Exodus 24

Then Moses went up on the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. The glory of the Lord dwelt on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days. And on the seventh day he called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud.

Exodus 24:15-16

There are so many things! First is the presence of God and the presence of clouds. I am not sure about you, but oftentimes when there is a cloud cover I want the sun back and the clouds upset me a little bit. Reading that God's presence manifests in clouds, I feel convicted about my feeling towards them. Something about the teachings of Jesus is that they are convicting. I love them and they are convicting, and the same is true when it comes to the clouds. I love God, but He is convicting. He hates sin and my life is filled with sin. There is something to the things that we don't like that allows us to grow more than the things that we do like. We know that Jesus teaches the truth because He is God, and sometimes the truth is hard to hear, but we know that the truth is what is best. When we are presented with something that we don't like, there is value in wondering why. Is it because we are confronted with something we don't want to be confronted with? Is it because we are convicted about something we are not ready to turn from? This is my new thought about the clouds.

The other thing is that the glory of God dwelt for six days, and it was on the seventh day that God called out to Moses and spoke to him. Waiting six days takes a lot of patience. I like things right now, and waiting six days is a long time to wait for a calling or for an answer. But we know that one of the fruits of the Spirit from Galatians is patience. Generally without the Holy Spirit, we are not a patient people. We want things now and we make bad decisions because of it. Patience is something that can be developed, and when we are patient, we can hear from God. If we dwell in His glory, look around, give things to Him, and praise Him for six days, then my bet is we are more likely to hear His voice and His calling on the seventh day when we rest in His presence on the Sabbath.