A Holy God

I'm reading in the Old Testament again. I can't decide what excites me more, being in the New Testament with all the writings about Jesus and all the critical instructions from Paul, or the Old Testament where the holiness of God is so powerfully displayed. Right now I am in Deuteronomy. I stay in awe of the power and holiness of Jehovah God when I read the Pentateuch (the first 5 books of the bible). I can't even imagine being one of the Israelites and seeing all the miracles of God when He led them out of Egypt. Can you imagine walking across the bed of the Red Sea, a DRY bed, and on either side of you is a wall of water, held in place while you pass through? I try to picture that. I wonder if they were in awe or were they afraid, or just what emotion they had. I love the story of the people at Mt. Sinai. God told Moses that He would come to them in a thick cloud so that the people could hear when God spoke. In Exodus 19 God tells the people that neither man nor beast was to go up on the mountain or even touch the boarder, or else they were to be put to death! Verse 16 says that on the morning that God came, there was thunder and lightning flashes and a thick cloud on the mountain. There was a loud trumpet sound. The Lord descended on the mountain in fire and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace. Then it says that the whole mountain quaked violently! Awesome! There were a couple of different times when they had no water and God brought it out of a rock, gushing, flowing enough to quench both man and beast. He still provides so wonderfully for His own! There's a story in Numbers chapter 12 that talks about Moses' siblings, Miriam and Aaron. Because of jealousy, they were grumbling and gossiping about their brother Moses. And of course God sees and hears everything so this was really foolish on their part. (We've all been guilty of gossip at one time or another in our lives, and it is sin. Gossip is a sin anytime, but you best be careful gossiping about one of God's servants!) Moses was God's chosen man and he was a very humble servant of the Most High. So it displeased God greatly to hear them gripe against their brother, and gossip about him. Miriam was the principal offender in this so she was the one punished. Verse 4 and following tells us that God called the three siblings and told them to come to the tent of meeting. He came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the doorway of the tent. God then called Aaron and Miriam to come forward. Oh no, can you imagine? Surely they had an idea that they were in trouble. I'm sure they sensed that this wasn't good. Can you imagine being called to the "front of the class" by God Himself? He proceeded to remind them of the fact that He and Moses had a "mouth to mouth" relationship, and that there was nobody more faithful in all His household than His servant Moses. And that Moses actually beholds the form of the Lord! Then God proceeds to ask them, "So why then weren't you afraid to speak against My servant?" That was the last thing He said but it wasn't the end of it. When He finished saying that last sentence, He departed. It says that His anger BURNED against them. And when the cloud was gone, Miriam looked and she was covered with leprosy!! Immediately Aaron starting apologizing to Moses and begging him to ask God to forgive them and heal their sister. Moses pleaded for God to heal her. God said to put her out of the camp for 7 days and then she would be clean. Wow, that is so awesome! God is a holy God, and nobody is exempt from His punishment. Unbelievers receive His wrath. Believers, when necessary, receive His chastisement. He is holy, holy, holy! All His judgements are perfectly righteous. God took grumblings against Moses personal because they were really against Him, because Moses was God's spokesman, His representative. But Moses wasn't exempt from God's punishment either. Here you have a man that was chosen out of all the men on the earth to lead God's people out of captivity. Moses was God's very faithful servant. Num.12:3 says that Moses was more humble than any man on the face of the earth. He obeyed God and did everything God asked him to for all those years. But then he angered God by not obeying a command that God gave him about getting water for the people. God told him to speak to a rock and it would produce water. Instead, in his anger against his fellow Israelites, Moses struck the rock, twice. He took the focus off of God's provision and he disobeyed the command to only speak to the rock. God was so angry that He let Moses know that Moses would NOT have the privilege of going into the promise land. And in fact, He told Moses that instead of going to the promise land, Moses was going to DIE soon!! Can you believe that? Here this man had been faithful for 40 years and lead these people all that time and now he wasn't even going to get to go to this wonderful land. Man, that's pretty stiff punishment! One might think that God would let it slide with an apology. After all, Moses hadn't had things easy for the last 40 years, and that was a lot of years of buildup in frustration in having to be the leader of such "stiff-necked" people. But God is a holy God and His judgements are righteous and perfect. It hurt Moses that he was not going to get to go. He pleaded with God to change His mind but God wasn't budging. God had already told Moses that he was allowed to go on top of the mountain and get a look at the land, but that he wasn't going. Apparently Moses didn't want to give up. He really wanted to be allowed to go to this land that he had been anticipating all those years. So he kept asking. It came to a climax in Deuteronomy 3:23-28. God was angry and when He had heard all that He was going to listen to on the subject He said, "Enough! Speak to Me no more of this matter" And then He told Moses something to the effect of, "Go on, go to the top of Mt. Pisgah and get you a good look around at the promise land cuz you AIN'T goin!!" I remember reading the story for the first time about 6 years ago. I remember being shocked when I got to that point. It would have made sense to me at that time to read that Moses had been able to talk God into changing His mind. After all, Moses was so faithful to his Master for all those years! Surely God would relent and feel sorry for Moses and let him go. So when I read where God told him that he was going to have to settle for nothing more than a good look around, and to stop bugging Him about it, I was shocked! But it made me realize just how serious one single sin is in the eyes of a holy God. All those years of service didn't tip the scale of God's judgement and punishment for that one single sin! That ONE SIN kept the faithful servant of God from the one blessing that he longed for. Beloved, that's what I want you to see. God is so good and He takes such good care of His children. But He is holy, holy, holy! He demands reverence for His holiness. You cannot sin against a holy God and get away with it. Even if it feels as if you have, you haven't and you won't. If you are a child of His, He will be patient with you, for He is long-suffering. But if you continue in sin, he will punish you. You will feel the rod of His loving correction. If you are not saved, then you may go your entire life feeling like you are getting away with sin. But a day will come when He'll cash in all of your I.O.U.'s and you will be sent to hell for all eternity for those sins against the Most High God. Whatever the case may be, get right with God now! Don't put it off. He is the same God today as He was in the days of Moses. Whatever the case may be, don't let His punishment or His wrath fall on YOU!