THROUGH THE BIBLE - Exodus 3..

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com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. The Lord said to Moses, cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first one, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. Be ready by the morning and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to me on the top of the mountain.

No one shall come up with you, and let no one be seen throughout all the mountain. let no flocks or herds race opposite that mountain. So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the first and he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai as the Lord had commanded him and took in his hand two tablets of stone. The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of the Lord. The Lord passed by and he would proclaim, The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and on the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.

And Moses quickly bowed his head towards the earth and worshipped. And he said, If now I have found favour in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance. And he said, Behold, I am making a covenant before all your people I will do marvels such as have not been created in all the earth or in any nation. And all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the Lord, for it is an awesome thing that I will do with you. 11.

Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I will drive out before you the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the parasites, the Hippites, and the Gentile sites. Take care, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land to which you go, lest you become a snare in your midst. You shall tear down their altars, and break their pillars, and cut down their asherim. For you shall worship no other God, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is Jealous God.

lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and when they pour after their gods and sacrifice to their gods, and you are invited, you eat of this sacrifice, and you take of their daughters, or your sons, and their daughters pour after their gods, and make your sons pour after their gods. You shall not make for yourselves any gods of cast metal. You shall keep the feast of unleavened bread, Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread as I commanded you at the time appointed in the month of Ahib. For in the month of Ahib came out Egypt. All that opened the womb are mine.

All your male livestock and the firstborn of cow, sheep, the firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb. And if you will not redeem it, you shall break its neck. All the firstborn of your son, you of your sons, you shall redeem and none shall appear before me empty-handed. Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest. In ploughing time and in harvest you shall rest.

You shall observe the feast of wheat, the first fruits of wheat's harvest, and the feast of ingathering at the year's end. Three times in the year shall all your mouths appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. for I will cast out nations before you and enlarge your borders. No one shall covet your land when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in a year. You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with anything leaven, or let the sacrifice on the feast of the Passover remain until the morning.

The rest of the first food of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God. shall not boil a young goat in its mother's womb. And the Lord said to Moses, write these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel. So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights, neither ate bread nor drank water, and he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant. When Moses came down from the mount Sinai, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand, as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone, because he had been talking with God.

Aaron and all the people of Israel saw Moses, and behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. But Moses called them, and Aaron and all the leaders of the congregation returned to him, and Moses talked with him. Afterwards, all the people of Israel came near him, and he commanded them all that the Lord had spoken with him in Mount Sinai. And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face. Whenever Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he would remove the veil until he came out.

And when he came out and told the people of Israel what he was commanded, the people of Israel would see the face of Moses, the skin of Moses' face was shining, and Moses would put the veil over his face again. until he went in to speak. This is the word of God. Brothers and sisters and friends, last week we considered together Exodus chapter 33, and if you look or remember what we said last week in that chapter in particular, Moses was making intercession before Yahweh. before the Lord on behalf of the people of Israel, because the people of Israel had committed a great abomination in God's eyes.

We know that as the golden calf incident. They worshipped a golden calf that Aaron had made, rather than worship Yahweh, the only true God. And that caused God's anger to burn. It's not as though the people didn't know, because we know as we will be working our way through the book of Exodus, that in Exodus chapter 24, after the people had heard all the book of the covenant read to them by Moses, they all declared in unison that we will obey. They said, all that the Lord has spoken, we will do, and we will be obedient.

They declared this before the Lord. But then on the mountain of Mount Sinai, when Moses was on the mountain before the Lord, They committed this abomination before the Lord. They engaged in illicit, forbidden worship of an idol, thereby breaking the covenant and also violating the first two commandments that God had given them. As a result of this people's rebellion, Yahweh burns with righteous fury. He threatens to withdraw his presence from among these people because of his wrath.

He tells the people that Yahweh is going to remove his presence from among them. It seems like that message hit home because his people were devastated by the news. They mourned over the fact that their sin is causing now the only true God to withdraw from them. So Moses comes before the Lord as a mediator to intercede on behalf of a sinful people before a good and holy God. He knows, Moses knows that apart from being in God's, or apart from God's presence with him, everything else is in vain.

He knows that these people, Israel, would be no different to all the nations of the world, apart from God being with them. That's what makes them distinct. Moses knew this, and so he pleaded with God to remain among them, to presence himself among them, or otherwise everything is in vain. And God in His mercy continues and says to Moses, I will do that which you have requested. You will continue to be among His people.

So now in chapter 34, it begins for us that Moses is now told by God, commanded by God to rise early and to go up to Mount Sinai. This will be his last ascent on the Mount before they move from this place to receive the Lord once again from God. Because if you remember, when he came down the last time, He broke the tablets of stone before the people. But what is the point? The Lord now is, in this chapter, chapter 34, He's renewing the covenant with Israel.

Even though they had broken covenant, even though breaking the covenant was deserving of death, in His mercy, Yahweh is now renewing His covenant with His people. But when we read this chapter, despite the horrendous sin that was committed by these people, it seems to us at least that not much has changed. The blessings of the original covenant seem to be in place. The plan of God to bless these people seems to be back on track. He is still going to go before them with his mighty hand.

He will drive out the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hittites and the Jebusites, we're told that, and he will And in light of this incident with the golden calf, he does speak to Moses in a more specific way as to what to be warned of as they go into this land flowing with milk and honey. Because he says, you're going to go there and you're going to be giving out these Canaanites and these Jebusites, these people who have foreign gods, these people who have given their worship to false gods. He tells Moses, you need to be aware of this. You need to keep them out of that land. You need to break their altars.

You need to tear down their worship centers. You need to get rid of everything in there that is other Yahweh. Otherwise, we'll see you repeat the depravity that you did only, or your people did only, a short while ago at the base of Mount Sinai. God then reveals to Moses, And he would call his name by jealous, because he's not going to share his people with anyone else. They are his people, and he needs to be exclusive.

What we find in this passage here is very much covenantal language. It's as we know, the covenant we know of, best of all, is one between a husband and a wife, and the language is very similar to that. That God is like a marriage covenant between the people of Israel and himself. And so he says to these people through Moses, adulterating their hearts to false gods. He even uses the word in verse 16, he says, these people will whore after other gods as they have done.

He warns them not to whore after other gods as they have done with the golden calf, only probably just a short time earlier. You see, is that Israel is completely given over to him. She's not to seek through other false gods that which only she should receive from Yahweh, from the Lord. Like a marriage, a husband or a wife ought not to seek outside the covenant marriage what belongs to the covenant marriage. And so God has promised his people safety, security, He's promised them that He'll provide for their every need.

He's promised them that He will protect them from their enemies. Israel must recognize this God as the only supreme God and one who is all sufficient to do as He has promised. And therefore there is no need for them to adulterate their hearts to any other false gods. Israel needs to have Him as the object of her love. As the object of her worship, as the object of her devotion, solely, Yahweh needs to be all in all to His people.

Therefore, other gods must be destroyed. There must be no hints of other gods in that nation, beloved. They must destroy all hints of sin among them. For His laws, And all these precepts must be obeyed, no matter what lurks around the corner. This is an object lesson for people of Israel, to trust.

Not to trust Yahweh. You see, verse 18 through 26 is an exhortation which really emphasises trust and obedience for His people. It tells Israel to obey in giving their first fruits as He had commanded. and for them to know that everything is from God anyway. Don't hold back.

He's commanded for you to give the first fruit. Do that which He has commanded. He then tells them to keep the Sabbath in times of ploughing and times of harvesting. Despite any urgency, whether it's natural or otherwise, that may threaten the crop, Yahweh promises to provide. It's Him that brings about the increase.

It's Him who brings their provision in the first place. So observe his law, be obedient to his law, don't be afraid of these other things. Don't think for a moment, he says, don't think for a moment that obedience to him will be, as a result, a disadvantage to you. It's the opposite. Being obedient to him is the opposite.

By this point, they don't know but to go down to Jerusalem from wherever they are, three times a year they're meant to observe the feasts. They will leave sometimes their land unoccupied. God is saying, yeah, don't worry about your neighbors. They're not gonna cover your land. I will protect you and I'll protect your land and your possessions.

Trust me, Israel. Trust me. God is able to do exceedingly above anything you can imagine. He is your provision. He is your safety.

Here's your security, here's your protection. Will you trust? Moses no doubt was hearing these words. No doubt in his mind he's saying, Yahweh, you are worthy of all trust. You see, earlier in the previous chapter, chapter 33, verse 18, Moses requests all the old Yahweh to show him glory, it says, show me your glory.

We didn't address that last week, because what I said last week is that that glory, Yahweh showing Moses his glory, is very much described in chapter 34. We'll get into that in a moment. But I want you to see, and I want you to see that what Moses was doing in asking God to show him his glory is not an act of presumption. It's not as though Moses was being arrogant to ask to see God's glory. We've already been told in verse 12, the previous chapter, that Moses designed above all things to know his ways, to know the ways of God.

It's to become more intimate with this God of Israel, the one who has captivated his heart. Remember, it was Moses who said to the Lord, if you don't come with us, leave us here in the wilderness. Essentially, leave us here to die. Don't give us the land. idea to God.

The treasure, the treasure is God himself. Moses was convinced that the greatest treasure for the people was not the things that God could give, but rather the greatest treasure for God's people is God himself. And so Moses was not satisfied in remaining where he was spiritually. He wanted more than anything else to know this God more intimately, more deeply, You want to know His great love. He has become the treasure of your soul.

You want to know His glory. Brothers and sisters, I hope that our heart's desire is the same. I hope more than anything else, we too want to see His glory. We want to know our God more intimately. You see, Moses, when he asked this of the Lord, the Lord said to him, you cannot see my face.

No man can see my unmitigated, absolute glory and not be incinerated in my presence. So the Lord had preached to show him his back, meaning a glimpse of his glory. But he calls it his goodness. Moses asks to see God's glory, and then Yahweh says, I will show you my goodness. He said glory by his majesty, his beauty, his splendor.

It's found in all that he is. It's seen in some of his attributes, especially towards his people. It's seen in his goodness. It's seen in his goodness. And the revelation is described for us in verses five through seven.

Let's have a look down at our Bibles. Chapter 34, five through seven, and this is how it reads. The Lord descended in the cloud and stood before and stood with him there. and proclaim the name of the Lord. The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, the Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love of thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgressions and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.

The glory of God. His goodness is displayed here for Moses. Firstly, the giving of His name. He gives His name Yahweh. He says, I am Yahweh, I am God.

He's a personal God. He's not far and aloof, but He's a God who's personable. He's God of His people. There's an intimate relationship that He'll have with His people. He's merciful.

He's gracious. In the previous chapter of Talmud, He'll be merciful upon he who is merciful, too. In Corrections, He'll show His grace To whom He will show His grace. In other words, He is a sovereign God. He's sovereign over who He shows His grace to and who He shows His mercy to.

And in this context, He's showing His grace and His mercy to the people of Israel who, beloved, do not deserve it. None of us deserve it. He's showing His grace and mercy to undeserving people. He's a God of steadfast love and He is showing His love to an undeserving people. deserving people who don't have the time this evening to go through all the facets of what is found in this wonderful passage.

But I want you to see the last point. And you might look at that last point, and you might think, hey, this might be misplaced. Well, what does visiting the iniquity of the fathers to subsequent generations have to do with God's goodness? How is that indeed grace? Robert, I want you to think of that.

There's so much we can say. There's only one element I want to bring out in this point, and this is this. If God was to punish the fathers for their sins, then and there, let's look at the last sentence again. If God was to punish the people of Israel for what they had done at the base of the mountain, when they gave their hearts over to this golden covenant, they adulterated their hearts, they made covenant with God, they were married with Yahweh, and now they've gone and committed adultery against Yahweh, the penalty of that is death. How about the one who was promised way back in Genesis 3, verse 15?

This evil woman will trample the head of the serpent. No, no, God in all he does is gracious and is good. And what was Moses' response? Surely his response was the only fitting response when someone is made aware of the glory of God who falls on his face and washes. And then he pleads with the orphan, go in our midst, go with us.

And then he says something interesting, he says, I emphasised them when we were reading the original. When Moses mediated before the Lord back in chapter 32, when people had committed sin with a golden calf, you remember, he went before the Lord and he said, forgive, that's it. Here, the pronouns change. You see, now Moses is standing before the glory of God. God has revealed his goodness before Moses.

He's revealed his grace, his mercy, his forgiveness, his steadfast love, and Moses sees himself in light of that glory, no doubt, as he's saying. And then he uses the pronouns change. He says, forgive our iniquity. Forgive our iniquity. Take us as your inheritance.

When he comes from the bottom of the water, When he walks away from being with Yahweh for 40 days and 49 nights, no one can see him. He ain't no fugitive. Nobody can invade our border. He is completely sustained on one of his weaknesses. No other prophet has experienced what Moses experienced before him.

And when he came down from there, we're told his face was shining. He didn't know it. The people, and they were terrified. Aaron and the men were afraid to approach Moses. And there's no need for us to speculate why these approaches weren't available.

There were logical reasons to do so. But the Apostle Paul gives us the reason in 2 Corinthians 3, where he says that Moses bowed his face to prevent Israel from gazing at a fading glory of the Old Covenant. Because the Old Covenant, a covenant that means stipulations, do this and live. Obedience brings forth life. That Old Covenant is making way, it's fading and making way to a new and better covenant.

And the covenant who Moses is no longer the mediator. He was a deep reflection of God's glory. And he mediated with the old covenant for the people of Israel. But now it's Christ who is the mediator of the new covenant. He's the one who is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact, the exact, It's Christ who mediates a better, new covenant, ratified in His strict blood.

He's also the one who fulfilled all the requirements of the covenant perfectly, in perfect obedience to the law of God. His Spirit reconciles His people to God. God's glory and God's As the Apostle Paul says in 2 Corinthians 4, he says, for God, who said, let light shine out of darkness, has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Brothers and sisters, the glorious truth is that Christ is the Lord. And the glorious truth for you and I, for those who are found in him, Those who are trusting in Him, the glorious truth of the better and the new covenant is this, as Paul says earlier in that chapter, and we all with unveiled faces behold the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory is a glory that goes from glory to greater glory and is unveiled because it is truly the glory of Jesus Christ.