God Is Entirely Glorious

God is entirely glorious. This is a truth that is proclaimed, celebrated, and wondered at throughout the Scriptures. Imagining God in His glory entering Jerusalem, David cried out in Psalm 24:

Lift up your heads, O gates!
And be lifted up, O ancient doors, That the King of glory may come in.

Who is this King of glory?
The Lord, strong and mighty, the Lord, mighty in battle!

Lift up your heads, O gates!
And lift them up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in.

Who is this King of glory?
The Lord of hosts,
he is the King of glory! (vv. 7–10)

The language of “glory” is used a lot in the Bible and it is used in a variety of ways. But at the most fundamental level, it speaks of the excellence of God Himself: His worth and His beauty, the perfection of His character, His holiness, and power. “Glory” refers in a basic way to the excellence of God, but this language is also used to speak of the visible display of God’s worth and majesty. It indicates the fact that this majestic and holy God is manifestly present.

“Glory” refers in a basic way to the excellence of God, but this language is also used to speak of the visible display of God’s worth and majesty.

When the people of Israel traveled away from slavery in Egypt toward the promised land, God’s glory was present and visible to them in the cloud that led them by day and the pillar of fire that led them by night. When Moses met with God at Mount Sinai, God was present there in His glory, and the cloud and the fire were the physical manifestations of His presence:

Then Moses went up on the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. The glory of the Lord dwelt 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. Now the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel. Moses entered the cloud and went up on the mountain. And Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights. (Ex. 24:15–18)

Later in the book of Exodus, the Israelites sinned greatly by making and worshiping the golden calf while Moses was on the mountain meeting with the Lord. The Lord had been gracious in not casting off His people nor revoking His promise to continue to go with them. Moses then made a great request, asking, “Please show me your glory” (Ex. 33:18). The Lord put Moses in a cleft in the rock and covered him while He passed by, stipulating, “Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen” (Ex. 33:23).

Moses knew that seeing and experiencing the glory of God would be a majestic, awe-inspiring thing. That is what he longed for; that is what he asked for. And, quite incredibly, the Lord said that He would make His character and identity known to Moses and the people in a special way. He would show them His goodness, proclaim His name, have mercy on sinners, and show compassion on the needy. Those are all aspects of His glory and they reveal the beauty and wonder of who He is. But a full, unfiltered display of that glory would be too much for Moses. In fact, it would be too much for anyone. Nonetheless, Moses was given a partial and limited display, shielded from a distance. In Moses’s desire to see God’s glory there is a wholesome and appropriate longing. God’s glory is wonderful, and seeing Him as He is would be magnificent. But God’s reaction teaches us that it is not quite that easy for sinful people to see His unfiltered glory.

Another figure from the Old Testament who learned something of this lesson, and who saw something of the Lord’s glory, was the prophet Isaiah. In a great vision he received his commissioning (Isa. 6:1–4). When he saw the powerful manifestation of the Lord’s presence he immediately cried, “Woe to me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts” (v. 5). In that moment, it seems, Isaiah realized that the Lord is so great, so holy, and so majestic that compared to Him, he himself was grossly tainted and defiled by sin. The only result of such exposure, he reasoned, would be his ruin and destruction. It is akin to approaching the inner chamber of a nuclear reactor, in that the sheer radiance of energy is more than any one of us could safely absorb in our natural state.