“Moses responded to the Lord, ‘The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, since you warned us: Put a boundary around the mountain and consecrate it.’ And the Lord replied to him, ‘Go down and come back with Aaron. But the priests and the people must not break through to come up to the Lord, or he will break out in anger against them.’ So Moses went down to the people and told them.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Sometimes as a parent you have to repeat yourself to your kids. I know there are experts who insist otherwise, but some things are important enough you have to say them more than once because you know they’re not going to be fully or properly understood the first time. As we come to the end of chapter 19 here, Moses doesn’t understand why God is so worried about the people’s coming up the mountain. God knows the people better than Moses does. Let’s talk about what’s going on here and reflect again with gratitude on Jesus.

If you think about it, this chapter ends in a really odd place. Let’s remind ourselves again where we are. The Israelites have left Egypt under the God-directed leadership of Moses. They have traveled three months through the desert wilderness of Arabia to the base of Mount Sinai. Along the way, they have experienced God’s miraculous intervention for their salvation over and over again. After all of this, God comes to the people through Moses and invites them into an official relationship with Him. This whole chapter has been about getting the people ready for this invitation into a covenant with God.

If you or I were writing this story, we would almost certainly have included some kind of a grand build-up to God’s delivering the Ten Commandments which serves as the foundation of the covenant relationship He was inviting them into. And, we get a little bit of that here when after the people had prepared themselves for three days, God’s presence descends on the mountain with quite a show of His power and might. But if we were writing the story, the giving of the Commandments would have followed immediately after that show. Instead, what we get is God’s calling Moses up on the mountain to reiterate just how important it was that the people did not try to enter into His presence and Moses’ arguing with Him about it a bit.

Yesterday we saw the first part of this scene unfold. God had come down in a big show, called Moses up, and gave him the instructions for the people. Those instructions were basically a repetition of the instructions God had already given him…which he had led the people in following to a T. So, why was God repeating Himself to them? Moses’ response, then, really should not surprise us. “The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, since you warned up: Put a boundary around the mountain and consecrate it.” In other words, “You already told us this, and we did it. What are you so worried about?”

Now, on the one hand, this kind of a response from Moses shouldn’t really surprise us. He’s been willing to speak his mind with God since the very beginning. Why would that be any different here. On the other hand, the fact that he would be so forthright with God in not necessarily agreeing with what He was telling him to do right after the display of power God had just made does make you wonder a bit if Moses knew he was swimming in waters that were awfully deep for him. And yet, I can’t help but lean back into that first thing. This kind of intimacy in a relationship with God is something we should desire. Moses trusted God absolutely. He trusted in His character. His posture was ultimately going to be one of obedience and God knew that. As a result, Moses could be honest about what he was thinking even when he didn’t agree with Him.

As much as God knew Moses’ heart at this point, He also knew where the rest of the people were. He knew that part of what Moses was reacting to was having to do all of what God was commanding him alone. Moses struggled with insecurity. He had since the first time God called him. As a result, God told him he could bring Aaron up with him when he came back to receive the Law, but no one else. And he had to make doubly sure the people weren’t going to try to follow him.

At first glance, this seems kind of hard of God. “Don’t let those people anywhere near me.” But God knew what He was doing. He was being gracious and compassionate and loving here just as He always was and is. He knew His character of holiness. And even though He had just put the fear of…Himself…in them, He knew that wasn’t going to be enough to convince some of them of the importance of taking Him seriously. He was coming down closer and more personally than they had yet experienced Him. To approach Him at this point would not have been an act of great devotion on their part, it would have been an act of pride. That kind of a sinful heart wandering into His presence was going to be snuffed out quickly simply by the aura of His holiness. He didn’t want that for them.

Furthermore, God knew the hearts of the people. He knew they were fickle and untrusting. They didn’t really grasp who He was. He knew that the events of chapter 32 were coming, when the people complained to Aaron that Moses was taking too long and they wanted to follow someone else resulting in the construction of the golden calf. As faithful as Moses may have been, the people were not. So, He repeated Himself to Moses again, even over Moses’ hurt and lack of understanding. So, Moses played go-between yet again. He went back down the mountain…yet again…and told the people what God had to say. Then he went back up. Again.

This whole episode is a reminder for us of two things. Number one, God was gracious and patient with the people of Israel far beyond what they deserved. He took them as they were and worked with them from there. If their heart was inclined to obey Him, He was willing to give them a ton of leeway to wrestle with the instructions He gave them. Moses’ was so he got a lot of latitude. The people’s were not and so they got a lot of guardrails. This character on His part has not changed. He is still willing to take us where and as we are and work with us from there. When we are inclined toward obedience – and He knows that better even than we do – He will give us quite a lot of room to struggle with what He is calling us to do. If we are not, He will be pretty limited in what He does with and through us while He continues to patiently grow us in our faith.

Number two, we should be really glad for Jesus. Because of Jesus, we don’t have to worry about so much of what the people of Israel had to go through. Because of the Holy Spirit, God does work in our hearts to make us clean and able to stand before Him in ways the people of Israel could never experience. Jesus allows us to get to God simply and humbly by going through Him. We don’t need any other rituals or sacrifices. We don’t need to worry about putting boundaries in place and not crossing them. Through Jesus, we can get to God. It’s that simple.

Starting tomorrow we are going to begin working through the Ten Commandments themselves. It’s going to take us a couple of weeks to get through all of them. As we go, we’ll need to remember that they aren’t commands for us like they were commands for Israel. We have a new covenant with a new law. But they will reveal aspects of God’s character for us that haven’t changed. And even as we have seen again and again through chapter 19, they are a reminder of just how good we have it now in Jesus. If you aren’t in a relationship with Him, now would be a great time to start.