“Oh, Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant, your greatness and your mighty hand. For what God is there in heaven or on earth who can do such works and mighty acts as yours?”
– Deuteronomy 3:24
Deuteronomy 3:24 is one of my favorite verses in the book of Deuteronomy, I think maybe in all the Bible. And I know there’s a lot of favorite verses, but just think about what this verse means. So this is Moses speaking here. So he’s talking about his desire to enter into the promised land, and because of his sin against God, he would not enter into the promised land, going all the way back to Numbers 20.
There is no one like our God, for He is incredibly great and powerful.
Moses Saw Many Great Works of God
But Moses gets near the end of his life. And you think about all that Moses has seen. Like Moses has spoken with God in the form of a burning bush. He’s encountered God in so many different ways. He was chosen by God to go before Pharaoh and he would meet with God, then go before Pharaoh. He saw plague, after plague, after plague, he had a front row seat on all of them. Additionally, he saw God deliver the people of Israel out of slavery in Egypt. And he was the one who was standing at the edge of the Red Sea. When he saw it split down the middle so they could walk through on dry ground. He led them through on dry ground.
He saw food coming down from heaven and water flowing from rocks. And Mount Sinai in Exodus 19, when everybody else had to stay away, Moses was invited by God to come up on that mountain and meet with him to receive his law. Moses would go into the tent and meet with God. Exodus 33:11 says, “Face-to-face as a man speaks with his friend.” Like if anyone had seen the glory of God, the great works of God, Moses has. And it gets to the end of his life. And he says in verse 24, “Oh Lord God, you have only begun to show your servant, your greatness and your mighty hand.”
This Verse Reminds Us That God’s Might Has no End
What a statement. After all that, Moses says to God, “Well, that was a good start.” A good start. He’d seen a lifetime of God’s greatness and God’s mighty hand. But that’s the beauty of this verse, because when you know this God, you know that all the greatness, and all the might you have seen, is only the beginning, because his greatness and his might have no end. They cannot be exhausted. This is our God. This is your God.
Deuteronomy 3:24: Praising God For His Might
And so we pray. Oh God, all glory be to your name for the greatness and the might we have seen from your hand in our lives, in your word as we read these stories about Moses, and so many others in scripture, as we think about, as I think about God, all that you have done in my life, that I’ve seen in others’ lives that we have seen. And we just say to you right now, in the words of Deuteronomy 3:24, “God, we’ve only begun to see your greatness and your mighty hand.” And we want to see more.
Asking God to Continue to Perform His Works
And God, we want to see more today. We want to see more tomorrow. We want to see more next week. God, for every moment you give us breath on this earth, we want to see more of your greatness, and more of your mighty hand at work, more of your glory. You have given us an insatiable desire to see more, and more, and more glory. And God, even when we die and we enter in to eternity with you, we realize, even as we pray Deuteronomy 3:24, that we will never exhaust knowing all of your greatness, seeing all of your might, because your greatness and your might, and your love, all of your attributes are eternal.
A billion years from now, there will still be more to see in you. And a billion years after that, more to see in you. Oh God, there is no one like you. So show your greatness, show your mighty hand in and around our lives today and tomorrow, until we see your face. And when we do, we will look forward to seeing more greatness and more might, more wonder in you for every single day for all of eternity. All glory be to your name. In Jesus’ name we pray. Deuteronomy 3:24. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
