Christian Rata, Professor of Old Testament at Southwestern Seminary, preached from Psalm 90 in SWBTS Chapel on October 15, 2024.
The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
The Book of Psalms is a book that I love very much. I’m actually teaching a course this semester on the book of Psalms, and we were just looking at Martin Luther. And Martin Luther gave some good advice for studying and preaching the book of Psalms. He said, you have to have three points. He said, horazio, he said, meditatio, and tantazio. Basically. He said, If you want to preach the book of Psalms and understand that well, you have to pray well, you have to meditate well on it, and you have to struggle with it. And God knows, I’ve been struggling a lot with this Psalm. I love the book of Psalms, but this is a very, very demanding Psalm with which I’ve been struggling. But I pray that God will make the meditations on my heart be acceptable to Him and useful for you.
Let me start by congratulating, if you allow me, congratulating, our Korean students and Korean friends for Han Kang. I don’t know if you know, but Han Kang won the Nobel Prize for Literature. Why am I saying that? I see some Korean students are nodding. Why am I mentioning her? Is because she won the prize, apparently for her intense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life. So when I read this about Han Kang, I don’t know much about her, I realized that she kind of connects a little bit to Psalm 90. Because if you paid attention to Psalm 90, you notice that Psalm 90 has to do with the fragility of human life and also has to do with some trauma. But the second reason I’m mentioning Han Kang is because a friend of mine from Korea knows her uncle, and her uncle, believe it or not, is a devoted Baptist pastor in Taejong. So, we pray, and I pray for her that maybe through her uncle, maybe through somebody else, maybe she will become a Christian.
She understands well the traumas of life, she understands well the fragility of life, but we pray for her that she also understands the hope that is offered through the gospel. I’d like to start this message by mentioning the importance of context. Every time when we study the Bible, one of the first things we learn is that context is king. And sometimes you might have heard this expression, “text without a context is a pretext”. That’s why one of the most important things that we learn in hermeneutics and studying of the Scripture is the importance of context. The importance of context, however, is a little bit diminished, is a little bit loosened when we look at the book of Psalms. Why? Because for most of the Psalms, we do not know the context of the Psalm. We have the context of the Psalms. For about a dozen of the Psalms, probably you remember Psalm three, when David ran away from his son, Absalom. Probably you heard the sermon a few weeks ago on Psalm 51 when David sinned with Bathsheba. But the reality is that for the majority of the psalms, we do not have the context.
Of course, that doesn’t stop us to from from sometimes trying to figure out the context from the text of the Psalm. And many of us probably remember Psalm 137, by the rivers of Babylon, we sat down and wept when we remember Zion, it doesn’t give us the context, but from the text, we can figure out that the psalm took place sometimes during the exile, and these people who are weeping are somewhere in Babylon captives. The same thing happens here with Psalm 90. Psalm 90, it’s impossible for us not to speculate about the context, because Psalm 90 starts like this, a prayer of Moses, the man of God.
And the moment we read this, we are a little bit surprised, because this is a unique Psalm. It’s a unique Psalm because this is the only Psalm that Moses has. And it tells us that Moses the man of God, a way to refer in the Old Testament to a prophet. This is a Psalm of Moses, who was a prophet, a man of God. And it’s also a prayer. And immediately, all of us tried to speculate. And in our Psalms class, we were trying to speculate. Just like the early writers and people throughout the centuries, we tried to speculate, when was the. Psalm written. And most likely, the Psalm was written sometimes during the wandering through the wilderness. It’s very, very possible that this was written by Moses, possibly after the spies came from Canaan and brought a bad report, and many of these people were punished, many of these people were judged, and we have a nation under judgment.
The whole generation is going to fall under the judgment of God because they were unfaithful to God and because they did not trust him. This is a very likely context of this psalm. So, it’s a situation which is a very difficult situation, the anger of God and the wrath of God is upon the people of God. And in this situation, we want to see how Moses responds to this dire situation. But I want to, I want to teach you something here now also, which I think is a little bit even more important than the context. So, in the last 50 years, in the study of the Psalms, the people who are looking at the book of Psalms notice that it’s important to look at the context, if possible, the more important is to look at the location of the psalm in the book. The location of the psalm in the book is very important.
Already during the time of St Augustine. St Augustine said, I noticed that the book of Psalms is arranged very well, but I cannot quite figure out how it is arranged. And many people around the centuries, many interpreters, many believers, noticed that the book is arranged very, very skillfully, but they couldn’t figure out exactly how the arrangement is. But in the past 50 years, a lot of scholarship has been directed especially to figure out how the book of Psalms is arranged. And this is a very important Psalm, because, if you have your Bible, you can see right there at the top, at the top of Psalm 90 says book four. So, this is at the beginning of book four. It’s at the seams of the Psalter. And before I go to this Psalm, I want to I want you to understand a little bit about the context, and I want to come back a little bit and do a little bit of a review and remind you that Psalm one and Psalm two function as a double introduction to the whole book, Psalm one and Psalm two.
We already heard a great sermon from Psalm one. Psalm one is a didactic Psalm is a Psalm of wisdom which is teaching us. We can say that. We can say that the purpose of the book of Psalms is instruction for happiness that begins with holiness. Psalm one is telling us from the very beginning, if you want to have a happy life, that’s the first word in the book of Psalms, ASHRAE, happy. If you want to have a happy life, you have to live a holy life. And Dr Williams taught us very well, you have to take the right path. Because if you take the right path, you’re going to flourish. You’re going to be like you’re going to be like a tree planted by streams of water, but if you take the wrong path, you’re going to become a hollow man. It matters which path you are taking. That’s what the first psalm is teaching us.
It’s a psalm, a dig Psalm. It’s right there a pillar at the entry of the book. And Psalm number two, which we didn’t preach from. But probably you know, Psalm number two is telling us what is the theme of the Psalter. And the theme of the Psalter is very simple. It’s the Lord reigns. It’s very much like the preaching of Jesus Christ, when He came and said, Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. What is the Kingdom of God? The Kingdom of God is the place where the Lord reigns.
So, in the Old Testament, times when the people came back from exile, they have no more temple. There in exile, probably when this book was put together, probably in about 400 before Christ. Many of them are in exile, and they don’t have any more temple. But for them, the book of Psalms became a sanctuary, and the way in the sanctuary was to pass through these two pillars. First of all, understand that to live a happy life, to have a good life, you have to live a life of holiness, separate yourself from anything that is wicked and sinful, and devote yourself to the Torah. Memorize it, meditate on it and put it into application, apply it. But the second pillar that you have to know is that the Lord reigns.
The Lord reigns, and he learned reigns through his anointed, his Moshiach, who is on Mount Zion. These are the two pillars that we have to have in mind when we look at the whole book. But then of all of a sudden, it’s good to have these two pillars when you read the book of Psalms, when you meditate on it, when you sing it, when you pray it. But then all of a sudden you open the Bible and you read Psalm three, and Psalm three says, Oh Lord, how many. Are my enemies. Psalm one and two can also describe the Psalm as psalms of orientation. They are orienting us. They’re giving us the basics. They’re giving us the most important thing that you have to know again, happiness begins with holiness, and if you look at the last verse of Psalm two also starts with “Ashrae”.
Also starts with happy and ends like this. Happy are all those who seek refuge in Him, all who seek refuge in God. In other words, if you want to live a life of happiness, seek holiness and submit to God. Seek refuge in Him, trust in Him. But the rest of the psalms that come are what are called by some theologians, sons of disorientation. Because in the first book, first book number one and two, we have, we have the majority of what people call laments. I don’t like to call them laments. I like to call them prayers, but the majority of laments in the book of Psalms nine, in the first two books, these are sounds of disorientation. But what happens is very interesting. What happens is very interesting. And I’m just going to mention a couple of more Psalms just to have the whole context. In Book Three. Book Three, we’re fast forwarding a little bit. In Book Three starts with Psalm 73 and some of you maybe read Psalm 73 Psalm 23 is another wisdom Psalm.
Psalm 73 starts like this, Truly, God is good to Israel. To those who are pure in heart, starts very beautiful. It’s almost like Psalm one, wow. If I’m pure in heart, things are going to be good for me, Truly, God is good with Israel. In the Bible, the Bible never uses this expression, the good life. The Bible refers to the good life even by using the word good or by using the word life separately. When the Bible talks about life, it means good life. When the Bible talks about good. It means, again, the good life. And the psalmist starts like this, and you’re like, oh yes, it’s exactly what we learned in Psalm one. But then the next line is, but my foot almost slipped. Why? Because I saw the prosperity of the wicked.
And all of a sudden, this is a crisis situation, but this psalm is actually one of the most important in the book of Psalms, because it’s right in the middle of the psalter, and it’s called by Psalm, a Psalm of reorientation. This Psalm is telling us it’s good that you have the orientation in chapter one and two, but you have to be aware that it’s possible for you to live a life of righteousness, and also to suffer, because this person is suffering, this person is languishing, and he doesn’t know why. He saw the prosperity of the wicked and he saw the deception and the sickness that was for him who seems to have been a righteous Israelite. And of course, you know, if you fast forward, that this person has a vision somehow in the temple, and he understands at one point that God is going to punish the wicked, and he understands that what’s the most important for him is to be near God, because that’s where happiness is. It’s a step in maturity.
Maybe we’re not going to have a lot of the things that you find in Psalm one, but in Psalm 73 this person is more mature. He’s being reoriented. He understands that it’s possible in life to see the wicked who prospers, and it’s possible in life to see the righteous who suffer. But for me, the joy is to be near God, to be in His presence. And this brings us to Psalm 90, almost. Psalm 90, in my opinion, is Psalm actually, which gives us the other the other side, right in the beginning, in Psalm one, it says, these are the wicked, these are the righteous. Live a righteous life, and it will be good. Live a wicked life, and you will perish. And this is what Psalm 79 is telling us.
I think Psalm 79 is trying to pick up these people who lived a life of disobedience to the Torah, the people who rebelled in the wilderness. And now Moses, the man of God, the Prophet, is praying for these people. This is a major crisis situation, if you, if you have your Bibles open with me, actually, we also have to look at Psalm 89 Psalm 89 and Psalm 72 because, again, just to have in mind, this whole arrangement of the book of Psalms has a has a royal, Royal alignment, we can say, like we see in Psalm two, but he also has the wisdom, wisdom, wisdom. He has also a wisdom strand. We could call it. So the royal one starts with Psalm two, but also continues to Psalm 72 the last Psalm in the book, too.
And you know, Psalm 72 it’s a Psalm of Solomon where every nation is going to call him blessed, and he will reign from sea to sea. It looks like the kingdom of God is expanding from Psalm two and Psalm 72 but then it gets us to Psalm 89 and Psalm 89 is also a royal Psalm, and it’s a royal Psalm that praises the covenant with David and praises, the steadfast, steadfast steadfastness of God, the love of God. But it’s the ending that is, that is really disappointing, is the ending that is really very, very difficult to read. So, notice how, how Psalm 89 ends. It sends like this in verse 46 how long O Lord, will you hide yourself forever? How long will your wrath burn like fire? How long will your wrath burn like fire? Remember how short my time is for what vanity you have created all the children of men? What can one man can live and never see death. And verse 49 is this important question, Lord, where is your steadfast love of all which, by your faithfulness You swore to David, remember, O Lord, how your servants are mocked and how I bear in my heart the insults of all the many nations with which your enemies mock. O Lord, with which they mock the footsteps of your anointed.
This is the end of Psalm 89. Psalm 72 looks great. Solomon is king. The kingdom is expanding. But in Psalm 89 the anointed is mocked. If you go back to Psalm two and you see the Lord reigns, The Lord reigns. But why do the nations rage, and the people plot in vain? The one who sits in heaven laughs, laughs, because these people have no chance of upstaging and of overturning the reign of God. But here the one who are mocking are the nations, and they’re mocking the anointed. And this is the major question that is happening. Where is the hesed? Where is the stethaslav of the Lord? This is the context in which the editors of the book, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, brilliantly took this psalm of Moses and put it here, because the situation that we find here in Psalm 90 is very much like the situation that was in the time of Moses.
In the time of Moses in the wilderness, there was no king, there was no there was no land for them. But in that land, Moses says, it says, here, O Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations Before the mountains were brought forth or ever, you had formed Earth and the world from everlasting to everlasting. You are God. Imagine now the population of Israel, which is now on exile. The people are in exile. If you look in Book Three, Jerusalem is destroyed, the people are in exile. They are under the judgment of God. As I was preparing for this Psalm, I was also reading through the book of Jeremiah. And in the book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah is presenting a nation under judgment because of their sins. And at one point in the book of Jeremiah, I think in chapter 16, God says to Jeremiah, even if Moses or Samuel would pray for these people, I’m not going to forgive them. They are a nation under wrath. And this is what we find, of course, at the end of Psalm 89 the people are in exile. They sinned. They rebelled against God.
Even if Moses would have prayed for them, God would not have listened to him. But now the people here are in exile. Now the people here are under wrath, as we shall see and brilliantly the sages, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. They’re thinking in this dire situation, in this dire situation when it seems that the covenant is broken, when there’s no king, and when we have no land and we have no temple, I have we wanted Moses to pray for us, and Moses is going to look back. He’s going to look back and he’s going to say, Oh Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations. Oh Lord, you are eternal. Before there was King, before there was the land of Canaan, you were Lord, and you have been our dwelling place, right?
It’s such a beautiful image of comfort. It’s almost like Moses is listening to the end of Psalm two. The end of Psalm two ends like this blessed or happy is, are those who seek refuge in Me. And Moses comes and is thinking, I want to. Be happy. I want this nation to be happy. I want this nation to be blessed. What shall I do? I’m going to seek refuge in God. Because this God is an eternal God. He was there before the Mountains were formed. And this is the God that I’m going to seek refuge in. This is what Moses does. And this is, I think, what revives the people and what should revive us? Because we also live in the wilderness. We also live under the wrath of God. The wrath of God is being revealed as we are speaking. Jesus Christ talks about the wrath of God. If you don’t believe in the Son, and if you take the son of your personal savior, you remain under the wrath of God.
But in this situation, we also have to look back and we realize, Lord, you have been our dwelling place. This is an expression that Moses already uses in Deuteronomy, where he says that the Lord is the dwelling place, and then he says, and underneath are the everlasting arms, right here are the people in exile, far from the Lord suffering or prolonged, a prolonged time of distress. And Moses is saying, I’m not going to let that, I’m not going to let that control my prayer. I’m going to meditate on that. I’m going to look at that, but I’m going to start with first things first. And the first things that we have to remember is that the Lord is our dwelling place in all generations. Some of us like that song, and I like it very much, and I was hoping that it might be sung in chapel, the song of Isaac Watts, oh, Lord, oh God, our rock or our rock of ages past, right? And our hope for the future. This is what Moses does. But Moses doesn’t stop here.
If we look a little bit further the if we look a little bit further, we see that after this statement of trust, after the statement of directing the people to the Lord as the refuge here, I like very much this quotation that comes from, from Charles Spurgeon. Charles Spurgeon says this, we have not shifted our abode. Kings’ palaces have vanished beneath the crumbling hand of time. They have been burned with fire and buried beneath mountains of ruins. But the Imperial race of heaven has never lost its regal habitation. Go to Palestine and see how the seizes are forgotten of the holes which echoed to their despotic mandate and resounded with the plaudits of the nations over which they ruled. But where dwelt our fathers? 100 generations since there dwell, we still. It is of the New Testament saints that the Holy Ghost has said he that abideth, he that keeps my commandments, the commandments of God, abides in him, right?
I like to visit palaces when I go sometimes not certain countries. You probably visited the palace of Buckingham or the Versailles. That’s great. And you sometimes you imagine how nice it would be to live here, but at the same time, sometimes I feel sorry for those people, because I’m thinking, if they go on vacation, you know, you live in the Versailles or in Buckingham Palace, and you go on vacation, it can only be downhill, right? But if the Lord is your abode, you don’t have to worry about that, because he’s been the same, and he would be the same for every generation but the second part.
Now, in verse three, the Psalmist says, in the psalmist, the Psalmist says, you return man to dust and say, return of Children of Men. In the second part, we will see that the psalmist, Moses concentrate especially toward the ephemerality of men, and this is one of the reasons that I found it very difficult to preach from the psalm. In fact, I wanted to give, like, about three reasons at least, for which I shouldn’t preach from the psalm in chapel. First of all is that usually this psalm used to be sang a funeral. So, thinking, well, why am I preaching this here? It’s supposed to be a funeral. Second thing is like, well, I was talking about the ephemerality of life. I mean, these are students, you know, they’re just coming from vacation. Do they want to hear this? Right? Somebody said, this is a very agitated Psalm. Do I want to agitate? You know, it’s also a song full of wrath. And I was very reluctant. What do I do? But these are superficial reasons.
They are superficial reasons. They are very deep reason. We preach this psalm because this psalm is going to teach us, as we shall see, to get a heart of wisdom. But before we get a heart of wisdom, we have to look at this passage that talks about the ephemerality of men. It, and it says here in verse, verse three, you return to dust. And say, return, O Children of Men. And that the images, the image reminds us of Genesis, 319, where God told Adam, you came from dust, and your dust shall return. But it’s not exactly the same terminology. When it says, here, return, O Children of Men, you return to dust. The term is like something that is very pulverized, like something that is crushed. So, this text can be understood at least in two ways, and I think it’s meant to be understood in both ways.
In a sense, it’s saying, this is the judgment of God on every human being because of sin that came into the world, you shall return to dust. Death is the penalty for sin, and everyone are under that judgment of God, we will all return to dust. But at the same time, I’m wondering if this text also maybe is trying to tell human beings, human beings who did not take the right path, who took the wrong path of rebellion?
Maybe he’s also trying to tell us, Son of man, return is the same word even in English, return, kind of repent, come back to God. But regardless of how we interpret this, there’s no doubt that the text talks about the ephemerality of a man for 1000 years in your sight are but as yesterday, when it is past, or as a watch in the night, you sweep them away, as with the flood, they are like a dream, like grass that is renewed in the morning. In the morning, it flourishes and is renewed in the evening, it fades and withers. The image is so clear it’s repeated. You’re like grass, we’re like grass. In the morning, looks good, especially in Palestine. There’s a little bit of dew. It’s very green. By the evening, because it’s hot, it dries and withers, right? It’s like a flood. It’s like a sleep there are all these images, images of ephemerality, images of which tell us that we are very, very fleeting.
This is the real situation of human beings, and it’s something that we should learn, and it’s very important for all of us, as we shall see, right? This is a prayer for the next generation. It’s not a prayer for the generation that is already perishing, has already probably perished in the wilderness. It’s too late to pray for those it’s not a prayer for those people who are taken in captivity, and of course, many of them died. No, it’s a prayer for the next generation. It’s a prayer for me, and it’s a prayer for you, especially who are young. And one thing that Moses is telling you and is telling me, think about this.
Think about this even if you’re 20 years old, even if you’re 30 years old. The reality is that we are like the grass which flourishes in the morning. And notice now the next verses is going to tell us why this situation is like that. It says in verse seven and verse 11 to 11, for we are brought to an end by your anger, by Your wrath. We are dismayed. You have set our iniquities before you, our secret sins in the light of your presence. For all our days pass away under your wrath, we bring our years to an end like a sigh, right? It’s a very, very depressing, depressing text. Let’s face it again, another reason.
I didn’t really want to preach about this. Some people mentioned the same idea. They found it not only agitated, but they found it again for very depressing, very disappointing. Wow. Why would I be preaching from this, right? In fact, somebody at the conference many years ago said that this text should not even be read at funerals because it’s overwhelmingly it’s overwhelmingly because of its overwhelming negativity, right? And you read this, and it seems very negative, this is something that a lot of the world contests. Now, this is about the wrath of God, but it cannot be contested because the wrath of God is repeated here in various ways at least five times. And I think this is part of our wisdom, and it’s part of what Moses is trying to teach us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.
We are ephemeral, people, but we are also sinful people. And if we are sinful people, we are under the wrath of God, and we are under the wrath of God, which is a just wrath of God. Because notice what is happening. Moses doesn’t protest this. Moses repeats this with this word, Wrath or anger, and it tells us here it gives us the reason. It gives us the reasons. Again, the span is but toil and trouble in verse 10. But then it says, who considers the power of your anger in your wrath, according to the fear of you? And in verse eight, you have set our iniquities before you, our sick? It says in the light of Your presence, the truth is that the Bible, both Old Testament and New Testament, teach us about the wrath of God. It teaches us that the wrath of God is real. It teaches us that the wrath of God is visible even today in our society, and it’s taught both in all the New Testament. It teaches us that the wrath of God is actually many times restrained.
If you look carefully and you read the other Psalms, many times God restrained His wrath. But praise God. It also teaches us that the wrath of God was absorbed. We deserve God’s wrath. Moses doesn’t protest that your anger is right. And that’s a sign of wisdom when we understand, when we look around and when we understand that the God of wrath is not a contradiction to the God of love, don’t believe the lie which says that in the Old Testament there’s a God of wrath, or in the New Testament as a God of love, because that’s not biblical. There is a God of wrath in the Old Testament. There’s a God of wrath in the New Testament as the same God. And there’s a God of love, as we shall see in the New Testament. But there’s also the same God in the Old Testament. But here we have to spend our time, and we have to realize the burden that these people had.
The burden and Moses is pleading with God and saying, Look, God, we have been living under your wrath, and all our time has been toil and trouble, and it’s a very, very short life. And then he puts this question as a question that we have to ask ourselves, who considers the power of your anger and your wrath according to the fear of you, when was the last time when you meditated on the wrath of God? It’s good that you memorize the that you meditate on the love of God. It’s good that we meditate on the grace of God. We should do that. But who, who of us considers the power of God’s anger in your wrath according to the fear of you. In other words, you’re right, which is due to you who fears God the way God should be feared when you see the anger of God that is revealed in our society and then sometimes revealed in our life, the truth is that most of us do not fear God in measure with his the power of His wrath. And this is the beginning of wisdom.
This is the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. And the fear of the Lord is very legitimate, is very biblical. We find it even here. And then the text starts to teach us, so Teach us to number our days that we may get a heart of wisdom. This is the this is a doctrine that requires to be continually meditated upon. We have to think about it. And the younger you are, the better. Think about the ephemerality of your life. Think also about the consequences of sin, and that should make you hate sin. That should make us hate sin and anything that is wrong. And it should teach us to number our days, that we may get a heart of wisdom. I’m about 56 years old, and here it tells us, Moses tells us, I may live 70, maybe 80. I don’t know, I don’t have that many years left to live. But it says, I see, it’s an art.
It’s a very important art. It’s an excellent art to learn, to number your days and to be ready and to use your life for God and for His kingdom. But if we go a little bit further, we see that this ends with a very important prayer, and this is the prayer that I want to finish with. The prayer says, satisfy that Return, O Lord. How long God told the people to return, and now the people Moses is telling God to return. O Lord, how long have pity on your servants? Satisfies us in the morning with your steadfast love that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. Let your work be shown to your servants in your glorious power to their children. Let the favor of the lord of God be upon us and establish the work of our hands upon us. He has to establish the work of our hands. What has happened here is a great reversal, and this great reversal is possible because of the grace of God. Notice how the prayer starts here. It says, return the Lord. How long have pity on your servants?
These are the people under judgment, but there are people who repented. There are people who repented, who are ready to receive the grace of God. And in verse 14, it tells us satisfies that in the morning with your steadfast love, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days. The truth is that the prayer ends with a great reversal, and this great reversal is possible because of grace of God. This is a very interesting term here, the word hesed. I’m going to teach you a couple of Hebrew words, and this one is hesed. The word hesed is translated steadfast love. It can also be trans. Grace. Moses, what he can do in this difficult situation, under the anger of God, he can do only one thing. He can appeal to the grace to the steadfast love of God. And this turns everything around.
This makes now happiness possible. This makes now song possible. This makes now work possible, a work that is not in vain, but a work that is established by God. So brothers and sisters, you are young. Here you are the next generation. Take this prayer of Moses, and let’s go home and meditate. Meditate on how short your life is. Meditate on how real the anger of God is, but more importantly, meditate on how great the grace of God is, because this reversal is possible. This reversal is possible because somebody absorbed the wrath that we deserved. Right? It’s very interesting.
In Hebrew, the word starts the Psalms start like this, my own, Adonai. Adonai, my own. The Lord has been our dwelling place. And the last line said, May the Noah Adonai. It’s like almost a reverse, even in the if you see, even in English, may the beauty of the Lord be upon us. Now. When did Moses saw the beauty of the Lord. When was this sermon? What was this prayer? When was this prayer answered to Moses? I think the prayers was answered when Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration, when he really saw the beauty of the Lord. And for us, we see the beauty of the Lord, and we see His saving work because of the grace of God, and because of the grace of God, we can participate in his work and praise the Lord. Our work in the Lord is not in vain. May God help us to work for him and for his glory. Amen.
