Entering the Cloud
Exodus shows that God is mysterious, dangerous, and a patron of the arts
On January 5, I started a “read the Bible in a year” plan along with a small group of women at my church (the accountability will keep me on track, I hope!). I just finished Exodus today, a book of plagues, miracles, and the vast power and faithfulness of God.
God’s appearances in Genesis and Exodus are as straightforward as taking a stroll with Abraham (Genesis 18:16-22) and as wild as descending on Mt. Sinai in clouds, thunder, and fire and then appearing to the Israelite elders as they ate and drank. The text for that event is both highly detailed and not detailed at all.
Then Moses and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel went up, and they saw the God of Israel. There was under his feet as it were a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness. And he did not lay his hand on the chief men of the people of Israel; they beheld God, and ate and drank. (Exodus 24:9-11)
Apparently, it was important to describe what God stood on, but not God himself? (Although I guess seeing God would defy any coherent description.)
Just before this, the people of Israel had agreed to a covenant with God: the Israelites would follow God’s rules (including the Ten Commandments) and God would dwell with them and settle them in the land of Canaan. The meal together on the side of the mountain signified the confirmation of the covenant.
Then God calls Moses alone to come farther up the mountain, and more strangeness ensues.
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. (Exodus 24:15-18)
What on earth? God tells Moses to come to him, but then Moses has to wait for six days—just sitting there halfway up the mountain, I imagine. Was Moses kind of in the cloud, but not really? Was he out in the daylight, watching the glory of the Lord manifest in fire and cloud right in front of him?
Then God calls to Moses from out of the cloud. The narrative uses the same phrasing as when God called to Moses from out of the burning bush at the beginning of this adventure. The glory of God is simultaneously cloaked and revealed in fire.
And Moses enters the cloud.
[My irreverent humor asserts itself here: after the big drama of the covenant-making and the six days of fire and the voice calling out of the dark cloud, God then gives Moses five chapters of detailed, step-by-step instructions on how to build God’s tabernacle, right down to which parts of which animals should be burned on the altar, eaten, or disposed of outside the camp. So. Many. Details. Important if you’re the one tasked with this huge undertaking, not so interesting if you’re an ordinary person reading it in the 21st century. But I do wonder if at any point Moses lost track and had to ask God to repeat, say, exactly how many flowers were to be shaped on each of the six branches of the solid-gold lampstand? (Exodus 25:31-40)]
Meanwhile, down in the camp, Aaron has lost control of the mass of Israelites. Moses disappeared into a scary cloud ages ago and has not emerged! Time to make their own god, something smaller and more recognizable than that fire/cloud deal they’ve been following. Told on its own, this story sounds bad, but when I realized that Aaron himself and a bunch of the elders had, just a few days or weeks earlier, literally eaten dinner with God, well, no wonder God contemplated destroying them all and starting over with just Moses.
Anyway, these Exodus stories show a God who is mysterious and dangerous, swathed in darkness, clouds, and fire. A God who triumphed over Egypt and its gods through plagues and destruction. A God who had to be talked out of smiting the whole lot of unfaithful Israelites, but who did, indeed, listen to Moses and change his mind. (There was still some killings and a plague, though, so God did exact punishment for their unfaithfulness. Just not at the scale that he threatened.)
I don’t claim to fully understand the differences between how God appeared and interacted with humans in Exodus versus how God is embodied in Jesus. Whenever I go back into the Old Testament, I am thrown into questions about the nature of God, the amount of violence and death caused by or commanded by God. It’s troubling, and difficult to integrate this fiery God with the humility and sacrifice of Jesus.
Yet, Exodus culminates in the building of the tabernacle and the glory of God coming to inhabit it. From the moment God rescues his people from slavery in Egypt, he remains with them in a more tangible way than most of us can imagine. He describes every little detail of the tabernacle, even telling Moses who should be in charge of this massive undertaking. He gives the head craftsman/artist “the spirit of God,” plus the intelligence and skills to use wood and gold and silver and bronze. Others spin and sew fine fabric for the curtains, and tan hides for the outside of the tent. Building and outfitting the tabernacle would have taken the combined skills of many artisans and skilled labor, and many months of work.
To completely oversimplify it, in Exodus, God rescues the Israelites, leads them out into the desert, provides them with supernatural food and water, appears to them in clouds and fire, gives them rules to follow, and then assigns a huge group project.
They are building and carving and gilding things with gold and silver, all there in the desert, just a couple of months or so after walking across the Red Sea and leaving everything they have ever known.
Why?
So God can dwell with them.
In the Ten Commandments and other laws, God tells these former slaves how to live well as a free people. In the elaborate preparations and consecration of the tabernacle, God guides the people in creating a place where they can reliably seek and find God. At the end of Exodus, the glory of God descends on the finished tabernacle in the form of a cloud, and there it stays, visible to all the people.
Despite the wildly divergent ways that God is portrayed here and in the New Testament, there is still one throughline: God’s desire is to come close to his people. God doesn’t want to be a far-off, “watchmaker” deity, but to dwell with us. Through the Bible and through history, the how and where change, but God’s ultimate goal does not.
God wants to be with us, and he will do what it takes to make that happen. Even die.
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. (Revelation 21:3)