THE WHOLE EARTH WILL BE FILLED WITH THE GLORY OF THE LORD

Numbers 14:21 – So the LORD said, “I have forgiven them in accordance with your word; however, as I live, all the earth will be filled with the glory of the LORD.

The Lord made one of His greatest promises in the Bible at one of the lowest moments. The children of Israel were poised to enter the promised Land when the spies who had been sent by Moses to prepare their invasion returned with a bad report. The people were overcome with fear and as a result rebelled against Moses. God’s response was that an entire generation would wander in the wilderness for forty years until they all died. The Lord then gave this promise to Moses, “the whole earth will be filled with the glory of the Lord”. There have been great outpourings of the Glory of God throughout history but this promise is yet to be fulfilled. Every time God’s Spirit is poured out it is a prophetic look to the great day of the Lord when His glory will fill the earth. Here is how Matthew Henry describes this.

“The glorifying of God’s name is, in general, decided on. It is said on oath, ‘All the earth shall be filled with the glory of the LORD’. Moses in his prayer had shown great concern for the glory of God. “Leave me,” God says, “to secure that effectively, and to advance it, by my purposes.” All the world will see how God hates sin even in his own people and will judge it, but how gracious and merciful he is, and how slow to anger. And so, when our Savior prayed, Father, glorify thy name, he was immediately answered, I have glorified it, and will glorify it yet again (Jn 12:28). Those who sincerely seek God’s glory may be sure of what they seek. Because God turned this prayer for the glorifying of himself into a promise, we may turn it into praise, in harmony with the angels (Isa 6:3): The earth is full of his glory.”

I love what Matthew Henry said in his comments, “God turned this prayer of glorifying Himself into a promise, we may turn it into praise in harmony with the angels”. Anyone who has tasted the manifest presence of the Lord, His glory, understands the magnitude of this promise. His immediate presence is like nothing else and when His kingdom is finally on full display in this world the whole world will be inundated with God Himself. There are literally no words to tell. So when the world looks incredibly dark we can join together with the Lord, the angels, and the redeemed from the earth and say, “the whole earth will be filled with the glory of the Lord”.