Exo 33:12-17 Moses said to the LORD, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’ Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” And he said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” And he said to him, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?” And the LORD said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”
Jehovah had commanded Moses to lead the people to Canaan, and promised him the guidance of an angel; but He had expressly distinguished this angel from His own personal presence (Exodus 33:1-3). Moreover, though it has not been mentioned before, Jehovah had said to Moses, “I have known thee by name,” – i.e., I have recognised thee as Mine, and chosen and called thee to execute My will (cf. Isaiah 43:1; Isaiah 49:1), or put thee into “a specifically personal relation to God, which was peculiar to Moses, and therefore was associated with his name” (Oehler); – “and thou hast also found grace in My eyes,” inasmuch as God had granted a hearing to his former intercession. Moses now reminded the Lord of this divine assurance with such courage as can only be produced by faith, which wrestles with God and will not let Him go without a blessing (Genesis 32:27); and upon the strength of this he presented the petition (Exodus 33:13), “Let me know Thy way (the way which Thou wilt take with me and with this people), that I may know Thee, in order that I may find grace in Thine eyes, and see that this people is Thy people.” The meaning is this: If I have found grace in Thy sight, and Thou hast recognised me as Thy servant, and called me to be the leader of this people, do not leave me in uncertainty as to Thine intentions concerning the people, or as to the angel whom Thou wilt give as a guide to me and the nation, that I may know Thee, that is to say, that my finding grace in Thine eyes may become a reality; and if Thou wilt lead the people up to Canaan, consider that it is Thine own people, to whom Thou must acknowledge Thyself as its God.
As a believer, we are given the Holy Spirit to lead, direct, comfort, teach, convict, encourage, help, etc…. us in all truth, wisdom, knowledge, and understanding of God’s grace, mercy and love, God’s Word, things of God, discernment, Holiness and Sin, right and wrong, truth and false, blessings and judgment. We can intentionally seek and desire all of these infusions from the Holy Spirit and thereby place ourselves in the proper mindset to hear those quiet whispers and loud shouts within our souls.
Conversely, we can reject, harden our hearts and minds, deafen our ears, and blind our eyes to what, where, and when the Holy Spirit is leading us in. We might proclaim we want the presence of the Holy Spirit but do not give it futile ground in our hearts, minds, or souls.
David said, search me, know me, see if there is anything offensive within me, and lead me in the everlasting ing way. If we would be so bold and willing to be lead by the Holy Spirit of God.
