Exodus 33:7

The Bible says in Exodus 33:7-11, “And Moses took the tabernacle, and pitched it without the camp, afar off from the camp, and called it the Tabernacle of the congregation. And it came to pass, that every one which sought the LORD went out unto the tabernacle of the congregation, which was without the camp. And it came to pass, when Moses went out unto the tabernacle, that all the people rose up, and stood every man at his tent door, and looked after Moses, until he was gone into the tabernacle. And it came to pass, as Moses entered into the tabernacle, the cloudy pillar descended, and stood at the door of the tabernacle, and the LORD talked with Moses. And all the people saw the cloudy pillar stand at the tabernacle door: and all the people rose up and worshipped, every man in his tent door. And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into the camp: but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle.” One of the verses that stands out in this passage is Exodus 33:11 that says, “And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.” A “friend” is someone whom one knows, likes, and trusts. Obviously, God knew, liked, and trusted Moses.

Of course, Jesus wants to be a friend of every person. Also, everyone has an opportunity to become a friend of God. Concerning the children of Israel, it says in Exodus 3:7, “And it came to pass, that every one which sought the LORD went out unto the tabernacle of the congregation, which was without the camp.” To be God’s friend, Jesus must know you, like you, and trust you. In order to know Jesus and in order for Him to know you, you must seek the Lord. Everyone seeks something, and everyone desires something. In order to be God’s friend, you must seek Him. Jesus said in Matthew 6:33, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” And Jesus also said in Matthew 7:7-8, “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” You can come to know God through faith in Jesus Christ. In order to have a friend, you must be friendly. Seek Jesus, and He will be your friend.

In order for you to be God’s friend, God must like you and you must like him. As far as God liking you is concerned, He more than likes you: He loves you. As Jesus said in John 3:16, “For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten son…” The question is: do you love God? He certainly wants us to love Him. That is why Jesus said in Mark 12:30, “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.” You can come to love God by realizing how much God loves you and how much Jesus has done for you. The Bible says in First John 4:9, “We love him because he first loved us.”

To be called God’s friend, He must know us, love us, and trust us. He knows us when we know Him through faith in Christ. He loves us more than we can imagine. The final issue will always be: can He trust us? We can trust Him because He keeps His promises and He is faithful. It says in First Thessalonians 5:24, “Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it.” The question is: are we faithful so that He can trust us to do what He wants us to do in the service of Christ? It was said of Moses, “And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.” If someone made a true analysis of your life, would they come to this conclusion: this person was a friend of God?

There is one more fact that we want to notice about Exodus 33:11. It has to do with Joshua. Of course, after Moses’ death Joshua became the next great leader of Israel. Joshua was the one chosen to actually lead the children of Israel into the Promised Land. Moses led them out of Egypt and through the wilderness, but it was Joshua who led them into the Promised Land. Why was Joshua chosen for this? One reason is because of what it says in Exodus 33:11, “but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle.” The fact that Joshua stayed in the tabernacle means that he wanted to know more about God, he loved God, and he enjoyed being in the presence of God. Today the equivalent to loving God like that is knowing Christ as Savior and walking consistently in fellowship with Christ. It means to reject the world and its ways, and to take Jesus instead as one’s constant companion. A Christian who is like Joshua knows what it means to be in fellowship with Christ, and will not allow anything to come between him or her and the Savior. Such a Christian turns away from sin and confesses their sins regularly. First John 1:9 is a very important verse. It reminds Christians how to stay in fellowship with the Lord. Christians who want to be faithful like Joshua and Moses will rely upon this promise in First John 1:9. It says, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

In Exodus 33:11 it is also important to notice that Joshua was a “young man” when he demonstrated such love for God and desire to always be in fellowship with the Lord. The best of all lives is to start serving the Lord and walking with Him at a young age. You are likely to acquire more bad habits and bad ways of thinking the longer that you live on this earth without walking closely to the Savior. Then once you do start serving Jesus, it can take a long time, even years, to grow out of those bad habits. The younger the better, when it comes to first starting to serve Christ in your heart. This spiritual truth is stated very clearly in Ecclesiastes 12:1, “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them.”

The Bible says in Exodus 33:12-17, “And Moses said unto the LORD, See, thou sayest unto me, Bring up this people: and thou hast not let me know whom thou wilt send with me. Yet thou hast said, I know thee by name, and thou hast also found grace in my sight. Now therefore, I pray thee, if I have found grace in thy sight, shew me now thy way, that I may know thee, that I may find grace in thy sight: and consider that this nation is thy people. And he said, My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest. And he said unto him, If thy presence go not with me, carry us not up hence. For wherein shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight? is it not in that thou goest with us? so shall we be separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth. And the LORD said unto Moses, I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken: for thou hast found grace in my sight, and I know thee by name.” It is one thing to “know” the Lord, but it is another thing to be led by the Lord daily in your work and in your daily life. Moses knew there was a difference. That is why Moses said in Exodus 33:13, “Now therefore, I pray thee, if I have found grace in thy sight, shew me now thy way.”

There are some people who come to know the Lord Jesus as savior at some point in their life, but they never learn what it means to walk daily in God’s way for them. It can happen. For example, it says about some Christians in Second Peter 1:8-10, “For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall.” Unfortunately, some Christians do fall. It appears that in these last days it is happening to more and more Christians. Jesus said in Luke 18:8, “Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?” It also says in Second Thessalonians 2:3, “Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition.” This subject of believers falling away is covered in some detail in Hebrews 4:1-11 that says, “Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it. For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it. For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. For he spake in a certain place of the seventh day on this wise, And God did rest the seventh day from all his works. And in this place again, If they shall enter into my rest. Seeing therefore it remaineth that some must enter therein, and they to whom it was first preached entered not in because of unbelief: Again, he limiteth a certain day, saying in David, To day, after so long a time; as it is said, To day if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts. For if Jesus had given them rest, then would he not afterward have spoken of another day. There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God. For he that is entered into his rest, he also hath ceased from his own works, as God did from his. Let us labour therefore to enter into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of unbelief.”

Notice that God said to Moses in Exodus 33:17, “And the LORD said unto Moses, I will do this thing also that thou hast spoken: for thou hast found grace in my sight, and I know thee by name.” When God said to Moses, “Thou hast found grace in my sight,” we see a spiritual principle that is, of course, emphasized greatly in the New Testament through Jesus Christ: the need for grace. Grace is when God gives us what we do not deserve. Moses was the Lawgiver. With the law God says, “Keep the law, or be punished.” But by means of grace God says, “You have not kept the law and you cannot keep the law, but I will bless you anyway.” We will appreciate grace more when we understand how sinful all of us really are. A holy God who is a just Judge must punish sin. Therefore, how can He shower so much grace upon us when we deserve the opposite? The answer has everything to do with the bloody sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary. Jesus died in order that we might live. Jesus suffered in order that we would not have to suffer the eternal pains of hell or any other punishment for sin. The Bible says in Romans 1:3-5, “Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead: By whom we have received grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name.” And it says in Romans 3:24, “Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” And in Romans 5:2, “By whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God.” In Romans 5:15 the Bible says, “But not as the offence, so also is the free gift. For if through the offence of one many be dead, much more the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.”

It is important to notice in Exodus 33:17 that Moses “found grace” from God. Moses was the Lawgiver, but he still needed grace. People who were under the law needed grace because the law could never save them. Only by the grace of God was anyone ever saved. This is an important example about how to understand the Old Testament. Many things in the Old Testament no longer apply to Christians who are living in this age of grace, because we are not under law but under grace. Nevertheless everything in the Old Testament is profitable to study because of the spiritual lessons that can be learned. We saw the spiritual lessons with the building of the tabernacle and the establishing of the priesthood. We no longer construct a tabernacle and we no longer establish a priesthood, but there are many great spiritual lessons in reading the Old Testament verses that tell us spiritual principles that we need to remember: especially concerning the death and sacrifice of Christ. Some people are not aware of this truth about the importance of noticing the spiritual lessons when they read the Old Testament, and therefore they become susceptible to trying to apply certain Old Testament legal commands to Christianity that should not be applied. Some modern examples of this error have to do with teachings about tithing, the Sabbath Day, and the spanking of children. These things are taught in the Old Testament, but they are not taught to Christians in the New Testament epistles.

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