Walking through the bible

Good morning, it's Friday once again and the week is nearly through. I'm still finding myself amazed as scriptures that seemed dull as paint drying have opened up so much for me. The questions the scriptures open up for me are questions fraught with doubt, but curiosity. I've become actively curious about the personality of this Author and I can't wait to meet Him.


Exodus 24:9,10 Then Moses went up, also Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and they saw the God of Israel. And there was under His feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and it was like the very heavens in it's clarity.

How many verses are there in the bible that say no one can see God and live? Earlier in this same book Moses asks to see God's glory and God says No, but you can look at my 'hinder parts' because no one can see me and live. So what did Aaron, Moses, Nadab and Abihu and these seventy elders of Israel SEE? They saw His feet at least. This scripture bugs me, not because it's a contradiction but because I want to know what they saw. If it was possible for them to see however much they saw (and live) then it's possible for me. Granted I'd have to get a lot holier more than likely, but still, it could be something to aspire to.

Exodus 30:15 The rich shall not give more and the poor shall not give less than half a shekel, when you give an offering to the Lord, to make atonement for yourselves.

This whole section of scripture is talking about the price of a life. Everyone will tell you we're equal, everyone says that. These are all things you already know, but it's just nice to know that I cost the same amount as Charles Spurgeon, Billy Graham, Billy Sunday, A.W. Tozer and guys like those. I'd pay less for me and wouldn't think anything of it. But God wouldn't.

Exodus 33:3 Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; for I will not go up in your midst, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.

Paraphrasing..."Get out of here before I kill you". Not exactly a statement I generally picture God saying. If He's omnipresent how can He get away from us anyway?

Exodus 33:11 So the Lord spoke to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. And he would return to the camp, but his servant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, did not depart from the tabernacle.

I've always had a lot of respect for Joshua. I don't remember hearing/reading anything bad about him at all. From what I've read so far this year, when he's mentioned, Joshua sounds like an intelligent kid that desires God. I like the fact that he wasn't able to talk to God face to face like Moses, but he was determined to be and stay as close to something like that as he could. I want to be like that.

Exodus 33:15 Then he said to Him, "If Your Presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here.

These words are hard to say when you're in a GOOD place. But these people were stuck in the desert. Would I be able to crawl into the worst place in my life and tell God to keep me there if that was the only place He'd be with me?

Exodus 33:16 For how then will it be known that Your people and I have found grace in Your sight, except You go with us? So we shall be separate, Your people and I, from all the people who are upon the face of the earth.

That's what I'd like to be. Separate and different, set apart from the rest of the world. Not because of where I came from, not because I walked through the wilderness, not because I'm slaughtering bulls left and right to atone for myself, and not because I helped build the tabernacle of God, but because God went with me.

Exodus 35:26 And all the women, whose hearts stirred with wisdom, spun yarn of goats' hair.

To me this statement is like saying, "Jeanette, whose heart stirred with wisdom, played the piano." It doesn't make sense for me. The two seem entirely unrelated. I wonder if it took extra special knowledge to figure out how to spin yarn of goats hair.

Exodus 36:8 Then all the gifted artisans among them who worked on the tabernacle made ten curtains woven of fine linen thread, and blue and purple and scarlet yarn; with artistic designs of cherubim they made them.

Unimportant I'm sure, but I wonder what their cherubim looked like. How did they know what to make them look like?

I know a lot of people in our bible reading program give up during these first couple of months that we tackle the Torah portion of the bible. Other years I've struggled through it myself, sometimes just plain skipping this part of the bible. This year could not have been easier for me at all. The hardest part of staying with the program is not reading ahead this year.

A preacher I heard the other day was talking about how he can't be a patient person, a loving person, a self-controlled person on his own. That God is the only one that can do it. And it's brought something to my mind as I realized it could only be God that's giving me the hunger I've had the last two years for Gods word. Psalms 37:4 says 'Delight yourself in the Lord and He shall give you the desires of your heart. ' This past week has just reminded me that, God won't just give me some of the things I'm desiring, but give me the desires themselves. There's nothing more fulfilling, more exciting, and more wonderful, than chasing God given desires.