Tag: Understanding the Old Testament

Digging in Deeper: Exodus 24:12-18

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“The Lord said to Moses, ‘Come up to me on the mountain and stay there so that I may give you the stone tablets with the law and commandments I have written for their instruction.’ So Moses arose with his assistant Joshua and went up the mountain of God. He told the elders, ‘Wait here for us until we return to you. Aaron and Hur are here with you. Whoever has a dispute should go to them.’ When Moses went up the mountain, the cloud covered it. The glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days. On the seventh day he called to Moses from the cloud. The appearance of the Lord’s glory to the Israelites was like a consuming fire on the mountaintop. Moses entered the cloud as he went up the mountain, and he remained on the mountain forty days and forty nights.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

We live in an instant society. We are so used to getting just about everything immediately now, that the idea of waiting for something for just about any length of time is wildly unappealing to us. And yet, things that happen instantly are rarely as good as those which take a little longer to develop. This is the case with all sorts of different things in life. As much as we want to hurry up, so often we have to wait. When God called Moses to Himself to give him the covenant laws for the people, it didn’t happen overnight. In fact, it took a pretty long time. Now that the covenant is in place, let’s take a look at Moses’ going to receive it and the events surrounding his departure.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 24:9-11

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“Then Moses went up with Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy of israel’s elders, and they saw the God of Israel. Beneath his feet was something like a pavement made of lapis lazuli, as clear as the sky itself. God did not harm the Israelite nobles; they saw him, and they ate and drank.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Starting out something new with God feels good. It’s exciting. We pour ourselves into it and into Him. Everything is going just as it’s supposed to go. Now, this doesn’t mean everything is going to stay that way. But getting off on the right foot is better than getting off on the wrong one. This next passage is unexpected and, honestly, kind of weird. But it’s pretty important. Let’s talk about why and what’s going on here.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 24:3-8

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“Moses came and told the people all the commands of the Lord and all the ordinances. Then all the people responded with a single voice, ‘We will do everything that the Lord has commanded.’ And Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord. He rose early the next morning and set up an altar and twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel at the base of the mountain. Then he sent out young Israelite men, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed bulls as fellowship offerings to the Lord. Moses took half the blood and set it in basins; the other half of the blood he splattered on the altar. He then took the covenant scroll and read it aloud to the people. They responded, ‘We will do and obey all that the Lord has commanded.’ Moses took the blood, splattered it on the people, and said, ‘This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you concerning all these words.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the things I always talk about with couples when doing their premarital counseling is that marriage is supposed to be a covenant, not a contract. We don’t distinguish very well between those two ideas today, and often think about marriage in contract terms rather than covenantal ones much to the detriment of our marriage relationships. In the ancient world, people were more accustomed to the idea of covenants and better understood just how serious they really were. After having heard the basic contours of the covenant God wanted to make with them, the people agreed to His terms and went forward with the covenant. Let’s take a look here at part of how this process unfolded.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 24:1-2

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“Then he said to Moses, ‘Go up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of Israel’s elders, and bow in worship at a distance. Moses alone is to approach the Lord, but the others are not to approach, and the people are not to go up with him.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Everything has to start somewhere. The nation of Israel as we know it throughout the rest of the Old Testament period and to at least some extent on through to today started with the events of this chapter. What we will look at over the next few posts is the covenant ceremony in which God made things official with the people. It’s an interesting affair, to say the least. Right here at the start, though, something caught my attention that doesn’t have anything to do with the rest of the chapter. As we prepare to talk about God’s officially bringing the people of Israel into a new covenant relationship with Him, let’s talk for just a minute about human leadership and failure.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 23:32-33

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“You must not make a covenant with them or their gods. They must not remain in your land, or else they will make you sin against me. If you serve their gods, it will be a snare for you.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the best and most memorable ideas about friendship I’ve ever heard is that our friends determine the direction and quality of our lives. If we spend all our time with people who discourage us and point us in the wrong direction, our lives will soon show the evidence of this and it won’t be good. Thankfully, the opposite is true as well. As God was preparing the people for the journey that lay ahead of them, He wanted them to know that this same basic idea applied to them too. Let’s talk about what’s going on here and what we should make of it.

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