In that day shall the Branch of the Lord be beautiful and glorious,
and the fruit of the land shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel.
And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy,
even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem:
when the Lord shall have washed away the filth of the daughters of Zion,
and shall have purged the blood of Jerusalem from the midst thereof,
by the spirit of justice, and by the spirit of burning.
And the Lord will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion,
and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day,
and the shining of a flaming fire by night;
for over all the glory shall be spread a covering.
And there shall be a pavilion for a shade in the daytime from the heat,
and for a refuge, and for a covert, from storm and from rain.
Let us pray.
O beloved Lord, we thank Thee for those wonderful words: “Stamped with My name from the palms of His hands, eternity will not erase; impressed on His heart, it remains in marks of indelible grace.”
O, how we thank Thee, our beloved Father, for putting us in the Lord Jesus Christ, for the security, the eternal security, which is ours in Him.
And Father, we pray this evening that by Thy Spirit Thou wilt make this time a time of illumination, a time of divine revelation; a time when things that perhaps we know in the head become somehow known in the heart, when all things dawn on us in all their wonder and power and glory.
O Father, we pray that Thou wilt not allow these studies on this matter of covering to just somehow pass us by, to become just one more study which we have gone through. But rather, Lord, we pray that we may be a people who know in our experience what it is to abide in the Lord.
Hear us then, Lord. We commit ourselves to Thee: the weakness of these lips, the weakness of this mind and body. Thou art able, Lord, to display Thy superior power and grace, and Thou canst, Lord, through the anointing upon our Lord Jesus Christ, cause that this speaking and ministry be anointed, and that our hearing also be anointed. We ask it in His name. Amen.
Well now, it is a good four weeks since we last looked at this subject of covering. I do not think I need to say to you all that it is a matter of vital importance. Perhaps there is no other subject that is more necessary, more important, to both young and old believers.
When we are young in the Lord, if we can only learn what covering means and how to stay covered, it will be a lesson that will stand us in good stead for the whole of our Christian life. And if we are old in the Lord, oh, the need for us to understand that spiritual age is no guarantee that we stay covered. The Word of God teaches, by lesson and incident, in many, many cases, of those who, having known God in the most wonderful way, have yet got uncovered in their last days.
Therefore, I say this is a tremendous subject. We know that the enemy’s objective is to get us uncovered, because only when we are uncovered can he strike us. If only that would sink into every single believer—every one of us in this place tonight—if everybody would just grasp the simplicity of it.
The fact of the matter is that we are absolutely safe in the Lord Jesus. Nothing, nothing in the whole of hell can touch us when we are in Christ.
Now, there are things, of course, which God allows—there are inexplicable problems that come to us, and there are the normal sufferings that come to all mankind. There are many things that come our way. But when it is through the hand of God, we are absolutely safe.
Every single problem or trial is turned into a kind of agent by God to work glory into our lives, to change us from glory to glory: from one capacity of glory to another capacity of glory, from a smaller capacity to a larger capacity.
Therefore, if only every one of us could see that to stay where God has placed us in the Lord Jesus Christ is the safest place on earth, in the whole universe. In the heaven of heavens, there is no safer place than to be in Christ.
Those who have gone into the presence of our beloved Lord are, in fact, no more secure than you and I. That may take some swallowing. We have sung it, as we all do so happily:
More happy, but not more secure,
the glorified spirits in heaven.
If perhaps, from our point of view, they are a little more secure, it is because the enemy cannot reach them there. But, oh, if only every believer could understand this simple fact: Satan cannot reach us in Christ on earth, if we would only stay there.
What does it mean to be covered? Well, of course, there is this little phrase used in the New Testament over two hundred times: “in Christ.” And that sums up this whole matter.
To be covered is to be concealed in Christ. It is to be robed with the garments of His salvation. It is to be completely, as it were, hidden in Him. The Lord Jesus said to us, “Abide in Me, and I in you.” That is what it means: a life hid with Christ in God.
We are with Christ in God. How can the devil get us if that is our position? First he has got to come to the Father. Then he has got to come to the Son. And only then can he get at us: a life hid with Christ in God.
Now, I hope this little brief survey of all that we have done over four weeks or more may dawn upon you again this evening: that it is, in fact, the most secure and safe place in the whole world to be—in Christ.
In your office, in your home, with those difficult people, here in this company made up of such difficulties—wherever we are, we are absolutely safe in Christ.
If we could only see that if we have believed, if by faith we have been saved, if we have through faith come into the Lord Jesus Christ, we are absolutely secure. Nothing can touch us there except by the sovereign permission and will of God.
But, you see, the whole point is simply this: if the devil is going to destroy us, paralyse us, corrupt us, or sidetrack us, the first thing he has got to do is to get us to uncover ourselves.
Now, the devil cannot uncover us. The only people who can do this are you and me. So the whole strategy of Satan, the whole plan, the whole objective of the enemy, is to get us unwittingly to uncover ourselves. Then, when that has happened, he can strike.
Of course, the tragedies we see in the Christian life and in Christian work, the terrible things that sometimes we hear of, are all due—or very, very largely due, if not all of them—to this uncovering.
The Bible warns us seriously about this matter. It tells us that some are sick. In other words, it is not far-fetched to understand that sickness—physical sickness or mental sickness—can come to us as a result of uncovering.
Now, this is not to say that all sickness and all illness is due to uncovering. But there can be cases of sickness which are the direct result and consequence of getting uncovered.
There is weakness. Here is a person who has run well in the Lord. Here is a person who has been in the forefront of the battle. Here is a person who has been up with an open spirit, wholly with what God is doing, cooperating to the full. Then, slowly, he becomes sluggish. He begins to opt out. Something else takes the moment. What has happened?
There has been an uncovering, and the Scripture says, “Some of you are weak.” Where before there was spiritual muscle and spiritual sinew, now there is only weakness, spiritual lethargy, indolence.
We forget that this is, not in every case, but in so many cases, a direct consequence and result of uncovering.
We are warned, furthermore—and that is the most solemn level—that we can lose our physical life. There can be, in that case, physical death. “Some of you have died,” says the Apostle Paul, “because of this.”
Now, that makes us wake up, or should do, to the fact that the only way the enemy can trip most of us is by getting us to uncover ourselves. And his methods of so doing are multitudinous.
In one of our studies, we dwelt, I think over two evenings, on the many ways that we uncover ourselves: an unforgiving spirit, absence of love, backbiting, an untamed tongue, not walking in the light—oh, so many ways.
The enemy is so ingenious. He seems to cut the cloth to the person. He watches us. He has a vast intelligence. It is not stupid, again, or imaginative to say that he has a spiritual intelligence which has watched us from childhood, which knows our weaknesses, knows our foibles, knows our temperament, knows our background, knows the things that get us down.
Slowly but surely, we are engineered into such a position that it is difficult for us to walk in the light.
Have you not had an experience like that, where there is something which you know very well should be dealt with, should be put right? You should come out into the light, get it done, but you just cannot do it.
Somehow you have been engineered into such a position that it is impossible to say anything or do anything. That is uncovering.
We have to face the terrible possibility then: do I either pay the price and get out into the light, or do I remain uncovered, with the possibility of spiritual destruction and, at least, spiritual paralysis?
Now, I use just the question of walking in the light. There are all kinds of things that we get engineered into.
I have seen people desperately ill who know very well that there is some connection with conduct. And when they have been asked, they have said quite firmly that they have nothing to confess. I remember one person who actually died shortly after saying that.
It is quite incredible how the enemy can engineer us into a position where we cannot be honest, where somehow or other we feel powerless.
Well, we have spent time upon those many ways in which we can get uncovered. We have also talked about this simple fact: what do we need to do when we know we have got uncovered?
Of course, the first thing of all is to seek to remain always covered, to abide in the Lord at all times, never to let there be any uncovering. But in all our experience, we have to be realists. In all our experience, I think even the greatest saint comes to points where he has uncovered himself.
What are we to do when we have uncovered ourselves? Well, there are two tremendous things to remember. The first is that the Lord Jesus Christ has already paid the price.
His finished work means that we can get back to covering, even when we have terribly uncovered ourselves.
Secondly, we have the intercession of the Lord, who ever liveth to make intercession for us. He pleads for us just as He prayed for Peter, when He knew Peter had uncovered himself and Satan obtained him by request that he might sift him as wheat.
The Lord Jesus prayed for him that his faith would not fail. So the Lord Jesus prays for you and for me, on the basis of His own finished work, that our faith shall not fail, but that we shall come through sifted.
There were four things that I mentioned which I feel I ought tonight just to repeat—four things about how to get covered when we have got uncovered.
The first is this: recognise that you are uncovered. Be blatantly honest with yourself. Recognise that you have gone. Do not excuse yourself. Do not sort of say, “Well, there was this, and there was that, and the other, and I was pushed into this,” and so on and so forth.
Just simply say, “I can see I have got myself uncovered.” Confess it. Recognise it. It is essential to recognise that one is uncovered when one has got uncovered. There is nothing to be gained by hiding it.
Secondly, by faith retake your divinely given position in Christ. Do not wait for a moment. Do not wait till next week. Do not wait till tomorrow. By faith, retake your divinely given position in the Lord Jesus Christ. There you are absolutely safe.
Do not stay for a moment longer uncovered than your knowledge. Certainly put right whatever is wrong, no matter what the cost.
If there is something wrong which has caused the uncovering, put it right. There is no back door to covering.
If you have done something, if you have said something, you have got to withdraw what you have said. You have got to undo, as it were, what you have done. Put right whatever it is.
Lastly, learn the lesson. Learn the lesson. There is always a cause. Learn it.
Now, folks will often say, “Well, you know, my temperament is such.” Learn the lesson. We are all as different as blades of grass. Everyone is different, but we cannot make an excuse of our background, our circumstances, or even our temperament.
We must get to know it, and get to know what the devices of Satan are in our own lives, so that we learn the lesson. “This is the way the enemy did it. I have learned that lesson.”
A fool is not someone who falls once. A fool is someone who falls in the same place again and again. That person is a stupid fool. If a person keeps on falling into a ditch in a certain place, he must be potty. Only he truly is a fool.
But if he has fallen into a ditch in the dark for the first time in his life, well, he did not know the ditch was there. We all fully understand that it could happen to any of us. But to fall in again, and again, and again, and again—that person must be really dumb.
Unfortunately, many of us are just like that. The reason we fall again and again in the exact same places is because we have never learned the lesson.
We are rather like those people who, when they have any spot or pimple, plaster something on it. Any sort of rash or anything like that, they rub something on it and destroy the rash. Of course, it comes up again, because they will not go—or let someone else go, a doctor or someone—to the root of the problem.
There is something there which is causing it. But many of us are just like that. We see something there, so we slap something on it, and we are very happy that it has gone the next day. “Look, it has gone,” we say, only for it to come up somewhere else.
And that is how some Christians live their Christian life.
This whole matter of covering is so marvellous in many ways, so wonderful, and yet so solemn and so serious. In many ways, I suppose there is a sense in which we can say that it puts a certain amount of fear into us. I do not think it ought to in a wrong way. I think it is excellent if the fear of the Lord comes upon us in this matter.
But, you know, for me, covering is not a negative thing. It is not that there is all the possibility of being sidetracked, destroyed, corrupted by the enemy, or somehow paralysed. For me, covering is wonderful in that we are so secure and so safe.
So why look on the dark side? If you know that you are absolutely safe in Christ, why not dwell upon the positive business of staying where you are safe? And when you have got drawn out, learn why you got drawn out.
It says in James that every man sins only when he is enticed by his own lust. Finally, he is drawn out.
You will remember that the last evening we had on this matter of covering, we took a whole number of Old Testament pictures and saw both the positive and the negative side of this whole matter.
We saw how this subject, this matter of covering, was illustrated and illuminated in all kinds of lives, from Adam and Eve right the way through down to Hezekiah. Of course, there were many others. We were only able to take some of the really big stories.
How full of divine instruction those stories are. I hope that any who were not there for that evening will listen to the tape of that time, because I have said all along that it is those stories in the Old Testament which are, in fact, the most illuminating and instructive concerning this matter.
Now, this evening, we come to perhaps, for me, the most difficult aspect of all. How do you explain a mystery when it remains a mystery?
Now, someone prays something about the mystery being revealed to us, and that is just marvellous when a mystery has in fact been revealed. But there are some things which still remain mysteries.
I can only lead you so far this evening. I can only take you a little way and leave you on the brink of an abyss, in a sense. You can sort of look, as it were, from an observation point on the Grand Canyon over a tremendous panorama stretching away into the distance, range after range in the far distance. That is all I can do this evening.
But as perhaps some of us have not even been to the observation point and seen really anything of it, it may be just as well that we do the little that we can do as a first reading and a superficial reading of the Bible concerning this matter of covering.
It would seem that it is all to do with sin and failing. In other words, we think of Adam and Eve: they sinned, and they were immediately conscious that they were naked. God, in the end, shed blood and clothed them, covered them with skins.
I think most of us have a deep, deep-seated conception of this matter as being something to do essentially with sin. In other words, if there had been no sin, there would be no need of covering.
We are sinners, and we need the garment of salvation. We need to be robed with the robe of His righteousness. We have no hope of coming before God except in Christ. I think that is what most of us feel to be the teaching, or the whole extent of the teaching, concerning this matter of covering.
It is really virtually a question of knowing how to confess sin, how to take Christ as our salvation and our righteousness, our acceptance before God.
Nevertheless, as we grow deeper into this whole matter in the Word of God, we discover that it has far, far greater meaning and significance. In fact, we begin to discover that this matter of covering is not just to do with sin and human failing.
It appears that before sin ever entered the world, there was evidently some kind of need for covering.
Let us take the Word of God and look at one or two Scriptures. First of all, Ezekiel 28, verses 14 and 16. Many of you will know that this is the extraordinary prophecy concerning Satan and how he fell.
Thou wast the anointed cherub that covereth;
and I set thee, so that thou wast upon the holy mountain of God;
thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.
Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created,
till unrighteousness was found in thee.
By the abundance of thy traffic they filled the midst of thee with violence,
and thou hast sinned:
therefore have I cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God;
and I have destroyed thee, O covering cherub,
from the midst of the stones of fire.
Now, you notice that the devil has been called here—Satan has been called here—the cherub that covereth, and then again, in verse 16, the covering cherub. O covering cherub.
The Hebrew word here is one of the three used and translated in English by the word cover. It is the word, in this instance, meaning “to hedge in” or “to enclose.” So we have some thought of this person hedging in something, enclosing something; in other words, protecting something, guarding something. He was the guardian. He was the protector, if you like.
Now, this was before sin ever entered into the world. This was before there was the whole story of the fall. But unrighteousness was found even in Lucifer.
What does this mean? So problematical is this verse that the Revised Standard Version amends it to this: “With an anointed guardian cherub I placed you,” and then they put a note and say, “Hebrew quite obscure.”
Verse 16, they render: “I cast you as a profane thing from the mountain of God, and the guardian cherub drove you out.” That is how they have amended it.
In other words, we have here something extraordinary. Someone is called, if we take the Hebrew literally, “the anointed cherub that covereth,” and that does not seem to make too much sense.
O covering cherub. Now, what is it? That is Satan, Lucifer. What was it that God gave him? What was his job?
We now look back into the mists—not just of time, but before time was, right, right back—and we get some glimpse of someone whose job was covering. Something to do with the glory of God. Something to do with the presence of God. And this one was anointed by God to guard, to protect, or to cover—to hedge in, to enclose.
That is the first thing. The New English Bible, of course, follows the Revised Standard Version by also amending it in exactly the same way, suggesting that an anointed cherub was meant in this passage. This is because, to the human mind, it does not seem to make sense. So it has been amended in a way that would seem or appear to make sense.
But that is never the way with the Word of God: to amend it so that it falls in with our understanding or sense.
Now I pass on to another verse, one that we read together in Isaiah. Isaiah 4, verse 5:
And the Lord will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion,
and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day,
and the shining of a flaming fire by night;
for over all the glory shall be spread a covering.
Now, will you note that: “Over all the glory shall be spread a covering.” Is that not a most extraordinary and mysterious verse? What does it mean? Had you ever heard that the glory of God needs a covering?
Again, this Hebrew word here means very simply “covering,” or “canopy,” or “covering over all”—a canopy or a covering. Or, as you who have the Authorised Version will see, “defence.”
The Hebrew word does not mean “defence,” but it has the thought of overlaying something, thus protecting it. So the old Authorised Version, the King James translators, translated the word “defence.” Not incorrectly, for defence. This covering of the glory is for defence—an overlaying.
Now, I suggest to you that we are face to face with this: why is there a need, when there is no more sin—and no more sin in eternity to come, in ages to come, when all that is evil has finally been finished, done away with, and burnt up in the lake of fire—why is there a need for there to be a canopy over the glory?
Why an overlaying? Why a canopy? The Revised Standard Version uses the word “canopy.” The Septuagint, the earliest Greek version that we have, puts it this way: “Upon all the glory shall be a defence.”
Now, once again, the New English Bible has found it far too much. It has not made sense to our modern translators, and therefore this is how they have rendered it: “For glory shall be spread over all as a covering and a canopy.”
Now, of course, we must all say that that immediately makes much more sense. We have to say that that falls completely in line with all that we know. There is a note which tells us that the Hebrew is obscure. But the Hebrew is not obscure. Our understanding of the Hebrew is obscure.
The Hebrew is here, and it is perfectly clear. In verse 5 it says, “And the Lord will create over the whole habitation of Mount Zion, and over her assemblies, a cloud and smoke by day, and the shining of a flaming fire by night.” That little preposition over is precisely the same word used in modern Hebrew for “over.”
If I put something on the table, if I put something over something, it is exactly the same. Over the glory, there shall be a covering. There is no mystery about it. The mystery is what it means.
Again and again, our more modern translators feel that if there is anything which somehow or other does not add up, it means that the original is obscure. In other words, they feel that some dreadful mistake has been made by some sleepy copyist who, when he was copying, was sort of falling asleep and changed a Hebrew letter or two. So they feel there must be something obscure here; therefore, we all amend.
But it is in fact quite simple: over the glory, a covering. Over the glory, a covering. What does that mean?
I suppose really it is very wicked to bring you thus far, provoke a whole number of questions, and stay there. But, you see, I have to say this: I do not know what it means.
Except that we are touching something which is not just to do with sin and human failing, but something that was evidently an essential need when there was no sin and no failing; and when one day there is no more sin and no more human failing, there will still be a need.
Let me, just in passing, point you to another Scripture which may or may not help us. For those who are wise amongst us, perhaps they will get light on it. I do not know. It is in Zechariah 2, verse 5, and is an interesting parallel:
For I, saith the Lord, will be unto her a wall of fire round about,
and I will be the glory in the midst of her.
Does that throw any light on this matter? I leave it to you to think about. A wall of fire round about—there is the defence—and glory in the midst. The glory in the midst is defended by a wall of fire. The same idea? I do not know.
You will remember that in the tabernacle, where the glory of the Lord filled the whole place, there was a veil. On that veil, which spoke of the absolute holiness of God, were embroidered cherubim.
The anointed cherub that covereth fell. But on that veil were cherubim. Do you remember, in Genesis 3, it was cherubim that stood guarding the way to the tree of life, with a sword of flame?
You see it in the tabernacle and in the temple. Maybe that does not mean anything. But you remember, when you go into the holiest place of all, the thing that you see: the two huge cherubim above the mercy seat.
So great were these cherubim in the temple that their wings stretched together from end to end, from wall to wall. What is it all? It seems to have, again, something to do with covering. Somebody is covered. Their wings cover.
Their wings covered the mercy seat, the ark of the covenant. Now, the ark of the covenant, all of you know this, was the outward symbol of the presence of God. Those great wings were covering something. The glory of the Lord appeared there. It was there that God communed with the high priest.
There again, there is something I cannot fully understand. But I have entitled this evening’s study “The Mystery of Covering.”
If it does no more than bring us face to face with something far beyond our finite little minds, it has not done us harm. Far, far too much trouble has attended those who come to Bible studies and get it all beautifully into their head.
There is no mystery. We take recorders, we press the button, and out it all comes. It is a good thing to find something that is beyond us all—speaker and hearer alike.
Now I would like us to read a few more verses in connection with this which may or may not have some bearing on it. Before we go to Hebrews 12, there is one thing I remembered: I have not said anything about the cherubim.
Look at Ezekiel 1, verse 23:
And under the firmament were their wings straight, the one toward the other:
every one had two which covered on this side,
and every one had two which covered on that side, their bodies.
So these wings, which were not in use, were covering them completely—these strange creatures. Verse 11 of the same chapter says:
And their faces and their wings were separate above;
two wings of every one were joined one to another,
and two covered their bodies.
This is quite extraordinary again. These cherubim and their wings—whoever sees the cherubim is always struck by their wings.
A little farther on in Ezekiel, a most extraordinary thing happens in this vision. As the prophet Ezekiel looks at the cherubim, a man’s hand appears under the wing. In one case, the hand comes out, as it were, and takes coals from off the altar.
When we come to the last book of the Bible, Revelation, chapter 4, we find these strange creatures there again: the four living creatures full of eyes. We hear again that they had wings. We are told there that they had three pairs of wings, six wings each.
They cry, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God, the Almighty.”
Now, in Isaiah 6, in the year that King Uzziah died, Isaiah saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up. He saw seraphim. Some people try to tell us that seraphim are angels, but I think I side with biblical scholarship in this matter. Without, I think, exception, they all say that seraphim are like the cherubim. They are, in fact, symbolic.
These seraphim, you will see, have six wings. With two they cover their face, which is most extraordinary. With two they cover their feet, and with two they fly.
Now, have you ever seen any flying creature flying with wings over its eyes? But these creatures fly with two wings over their eyes, two wings over their feet, and with two they fly. What an extraordinary picture.
Whatever does it mean that whenever we see the presence of the Lord, the glory of the Lord, we see these cherubim?
Perhaps in this they speak of the whole creation of God in its entirety, visible and invisible, as the expression of the glory and grace and power of God.
Well, I do not know if it would be a whole evening’s study just to take the cherubim, but there is something there. We know, of course, as I have already said, that in the tabernacle we saw them within the holiest place and on the veil, both in tabernacle and temple.
Now let us go back to these other Scriptures. Hebrews 12, verse 29:
For our God is a consuming fire.
There are those who would like to relegate that to the Old Testament. They seem to think that God was only a consuming fire in the Old Testament, that He changed His character since then and has now become a sort of gentle old man.
But the writer to the Hebrews says, “Our God is a consuming fire.” That is His character. That is His nature. He is a consuming fire.
He has just been speaking about receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken. He is speaking about giving service well-pleasing to God with reverence and awe. Why? Because our God is a consuming fire.
Turn back to Deuteronomy 4, verse 24:
For the Lord thy God is a devouring fire,
a jealous God.
Again, Isaiah 33, verse 14:
The sinners in Zion are afraid;
trembling hath seized the godless ones:
Who among us can dwell with the devouring fire?
Who among us can dwell with everlasting burnings?
Now turn back to Exodus 33, verses 21 to 23:
And the Lord said, Behold, there is a place by Me,
and thou shalt stand upon the rock:
and it shall come to pass, while My glory passeth by,
that I will put thee in a cleft of the rock,
and I will cover thee with My hand until I have passed by:
and I will take away My hand, and thou shalt see My back;
but My face shall not be seen.
I have just read those few Scriptures because they may or may not throw light upon this whole matter.
The majesty of God, the greatness of God, the infinite greatness of God, the infinite power and holiness of God—what the old Puritans used to call the unutterable holiness of God—are today not appreciated.
You have to go a long, long way in Christian circles to hear someone speak of the majesty of God. How often, even in Christian circles, are we left with a feeling that God is very cosy, very small, very little?
Somehow, we have managed to make God small, at least in our conception. We have reduced Him. We have made Him more mundane, more ordinary, without, I hope, being blasphemous—more cosy, more easily analysed.
We can inspect God. We can put Him almost under a kind of spiritual microscope and examine Him. We can almost take Him apart and put Him together again. Sometimes I think they do in some theological seminaries.
The way they categorise God, you would think they can hold everything about Him in their hands at the end. Instead of being left with a sense of the infinity and greatness—how awe-inspiring God is—we are left with someone whom we have managed to analyse, and we have lost our fear.
But God is God, eternally and unchangeably the same.
There is no more nonsensical teaching than that teaching which tells us that the God who appeared at Sinai to our fathers has today a changed character; that somehow or other He was all wrath and now He is all mercy.
That He should have revealed Himself in this age as love, that is different. But to imagine that He has changed His character, as if God can evolve in a kind of spiritual Darwinian theory of divine evolution—that He has somehow evolved from some tribal, patriarchal deity that was savage and cold and followed law, to a God who is benign and loving and sweet—is nonsense.
No wonder the world, and many young people, turn away from an idea of God like that: some old gentleman up in the sky. God is no old gentleman up in the sky.
The same God that caused Mount Sinai to smoke like a furnace is the God you and I have come to know through Jesus Christ. He is no different. He is this very night a consuming fire, infinite in power, infinite in majesty, unutterably holy.
That is the God with whom you and I have to do: the living God, eternal and unchangeable.
Now, the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him. Not if there are billions and billions of universes will you exhaust Him. If there were billions multiplied by billions of universes, still beyond the end God will be infinite.
There is no end to His majesty, no end to His power, no end to His greatness. If that is so, certainly it must be true that no finite created being such as you and such as me can ever fully comprehend Him.
Do you really think you can analyse God? No.
Now, does that not, as it were, make us think? The twentieth century has made no difference to Him. It has not limited Him.
The fact that we explore space, the fact that we have whizzed round one of the smaller of His planets, that we are trying to do this and that—has that made it any more difficult for God? With one word, He could finish the whole thing. With one word.
He is absolutely the same. It has not made Him harder. It has not made it harder for Him or easier for Him. He is the same.
Now, do you begin to see how wonderful it is that God became man? That God, so infinite in His majesty and in His power, should have become a man, born of a simple human being.
He should have come to us in such a way that He is localised, that He has a colour to His hair, a colour to His eyes, skin, flesh and blood, a body like you and me.
The wonder of the resurrection and ascension of Christ is that today He has a body. He is not some ethereal being, like a hand from the Father, but He is a person with an actual body. For one day, by the grace of God, if He so allows us, we shall be able to tell: here is a human being, still God, but also man.
So that this Person, infinite in majesty and infinite in power, unutterably holy, can be understood by you and me. We can know an intimate relationship to Him. We can know Him as Abba, Father.
But woe betide any of us who, having been introduced into such an intimate relationship with God, should start to become familiar.
God is love. But God is also power, and truth, and righteousness, and holiness.
Now, this means simply that if the glory of God were to break out upon us, it would be as if we were touched by a million volts. We would shrivel up.
That is why in the Old Testament, again and again, there is this strain: “Lest I break out upon them.” What does it mean? How strange: “Lest I break out upon them. Tell them to keep their distance. Tell them to stand away, lest I break out upon them and they die.”
We have enough in the Old Testament to understand what the presence of God can do. This matter of covering—forget sin, forget human failing. Apart from human failing and sin, we still need to be covered.
There needs to be an overlaying of the glory. There needs to be, as it were, a protection of the glory. At least, I humbly submit this as a possible explanation for some of these verses.
In Christ, you and I approach the infinite power and holiness of God, and we are absolutely safe. O, the privilege that is yours.
When people become familiar with Him, when you hear His name bandied about, when you somehow hear Him spoken of as if He is some commodity to be sold, some sort of trite experience to be tried, does it not hurt you?
I can never understand Christians who do not get sensitive or hurt. I do. I suppose I belong to an old-fashioned, antiquarian sort of person, I do not know. But I find there is nothing more wonderful in the whole world than when people are full of the Spirit, when people are full of Christ, and when the language is genuine because it is all about Him.
When it is a sharing, oh, how one is refreshed. But I do not know whether it is me, but sometimes when I go round the country, I find it is a battle all the time to stop myself shrivelling up.
I hear things, I see things, and I sometimes think, “Dear Lord, I feel so sorry for them.”
Here you are at Your table, and here is someone dressed in such a slovenly way that you would not think that he had come to anyone but the dust. Here is someone whose posture is so familiar, so cheap, that you would think they were watching television in some dirty little back room.
Or here is language which, far from being even—I mean, we cannot all speak with an Oxford accent, and God forbid that we should—but the fact still remains: there is a sense of God’s dignity.
I have heard people with a Cockney accent speak of the Lord and speak to Him in such a way as to bring tears to your eyes and to warm your heart. Why? Because they are conscious that they are in the presence of a Person infinite in power and infinite in grace.
How would you like it if someone you loved very much, you heard being referred to as a kind of commodity? Why, do not you try it. You hear that person who means so much to you spoken of in that way, and you will know what I mean.
No wonder Malcolm Muggeridge said some year or two ago on television that he could not understand evangelicals, because they spoke of God as if He was a thing rather than a Person.
We can all become so familiar with the Lord that we all fall into a kind of jargon, into a kind of phraseology, where it just seems as if the fact that we are in a living union with a Person has taken an accident. Now it seems as if it is a thing, a power, something impersonal.
I want simply to say this evening that God is still God. His power, His glory, are still exactly the same.
Just because we have become familiar with the Lord, we have got to know Him in a very intimate, wonderful way through Christ, it does not mean for one single instant that He is different.
One day you and I will see Him. We shall see Him with our eyes. In our flesh, we shall see God.
Well, it seems to me that this whole matter of covering is not just and only to do with sin and with failing. It is something to do with the Person and the infinite power of that Person.
If we were to understand this, it would seem to me that the fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom, would come upon us all.
I only pray that this little time may serve us, though we cannot understand this subject fully.
All we know is that there is no way of touching it fully. Moses said, “May I see Thy glory?”
God said to the one person of that day and age whom He knew most intimately, “You shall see it. You shall stand by Me upon this rock, and My glory shall pass by you. And as I pass, I will cover you with My hand. My back you shall see, but My face you shall not see.”
Now, people tell me that Moses did not know anything about the substitutionary death of the Lord Jesus, the atoning death of the Lord Jesus. But the Lord Jesus said, “Abraham rejoiced to see My day.” A lot of animals had already been offered typically. He was as much covered as you and I by the blood of those creatures. They were looking forward. But this was a question of glory.
Therefore, is it not simply wonderful that in Revelation 22 it says, “They shall see His face”?
How much that will be, to see the face of God.
Well, there we are. I do not know. I hope that helps you a little. Do not think that this subject is some small thing, just to do—even great, great though it would be—with our sin and failing. It is something much, much bigger.
O, how wonderful it is that God loves us. How amazing it is that this infinite God should long for our fellowship, should long to dwell in us. Is it not incredible that He should have gone to such lengths to obtain it? I think it is amazing. Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, to save a wretch like me.
Let us pray.
O Lord, this whole matter is beyond us. But by Thy Spirit, Thou wouldst impress us with something of the profundity of it and the mystery of it, so that, Lord, if nothing else, we are a people who come to know Thee intimately, who experience all Thou hast given us in the Lord Jesus Christ, and yet at the same time never become cheap and never become familiar.
O Father, grant, we pray, for every one of us that we might know that in our experience. May we know, Lord, what it is to remain covered. We ask it in the name of our Lord Jesus.