“They’ll ask: ‘What’s His name?’ What Shall I Tell Them?” (Exodus 3:13)

 What is God Like? – How Can We Know for Sure? – Part 10

 By Richard Allen – February 2, 2026

Since this is the tenth installment of this series: “What is God Like? – How Can We Know for Sure?” You might have thought I would never ask the question: “In what manner did God reveal Himself to fallen men and women during that time, starting with the Fall of Adam and Eve, until the Advent of the Lord Jesus?” Did God speak or appear to fallen men? Or did He perform a miracle to get their attention? God revealing Himself since Eden was the story of “Redemptive-Progressive-History.”  Over the centuries we observed God speaking to specific men such as Enoch, Noah and then to Abram. But other questions could also be asked and answered: “Did God ever appear to fallen men or women during the Old Testament?” The answer is yes, but it’s a “qualified yes.” God appeared to both men and women such as Abraham (Genesis 16:7) and Hagar, his wife Sarah’s bond servant (Genesis 18:1). But what were those appearances like?  Did the “God who is Spirit” (John 4:23) provide full and complete revelation to mortal eyes? From God’s explanation to Moses years later, the answer is No. No man can see God and Live (Exodus 33:20).

Another important question is: When did God reveal His Name to men? If we look at Scripture, “The Angel of the Lord,” a Theophanic manifestation of Jehovah as a man, God did appear several times over the course of the Old Covenant.  Note: “A Theophany is a visible manifestation of God to humankind.” God appeared as a man and broke bread with Abraham at the “Oaks for Mamre” (Genesis 18). He also wrestled with Jacob “all night long” by the River Peniel (Genesis 32:24). But it wasn’t until He appeared to Moses in the “burning bush” on Mount Horeb that God actually revealed His Name to man:

“God said to Moses, ‘I am who I am.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel: I am has sent me to you’ ” (Exodus 3:14)

It’s wrong to say that knowledge of God was not forthcoming, as if God were holding revelation back. The real problem was not God’s failure to tell us; it was that fallen men and women were incapable of understanding the “truth about a Holy God.” God was “longsuffering and patient” for twenty-five centuries, bearing with man’s sin from Adam to Moses. For reasons known only to Himself, God waited until His Covenant people, the Israelites – were groaning under the yoke of Egyptian servitude, to reveal Himself first to Moses, then to Israel. Even then – the Jewish people failed to grasp that God was ready to reveal Himself and free them from slavery. When Moses saw an Israelite abuse another Israelite, Moses intervened. The Israelite who was in the wrong made it clear that he wanted nothing to do with Moses:

“When he was forty years old, it came into his heart to visit his brothers, the children of Israel. And seeing one of them being wronged, he defended the oppressed man and avenged him by striking down the Egyptian. He supposed that his brothers would understand that God was giving them salvation by his hand, but they did not understand. And on the following day he appeared to them as they were quarreling and tried to reconcile them, saying, ‘Men, you are brothers. Why do you wrong each other?’ But the man who was wronging his neighbor thrust him aside, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and a judge over us?’ ” (Acts 3:23-27)

We next hear about Moses – 40 years later in Midian. He was an 80-year-old man by then, tending his father-in-law Jethro’s flock on the backside of the desert. Gone was the brash young man who supposed that his fellow Israelites should have known that he was God’s promised deliverer. But apparently Moses knew it, though we have no record of God revealing it to him. Now, as a humble shepherd tending his flocks, Moses sees a burning bush that continues to burn – yet is not consumed. While Moses is drawn to this amazing sight, he is also afraid to look at it directly – indicating that he knew that what he was beholding, was “holy,” and that he was in God’s very presence. God instructs Moses to “take off your sandals for the very ground upon which you stand is holy” (Exodus 3:6). This was all in preparation to God telling Moses that He had seen the suffering and servitude of His people, and was sending Moses to bring them out of Egypt. But this Moses – of whom Numbers 12:3 states “was the most humble man on earth” – was unsure of himself to be the agent through whom God would deliver His people. 

Moses was also very concerned that he would have to command Pharaoh, King of Egypt, to “Let My People Go.” All Moses could say was: “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” (Exodus 3:11).  Furthermore, Moses was not confident that he would be received by his own brethren, the Children of Israel, if he were to call upon them to leave Egypt, traveling a three-day journey into the desert to worship God!  It’s here that Moses says something quite amazing:

“Then Moses said to God, ‘If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name? What shall I say to them?’ God said to Moses, ‘I am who I am.’ And he said, ‘Say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you.’  God also said to Moses, ‘Say this to the people of Israel: The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations” (Exodus 3:13-15).

Moses’ lack of confidence was startling, so God sent his brother Aaron to “speak for him.” But what strikes me is, that up to this point, God had never revealed His name to anyone!  Yes, we see the Hebrew words Elohim (God), Adonai (Lord) God Almighty (El Shaddai) and even Jehovah (Yahweh) used in Scriptures leading up to Moses. But God hadn’t made known His Name until he met Moses at that burning bush on Mount Horeb:

“God spoke to Moses and said to him, ‘I am the Lord. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by my name the LORD I did not make myself known to them’ ” (Exodus 6:2-3).

“Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians’  ” (Exodus 6:6-7).

At that point in time, our holy God opened up a new chapter in the revelation of Himself to fallen men. The Patriarchs had numerous encounters with this “God who is Spirit,” often in a Theophanic form, as a man. But those revelations were still hard to understand – God was mostly still “dwelling in thick darkness” (1 Kings 8:12). While the Jewish writer (probably Moses) who wrote the Pentateuch – that is, the first five books of the Bible: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy – used LORD, meaning Yahweh from Genesis Chapter 2 and forward in the Old Testament, God did not reveal Himself as the great “I am” until He talked to Moses through the burning bush on Mount Horeb.  Here’s how the Blue Letter Bible explains this:

“Yahweh is the promised name of God. This name of God which (by Jewish tradition) is too holy to voice, is actually spelled “YHWH” without vowels. YHWH is referred to as the Tetragrammaton (which simply means “the four letters”). YHWH comes from the Hebrew letters: Yud, Hay, Vav, Hay. While YHWH is first used in Genesis 2, God did not reveal Himself as YHWH until Exodus 3. [ https://blogs.blueletterbible.org/blb/2012/07/18/the-names-of-god-yahweh/]

Moses’ reluctance and God’s subsequent revelation, can now be seen as a “milestone” in God’s ongoing revelation. Again, you might ask “why is that?” The simple answer is:  Moses!  Moses was a very important servant in God’s house, but Jesus was the Son! Here’s how the writer to the Hebrews says this in his Epistle:

“For Jesus has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses – as much more glory as the builder of a house has more honor than the house itself. (For every house is built by someone, but the builder of all things is God.) Now Moses was faithful in all God's house as a servant, to testify to the things that were to be spoken later, but Christ is faithful over God's house as a son. And we are his house, if indeed we hold fast our confidence and our boasting in our hope” (Hebrews 3:3-6).

The man Moses was synonymous with “the Law of God.”  In John’s Gospel, John makes a clear delineation: “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.”  It was no accident that God’s revelation of His name came at Horeb, the very mountain on which God gave Moses the Law. Paul alludes to Moses’ position in God’s economy – not only as a servant, but the Law with which he became synonymous, was itself a specific kind of servant.  The sole job of this servant, called a Pedagogus, meaning “Guardian-Schoolmaster,” was to bring us to Christ (Galatians 3:24). In God’s plan for “redemption,” Moses was the next big step in Revelation, all to reveal God through His Law, not only through the Decalogue – that is the 10 Commandments or Moral Law – but also through the Civil and Ceremonial Laws in the Pentateuch. Through this "Schoolmaster," God would be revealed in ways that were unknown to the Patriarchs!  We’ll have more to say about Moses and the Law in our next Blog!

Soli Deo Gloria