If you’ve been with us for a while, you may know that I was looking at the Book of Exodus and the lessons which we learned from the event of the Jews coming out of Egypt. And, in Corinthians Paul tells us that these things which happened are examples to us who have come to faith in Jesus the Messiah.
As we look at the pattern of events which took place with the Exodus, we can see that there are many things which apply to us, which connect to the New Covenant and to Yeshua Jesus as the Messiah.
Last time I spoke on this I was looking at the Ten Commandments. I want to move on now to Exodus chapter 24. So, if you have your Bibles we’re going to read Exodus chapter 24.
Let’s just have a word of prayer as we come to the Word of God. Lord, we would like to you thank you for your Word; we thank you that it is truth and pray that you bless the reading and the preaching of your Word and guide us into all truth. We pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ Yeshua Jesus the Messiah, amen.
This chapter is actually pivotal in our understanding of the Hebrew scriptures of the Tanakh, the Old Testament. It shows how God sealed the covenant with Israel through the Torah (the Law) and how this was going to be the means by which He would communicate and relate to His people in the time between Moses and the Messiah.
When the Messiah Yeshua would come in, He would bring in the New Covenant but, up until this time, God would communicate through the Covenant with Moses.
We see that this is a covenant sealed with blood, a covenant which God makes which is of great significance in our understanding of the Hebrew scriptures and indeed, of the whole of the Bible.
There are a number of significant parallels between what happens here and what happens in the giving of the New Covenant, particularly in the day of Pentecost.
Interestingly, these two events (Old and New Covenants) took place at the same time in the Hebrew calendar, on the day of Pentecost, the feast which the Jewish people hold called Shavuot which is the equivalent of Pentecost.
Now I want to make a few points on this subject if I can get through them all.
Now He said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and worship from afar. 2 And Moses alone shall come near the Lord, but they shall not come near; nor shall the people go up with him.” 3 So Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the judgments. And all the people answered with one voice and said, “All the words which the Lord has said we will do.” 4 And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord. And he rose early in the morning, and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars according to the twelve tribes of Israel. 5 Then he sent young men of the children of Israel, who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the Lord. 6 And Moses took half the blood and put it in basins, and half the blood he sprinkled on the altar. 7 Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read in the hearing of the people. And they said, “All that the Lord has said we will do, and be obedient.” 8 And Moses took the blood, sprinkled it on the people, and said, “This is the blood of the covenant which the Lord has made with you according to all these words.”
Exodus 24.1-8
First of all we see that, in this passage, Moses is the mediator. I mentioned this man, Asher Norman, who wrote the book ‘26 reasons why Jews don’t believe in Jesus‘. He said that, at this point, when the Jews come to Mount Sinai, the whole people of Israel is raised up to the level of prophecy because they hear the Word of God.
That’s not actually true. The scripture doesn’t tell you that. Scripture tells you that God separated Moses from the people of Israel to reveal the scriptures to Moses, and through Moses, then, to the people. It says that, in Exodus 20. After the giving of the Ten Commandments, in verse 18 of Exodus chapter 20 it says:
18 Now all the people witnessed the thunderings, the lightning flashes, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off. 19 Then they said to Moses, “You speak with us, and we will hear; but let not God speak with us, lest we die.” 20 And Moses said to the people, “Do not fear; for God has come to test you, and that His fear may be before you, so that you may not sin.” 21 So the people stood afar off, but Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was.
Exodus 20.18-21
We see that God separated Moses from the people, He didn’t speak directly to the people. They were afraid to hear the voice of God because they’d seen all these thunderings and lightning and they thought that if they heard the voice of God speaking directly to them, they would die.
There is this idea in the Bible that if you see God, you’re going to die. So, they have this fear of this awesome presence of God and, as you read through this passage, through Genesis and Exodus you can see that this was a visitation of God which was unparalleled.
In fact, up to this point that God actually appeared to the elders of Israel that He appeared in this smoking fire which came upon mount Sinai you can imagine it’s pretty terrifying sight God was revealing himself and relating to the people in an awesome way and the people were afraid to come into the awesome presence of God at Sinai and so God said well-done Moses is going to come in on his own and I’m going to speak to Moses and through Moses I will give the Word to the people.
Moses having got the Word would then communicate it with the people and tell them what God has told him. So, Moses was acting here as the mediator and we see in the New Testament that Jesus comes as our unique mediator.
We can’t come into the presence of God because of our sinful state. God is holy, we are not holy, therefore, we need a mediator to come between us and God. We need someone to come from God to tell us the truth about what God is like.
And Jesus, as the mediator, became man – God amongst us – and revealed God to us.
In John chapter 1 it says:
17 For the law was given through Moses, but grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. 18 No one has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him.
John 1.17-18
This is telling us why Jesus is unique. He is the only one who has come from God to declare the truth of God to us, to declare to us things which we can’t find out by our own wisdom and understanding.
That’s why the Christian faith is unique, because it is speaking about the unique revelation of God to the human race. People try and think that they can think and understand their way to God. They can’t! We can never get to God, we can only find out what God tells us when He comes down to our level and reveals Himself to us.
That was what was happening here at Sinai, what happened in the person of Jesus coming.
We need a mediator, we need Him to mediate God’s grace and truth to us.
In Deuteronomy chapter 18, we’re told that there will be a prophet like unto Moses, Him you shall hear. And the prophet like unto Moses is fulfilled in Jesus the Messiah who comes as the one who’s going to speak God’s Word. He’s not just a prophet but He is a prophet. The prophet is the one who brings God’s Word to to human beings, so, He mediates God’s Word to us.
Jesus uniquely came as the prophet like unto Moses to bring the Word of God to us. The Book of Hebrews chapter 3 verse 3 says that Moses was a servant in the house so he has great honour but Jesus is the maker of the house, He’s the builder of the house so he has greater honour.
3 For this One has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as He who built the house has more honour than the house.
Hebrews 3.3
Jesus is actually the creator of the whole universe, He was there at the beginning of creation and so He has the ability to come to us from God to reveal the truth of God to us.
And the first lesson which we see from this passage in Exodus 24 which ties in with the New Testament is that God requires a mediator between Himself and sinful humanity. In this case, it was Moses; in our case it is Jesus who comes to bring in the New Testament.