Exodus 22-25

Exodus 22

Exodus 22 (NKJV)

1 “If a man steals an ox or a sheep, and slaughters it or sells it, he shall restore five oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep.

2 If the thief is found breaking in, and he is struck so that he dies, there shall be no guilt for his bloodshed.

3 If the sun has risen on him, there shall be guilt for his bloodshed. He should make full restitution; if he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft.

4 If the theft is certainly found alive in his hand, whether it is an ox or donkey or sheep, he shall restore double.

5 “If a man causes a field or vineyard to be grazed, and lets loose his animal, and it feeds in another man’s field, he shall make restitution from the best of his own field and the best of his own vineyard.

6 “If fire breaks out and catches in thorns, so that stacked grain, standing grain, or the field is consumed, he who kindled the fire shall surely make restitution.

7 “If a man delivers to his neighbor money or articles to keep, and it is stolen out of the man’s house, if the thief is found, he shall pay double.

8 If the thief is not found, then the master of the house shall be brought to the judges to see whether he has put his hand into his neighbor’s goods.

9 “For any kind of trespass, whether it concerns an ox, a donkey, a sheep, or clothing, or for any kind of lost thing which another claims to be his, the cause of both parties shall come before the judges; and whomever the judges condemn shall pay double to his neighbor.

There is a principle that is reflected in this law consistently, and that is the restoration of what has been lost or stolen in double fold to the owner.

So if one claims that anothor has stolen what is his, or that another has lost what was given to him by the owner. The owner would come before the Judge and whomsoever the Judge condems shall pay double.

This is important principle that aplies to us when he restores something that we have lost.

Job 42:10 “10 And the Lord restored Job’s losses [captivity] when he prayed for his friends. Indeed the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before.”

If we have lost something if the enemy has stolen something from us, let us go to judge and plead our case. He will condem our adversary and restore double to us.

10 If a man delivers to his neighbor a donkey, an ox, a sheep, or any animal to keep, and it dies, is hurt, or driven away, no one seeing it,

11 then an oath of the Lord shall be between them both, that he has not put his hand into his neighbor’s goods; and the owner of it shall accept that, and he shall not make it good.

12 But if, in fact, it is stolen from him, he shall make restitution to the owner of it.

13 If it is torn to pieces by a beast, then he shall bring it as evidence, and he shall not make good what was torn.

14 “And if a man borrows anything from his neighbor, and it becomes injured or dies, the owner of it not being with it, he shall surely make it good.

15 If its owner was with it, he shall not make it good; if it was hired, it came for its hire.

16 “If a man entices a virgin who is not betrothed, and lies with her, he shall surely pay the bride-price for her to be his wife.

17 If her father utterly refuses to give her to him, he shall pay money according to the bride-price of virgins.

18 “You shall not permit a sorceress to live.

19 “Whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death.

20 “He who sacrifices to any god, except to the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed.

We must only sacrifice to the only true God and not any other.

21 “You shall neither mistreat a stranger nor oppress him, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

22 “You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child.

23 If you afflict them in any way, and they cry at all to Me, I will surely hear their cry;

24 and My wrath will become hot, and I will kill you with the sword; your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless.

25 “If you lend money to any of My people who are poor among you, you shall not be like a moneylender to him; you shall not charge him interest.

26 If you ever take your neighbor’s garment as a pledge, you shall return it to him before the sun goes down.

27 For that is his only covering, it is his garment for his skin. What will he sleep in? And it will be that when he cries to Me, I will hear, for I am gracious.

28 “You shall not revile God, nor curse a ruler of your people.

Don’t insult God, or curse that is insult revile the ruler of any people.

29 “You shall not delay to offer the first of your ripe produce and your juices. The firstborn of your sons you shall give to Me.

30 Likewise you shall do with your oxen and your sheep. It shall be with its mother seven days; on the eighth day you shall give it to Me.

31 “And you shall be holy men to Me: you shall not eat meat torn by beasts in the field; you shall throw it to the dogs.

Exodus 23

Exodus 23 (NKJV)

1 “You shall not circulate a false report. Do not put your hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness.

You must not gossip or speak about other people things that is not true.

2 You shall not follow a crowd to do evil; nor shall you testify in a dispute so as to turn aside after many to pervert justice.

We must not pervert what is true because of the pressure of the majority, or of the popular opinion of the masses.

We must be courages to speak the truth even if it is goes against the popular opinion of the crowd.

3 You shall not show partiality to a poor man in his dispute.

4 “If you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, you shall surely bring it back to him again.

5 If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying under its burden, and you would refrain from helping it, you shall surely help him with it.

The principle laid out here is overcoming evil with God. One evil should not induce another.

When you repay evil with evil, is you are being overcome by evil. However you should overcome evil with good.

Roman 12:20-21 “20 Therefore “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; If he is thirsty, give him a drink; For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.” 21 Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

6 “You shall not pervert the judgment of your poor in his dispute.

7 Keep yourself far from a false matter; do not kill the innocent and righteous. For I will not justify the wicked.

8 And you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the discerning and perverts the words of the righteous.

9 “Also you shall not oppress a stranger, for you know the heart of a stranger, because you were strangers in the land of Egypt.

10 “Six years you shall sow your land and gather in its produce,

11 but the seventh year you shall let it rest and lie fallow, that the poor of your people may eat; and what they leave, the beasts of the field may eat. In like manner you shall do with your vineyard and your olive grove.

12 Six days you shall do your work, and on the seventh day you shall rest, that your ox and your donkey may rest, and the son of your female servant and the stranger may be refreshed.

13 “And in all that I have said to you, be circumspect and make no mention of the name of other gods, nor let it be heard from your mouth.

circumspect means to be careful and cautious:- in other words God is saying pay careful attention to all that i have said to you. Take careful heed to what i am saying

This is an attitude that we need to have towards the words of God, because the salvation of our soul depends on it.

Proverbs 19:16 “16 He who keeps the commandment keeps his soul, But he who is careless of his ways will die.”

Carelesness can lead to death.

14 “Three times you shall keep a feast to Me in the year:

15 You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread (you shall eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month of Abib, for in it you came out of Egypt; none shall appear before Me empty);

16 and the Feast of Harvest, the firstfruits of your labors which you have sown in the field; and the Feast of Ingathering at the end of the year, when you have gathered in the fruit of your labors from the field.

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

18 “You shall not offer the blood of My sacrifice with leavened bread; nor shall the fat of My sacrifice remain until morning.

19 The first of the firstfruits of your land you shall bring into the house of the Lord your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.

Don’t make what is an instrument of life to be an instrument of death. Milk is to be life giving source to the kid by which he grows and matures. However when you use milk to boil the kid, you are making the milk to be instrument of death.

1 Pet 2:2 “2 as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby,”

1 timothy 1:7-8 “7 desiring to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what they say nor the things which they affirm. 8 But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully,”

20 “Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.

21 Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him.

22 But if you indeed obey His voice and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.

23 For My Angel will go before you and bring you in to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites and the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will cut them off.

24 You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do according to their works; but you shall utterly overthrow them and completely break down their sacred pillars.

25 “So you shall serve the Lord your God, and He will bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you.

26 No one shall suffer miscarriage or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days.

27 “I will send My fear before you, I will cause confusion among all the people to whom you come, and will make all your enemies turn their backs to you.

28 And I will send hornets [wasp] before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.

29 I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beasts of the field become too numerous for you.

30 Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land.

31 And I will set your bounds from the Red Sea to the sea, Philistia, and from the desert to the River. For I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you.

32 You shall make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.

33 They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against Me. For if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.”

Israel will later learn the lessons the hard way when they made a covenant with the people and let them dwell in their lands.

Exodus 24

Exodus 24 (NKJV)

1 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.”

This was how the covenant was established by the blood of animals.

The people were joined to God to the covenant through the blood of lambs.

In the book of the covenant contains God’s promise to his people, and the Peoples obligation to God.

God expects them to be obeidient and do all that he had said.

In the New Covanant, that we are in by the blood of Christ. God requires us to be obedient to all that he says to us.

9 Then Moses went up, also Aaron, Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel,

10 and they saw the God of Israel. And there was under His feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and it was like the very heavens in its clarity.

11 But on the nobles of the children of Israel He did not lay His hand. So they saw God, and they ate and drank.

We must not take this as literall seing the physical form of God,

Both in the old Testament and New Testament is clear they did not see any image or simitude.

Deut 4:15 “15 “Take careful heed to yourselves, for you saw no form when the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire,”

Exodus 33:20 “20 But He said, “You cannot see My face; for no man shall see Me, and live.””

1 Tim 6:16 “16 who alone has immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see, to whom be honor and everlasting power. Amen.”

They must have seen some form of the manifestation of God’s glory.

12 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Come up to Me on the mountain and be there; and I will give you tablets of stone, and the law and commandments which I have written, that you may teach them.”

13 So Moses arose with his assistant Joshua, and Moses went up to the mountain of God.

14 And he said to the elders, “Wait here for us until we come back to you. Indeed, Aaron and Hur are with you. If any man has a difficulty, let him go to them.”

15 Then Moses went up into the mountain, and a cloud covered the mountain.

16 Now the glory of the Lord rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days. And on the seventh day He called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud.

17 The sight of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the top of the mountain in the eyes of the children of Israel.

18 So Moses went into the midst of the cloud and went up into the mountain. And Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

Exodus 25

Exodus 25 (NKJV)

1 Then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

2 “Speak to the children of Israel, that they bring Me an offering. From everyone who gives it willingly with his heart you shall take My offering.

3 And this is the offering which you shall take from them: gold, silver, and bronze;

4 blue, purple, and scarlet thread, fine linen, and goats’ hair;

5 ram skins dyed red, badger skins, and acacia wood;

6 oil for the light, and spices for the anointing oil and for the sweet incense;

7 onyx stones, and stones to be set in the ephod and in the breastplate.

8 And let them make Me a sanctuary, that I may dwell among them.

9 According to all that I show you, that is, the pattern of the tabernacle and the pattern of all its furnishings, just so you shall make it.

10 “And they shall make an ark of acacia wood; two and a half cubits shall be its length, a cubit and a half its width, and a cubit and a half its height.

11 And you shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and out you shall overlay it, and shall make on it a molding of gold all around.

12 You shall cast four rings of gold for it, and put them in its four corners; two rings shall be on one side, and two rings on the other side.

13 And you shall make poles of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold.

14 You shall put the poles into the rings on the sides of the ark, that the ark may be carried by them.

15 The poles shall be in the rings of the ark; they shall not be taken from it.

16 And you shall put into the ark the Testimony which I will give you.

17 “You shall make a mercy seat of pure gold; two and a half cubits shall be its length and a cubit and a half its width.

18 And you shall make two cherubim of gold; of hammered work you shall make them at the two ends of the mercy seat.

19 Make one cherub at one end, and the other cherub at the other end; you shall make the cherubim at the two ends of it of one piece with the mercy seat.

20 And the cherubim shall stretch out their wings above, covering the mercy seat with their wings, and they shall face one another; the faces of the cherubim shall be toward the mercy seat.

21 You shall put the mercy seat on top of the ark, and in the ark you shall put the Testimony that I will give you.

22 And there I will meet with you, and I will speak with you from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim which are on the ark of the Testimony, about everything which I will give you in commandment to the children of Israel.

God will speak to speak to Moses about everthing which he will give in commandments to the people of israel from the Mercy seat.

God wanted his people to know that all his acts were grounded and rooted in Mercy.

Psalms 136, mentions all the acts of God with the phrase insert of “for the Mercy of the Lord endures forever”

23 “You shall also make a table of acacia wood; two cubits shall be its length, a cubit its width, and a cubit and a half its height.

24 And you shall overlay it with pure gold, and make a molding of gold all around.

25 You shall make for it a frame of a handbreadth all around, and you shall make a gold molding for the frame all around.

26 And you shall make for it four rings of gold, and put the rings on the four corners that are at its four legs.

27 The rings shall be close to the frame, as holders for the poles to bear the table.

28 And you shall make the poles of acacia wood, and overlay them with gold, that the table may be carried with them.

29 You shall make its dishes, its pans, its pitchers, and its bowls for pouring. You shall make them of pure gold.

30 And you shall set the showbread on the table before Me always.

31 “You shall also make a lampstand of pure gold; the lampstand shall be of hammered work. Its shaft, its branches, its bowls, its ornamental knobs, and flowers shall be of one piece.

32 And six branches shall come out of its sides: three branches of the lampstand out of one side, and three branches of the lampstand out of the other side.

33 Three bowls shall be made like almond blossoms on one branch, with an ornamental knob and a flower, and three bowls made like almond blossoms on the other branch, with an ornamental knob and a flower—and so for the six branches that come out of the lampstand.

34 On the lampstand itself four bowls shall be made like almond blossoms, each with its ornamental knob and flower.

35 And there shall be a knob under the first two branches of the same, a knob under the second two branches of the same, and a knob under the third two branches of the same, according to the six branches that extend from the lampstand.

36 Their knobs and their branches shall be of one piece; all of it shall be one hammered piece of pure gold.

37 You shall make seven lamps for it, and they shall arrange its lamps so that they give light in front of it.

38 And its wick-trimmers and their trays shall be of pure gold.

39 It shall be made of a talent of pure gold, with all these utensils.

40 And see to it that you make them according to the pattern which was shown you on the mountain.