Christians in this generation talk so much about meeting God, going to heaven, and the joy of experiencing His presence and Glory. They tell the good part of meeting God. But they rarely talk about the scary part of meeting God. Exodus 4:24 shows us the scary part of meeting God: the Lord met him and sought to kill him.
The timing is striking. In the chapter before, Moses stood at the burning bush and had a wonderful encounter with God. Here, only a chapter later, the same God confronts him in a way that is scary and dreadful. This is not a contradiction. God is a good God, but at the same time His holiness is the scary part that makes us tremble. With sin, meeting God is a fearful experience. God is first Holy, then a loving Father. Before we can rightly know God as a loving Father, we must experience Him as the Holy One. Holiness is the very ground on which His love stands.
Much of the modern church has reversed the order. We rush to the father’s embrace without experiencing his Holiness. We speak of grace without awe, and of nearness without reverence. But Scripture shows us a different pattern. In every encounter His holiness came first, and the assurance of love followed.
This is not because God is two different Gods. He is one God, whose holiness and love never contradict each other. But it is only when we see how holy He is that we begin to grasp what His love cost. The cross reveals both at once: a God too holy to overlook sin and too loving to leave us in it.
In these two chapters, Moses met one God from two sides. On one side was a compassionate God who remembered every promise He had made to Israel. On the other was the very same God, who will not compromise His standard of holiness.
Many believers in this generation talk so much about meeting God, but they don’t experience the scary part of meeting his holiness. They don’t experience God’s holiness making them repent. They don’t experience the touch of His Holiness. Without experiencing God’s Holiness, an encounter with God is fake.
Moses lived in between the natures of God as the Holy God and God as the loving Father, and he leaned more towards knowing God as Holy. That is the direction we must move as well.
Holiness and the fear of God is missing so much in Christian circles today. We need to first experience God as the Holy God, and then we will truly know Him as the God who loves us. The believer who has known both will worship with reverence and rest in His arms without fear.