You may recall that God wrote the Ten Commandments twice. This was due to the fact that Moses broke the first set in anger. On the occasion when God asked Moses to prepare two tables for the second time (found in Exodus 34) something astounding happened. As Moses descended the mountain with the new tablets, Aaron and the children of Israel noticed something different about Moses. His face was shining. The passage teaches us that Moses’ glowing face resulted from his time spent with God on the mountain. This phenomenon serves as the inspiration for this blog. It is our hope that we can learn to speak with God daily just as Moses did on the mountain. The glory of the Lord awaits us!
Isn’t it nice when the New Testament revisits an Old Testament passage? It seems to be God’s way of “zooming in” on something He’d really like us to notice. Well, the passage mentioned above falls into this category. The Apostle Paul opens a discussion in 2 Corinthians 3 that sheds a little more “light” on Moses’ shining face.
The Gist of the Passage
The whole idea of 2 Corinthians 3 is that the old covenant had it’s glory, but that the new covenant far outshines that glory. Paul uses the imagery of Moses’ face to convey this. He states the following:
Now if the ministry of death, carved in letters on stone, came with such glory that the Israelites could not gaze at Moses’ face because of its glory, which was being brought to an end, 8 will not the ministry of the Spirit have even more glory? 2 Corinthians 3:7-8
and,
Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, 13 not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. 14 But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains unremoved, because only through Christ is it taken away. 15 Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. 2 Corinthians 3:12-15
So we learn a few things from this passage. First, we learn that the old covenant had its glory, but that it was a fading glory. Second, we see that Moses covered his face so that the people wouldn’t see that the glory was fading. And third, we comprehend that even today, when people read the old covenant, some are unable to see the glory of the Lord due to the presence of a veil on their hearts. In my opinion though, one of the most important gleanings from the passage is that spending time with God changes us. In fact, it makes us more like Him.
Our Goal – Accessing the Glory of the Lord
This is where With Open Face comes in. Our hope and prayer is that we would encourage ourselves and others to mimic Moses in regard to his “talking with God.” We desire that our faces might glow with the glory of the Lord. We understand from 2 Corinthians 3 that the glory we seek is the one that comes through Jesus and the New Covenant. What we find extremely beautiful and terribly practical is that God has designed a process for us to achieve “glowing faces” – this process is straightforward – all we need to do is read the Bible. Paul describes this process for us in the last verse of 2 Corinthians 3:
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass [mirror] the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.
2 Corinthians 3:18
In a nutshell, our desire at With Open Face is that we would regularly speak with God through His book, the Bible. We would also hope and pray that we do this “with an open face” and with an open heart. We invite you to learn along with us as we explore the glory of the Lord.