#149 - Moses Denied - God’s Righteousness Beyond Human Standards or Thinking – Deuteronomy 3.23-29
The very persistence of Moses in prayer, which aroused the anger of the Lord, was nevertheless one of his greatest gifts; it was his dogged faith and persistence that had finally brought the Israelites to the plains of Moab. So the request made by Moses was probably not in itself illegitimate. But there is a sense in which the great vision of Moses had slightly lost its focus. The vision of the promise had become a consuming passion to set foot in the land, but the vision had slipped from the Lord of the promise to the promise itself. It was the Lord himself who was to remain the true promise and vision of Moses.
Peter C. Craigie, The Book of Deuteronomy, The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1976), 127.