Moses and the rest of the Children of Israel were near the end of their journey from Egypt. He could not enter the promised land because of his sin in smiting the rock rather than speaking to it, when the people murmured because there was no water. Yet, without question, he would enter heaven at the end of his journey through this world. And the Children of Israel would have the River Jordan opened up for them to enter the promised land. But before he left them, Moses was to speak to Israel the words of the “song” which was recorded in Deuteronomy 32. He was, he says, to “publish the name of the Lord” (v 3) – in other words, to proclaim what the Lord had revealed about Himself.
How has He revealed Himself? First of all, in creation. If we look around us, it should be very difficult to conclude that the sun, moon and stars, and the earth we live on, all came into existence in some random way, apart from a Creator. It should be just as difficult, if not more so, to believe that all the living creatures – including the stately trees that wave in the breeze not far from the windows inside of which this article is being written – are the result of some form of evolution which just happened to run in a generally positive direction over vast periods of time. Especially it should be impossible to believe that human beings came into existence in this way. The fact is, as Paul expressed it to the believers in Rome, we human beings are to recognise the Lord’s “eternal power and Godhead” through the things that He has made (Rom 1:20).
But God has revealed Himself through the Bible in a way that has even more authority than what we see in creation. We should recognise that “all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable” (2 Tim 3:16f). It is because this song of Moses was inspired by God the Holy Spirit that it is recorded in Scripture, and it is therefore profitable. And we should pray that the Lord who, by His Holy Spirit, inspired Moses would apply his song to our souls by the same Holy Spirit.
Moses went on to call on his hearers, “Ascribe ye greatness unto our God” (v 3). So, when we speak of God, we are to declare His greatness. And
when we think of Him, we are to consider Him as infinitely great, beyond anything that we can imagine. Moses reproved Israel for their carelessness about Him: “Of the Rock that begat thee thou art unmindful” (v18). We are to be conscious of God continually, but how far short of this even the people of God come! And how very forgetful of God most people are! They do not want ever to think seriously about Him, unless in some dire emergency, when they need His help – urgently. They may try to convince themselves that there is no God, and the idea of evolution provides them with a convenient excuse to dismiss God from their thinking.
But God most certainly exists, and He has revealed Himself. He warned the Israelites: “See now that I, even I, am He, and there is no god with Me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of My hand. For I lift up My hand to heaven, and say, I live for ever. If I whet My glittering sword, and Mine hand take hold on judgement; I will render vengeance to Mine enemies, and will reward them that hate Me” (vv 39-41). And He warns the people of this generation, by these same words, that He, the only God, does punish those who reject His authority. How fearful the meeting with God that sinners will have, at the end of their lives, who have spent their days in a settled determination to forget God!
Let us notice just a few aspects of the greatness of God:
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God is infinitely great in His power. So He was well able to create the whole universe and everything in it. Besides, He is in total control of all that He has made. In particular, He is in total control of all that mankind has done, is doing and will do in the future. Nothing is too hard for Him, as Jeremiah acknowledged (Jer 32:17). He showed His greatness in bringing Israel out of Egypt, and that demonstration of His power was very much in the mind of Moses when he gave Israel the song that has been referred to. But the conquest of the devil by the Son of God in our nature, and the working out of redemption for rebellious sinners, especially on the cross at Calvary in the weakness of His humanity, was an even greater exercise of divine power. And the deliverance of individual souls from Satan’s power, and the saving work of the Holy Spirit in them is a further series of demonstrations of God’s limitless power.
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God is infinitely great in His justice. So Habakkuk addressed the Most High: “Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look on iniquity” (Hab 1:13). Matthew Poole comments, “His omniscience doth behold all things . . . but He doth not, will not, cannot,” see evil “with delight, with approbation”. Accordingly, God must punish individuals for their sin, even eternally, when there is no repentance in this life. But the greatest display of God’s justice occurred when His own Son, having come into this world
as the substitute for sinners, had to endure the full punishment due to all those whom He came to save – He “spared not His own Son” (Rom 8:32). Believers are spared punishment, but Christ endured it in their place, and perfect justice is maintained.
We should also note that perfect justice will be administered at the end of the world, when “we must all appear before the judgement seat of Christ [who is entirely righteous]; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad” (2 Cor 5:10). The evidence led in favour of true Christians will be perfectly accurate and righteous; it will make absolutely clear that they trusted in Christ and were declared perfectly righteous, because of what He did on their behalf when in this world. At the same time, the evidence on the basis of which unbelievers will be condemned will be equally reliable, and these sinners will therefore be condemned in perfect righteousness.
- God is infinitely great in His mercy. This is His kindness to rebellious sinners in their great need on their way to punishment of infinite duration. The punishment of sin will last for ever because sin is an infinite evil, as it is committed against the infinite God. We may also note that all in a lost eternity continue to sin against God, but now without the restraint which God applies to them in this life. But, to those who will escape that punishment and go to heaven instead, infinite mercy has been shown: Christ took their place and suffered their infinite guilt. So David sang, “Great is Thy mercy toward me: and Thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell” (Ps 86:13). He was thinking of God’s infinite mercy, in applying to himself personally the wonderful salvation that was to be provided by the Messiah in the fullness of time.
Mercy continues to be shown to believers in all God’s further kindness to them, and especially in not imputing to them the guilt of their continuing sins. A perfect salvation has been provided, and we should all value it and seek it earnestly. How sad if we are continuing in unbelief and rejecting that glorious salvation, which is freely offered to us all in the words: “Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else” (Is 45:22).
We may, God willing, consider some other aspects of His greatness on another occasion, but meantime let us briefly notice the implications of Moses’ call to ascribe greatness to God. As we have noticed, He is the great God who created all things, and created each of us in particular. This implies that we should take Him as our God and should worship and serve Him continually, praising Him as One who has infinite power, justice and mercy, and trusting Him in the light of all His attributes as they are revealed in Scripture.