With or Without God - Exodus 33:1-11

Exodus 33:1–11 ESV

1 The Lord said to Moses, “Depart; go up from here, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give it.’ 2 I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 3 Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.” 4 When the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned, and no one put on his ornaments. 5 For the Lord had said to Moses, “Say to the people of Israel, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.’ ” 6 Therefore the people of Israel stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward. 7 Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp. 8 Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise up, and each would stand at his tent door, and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent. 9 When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses. 10 And when all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise up and worship, each at his tent door. 11 Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses turned again into the camp, his assistant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.

Introduction

Golden calf at the end of 32

Exodus 32:34 “Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them.””

How will God respond?

Good News - The Land (1-3a)

The purpose of the Exodus:

Exodus 3:8 “and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.”

Faithfulness to the covenant

Genesis 12:7 “Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built there an altar to the Lord, who had appeared to him.”

Everything was going to work out - even after their sin.

They would still receive and possess the land.

Bad News - God will not go among them (3-5)

God has progressively drawn closer and closer to them

He intended to dwell among them

They are His people and He is their God

Golden Calf - Bring God closer

Ryken,

Exodus—Saved for God's Glory God Cancels His Trip

This is what happens when we worship other gods, especially gods that we can see and touch. Rather than bringing us closer to God, our idols take us farther away

God will not go with them

“With you” is literally “in your midst” (3)

This is what they have longed for.

Distancing language

The people (1)

That Moses brought out

An angel rather than my angel (2)

Tent of Meeting is moved outside the camp

God is still speaking with Moses, but it is nowhere near the people.

For their own protection

God’s holiness and righteous judgment make it too dangerous for Him to be with a stiff-necked rebellious people.

Acts 7:51 “You stiff-necked people, uncircumcised in heart and ears, you always resist the Holy Spirit. As your fathers did, so do you.”

No Tabernacle?

Exodus 25:8 “And let them make me a sanctuary, that I may dwell in their midst.”

They had just received detailed instructions from God about the construction of the Tabernacle.

Undoing all that has taken place in the book of Exodus to this point.

It was for His presence, relationship, communion, worship.

God is offering to bless them without having a relationship with them.

Many people desire to be blessed without a relationship with God.

The Response

Mourning (4)

Disastrous word

Sadness for their sin and its consequences

The absence of God’s presence

It was the relationship to God that mattered.

No ornaments (4-6)

God commanded them to remove their ornaments (5b)

A bit of hope here. - Determine what He will do with them.

Jewelry and fine things

Exodus 35:22 “22 So they came, both men and women. All who were of a willing heart brought brooches and earrings and signet rings and armlets, all sorts of gold objects, every man dedicating an offering of gold to the Lord.”

Symbolic of their repentance and mourning.

The word in v.6 is related to plunder.

They plundered the Egyptians to gain these ornaments

Now, they are undeserving of them and thus plunder themselves.

Jewelry was used in the making if the golden calf - may be tied to idolatry

Matthew 6:21 “21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.”

From Mount Horeb on (6) they do not wear ornaments.

Worship (10)

Bowing in reverence to their covenant king.

To meet with God they had to go outside the camp.

Joshua would not depart from the tent (11)

The Tabernacle had not been built - a different tent of meeting.

He had been on the mountain with Moses and therefore did not participate in worshipping the golden calf.

He valued God’s presence

Guarded the tent from the people profaning it

Face to Face (11)

Moses enjoyed a level of fellowship and communion with God unknown by man since the fall.

God did not cease meeting with Moses as a Mediator for the people.

It occurred outside the camp but they did have a mediator.

Application

We leave no room for God in our hearts in our pursuit of our gods and the distractions of this world.

No greater chastisement than separation from God.

Tim Chester,

Exodus for You We Can’t Live without God

You want God to bless you: to forgive you, to rescue you from hell, to protect you, to provide a spouse or a job or good health. But you don’t really want God himself. You don’t want the demands his presence makes. You don’t want to make the changes his presence demands. You don’t want holiness

Today we have immediate access to God

His Spirit dwells within us

God has made His home with us

So that, we one day will make our home with Him.

Prayer - Speaking to God

Communion with Him

When we sin we sometimes doubt that God is with us.

Does God still love us?

Our relationship with Him is based on our union with Christ

Matthew 28:20 “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

If you are a Christian God is your friend (11)

John 15:13–15 “13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.”

Ephesians 3:16–17 “16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith”

God desires a deeper more intimate relationship with you.

His Word and prayer

Eternal -

1 Corinthians 13:12 “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

Unhindered communion

Closing Hymn: I Will Glory in My Redeemer

Benediction: May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.