Hell is a Joke - "Fire on the Mountain"

Stories of Faith - Book 6 - Hell is a Joke (and Other Stories of Faith)

Discover how the Player gets played by a young girl in love with God and how believing that Hell is a joke is turned against you every day of your life. In the end, Jonathan Temperley cannot handle the truth and it is his undoing.

Experience the thrill of watching Moses interact with God and the death of Rabbi Gamaliel after a lifetime of rejecting Jesus only to be saved at the last minute. Watch as Sundor ignores the power of Lucifer at the cross as he claims the soul of the believing thief who now belongs to heaven.

Stories that can push you toward heaven or hell should be read with caution. That is also our weight of glory.

Chapter 4 "Fire on the Mountain"

It had started at this mountain and the God of the Unquenchable Fire had brought them back. Mosheh watched the people make their way through the pass into the broad valley at the base of the mountain. The wagons first, and then the great herds of sheep and cattle began to spread out upon the two hills that faced the Holy Mountain. There was water here and grass and rest for the people. He had come home but he could not stay.

He saw Joshua stride toward him with an expectant look. There must be news.

“We have found the tents of Jethro,” he said. “They are in pasture on the far side of the Mountain.”

Mosheh watched as Joshua threw a fearful eye at the towering pinnacle of rock forever ringed with a dark mass of clouds. Even he seemed to feel the dread, the massive Presence that was more than the grandeur of that palace of rock and granite.

“They will be here by nightfall,” Joshua ended lamely, his concentration broken. The view from this cliff was even more magnificent, more dreadful for its proximity to the Mountain.

“Tell the people not to go up upon the Mountain,” Mosheh said. “Neither people, nor cattle, nor sheep. Set up barriers and get the word out. This Mountain is Holy.” Mosheh’s face was lined with the care and burden of living so close to that wonderful, dreadful Presence. He seemed to have a curious effect on everyone around him as if they expected him at any time to be consumed by that Holy Fire. He had become more secluded, he realized, less visible to the mass of people. He relied on young Joshua more and more these days. There was a look in his eyes that he liked.

“Wait.”

Joshua turned to look at Mosheh, a curious glint in his eye. Mosheh was listening, attentive to some voice beyond the hearing of mortal men.

Then he spoke.

“You must also tell the people to get ready. In three days they will meet their God.”

*****

Now at daybreak on the third day there were peals of thunder on the mountain and lightning flashes, a dense cloud, and a loud trumpet blast, and inside the camp all the people trembled.

Then Mosheh led the people out of the camp to meet God. They stood at the bottom of the mountain. The mountain of Sinai was entirely wrapped in smoke, because Yahweh had descended on it in the form of fire. The smoke went up like smoke from a furnace and the whole mountain shook violently. Louder and louder grew the sound of the trumpet.

Mosheh spoke and God answered him with peals of thunder. Yahweh came down on the mountain of Sinai, on the mountain top, and Yahweh called Mosheh to the top of the mountain and Mosheh went up.

The people were full of fear but when they saw Mosheh climb the Mountain, some, in their curiosity, began to approach the mountain for a better view.

Yahweh said to Mosheh, “Go down and warn the people not to pass beyond their bounds to come and look on Yahweh, or many of them will lose their lives. The priests, the men who do approach Yahweh, even these must purify themselves, or Yahweh will break out against them.”

Mosheh answered Yahweh, “The people cannot come up the mountain of Sinai because you warned us yourself when you said, ‘Mark out the limits of the mountain and declare it sacred.’”

But Yahweh said, “Tell them again.”

Mosheh turned to walk down to the people and already he heard the cry and tumult of the people as they cried out. Fear and dread had come upon them in full measure as the peals of thunder and loud trumpets came to a crescendo, echoing from rock wall to granite face, bouncing from one side of the natural amphitheater to the other. The people had drawn back in fear of the Lord and Mosheh was grim with satisfaction. The God of the Mountain was no spectacle to entertain but a Holy God to be obeyed.

“Moseesss,” came the cry when they saw him again upon the Mountain, unharmed. “Moseesss, help us.” They were not scared, they were terrified.

As Mosheh came down to them, the leaders of the people came up to him. They knelt at his feet, surrounding him and speaking all at once.

“One at a time,” Mosheh commanded.

The sudden silence was broken by the eldest. “Mosheh, we cannot bear it.” He could not look Mosheh in the eye for his raw fear.

“This is too much for us,” another broke in.

“You must stop it,” a third demanded.

They threatened to overwhelm him again with their fear but Mosheh raised his rod and struck the rock beneath his feet, sending small chips flying in his anger.

“Silence.”

He looked once again at the eldest of the leaders. “You, Othniel, you will speak and no one else. What is it you wish me to do?”

“Speak to Him yourself and then you can come to tell us His words,” Othniel said.

Mosheh looked around at them in silence for a moment. Then he spoke, his eyes ablaze. “Are you all in agreement?” He looked at each one in turn, capturing every eye, waiting for a nod or some sign.

“I will speak to Him on your behalf,” Mosheh said, “but He will decide this thing, whether it is good or not.”

Mosheh turned and climbed back to his place on the cliff side and then kept on going, higher and higher until he was lost in the clouds that covered the Mountain. He was gone for a very long time.

*****

It was a good thing, this fear, Gabriel thought. It was respect. It was a healthy fear but most of all it was protection, much needed protection.

So, in the interests of that protection, Moses was told to construct the Tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting where he would meet with God alone and in relative safety. It was based on the plans of the Heavenly Tabernacle that Moses saw when he was on the Mountain of God. And it was there that Moses saw the first and the last wonder of all.

It was an amazing moment of grace, since Moses, too, was a son of Adam, an unwitting ally to the Evil One.

Yahweh said to Moses, “I will let all my splendor pass in front of you, and I will pronounce before you, the name ‘Yahweh.’ I have compassion on whom I will, and I show pity to whom I please. You cannot see my face,” he said, “for man cannot see me and live.”

Gabriel could see Mosheh tremble at the words but he remained silent.

And Yahweh said, “Here is a place beside me. You must stand on the rock, and when my glory passes by, I will put you in a cleft of the rock and shield you with my hand while I pass by. Then I will take my hand away and you shall see the back of me, but my face is not to be seen.”

This was Eden renewed. This was the throne room of the Almighty God. This was the Holy God in his compassion abiding the presence of sin in the person of Moses.

Moses had found favor with God, remembered Gabriel. He had faith and faith is a powerful thing. Faith can go a long way towards righteousness, especially when God was determined to overcome the power of sin in mankind at any cost. Still it was a moment of great Divine compassion for God to reveal even a glimpse of His glory to this frail human with the rebellious nature who had discovered faith.

When the moment came, Yahweh descended in the form of a cloud, and Mosheh stood with him there. And Mosheh called on the name of Yahweh.

For a long moment there was an awesome, divine silence. Then the storm broke all around him with bright flashes of lightning and fearful rolling thunder. Then Mosheh heard the most beautiful voice imaginable utter the most beautiful words possible.

Yahweh passed before him and proclaimed, “Yahweh, Yahweh, a God of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger, rich in kindness and faithfulness; for thousands he maintains his kindness, forgives faults, transgressions, sin.”

The yearning and love in those words seemed to envelop Mosheh with a warmth that brought tears to his eyes. But there was firmness in that Voice, too, as it continued to reveal the heart and character of God.

“Yet he lets nothing go unchecked, punishing the father’s fault in the sons and in the grandsons to the third and fourth generation.”

And Mosheh bowed down to the ground at once and worshiped.

To think that it was this same Holy Presence and Shekinah Glory that would dwell in the midst of a sinful people in the Tabernacle in the center of the camp,Gabriel marveled.

It was dangerous. It was glorious.