“Being God’s People” (Exodus 19:1-25; 20:18-21) | 5/7/23
Exodus 19:1-25; 20:18-21 | 5/7/23 | Will DuVal
One of my formative memories as a kid was getting grounded by my father in 7th grade for receiving my first ever “B” on a report card. I was outside shooting hoops when he called me upstairs and asked, “What is this?”
I looked at the piece of paper in his hand and - not yet picking up on the anger in his tone - I sarcastically answered, “It looks to me like a report card.”
He said, “Okay, smart ass… but what is THIS?”, and he pointed more specifically at the letter beside “Mrs. Moss’s Biology class”.
I said, more timidly this time, “Well, I got a “B” in Biology”.
And I’ll never forget his reply; he said, “We don’t GET “B”s, in this family.”
And he took my ball, and handed me a vacuum.
That incident confirmed for me what I already knew to be true: to be a DuVal, was to be DRIVEN. Emulous. Competitive.
How about YOU? What did it mean to be a part of YOUR family, growing up? To be a ______, a ______, a ______?
Every family has an identity:
Being a KENNEDY means being powerful.
Being a KARDASHIAN means being spoiled.
Being a VON TRAPP means being musical.
Being an ADDAMS means being spooky.
Being a SIMPSON means being cynical.
Being an INCREDIBLE means being… INCREDIBLE!
Every family has an identity. And this morning, we’re going to discover what it means to be part of GOD’S family… what it means to be God’s PEOPLE.
As we’ve seen throughout our Exodus series, the Israelites were God’s OT people. In one sense, they were already His people: back in ch3, God had announced, “I have seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt”. But in another important sense, it’s not until AFTER God has delivered them that the Israelites truly BECOME God’s people. After all, as we’ll see today, part of what it means to be God’s people is to be FREE!
Hence, God’s promise to Israel, back in ch6: “I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and… I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God” (vv6-7).
And in Exodus ch19, this morning, God is gonna make GOOD on that promise. This is one of the most important chapters in all of the OT, in all of Israel’s history, AS a people; it’s essentially their ADOPTION ceremony, God “TAKING” Israel to be His people, His COVENANTING to them, to “be [their] God”.
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And in doing so, God teaches Israel - and He teaches US: because EACH of these family identity markers applies EQUALLY to us TODAY, as God’s NEW Testament, NEW covenant people: the CHURCH; for all who have truly been born again INTO God’s family by grace thru faith in Christ, God wants us to understand that it MEANS something to be a part of His family. So what DOES it mean? 5 things. 5 family traits.
But first, let’s read it together; would you STAND… Exodus 19, and then we’re actually gonna skip ahead to ch20, and read vv18-21, which sort of bookend this passage; in BETWEEN, in the FIRST half of ch20, which we’ll cover next Sunday and the following week, God will give them His LAW, the 10 Commandments; MASSIVELY important passages of Scripture, these next 3 weeks. But it starts here with ch19; hear the word of the Lord:
“On the third new moon after the people of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. 2 They set out from Rephidim and came into the wilderness of Sinai, and they encamped in the wilderness. There Israel encamped before the mountain, 3 while Moses went up to God. The Lord called to him out of the mountain, saying, “Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: 4 ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles' wings and brought you to myself. 5 Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.”
7 So Moses came and called the elders of the people and set before them all these words that the Lord had commanded him. 8 All the people answered together and said, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do.” And Moses reported the words of the people to the Lord. 9 And the Lord said to Moses, “Behold, I am coming to you in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with you, and may also believe you forever.”
When Moses told the words of the people to the Lord, 10 the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their garments 11 and be ready for the third day. For on the third day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. 12 And you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death. 13 No hand shall touch him, but he shall be stoned or shot; whether beast or man, he shall not live.’ When the trumpet sounds a long blast, they shall come up to the mountain.” 14 So Moses went down from the mountain to the people and consecrated the people; and they washed their garments. 15 And he said to the people, “Be ready for the third day; do not go near a woman.”
16 On the morning of the third day there were thunders and lightnings and a thick cloud on the mountain and a very loud trumpet blast, so that all the people in the camp trembled. 17 Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God, and they took their stand at the foot of the mountain. 18 Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke because the Lord had descended on it in fire. The smoke of it went up like the smoke of a kiln, and the whole mountain trembled greatly. 19 And as the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in thunder. 20 The Lord came down on Mount Sinai, to the top of the mountain. And the Lord called Moses to the top of the mountain, and Moses went up.
21 And the Lord said to Moses, “Go down and warn the people, lest they break through to the Lord to look and many of them perish. 22 Also let the priests who come near to the Lord consecrate themselves, lest the Lord break out against them.” 23 And Moses said to the Lord, “The people cannot come up to Mount Sinai, for you yourself warned us, saying, ‘Set limits around the mountain and consecrate it.’” 24 And the Lord said to him, “Go down, and come up bringing Aaron with you. But do not let the priests and the people break through to come up to the Lord, lest he break out against them.” 25 So Moses went down to the people and told them… [skip… 10 Commandments…]
[ch20, v18:] Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off 19 and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not fear, for God has come to test you, that the fear of him may be before you, that you may not sin.” 21 The people stood far off, while Moses drew near to the thick darkness where God was.” This is the word of God…
5 things we learn here, at Israel’s adoption ceremony, about what it means to be God’s people:
#1- Being God’s people means we TRUST God, because He is [our] SAVIOR. (19:1-4)
We’ve reiterated this point like every single week since ch14 when God decisively delivered Israel from Egypt through the Red Sea, but it’s SO important, it bears repeating again:
God DOES NOT SAVE us because we are so good at SERVING Him;
No: We SERVE God because He has already SAVED us.
Did you GET that? Getting the order of events STRAIGHT here is SO vitally crucial; it’s what makes Christianity different from every other religion on the planet: the LAW comes AFTER Israel’s redemption.
God didn’t say to them: “Prove to me that you DESERVE being saved… here’s a to-do list and a NOT-to-do list, and if you check enough of the boxes, then we can talk about a rescue plan…” NO! While the Israelites were still fearing and doubting and second-guessing and blaming Moses back in Egypt, God said, “Not because of YOUR faithfulness to ME, but because of MY faithfulness to YOU, I am taking action to REDEEM you!”
I am “[bearing] you up on eagles' wings and [bringing] you to myself.”
The word picture there is perfect. When a baby eagle is ready to leave the nest, it is understandably nervous, but the mother eagle knows there’s only one way to develop those wings. So she PUSHES it out of the nest. But THEN, when inevitably, that first time or two, the baby eagle can’t flap hard enough to stay afloat, mom will SWOOP down before the chick hits the ground and CATCH him… on her BACK. Now, from my admittedly limited bird knowledge, that is apparently somewhat unique to eagles; when other birds teach their young to fly, they grab the chicks in their talons or beaks. But the EAGLE makes her chicks grab on to HER back: “If you can’t fly on your own, then you’d better cling to mom for dear life - TRUST her!
God was teaching Israel to “fly”, to live freely as sons, not as slaves. But they were so scared, God had to send Pharaoh chasing after them to push them out of the nest. And less than a chapter after leaving Egypt, Israel was already doubting and grumbling again - “We’re gonna STARVE, we’re gonna die of THIRST, out here in the desert” - their wings are still weak. Nevertheless, God swooped in and saved them AGAIN, but He DOES so by showing Israel their utter DEPENDENCY on Him; “TRUST me, CLING to me.”
God is once again TESTING the Israelites here: “Do you trust me? Will you follow my lead? EVEN if it means I’m leading you deeper into the wilderness, all the way to Mt. Sinai. Check out the MAP. Now, we don’t know exactly where the Israelites crossed the Red Sea. We also don’t know exactly where Mt. Sinai is located, but MOST scholars identify it with Jebel Musa, lit. the “mountain of Moses”, located all the way at the southernmost tip of the Sinai Peninsula. IF they’re right, consider the ROUTE God was taking them on - they’re traveling HUNDREDS of miles through the desert in the WRONG direction (...SOUTH)!
Why? To TEST their TRUST in Him. And not just TEST it, but to GROW it. To BUILD their faith in Him. It’s the same reason God leads you and ME into and through seasons of wilderness still today. And since that was such a recurring theme of the last TWO sermons, in chs15-18, I think I’ll simply leave our application of point #1 here at that; with the encouraging reminder that because of God’s proven faithfulness as your SAVIOR, you really can TRUST His guidance, His provision, His protection, trust God’s PLAN… no matter WHAT.
#2- Being God’s people means We OBEY God, because He is LORD. (19:5-8) Not only is God our merciful SAVIOR; He is also our authoritative LORD, our master, our RULER.
In v5, God commands Israel to “obey my voice and keep my covenant”.
Now, it’s hard to overstate to significance of God’s words here, and especially his invoking of the COVENANT. A covenant is essentially just a PROMISE; a formal, binding promise. And God had initially made His covenant promise, to a man named Abram, back in Genesis ch12: “Go… to the land that I will show you. 2 And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing… in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”” (vv2-3) That was the Abrahamic covenant: God promised Abraham LAND, OFFSPRING, and BLESSING - “LOB”, if you find acronyms helpful.
Now, 645 years later, God RENEWS that covenant - He doesn’t UN-do it; He RE-news His promise - to Moses; we call this the MOSAIC covenant.
It helps me to think about God’s covenantal relationship with His people in terms of a parent’s relationship to his child as that child develops.
GOD doesn’t change. And God’s PROMISE of fatherly LOVE toward Israel didn’t change over time either. But what His love LOOKED like changed… because the RELATIONSHIP changed… because ISRAEL changed.
What my 5-month old son - BO - needs from me… is DIFFERENT from what my 3-year old son - ELIJAH - needs from me… is DIFFERENT from what my 7-year old daughter - ELLERY - needs from me… is DIFFERENT from what ANY of them will need when they’re TEENAGERS. My LOVE won’t change, but the way I EXPRESS that love will change, because our RELATIONSHIP will change, as THEY change over time.
Israel’s not a BABY anymore. It’s time for them to GROW UP a little. And as we’ve already noted, nothing grows you up quite like SUFFERING. 400 years in Egypt will grow you UP! So it’s time for a covenant UPDATE.
And perhaps the most SIGNIFICANT difference to note here, is that while the Abrahamic covenant was unconditional - God’s gonna give Abraham land, offspring, and blessing no matter WHAT - the MOSAIC covenant, now, is CONDITIONAL; v5: “IF you obey my voice,” THEN I’ll bless you… IF! There’s so much riding on those two little letters now! And as we’re gonna see in the months and years and chapters and BOOKS of the Bible yet to come, that is one GIANT “IF”!
But it’s totally appropriate. It would be IN-appropriate for me to tell BO “If you clean your room, then you can have a snack.” Bo’s snacks are unconditional - he gets them whenever he wants; all he’s gotta do is ask, CRY, and it’s “Milk on demand”, just for being our son… our 5-month OLD son. But ELIJAH’s snacks are becoming more and more conditional: “If you clean your room…”, well, at least pick up your toys. Now, ELLERY can pretty much clean her own room at this point - make her bed, dust, vacuum… She’s operating under the DAVIDIC covenant (but we won’t get there for another 430 years).
But HERE, in Exodus 19, with the Mosaic covenant, God RAISES the bar. You EXPECT more out of your toddler, than your newborn. God now EXPECTS Israel’s OBEDIENCE. He DEMANDS it, because He DESERVES it. God COMMANDS their obedience, because He IS their Sovereign LORD, their KING.
God makes King Charles look like the JOKE that he is. MILLIONS of people tuned in yesterday to watch Charles the Third get crowned “KING”. Today, if King Charles tried to command Joe Brit to “jump”, they’d just laugh in his FACE. Because his role is just SYMBOLIC. He’s got no real power.
Now, if King Charles the FIRST - 400 years ago - said, “JUMP,” then you better say, “How high?!” Cuz it used to MEAN something to be king.
Listen: when the ALL-mighty God of the Universe says, “Jump”... when He says, “Obey my voice… Keep my covenant…”, you better listen UP! Shape up! Fall in line! And we’ll get to the “OR ELSE” part later; look: it took the Israelites “3 moons” - 3 months - to get from Egypt to Sinai here, in these last 5 chapters we’ve covered. But now the story almost grinds to a halt, and they’re gonna camp out at Mt. Sinai for 11 ½ months - the next 59 chapters of the Bible - the rest of Exodus, ALL of Leviticus… it’s not until Numbers ch10 that Israel finally leaves Sinai and starts heading north for Canaan. But God devotes SO much precious biblical real estate to His LAW here because He wants US to “camp out” here with it, because it’s THAT important. When God says, “Thou shall” or “Thou shalt NOT”, it’s IMPORTANT.
But let’s QUICKLY look at God’s actual covenant with Moses here; we could spend all MORNING on vv1-6, but we need to move on. If God promised Abraham “LOB” (Land, Offspring & Blessing), He promises Moses that He’s gonna make Israel “SAC” -
SAC: God promises to make Israel SPECIAL, AMBASSADORS, and CONSECRATED.
“IF you will obey me”, God says, then FIRST of all, you’ll be SPECIAL, “my treasured possession among all peoples”. Sure, “all the EARTH is mine”; I own it ALL. But Israel: you’re gonna be SPECIAL. “My treasured possession”. If your house was burning down, and you only had time to save ONE THING, what would you save? That’s your “treasured possession”. God says: “Israel - you’re IT! I’m saving YOU!”
Second, He says, “I’ll make you my AMBASSADORS”, “a kingdom of priests”. It’s an interesting Hebrew phrase; this is the only place it’s used in all of the OT. But the best way to understand it is that God is bestowing upon Israel here the HONOR of being his ambassadors to all the other nations, his earthly representatives. That’s essentially what priests DID. Later in the Law, God will lay out His job description for the priests, but it was basically two-fold: represent God to the people, and represent the people to God. (Keep that in mind, because it’s a vocation we’ll RETURN to in point #5, in closing.)
But third, “I’ll make you SPECIAL, I’ll make you AMBASSADORS, and I’ll make you CONSECRATED.” God declares, “you shall be to me… a holy nation”. “I will MAKE you holy - sacred - by “consecrating” you, by “setting you apart” for my own good purpose and pleasure.
This is what it means to be God’s people: to the extent that Israel willingly - JOYFULLY! - submitted to Yahweh as Lord, in humble OBEDIENCE, He chose them and USED them as His special, consecrated ambassadors.
And He does the same with us too, by the way, Church; His new covenant people. 1 Peter 2:9 reads almost like a direct quote of Exodus 19:6 - “you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” That is who God has now made US, in Christ - same promises: “a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his treasured possession,” - and WHY He DID it: that we might “proclaim [His] excellencies”, shout it from the rooftops, be His ambassadors, His witnesses, to the ends of the earth.
#3 - Being God’s people means We BEHOLD God, because He is REVELATORY. (19:9-11)
In v9, God says to Moses, “Behold, I am coming to you in a thick cloud”; to “behold” means to “WATCH OUT”, to “look” or “observe”.
God continues on; he says, “Moses, I’m coming to you ‘that the people may hear when I speak with you, and may also believe you forever’”. See, God knew how fickle the Israelites were. He had saved them in ch14, and at first they PRAISED him for it; but that lasted all of 21 verses in ch15 and before the CHAPTER was even over, they had gotten thirsty and hungry and were BEGGING to go back to Egypt! So here in ch19 when God prepares them to receive His LAW, and the people respond in v8 AS THEY SHOULD - “All that the Lord has spoken we will do” - God knows their hearts might be in the right place NOW, but just GIVE them 40 days and before Moses is even off the MOUNTAIN, before God’s even done DELIVERING His Law, writing it DOWN for them, His people are gonna be down below building a Golden CALF to worship instead.
So God knows the Israelites need to HEAR Him SPEAK to Moses, deliver His Law. Otherwise, they’ll be tempted to DOUBT when the Law becomes too much of an imposition. “Did God REALLY say not to work on the Sabbath? But I have GOT to finish planting these crops before we leave town tomorrow; Moses, are you sure you didn’t just make that one UP??” NO, God says, they need to BEHOLD - hear it, SEE it, for themselves. V11: “on the third day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.” They say “seeing is believing”, and boy, is God about to put on a show!
But before we even get there, we need to just pause and take a minute to appreciate the fact that our God is a REVELATORY God. MOSES sure appreciated it; later, he marveled in Deuteronomy 4: “ask from one end of heaven to the other, whether such a great thing as this has ever happened or was ever heard of. 33 Did any people ever hear the voice of a god speaking out of the midst of the fire, as you have heard”, Israel?!” (vv32-33) It’s AMAZING!
God didn’t HAVE to reveal Himself to us.
He didn’t have to make it so OBVIOUS to us in Creation that He is the Creator, leaving everyone without excuse for their unbelief (Rom 1:19).
God didn’t have to reveal himself time and time again throughout the Old Testament to people personally, visibly - Adam, Cain, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses… all the prophets - they SAW God, they HEARD His literal voice; God was constantly reaching out to people.
And when they ignored His voice, rejected His warnings, God didn’t have to send His own SON, JESUS, to reveal Himself to us in the fullest, most perfect way possible - Immanuel, God HIMSELF, with us in the flesh.
And when we rejected even JESUS, and crucified Him, God didn’t have to reveal His power and love by raising Jesus from the dead for our sake, and God didn’t have ensure that ALL of it - all of redemptive history - was perfectly preserved in his WRITTEN self-revelation to us, the infallible, God-breathed Scriptures.
And God doesn’t have to CONTINUE speaking to us today through His very own Spirit, “convicting us of sin”, “guiding us into all truth”...
Friends: God didn’t have to do ANY of this, reveal Himself to us AT ALL. But He DID it cuz He LOVES us. And He wants a RELATIONSHIP with us. To know and BE known BY us. May we never cease to be ASTOUNDED by that - “who am I, that the eternal, all-powerful, all-holy, all-glorious God is even MINDFUL of me… much less, that He LOVES me!?” And IN love, that He would REVEAL Himself to me.
May we never take it for granted.
May our Bibles not collect dust on the shelves.
May those “boring” books of the OT not go unread - “ALL Scripture is God-breathed”.
May God’s “still-small voice”, His SPIRIT, not go un-HEARD; may we spend time - MAKE time; carve out time - in our busy days, for PRAYER; not just to SPEAK to God, but to LISTEN for Him. “Call to me and I WILL answer you”, He promised (Jer 33:3), but we have to LISTEN.
If we truly believe that Almighty God has graciously revealed Himself, we WILL take time to BEHOLD Him.
#4- Being God’s people means We FEAR God, because He is HOLY. (19:12-25) YES, we trust God because He is faithful. YES, we worship God because He is GLORIOUS. But part of what it means to be God’s people is that we approach Him with the appropriate fear and reverence and AWE that is due His HOLY name.
Psalm 33:8 urges: “Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him!”
Deuteronomy 10:12 summarizes that this is the heart of all the LAW: “what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God”
You remember from our study of Ecclesiastes last fall: everything under the sun is HEVEL - it’s fleeting, meaningless - except for what?? What was Solomon’s conclusion after 12 chapters of searching everywhere for something of lasting SIGNIFICANCE? “The end of the matter; all has been heard: Fear God…” (12:13)
According to the Book of Proverbs, the fear of the Lord is “the beginning of wisdom” (9:10), “a fountain of life” (14:27).
Psalm 25:14 promises that “The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him”... Luke 1:50 warns that “[God’s] mercy is [only] for those who fear him”
Jesus HIMSELF cautioned: “do not fear those who can kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” (Matt 10:28) Who’s that? That’s GOD! According to Jesus, We should be AFRAID of Hell, and therefore, we should be afraid of the ONLY person who can SEND us there… GOD!
And I think that’s exactly what God was trying to GIVE the Israelites here in vv12-25 with the “thunder and lightning”, the “clouds and trumpets”, the “smoke and fire”, the “whole mountain SHAKING” - God was instilling in His people BOTH a proper FEAR and AWE of His HOLINESS and POWER, but ALSO a proper fear and TERROR, therefore, of the CONSEQUENCES of violating God’s holiness by IGNORING His Law. Commentators point out the similarities between the language and imagery we get here, and the picture painted for us in the Book of REVELATION about God’s coming JUDGMENT in the end times, with “thunder and lightning”, “clouds and trumpets”, “smoke and fire”, “whole mountains SHAKING”, being thrown into the SEA - Sinai is meant to instill a proper fear of the Lord in us by giving us a glimpse of the judgment COMING for those who do NOT fear the Lord.
HENCE, all the warnings here for Israel to stay AWAY! V12: “you shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Take care not to go up into the mountain or touch [even] the edge of it. Whoever touches the mountain shall be put to death.” Why? Because God is THAT Holy! So holy that merely entering into His PRESENCE, in our sinful state, poses an existential THREAT to us. Later, in ch33, Moses is gonna ask to see God’s FACE, and God has to graciously decline, informing Moses that “man can not see me and LIVE”! Just ask Nadab and Abihu, the profane priests who casually approached God in Leviticus 10 without taking the proper precautions - that’s why God instructs Moses to “consecrate the people” here (v10), commands them to “wash their garments” (v10), refrain from having sex (v15) - it’s all about ritual PURITY, God’s symbolic, visual reminders to His people of their calling to holiness, and yet, a reminder of their spiritual impurity as a result of their SIN. And the existential THREAT it poses when we’re in God’s holy presence; just ask UZZAH, who thought He was showing God RESPECT in 1 Chronicles 13:10 when the oxen carrying the Ark of the Covenant, God’s temporary mobile home, that God will instruct Israel to BUILD Him later in Exodus - the oxen stumble, and the Ark starts to fall off the cart, and Uzzah - being the nice, respectful guy he was - just tried to steady the Ark, but God struck him DEAD, because just like Mt. Sinai, God had warned His people not to TOUCH the Ark, because God’s just TOO holy and we’re just TOO sinful, and the problem facing UZZAH was the same problem facing you and me today, friends: God doesn’t COMMAND us to be “nice, respectful” people; He has called us to “be HOLY, as I am HOLY”. Jesus said if you want to get into heaven on your OWN merit, “You must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Mt 5:48) THAT’s the bar: perfection, holiness. Otherwise, you better steer clear of God… for your OWN safety!
That’s why God’s got poor Moses - poor 80-year old Moses - hiking up and down the mountain THREE TIMES here - v3: he goes up; v7 he comes down; v8: he goes up; v14 he comes down; v20: he goes up; v25 he comes back down - Jebel Musa is 7,363 ft high, Moses is 80 years old! It’s almost COMICAL. Except it’s NOT. Because the point is: God is SO holy, we are SO sinful, and the DISPARITY there - the GAP between us and God - is SO great, and so DANGEROUS to sinners like us, that Moses: the people need DAILY reminders, WARNINGS - Moses FINALLY gets all the way to the top of the mountain in v20, and by the time he MAKES it there, immediately in v21, God says, “Sorry, Moses; time to head back down and warn them AGAIN - lest I break out against them,” in my HOLINESS.
Which makes you wonder how MOSES could step foot on the mountain, doesn’t it? After all, Psalm 24:3-4 asks, “Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord?
And who shall stand in his holy place? [Only] He who has clean hands and a pure heart”. In the NT, Hebrews 12:14 declares that “without [holiness] no one will see the Lord.” Was Moses “clean”, “pure”, perfectly HOLY?
No, Romans 3 reminds us that “NO ONE is righteous,” not even Moses. God let Moses on the mountain not because he was perfect, but because he PREFIGURED One who WOULD be. See friends, you and I need something better than consecration; we need so much more than just a change of clothes and a 3-day fast - we need that just to get NEAR the mountain. But to get ON the mountain? To ASCEND the hill of the Lord? We need a MEDIATOR.
#5 - We NEED Jesus, because He IS OUR MEDIATOR. (20:18-21) HE is our intercessor, our intermediary, our go-between, the one who bridges that infinite spiritual gap between a holy God and sinful US - only the infinitely HOLY Son of GOD could do that.
Philip Ryken points out (679): “One of the first things people do when they get into trouble with the law is hire a lawyer. That’s exactly what the Israelites [do here]… As soon as they heard the demands of God’s law, they asked Moses to be their legal advocate, their MEDIATOR.” They were CONFIDENT back in ch19: ““All that the Lord has spoken we will do.” But then the Lord SPOKE, in ch20, and Israel HEARD the 10 Commandments, and they TREMBLED. That’s PART of the reason they were so scared: it wasn’t just the shaking mountain, it was the demands of the Law ITSELF. The Israelites had to realize they could NEVER measure up, on their own merit. Charles Spurgeon exposited of Exodus 19 (in Ryken, 679): “[All] this terrible grandeur suggested to the people the condemning force of the law. Not with sweet sound of harp [and] angels was the law given… [But with THUNDER and TERROR.] By reason of man’s sinfulness, the law worketh WRATH; and to indicate this, it was made public with accompaniments of fear and DEATH.” As the apostle Paul simply pointed out: the law brings DEATH (2 Cor 3:6). God’s Law is GLORIOUS. But it brings DEATH cuz we don’t FOLLOW it. We need so much MORE than the Law, than consecration, than the Mosaic covenant, than the blood of bulls and goats; friends: we need JESUS.
And praise God, we HAVE Him. Or at least, we CAN. I want to end with Hebrews 12:18-24, and the New Testament’s juxtaposition of this scene from Exodus 19 at Mt. Sinai with OUR situation today, and Mt. Zion; this is GLORIOUS. It says: “you have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire and darkness and gloom and a tempest 19 and the sound of a trumpet and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that no further messages be spoken to them. 20 For they could not endure the order that was given, “If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned.” 21 Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, “I tremble with fear.” 22 But you have come [CHURCH] to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly[a] of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant” → Ryken explains (519): “The contrast here is absolute. It is the contrast between the law and the gospel, between Mount Sinai and Mount Zion. One mountain was dark and stormy; the other is a city of bright and shining joy. One mountain was a place of fear and danger; the other is a place of peace and safety… One mountain was designed to keep people AWAY; the other was designed to draw them CLOSE.”
So Tim Chester asks (157): “What makes the difference? God has not changed (he’s still referred to in the NT, right there in the same chapter, Hebrews 12 as “a consuming fire”). And People have not changed (we’re still “wicked; none is righteous” (Rom 3)). What has changed is the MEDIATOR.”
Jesus is the BETTER Moses, the better mediator, of a better covenant.
1 Tim 2:5 “there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”.
CONCLUSION:
Is he YOUR mediator? YOUR defense attorney?