He had been to Africa on a safari. Also on that ship was an elderly missionary couple who had ended their work in Africa and were coming home. The press was there. The press was there. And the flashbulbs were flashing and the president came down. It was just a big thing and the whole world welcomed him. You know, a big parade. And then down the gangplank came this elderly couple with their old luggage and they went to a modest hotel room to bed down for the night before getting a train home. And the man said, this is not fair. We have invested our whole lives in Africa. Not killing, but giving life. We've sacrificed. We've buried some children there. And we come home and there is nobody to meet us and we're in this cheap hotel room. It's not fair. Now wives are wives. They know what to say and how to say it. And all she said was, but my dear, we aren't home yet. We aren't home yet. Centuries later, the Lord Jesus said, Peter, James, John, come with me. They went up on a mountain and our Lord was transfigured before them. And here was Moses. He made it to the Holy Land. Here was Elijah in glory. And they discussed our Lord's exodus, says Luke, that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem. His exodus. Moses had accomplished an exodus. He brought the Jewish people out of Egypt. Ah, but Jesus was going to accomplish an exodus for the whole world. He's going to bring sinners out of slavery into redemption. And Moses made it to the glory. He saw the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Folks, we're not home yet. We're not home yet. You can't go to a board meeting and say, look, I paid these bills myself. You can't say that. You can't go to a congregational meeting and tell them the hours you were in the hospital at night till the wee hours of the morning. You can't tell people this. They don't believe you. Or they'll think you're bragging. And there are going to be days when the devil is going to say, fine master you've got. Look at all the sacrifice you make. Look at the extra burdens your wife and children have to carry. What reward is this? And when the reward seems too small, just get up on the Mount of Transfiguration and see the face of Jesus Christ. Moses eventually saw the glory. You say, well that's all very interesting, but what's it mean to me? Well, would you just in closing turn to 2 Corinthians chapter 3. 2 Corinthians chapter 3, the theme is glory. Thirteen times you find the word glory in 2 Corinthians chapter 3. He contrasts the glory of the Old Covenant with the glory of the New Covenant. The Old Covenant glory faded away. The New Covenant glory gets brighter and brighter. In the Old Covenant, the Word was written on stone. In the New Covenant, the Word is written on our hearts. As I stand here ministering the Word of God, if your heart is open to the Holy Spirit, He's writing this Word on your heart. Chapter 3 verse 18, In the Old Covenant, only Moses got up there to see the glory. Oh, the people could see the glory over the tabernacle, but only Moses got up there. And when he came down, his face was shining. He picked up some of the glory. And then that glory began to fade away, so he put a mask on, a veil on, so that he wouldn't see the glory fading away. Then he'd go out to see God or go out to the tent of meeting to see God, take the mask off. And when he came up, put it back on. 3.18, But we all, oh, not just the preacher, not just Moses, we all with unveiled face, ah, we don't have to worry about that, beholding as in a mirror, that's the Word of God, the glory of the Lord are being transfigured. That's the Word. Transfigured into the same image, from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord. You know, that verse says that when the child of God looks into the Word of God and sees the Son of God, he or she is transformed by the Spirit of God into the image of God for the glory of God. You can have your own private transfiguration every day. Just get to the Word and see the glory of Jesus in the face of our Lord Jesus. The trouble is, we go around wearing masks. When the task is too great for you, see God's glory in the bush. When the enemy is too strong for you, see God's glory in the camp. Oh, remind your people that they are an assembly of glory. When the people are too much for you and they break your heart, just see God's glory on the mountain. Get that distant view. Get that broad outlook. And when the rewards seem too small for you, just get your Bible, open it up, look for Jesus, and remember you're not home yet. And when you're home, God will take care of us. When I was pastoring the Moody Church in Chicago, I made it my business to investigate into the life of D.L. Moody. What a man. If you want your soul encouraged, read A Good Life of D.L. Moody. He was a bush. He was a bush. In fact, Richard Ellsworth Day called his biography of D.L. Moody Bush Aglow. He never got past sixth grade. He murdered the King's English. He'd say things like, God done it! They claimed he could say Jerusalem in one syllable. How he did it. But oh, what a man. Ignited by God. Well, he was in Birmingham, England having a crusade, and the great R.W. Dale, congregational preacher and theologian and author, was there to help. You couldn't find two more opposite men. R.W. Dale was a trained man who read the Scriptures and the original and wrote profound books. During the crusade, R.W. Dale came to D.L. Moody. He said, Mr. Moody, this work has to be of God. For I see no connection between you and what's going on. And D.L. Moody smiled and said, May it ever be so! I can't think of a greater compliment. Same thing happened to my predecessor, Theodore F., who found it back to the Bible. He and M.R. DeHaan, radio Bible class, were very close friends. In fact, Mr. F. preached Dr. DeHaan's funeral. Dr. DeHaan came to Lincoln and went through the broadcast office and everything. It was all over. He looked at his friend Theodore F. and said, F, if I were God, you're the last one I would have chosen to do all this. Mr. F. thought that was so funny. Isn't it wonderful when God does things and nobody can explain it? That's how he gets the glory. That's how he gets the glory. And so, oh, we are a bunch of bushes. We don't just bloom where we're planted. We are ignited by the glory of God. As long as we're bushes, he can get the glory. And so, Father, thank you that you've gained to share your glory with us. We can understand you're sharing the glory with the angels, but you share it with us. And so I pray in Jesus' name, may we not rob you of glory, may we not tarnish the glory, but rather may we be the means of extending the glory for Jesus' sake. Amen.