More Compassion and Grace

Exodus 34:5–8 “5 Then the Lord came down in the cloud and stood there with him and proclaimed his name, the Lord. 6 And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, 7 maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” 8 Moses bowed to the ground at once and worshiped.”

God describes himself as compassionate and gracious.

Slow to anger

Abounding in love and faithfulness

Maintaining love to thousands

Forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.

God is definitely all of these things because God doesn’t lie. In fact, maybe we would be more “obedient” if God was an angry and vengeful God.

God is also just.

Because of verse 6 and the beginning of verse 7, God’s punshment and wrath is even more unnderstandable as just.

Contextually it shows even more because our passage comes right after the Israelites worshipped the golden calf two chapters ago.

They also already received the 10 commandments knowing full well what God said in reference to worshipping idols:

Exodus 20:5–6 “5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.”

Even worse, Moses was on top of Mt. Sinai getting the instructions from God on how to live in harmony with Him when Israel made and worshipped this idol. The BibleProject said it’s like the bride kissing a groomsman at the wedding!

Top Ten Betrayals! But this is not surprising right?

Both are perfectly shown in Christ.

When we look at Jesus, who is perfectly God, we see both God’s justice and the compassion and grace. Jesus constantly forgave those who sinned against him, and yet not all who sinned were forgiven - many didn’t trust Jesus and in the end refused.

Romans 1:20–25 “20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles. 24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.”

God will forgive some and punish others. God’s compassion will be felt by some, and his wrath will be felt by others. Only those of us who have faith in Jesus Christ will not experience God’s wrath and punishment.

How does this make you feel? Probably good right? But isn’t it selfish for us to feel good by ourselves? This is why the heart of a Christian leads to evangelism. The good that I have I need to share. The love that I received and the wrath that I’ve been spared of should be for you too.

As Moses grew closer to God he sees those around him falling into sin. What does Moses do? He gets mad, he abides in God, worships Him, and intercedes for his people.