Seeing Glory

“This is the thing which Yahweh has commanded that you do, that the glory of Yahweh may appear to you,” Moses tells the assembled Israelites (Leviticus 9:6).

What is that thing we must do to see glory?

The following verses answer that question. Aaron comes near to the altar, offers a purification and ascension offer for himself and then for the people (9:7-21). After he lifts his hands to bless the people, the glory of the Lord appears and fire breaks out to consume the sacrifices (vv. 23-24).

To see the glory appear, you must offer sacrifice.

And so we allegorize: Jesus fulfills all the sacrificial system, and by His self-offering in death, the glory of God appears and the fire of the Spirit breaks out, burning on the heads of the disciples to make them living sacrifices.

And then we tropologize: We are living sacrifices by the Spirit, and as we offer our bodies as living sacrifices, the glory appears more brightly, and the Spirit’s fire bursts out again and again, brightening the church as a light to the nations.

And then we anagogize: In the end, after untold millennia of sacrifice in the Spirit, the glory of the Lord appears once for all, and this world is completely transfigured by the Spirit into new creation.