Deuteronomy 34: 4 “Then the Lord said to him: This is the land I promised on oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob when I said, ‘I will give it to your descendants.’  I have let you see it with your eyes, but you will not cross over into it.”

Have you ever disagreed with God? Thought he was unfair? I confess that I have. I know better now because I have come to understand his sovereignty and that his wisdom is beyond all. A couple of years ago I re-read the account of this encounter Moses had with God in Deuteronomy 34. It stopped me in my tracks. I thought: “God, why were you so harsh with Moses? After all, this is the man who had to face the great Pharaoh repeatedly at the risk of his life.  Then he led your people out of Egypt across the Red Sea and into the desert and had to put up with their grumbling and complaining all the time. At one point they even wanted to stone him!  (Exodus 17:4). He had done so much for you! And now he has come to what looks like his reward – life in the Promised Land – you tell him he can only look, he can’t enter it?”  I was pretty much throwing a tantrum on Moses’ behalf.

This was a prime example of the puny mind of a creature coming up against the all-wise Eternal God, Creator of the universe. In Romans 9, Paul addresses the matter of God’s sovereignty and among the questions he asks is “But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” “Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?”

The fact is that although our lives are intertwined with each other, God has unique divine purpose for each of our lives and he is in full control.  At the time of my little protest to God about Moses, the Holy Spirit, in his grace and wisdom, spoke to me:

“What you don’t understand my child is that God had taken him to the highest point of communion with himself in the earth that man could reach at that time. It was therefore fitting that I should take him home to be with me to share the joy of being in my presence, a fitting reward for this servant of mine. In your humanity you misconstrue my love for punishment. But I am a faithful God and Father. The standards of earth are not mine. I judge righteously all the time. I am the Almighty.”