Now and then we are given just a taste of the "kabod"-- the weighty glory of God. We call it His presence, or His touch, or His stirrings, or His Spirit's infilling. Whatever one calls it, it is the substance that our soul longs most for.
When we are touched by just a drop of His weighty glory our soul is saturated with a satisfaction that cannot be described. Just a momentary experience of this and we are completely at rest and satisfied. We have had a taste of that which completely quenches the cry of our soul. We have had a morsel of that "something" that our soul is so desparate for that we spend our lives running here and there and everywhere trying to satisfy it. The soul exists, it seems, with a deep cry to be united, at one with, and saturated by this "something" that we search everywhere to find.
Just a momentary contact with that glory and we feel symbiotically connected to something so deep, so weighty, so real, so imbued with life that the soul is at rest, yet alive and filled and complete. This is the experience that the mystics have difficulty expressing. Mere words like wonder, beauty, loved, sweet, powerful, presence, mystery, awesomeness, oneness, wholeness, fullness-- none of these even begin to convery what a soul experiences when touched, however lightly, by the glory.
Before we realize it, however, the moment passes and we find ourselves panting, like the psalmist, for more of His kabod-glory. We are left with an alarming thirst for more-- as in a parched and weary land. Nothing else will do. We have been satisfied for a moment, yet we find ourselves with even deeper longings as a result of the taste.
This is the place that Moses came to when He cried out to God, "Show me your glory." He was saying, I believe, "You have given me tastes, here and there, causing me to thirst more and more and more for the One that completely satisfies. You have tormented me, in a wonderful way, with the sweet tastes of who you are. Now, please, will you show me a more complete glimpse? Will you give me an experience that will stay with me?"
God, in essence, said, "Yes, I will show you my glory... but it will still be just a partial revelation. The human soul, on earth, can only handle so much and live. I will give you what you can handle." And that is our dilemma: caught between heaven and earth. Thirsting for heaven while living on earth.
Do we give up then? Do we settle for what we have experienced in the past? Do we stop pursuing if we cannot receive 100% everlasting satisfaction now?
If I had not tasted the glory, then my answer might be "yes." How tempting, even now, to try to find rest and satisfaction elsewhere. But having been awakened, if only by moments of droplets of that presence, I cannot rest until I find my rest in Him (Augustine). Therefore, though heaven will bring the fulfillment, even now I must continue to cry out with Moses, "Show me your glory."
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