Staying in Love With God, Exodus 34:18-35

In the previous verse we have looked at, God had told the Israelites they were not to make a covenant with people who worship other gods or to make idols or to worship at pagan altars. They were to worship the LORD alone. By obeying these commands in verses 11-17, the people would remain spiritually separated from false worship, helping them protect their love for God with a holy jealousy.

1. Principles for God’s People to Practice, 34:18-26.

In the text today, the LORD has some things that he wanted the Israelites to practice that would help them stay in love with Him. These things can be summarized in three principles:

Maintain a regular pattern of worship;

Enter God’s holy rest;

Offer God your very best.

They are appropriate for us as well.

A. Maintaining a Regular Pattern of Worship.

The Israelites were to nurture their love for God by gathering to worship at three pilgrim feasts every year, each one mentioned in Exodus 34.

The Feast of Unleavened Bread is the greatest feast of Israel. This feast commemorates the birth of the nation when they came out of Egypt. And yet they had attributed the deliverance of the exodus to a molten god. The LORD reminds them that He alone brought them out as He said He would; the feast belongs to the LORD. This celebration was to occur yearly on the same day, the same month--the month that the LORD delivered them out of Egypt (v. 18)

The next verses, v. 19-20, talk about the consecration of the firstborn son and is a reminder to Israel that the LORD owns their sons, having brought them out of Egypt and having killed the firstborn sons of Pharaoh and Egypt. No other gods could make such a claim on the Israelites. We will come back to these verses shortly...

We have seen these commands before, The emphasis here is that every Israelite who redeems his son or his donkey must come before the LORD with a proper sacrifice or gift. Redemption for the sons involved the presentation of the sons themselves before the LORD. In Numbers 3:39-51, the Levites are taken for the LORD’s service in place of the firstborn of Israel, and firstborn sons left over were redeemed by paying five shekels for each one to Aaron and his sons. Again we see an emphasis on the LORD’s ownership of His people.

The second and third pilgrim feasts are mentioned in verse 22: the Feast of Weeks and the Feast of Ingathering. The LORD continues to speak with Moses about the holy times and responses that He has ordained for Israel as their responsibility for keeping their part of the covenant. The purpose in keeping these festivals and feasts would be to curtail the enticement of the Canaanite religions that could lead them into idolatry and spiritual adultery. These three feasts are repeated in verse 18 and 22, as well as their instructions, first given in Exodus 23:17.

Exodus 23:17 NASB95

“Three times a year all your males shall appear before the Lord God.

Their obedient faithfulness to these instructions brings a promise from the LORD: The God of Israel will see to it that other peoples will not dare to covet Israel’s land -- as His people faithful worship Him at these appointed times.

These three feasts reminded God’s people of the great facts of their salvation. Feast of Unleavened Bread reminded them about God’s rescue of them from bondage in Egypt. The second and third feast days celebrate God’s providential care from the past up to the present day. As they would gather for worship, they were reminded in tangible ways of God’s saving grace and providential care, thus rekindling their religious affections for the LORD. Today, we recognize that all the old feasts have been fulfilled in Christ. We keep them today by trusting in Him for our salvation. The feast that God instructs us to keep today has been established by Jesus Christ Himself: The Lord’s Supper, or Communion, which we celebrate monthly here at our church.

B. God’s Holy Rest

The command here in verse 21 looks forward to Israel having obtained the promised land. Working the land properly does not supersede observing the Sabbath. or an agrarian society, this would be a great temptation as it also proved to be later in Israels history. What the LORD is saying here is there is not just no farming on the Sabbath; He is saying no work of any kind is to be performed by Israel.

Exodus 31:13-14, 16

Exodus 31:13–14 NASB95

“But as for you, speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘You shall surely observe My sabbaths; for this is a sign between Me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I am the Lord who sanctifies you. ‘Therefore you are to observe the sabbath, for it is holy to you. Everyone who profanes it shall surely be put to death; for whoever does any work on it, that person shall be cut off from among his people.

Exodus 31:16 NASB95

‘So the sons of Israel shall observe the sabbath, to celebrate the sabbath throughout their generations as a perpetual covenant.’

Exodus 31:13 tells us the Sabbath is an eternal sign between the LORD and Israel; it is holy to Israel and to be treated as such (Ex. 31:14), and is everlasting (Ex. 31:16). This special attention to the Sabbath in Exodus 31 was given just before we read of Israel breaking the covenant.

With the renewal of the covenant here in these verses of chapter 34, the LORD will reiterate the importance of keeping the Sabbath in Exodus 35:1-2, right before the beginning of the tabernacle construction, where the Sabbath was to be observed as well. Within this context we see that God’s appointed holy times must be set aside to enjoy and remember Him. The LORD at creation had a goal--to enter into a relationship with His people; the Sabbath was prepared for that purpose and its purposes remain forever.

Today we worship on the Lord’s Day, Sunday. This is our weekly gathering for worship, a day to stop thinking about earthly gain and to meditate on the glories of God and rest in God’s grace. This helps keep us in His love, and growing in that love. As we do it with others of like mind, we are encouraged and strengthened in our commitment to the Lord.

C. Offer God Your Very Best.

Verses 19-20 and 26 point to our third principle. Of course there is more to loving God than sitting down to the Lord’s Supper or setting aside a day for worship. To love is to give oneself to the beloved. Look at how God showed His love to sinners:

1 John 4:10 NASB95

In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.

To love is to give. When God was teaching the Israelites how to love Him, He instructed to give Him the very best they had to offer:their livestock, the firstborn son — everyone and everything belonged to Him. Whenever the people went up to worship the LORD, they had to bring something for Him. “None shall appear before Me empty-handed” (verse 20c).

Deuteronomy 16:17 NASB95

“Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God which He has given you.

To approach the LORD at these feasts is to make sure that all approach Him while observing the revealed proper procedures and using the proper materials in the LORD’s sacrifices, as they had been previously instructed. The LORD is merciful and compassionate, but He demands that He be approached as He has directed.

God wants the same from us: the best of our worship. The sacrifice we are to offer him?

Hebrews 13:15 NASB95

Through Him then, let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that give thanks to His name.

He wants the best of our possessions:

1 Corinthians 16:2 NASB95

On the first day of every week each one of you is to put aside and save, as he may prosper, so that no collections be made when I come.

But God wants something more than our worship and money. He wants our very lives, putting our time and our gifts at His disposal. A beautiful example comes from the life of Corrie ten Boom, the Dutch Christian whose family saved many Jewish lives during World War II and who endured the horrors of life in a German concentration camp. Corrie had been a Christian for most of her life, but a significant turning point came when she unreservedly offered herself in loving service to God. She prayed, “Lord Jesus, I offer myself for Your people. In any way. Any place. Any time.”

What God has given to us is far more extravagant than what he gave to Israel. He has given his Son to be our Savior. Now our work, our relationships, our families, our homes, our ministries, our bank accounts, even our vacations—all these things belong to him. It is when we finally learn this that we begin to serve God the way he really wants to be served and love him the way that he has taught us to love.

2. Phenomena Reflected from God’s Mediator, 34:27-35.

If we compare the words here in verse 27 with Exodus 31:18, which concludes the original instructions for keeping the covenant given in 25:1-31:17. Moses had not been able to deliver or record all those words to the people because of their worship of the molten calf. Now Moses has received the words again from the LORD Himself a second time, the covenant given to Moses and to Israel to obey.

This points out that not everything was written verbatim from the first covenant, but that the renewal of the covenant was complete. The items repeated in this section were important to emphasize to Israel due to their failure with the molten calf incident.

Verse 28 shows the LORD’s miraculous provision for Moses. Moses again experiences God’s presence for forty days and forty nights, and God sustained him physically and spiritually so Moses had no need of bread to eat or water to drink. He lived in the presence of God; his food drink the Presence and His words. Moses finds his purpose and nature fulfilled as he keeps the word of the LORD ( see Eccl. 12:13).

Later, he would share that humankind does not live by bread alone (Deut. 8:3-4). As we will see, Moses is the divinely approved covenant mediator and administrator.

Here it is pointed out to Israel that the LORD is not dependent upon all the meat and food they offered as sacrifices for His sustenance or pleasure. Rather we as God’s people are fully dependent on Him. In the presence of the LORD, Moses, a man, did not need physical food or water--in the desert!

The LORD is the source and sustainer of true life. True life consists of a relationship with God and His word--before and after the fall. Obedience to His words creates relationship with Him. Not until Jesus came was this experience eclipsed. Jesus was sustained through the words of God spoken through Moses. Jesus lived forty days and forty nights in the wilderness, tempted by the devil during that time. Jesus defeated and disarmed his adversary the devil, and subdued his own physical and human desires by the word of God--given through Moses.

It is clear from the context that the LORD wrote the Ten Words just as He had earlier. However, now Israel will know more than ever that these foundational stipulations of the covenant rested on the character of the LORD and who He is.

The gloriousness of God’s presence before Moses left an imprint upon Moses although that reflected glory of the LORD would soon fade. The marks of the LORD’s visit with Moses remained visible for all to see as he descended the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony. They could see that the LORD had met with him, and their response was fear. Yet they could look on Moses’ face and live; the glory he reflected was a derived glory. This manifestation gave the seal of approval to Moses as God’s covenant messenger. They listened to Moses.

As Moses returned, there was a distinct difference in the people. Unlike Moses’ first return from the LORD’s presence, there was a quiet fear and anxiety. Aaron was awaiting the return of Moses as well--impatiently but faithfully this time. All who saw Moses observed Moses’ face--they had never seen anything like it. They are back to fearing the servant of the LORD, as they were when they saw the effect of the LORD’s power upon the dead Egyptians at the crossing of the Red Sea. Now they see the effects of the LORD’s presence which transformed Moses and them as well.

Moses calls to the people and summons them to himself. He spoke to them as a fellow man, communicating to them all that God desires to maintain this covenant in plain words: as the Lord spoke to Moses as if face to face, now Moses speaks face to face with Israel in words they could understand.

It seems from verses 34-35 that Moses followed a procedure as he continued to enter God’s presence in the tent of meeting where He received additional commands and instructions for Israel. The veil over his face was removed in the LORD’s presence. The words given to Moses were made public to Israel, with His face uncovered, thus demonstrating that his words were from the LORD Himself, not Moses. Then he would veil his face again until the next engagement with the LORD.

The transfiguration of Jesus Christ eclipses this (Matthew 17:1-3); His face shone like the sun.

We who are in Christ, with unveiled faces, can now behold Him and reflect His glory, being inwardly transformed into His likeness (cf. 2 Cor. 3:16-18).

From the scorned and rejected Moses of Chapter 32, Moses is now a man in whose face the glory of God shines forth, before whose presence the people stand in awe, receiving for themselves his words for life. God has brought forth good out of evil by His grace and forgiveness and all of His goodness.