Today, I’m reminded of the deep wonders of God’s creation—how He made the trees. Now, our trees in Saskatchewan are not the hardwoods of my youth in southern Ontario, but we appreciate them. In fact, someone from the prairies can appreciate trees in a way that people from places where they just grow like weeds cannot, because we have so few of them. And our prairies have mighty wonders of God. I think of an antelope, half running, half floating over the plains, or a hummingbird buzzing with its impossibly fast wings.
Even in humble Saskatchewan, these far outpace any work of man or machine. But of all these wonders, the most incredible thing that God created on this green earth was truly you. Men and women are the height of God’s creation. When we take the Bible seriously, we can finally see how unique and special each one of us was created to be.
Created for a Purpose
God says in Genesis 1:27, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” God made you special, and God made you for a purpose—something far greater than just getting by, far greater than our moments sucked into various entertainments, wasted by every ding, beep, and buzz coming from Silicon Valley.
For those of us who have trusted in the Lord Jesus Christ, we can know this truth doubly so. For we have a purpose in our creation, and even more so in our new creation in Jesus Christ. God’s Word says in Ephesians 2:10, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” You are unique and you are special, and this is not simply the sentimental drivel of a Disney show—this is truth straight from God’s Word.
In our text today, Deuteronomy 34, Moses dies on Mount Nebo. My working title for this sermon was Finding Nebo. Moses dies less than a day’s journey from the Promised Land. While Moses is a unique figure in Scripture, he is, in some ways, a model for all of our lives as we live out God’s purpose and one day find our own Nebo. Moses, like you, was called to a unique purpose. And he, like you, failed and was frustrated in that purpose.
If you have ever been disappointed, if you have ever given up on your dreams or had them denied to you, this message is for you. When your dreams die, there is more than faint hope; there is more than wishful thinking. In that place where your dreams die, there is something greater to discover and greater joy than you ever imagined.
The Calling and the Obstacle of Fear
Moses led a unique life. As an infant, he was saved from Pharaoh’s wicked command to throw the Hebrew babies into the Nile. Almost eighty years later, he received his life’s calling. It’s never too late to start! He was called by God at the burning bush to lead the people of Israel out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and into the Promised Land. God said in Exodus 3:8, “I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey.” In this moment, Moses receives his life’s work—his calling to lead God’s people.
Now, you have a calling too. Maybe not as dramatic as Moses’s, but God has put you here on earth for various things: good works to walk in, being a parent, having a vocation, loving God and neighbor, caring for those in need, serving the church, sharing the gospel with a friend, caring day-by-day unnoticed for relatives. Some of these callings are big things; some of them might seem small. But God cares for every hair on your head, and God certainly cares for the small things in life.
Some things God calls you to are relatively easy, and some seem impossible. Speaking of the impossible, Moses’s life work had many obstacles to overcome. The first was not some big, bad enemy, but one that each of us needs to face if we are going to follow God and do anything worthwhile: he had to overcome his own battle with fear.
When God calls him at the burning bush, Moses begins making excuses. In Exodus 4:10, Moses said to the Lord, “Oh, my Lord, I am not eloquent, either in the past or since you have spoken to your servant, but I am slow of speech and of tongue.” God does not call the equipped; He equips the called. God knows what He is doing. In fact, God makes it a point throughout all the Bible to call people who are unexpected, unknown, and less-than-able, to show that the surpassing glory belongs to God alone and not to man.
If you think right now that you are the least likely person for God to call, maybe—just maybe—you are exactly the kind of person God is looking to call to something incredible. God replies to Moses’s fear, “Who has made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth and teach you what you shall speak.”
It is the same for you. God will equip you to do what He has called you to do. You need not fear; you need to trust God in the name of Jesus Christ to do bold things beyond what you can ask or imagine. The power is not of your own making—it is truly the power of God working in you, both to will and to do for His good pleasure.
Frustration, Sin, and Shattered Dreams
Moses didn’t only have to get over himself; he had to face Pharaoh, whom God defeated with ten plagues. He had to stand with the Red Sea before him and Pharaoh’s army behind him, before God parted the waters. But Moses’s deepest problems were not external enemies; they were the people’s failure of faith.
The Israelites grumbled when they ran out of water, but God gave them water from the rock. They grumbled when they were hungry, but God gave them manna from heaven. Then, on Mount Sinai, as the Almighty Lord Himself was writing Thou shalt not make a graven image with His own finger on stone, Aaron and the people were making a golden calf. Disaster!
Yet after all these setbacks, at eighty-two years old, Moses and the people of Israel reached the border of the Promised Land in Numbers 13. I can imagine Moses thinking his life’s work was about to be complete. The Lord would bring them in, and Moses could enjoy a long retirement under his vine and fig tree. But then, calamity. The people feared and rebelled. Now they would have to wait thirty-eight more years before standing on the edge of the Promised Land again.
I can’t imagine giving my life to one big goal—getting the people to the Promised Land—and then at eighty-two years old being denied, seeing my ninetieth birthday, my one-hundredth birthday, my one-hundred-and-nineteenth birthday, still wandering in a stinking desert.
God made you unique, and in Christ you have a calling to do good things. But in this world of sin, we will face frustrations. For all the successes we see and the battles won, there will be many setbacks, failures, and frustrations. Some come because of others, but far too many are our own fault. You work to raise children, and then they go their own way. You have a great business idea, only to see it struggle or fail. You fall prey to sin and temptation and make shipwreck of your life. Your sin, or another’s sin, destroys a marriage that was once the bedrock of your life.
For Moses, he was first denied the Promised Land because of the sin of the people. I would have quit if I had to lead the congregation of Israel! I’d be looking for a new platform, like NewPeopleToLeadOutOfSlavery.com. But Moses endured and was faithful. Yet one day, he lost it—and the sin of a single day cost him the Promised Land.
It happened in Numbers chapter 20: “Then Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock.” The Israelites needed water again, and they were grumbling again. Moses just lost it. God had commanded them to speak to the rock, but Moses said, “Hear now, you rebels: shall we bring water for you out of this rock?” Moses was told to speak to the rock, but instead he beat it—a metaphor for how he felt about the people who had kept him in the wilderness instead of under his fig tree.
When he said, “Shall we bring water,” he forgot that it was not he who led the people out of Egypt, nor he who would lead them in. It was God who did all of this work. Sin made him think it was all about him. That is what sin so often does: it makes us think our problems are all about us and the pleasures we are denied, instead of keeping our focus on the Lord God.
God gives His judgment in Numbers 20:12: “Because you did not believe in me, to uphold me as holy in the eyes of the people of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land that I have given them.” This moment was devastating. Moses’s life work was snatched away in a moment of anger. All the work facing Pharaoh, the Red Sea, standing with God on Sinai—all gone. The dream was dead; he wasn’t going in.
Failure is hard. If I’m an expert at anything, perhaps it’s failure—from the trivial, like forgetting to buy my wife a birthday present, to the serious, like losing my temper and yelling at my family in episodes reminiscent of Moses, forgetting to uphold God as holy in my own household.
The Secret to Joy on Mount Nebo
As we reach our text in Deuteronomy 34, Moses is perched on the precipice of the Promised Land, having gone 99.9% of the way, only to be prevented by the command of God. Yet he is given a blessing to go up the mountain. God tells him in Deuteronomy 32:49–50, “Go up this mountain of the Abarim, Mount Nebo, which is in the land of Moab, opposite Jericho, and view the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel for a possession. And die on the mountain which you go up, and be gathered to your people.”
Moses doesn’t get to cross over, but God, being a God of grace, gives him a preview. “And the Lord showed him all the land, Gilead as far as Dan, all Naphtali, the land of Ephraim and Manasseh, all the land of Judah as far as the western sea, the Negeb, and the Plain, that is, the Valley of Jericho the city of palm trees, as far as Zoar. And the Lord said to him, ‘This is the land which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, “I will give it to your offspring.” I have let you see it with your eyes, but you shall not go over there.'”
At this moment, as Moses looks over the land and supernaturally sees all its four corners, it feels like he should say, “God, can’t You just give me another chance?” But no. Moses leaves his last words as a blessing on Israel and quietly resigns himself to his fate. “So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord.” They wouldn’t even bring his bones into the Promised Land to set up a monument. They wouldn’t be like the bones of Joseph, carried all the way from Egypt, because Moses was not allowed to enter.
Deuteronomy ends with a note about Moses that is crucial if you are going to face disappointment and remain faithful in failure. Deuteronomy 34:10 says, “And there has not arisen a prophet since in Israel like Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face.”
Moses was the greatest leader in the Old Testament, but before any of that, he was someone whom the Lord knew face to face. He didn’t just know things about God; the Lord knew him face to face. God’s revelation to him changed everything. He stood on the mount of the Lord; he saw the goodness of the Lord pass by.
Moses stands on that mountain not in complaint or grumbling, but with joy. Even with his life goal ripped away, Moses is satisfied as he gives the blessing in Deuteronomy 33. Why? Because when the dream of the Promised Land died, Moses discovered a secret to joy—a secret you need to know in this life of sorrow and pain, a secret that will help you endure on the darkest days.
That secret is this: there is something better in this life than the best gifts of God. There is something better than all that God can give you on this earth, better even than being reunited with loved ones in heaven. That something better is God Himself revealing Himself to you—the God whom Moses knew face to face. Moses was satisfied on Mount Nebo because his treasure was in the Lord God.
Looking, Knowing, and Listening to Jesus
God made you special to know Him and to be known by Him. Knowing God is the solution to the deepest disappointments of this life. It is what will keep you going when your dreams die and your strength fails.
You can be known by the Lord by setting your heart to know Jesus Christ, believing in His name, and laying down your own plans, dreams, sin, and self. You pray, “Lord, I need You. I lay down myself, my sin, my dreams, and my ambitions, and I believe in You.”
It is incredible that while Moses fell short of the Promised Land, as he looked north, west, and south across that terrain, he was looking at a place he would one day visit with his own feet. Matthew 17:1–3 says, “And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him.”
Moses, still known by the Lord, stood talking with Him face to face! At that moment, when Moses’s feet touched the Promised Land for the first time, he was able to enter. His sin had prevented him, but Jesus allowed him. All of our works fall short, but with Jesus, we can cross the Jordan into all of God’s heavenly blessings.
Even then, standing in the Promised Land, Moses isn’t looking around saying, “Hey, maybe I can settle down here under my vine and fig tree.” What is he doing? He is talking with the Lord face to face. In a world of sin, pain, and shattered dreams, you can always have hope when you look to Jesus—the One who loves you, cares for you, and knows all the darkness of human existence, yet endured.
To look into the face of Jesus Christ is to find the greatest treasure there is. So know Jesus. Look to Jesus. And third, if we wish to endure, listen to Jesus.
As Moses was on that mountain in the Promised Land, the glory cloud appeared. Matthew 17:5 says, “He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, ‘This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.'”
Listening to Jesus is the difference between a vague concept of God and a real, rock-solid relationship where you are known by Him. A real relationship requires that you know Jesus, look to Jesus, and listen to Jesus. Listening to Jesus means attending to all that He has revealed in the Word of God. Jesus is the Word who was with God in the beginning, God’s revelation from Genesis to Revelation.
Listening to Jesus is what we seek to do here at Valley Alliance Church. Next week, we begin Sunday school, diving deeply into God’s Word from beginning to end together, learning to listen to Jesus as He is revealed in Scripture. Soon, we are beginning care groups to discuss God’s Word together. And every Sunday, we open up God’s Word to listen to Him. I invite you: grab your Bible, open God’s Word, and listen to Jesus.
Moses’s story is filled with disappointment. If this were a Hollywood movie, it might end with him dying alone on a mountain as a tragic moment. But I imagine it differently: as he looks at the Promised Land, he turns back—not with a look of disappointment, but with a look of pure joy. Because in that moment, he looks into the face of Jesus Christ, the same face he would behold in Matthew 17, standing with him on that mountain.
You can have that same joy in your life. Even when the big dreams of our twenties give way to the cynicism of later years, you can have joy day by day simply by knowing Christ, looking to Christ, and listening to Christ. Let us give up on this world’s striving toward a false promised land. Instead, in the place where our dreams die, let us know Christ, look to Christ, and day by day, listen to Christ. Amen.