Veils That Keep Us from Seeing the Glory of God
Author
Samuel Acevedo
Summary: Our competence does not come from ourselves, but from God, who makes us ministers of the new covenant—not of the letter that kills, but of the Spirit who gives life. The old way of trying to reach God through rules, works, and our own efforts keeps people at a distance, like Israel, who preferred to receive secondhand what Moses encountered in the presence of God. In Christ, by contrast, the veil is removed, and we have access to God.
We too can carry veils that dull our understanding and prevent us from fully enjoying his glory: deep-rooted sins, disobedience, unforgiveness, or an excessive focus on our needs, failures, and limitations. No formula or personal effort can tear them away. We must stop struggling on our own, turn to the Lord, and allow the Holy Spirit to work freely.
As we draw near to the throne of grace and behold the perfection, beauty, and work of Christ on the cross, we are gradually transformed into his image. That is why we study the Word not merely to gain knowledge, but to know God, remain in his presence, and be transformed from glory to glory.
Second Corinthians chapter 3, verse 5, please, declares here: ‘Not that we are competent in ourselves to think of anything as coming from ourselves, but our competence comes from God, who also made us competent ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.’ And we are going to skip to the last two verses, verses 17 and 18.
‘For the Lord is the Spirit.’ By the way, if those who knock on your door and try to convince you that Jesus Christ is something less than God and that Jesus Christ is something less than divine come to you, this verse is definitive. The Lord is THE Spirit—with a capital “S.” A mystery, the Trinity, perhaps, but an incontrovertible truth. And there it is in your hands, my brothers and sisters. Here, when the Spirit of God ministers, the Lord is ministering through His Spirit. Amen. The Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Therefore, all of us, beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled faces as in a mirror, are being transformed.
We are being transformed from glory to glory into the same image, as by the Spirit of the Lord. My brothers and sisters, not long ago, on Good Friday, the Pastor brought a message, and he has repeated this theme from time to time concerning the necessity of the sacrifice of the Cross. The necessity of Jesus Christ—why did the Father allow Jesus to be the lamb broken for our sins? And the scene before Jesus is one of a sorrowful humanity trying to reach the presence of the Lord.
For the Word declares, “In the presence of the Lord there is fullness of joy,” that the presence of the Lord is a fountain of life, that He is the bread of life, that He is the root; and these people tried to enter the presence of the Lord through their own works and by their own means, and this was an imperfect covenant. This was an era that broke the Lord’s heart, as He saw a people who needed Him. Imagine, my brothers and sisters, the eyes that longed to see what you saw tonight. The souls that desired the freedom to approach the full presence of the Lord, touch His glory, and receive freedom and healing.
They were trying to do it through their own works, when the Lord had a more perfect covenant: access to the throne of God, once and for all. Now, understand something, my brothers and sisters: even in the Old Testament, that was... Notice how these two covenants, these two worlds, arose. The difference between direct access to the presence of the Lord and others trying to do it by their own means, trying to understand this God, trying to live by the rules, trying to put on an appearance of a holiness that eluded them, and others, perhaps, who had access to the throne of God.
Do you know that the beginnings of this can be seen even in the Old Testament? Even in the Old Testament. In the Old Testament, believe it or not, these people chose distance. These people chose not to be witnesses of the glory of God, but distant, secondhand hearers of the presence of God. This takes time. Regarding what we read there, verse 5 again: “Not that we are competent in ourselves to think of anything as coming from ourselves, but our competence comes from God, who also made us competent ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter.”
Here are those two covenants, these two ways of living. “Not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.” And now I invite you to jump to verse 12: “Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness, and not as Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel would not gaze at the end of what was being abolished.” What is he referring to there?
Do not lose your place in Second Corinthians, but let us hurry over to Exodus chapter 34, verse 33. Moses has just spent forty days in the presence of the Lord. The Lord gives him the law to share with these people, and when he comes down, his face shone with the presence of the Lord. And the Word declares here in Exodus 34, verse 33: “And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face. But whenever Moses went in before Jehovah to speak with Him, he took the veil off until he came out; and when he came out, he told the children of Israel what he had been commanded.”
In other words, these people lived secondhand. They preferred not to stand in the presence of the Lord. The Lord tried; the glory of the Lord descended upon Mount Horeb, they saw the glory of the Lord, they heard the voice of the Lord, and they became so afraid that they said to Moses, “No, it would be better for you to present yourself before Jehovah. If we remain in the presence of the Lord, we will die here.” But Moses remained intently in the presence of the Lord. Verse 35: “And when the children of Israel looked at Moses’ face, they saw that the skin of his face was radiant; and Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with God.”
Brothers and sisters, there is a simple reference here, and I will not dwell on this point. It is the difference between the letter, a religion, and trying to reach God merely by understanding Him academically—understanding Him with your five senses—when the Lord wants more for you. That is the difference between someone who lives in the presence of the Lord and someone who hears about God from afar. The Word goes on to declare—let us return to Second Corinthians. Verse 14: “But their minds were dulled.”
The problem was not so much Moses’ veil, because even to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains, not lifted, which is taken away through Christ; and even to this day, when Moses is read, the veil lies over their hearts. And my brothers and sisters, tonight the Lord wants to give you freedom, but freedom in a very specific way. “Pastor Samuel, I want to take part in this, in the supernatural life.” This is the theme that the Lord gave the Pastor for this church, for this era. This is what we at Mover are about.
My brothers and sisters, every one of you, without exception—I declare it in the name of Jesus—every one of you is a candidate for a supernatural life. The Lord longs to move in each of your lives in a transforming way. But I want to save you some time. If you try to do it on your own, if you try to do it by your own means, if you try to dictate the means to the Holy Spirit, sooner or later you will become frustrated. Sooner or later, the letter will envelop you. Moses would come down from the mountain, and the people would say to him, “So, Moses, what does God want? What does He desire? How can we be blessed?”
Many of you, even to this day, ask this question: “Pastor, what does God want? How can I see the hand of God in my life? How can I experience blessing? What do I do? What secret is there? What are the magic words? What is the formula for unleashing the glory of God in my life?” And the Lord tells you tonight, brother, there is no formula. There is no formula. This is not magic; there is no trick here. There is a Spirit who wants to give life to the spirit within you. Because sooner or later, brothers and sisters, when we do it on our own, we will encounter veils.
There are veils. All of us have veils that prevent us from seeing. There is no way around it: in our hearts, we all have veils that prevent us from seeing the glory of God. For some of us—without pointing fingers—this is the human condition, brothers and sisters; do not be scandalized. For some, the veil will be a sin that has attached itself to their lives, a familiar, household sin that is part of your way of life. And the roots of this sin are as deep as those of an oak tree, wrapping themselves even around the concrete foundation of the house of your life.
And that veil is there. Perhaps it is a veil of disobedience, which is a little different. You know that God... A person looks at the Word. The Word rebukes us; we know that the Lord is waiting for us. “Lord, what do You desire from me?” The Lord answers you as He answered the rich young ruler: “Sell everything you have and follow Me. You know what you have to do.” But the price is too high; that obedience costs you too much, and as long as that disobedience remains in your life, it is a veil. It is a veil that prevents you from enjoying the glory of God in its fullness. It denies you access to the beauty within God.
For others, it is unforgiveness over one thing or another. This afternoon, I had a conversation with a brother whom I dearly love. And he was explaining to me that someone had hurt him, and it seems that someone... and I am not going to speculate about whether it was justified or not. But someone hurt him. That is what is true. That is the point. And that hurt has been like a poison running through his life, robbing him of his peace. But notice that at that moment I was listening to his story and hearing the pain, yet at the same time there was a resistance to forgiving. But at that moment—notice that in the end I asked the Lord for wisdom—and what the Lord gave me was: “Let us pray, brother.”
And the prayer went something like this: “Restore Your face to him; restore to him the joy of Your presence. Father, let him see You; let him see Your glory. Bring him back, Lord, to those times alone with You. Lord, renew that fresh word for him.” And do you know what? We felt freedom, relief, something precious. Do you know what? Through your own effort, you will never be able to tear away the veil. Through your own effort, you cannot tear away the veil. I can’t do it. Thank God that you do not need your own effort, and thank God for the Holy Spirit. It says: “But when they turn to the Lord, the veil will be taken away, because the Lord is the Spirit. And where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.”
Tonight, the message is very simple. And the Lord says to you: “Look, stop struggling. You cannot free yourself from this or that on your own. Draw near. Just draw near; come to Me, let Me deal with it. Look at Me,” the Lord says to you. You know, many times we focus so much—perhaps even during our times of prayer—we focus so much on our need, on our shortcomings, on our brokenness, on our failure, on how small we are. Brothers and sisters, I invite you during those times to direct your gaze toward the throne of grace. The Lord invites you there. And while you are there, beholding Him...
The Word of the Lord says: “All of us, beholding the glory of the Lord with unveiled faces as in a mirror—let us stand—are being transformed in glory, into the same image, as by the Spirit of the Lord.” Brothers and sisters, I do not know what veil has dulled your mind, robbed you of joy, or limited the extent of the flow of God’s Spirit within you, but I guarantee you this: it is not by sword, nor by army. You know, there is a God who loves you so very much. As you behold the Lord, if you are going to study the Word, do not study it to become a scholar; study it so that you may know this God, so that you may look upon Him and know His beauty.
So that you may commune with His heart. Brothers and sisters, as we behold the glory of God, you will say, “I do not measure up to His beauty,” but do not worry: while you behold Him, He is beholding you. As your gaze becomes fixed on Him—on His perfection, on His beauty, on the precious work upon the cross of Calvary—those eyes of fire become fixed upon your soul, and little by little the Lord begins to shape you. Little by little, without your realizing it, there is no way for you to be in the presence of the Lord, beholding His beauty and allowing God to be Lord...
Loving Him, taking your time with Him. The Lord, over time... you know? Welcome: you are a Christian. “Christian” is Greek for a little Christ. Stephen, on the day he was going to be stoned, stood before the Sanhedrin, and all of them remarked on this. And the reason it is in the Bible is that the people who stoned him were the ones who saw it. They saw that this man’s face was like the face of an angel. Brothers and sisters, that is what I desire. And that is what God has for you. Father, in the name of Jesus, we know that there are veils with which we struggle that keep us from seeing Your glory. But thank You, Lord, that this does not depend on us. Thank You for Your Holy Spirit; thank You for Your work in our lives. Lord, we draw near to You; we draw near to You.
As we lose ourselves in the beauty of Your presence, work in our lives; perfect us in the fire of Your presence. Purify us through the fire that flashes from Your eyes. Tear away the veil so that we may see Your beauty, so that we may be transformed from glory to glory, until that day when there will never again be any separation between Your creatures and Your throne. I ask You in the name of Jesus.