God Desires Obedience

KEY VERSE: “If ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people: for all the earth is mine.” —Exodus 19:5

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Exodus 19:4-6; 20:2-4, 7-17

WE READ, “IN the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of Sinai … and there Israel camped before the mount.” (Exod. 19:1,2) Moses was no doubt very familiar with this area, because it is the same location where God had earlier spoken to him from the burning bush. The Israelites remained here for almost a year, experiencing many spectacular events.

But the unhappy people were still complaining of their hardships despite God’s overruling providences throughout all their travels. Upon their arrival at Mt. Sinai, Moses promptly “went up to God, and the Lord called unto him out of the mountain … saying, Tell the children of Israel, ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself.”—Exod. 19:4

We find the same account of the Lord’s watchful care over his people in their desert journey set forth in Deuteronomy 32:9-12. It reads, “The Lord’s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance. He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye. As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings; so the Lord alone did lead him.”

Continuing to speak to Moses, the Lord announced his intention to make an agreement, or covenant, with Israel. If they would keep it, they would be his own possession—a “peculiar [special] treasure”—above all peoples of earth, adding they would also be to him a kingdom of priests, and an holy nation. (Exod. 19:5,6) We read that “the Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people, for ye were the fewest of all people: But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.” (Deut. 7:7,8) Since God was responsible for Israel’s freedom and deliverance from Egypt, he wanted obedience from them—not from fear, however, but as an expression of their love for him.

Moses is often referred to as Israel’s lawgiver. But as a matter of fact, he was merely the Mediator between God and the people in connection with the giving of the Law. We find this entire chronicle of events, as momentous and vital as they were, to be typical—pointing forward to future matters of far greater significance.

Moses, for example, is typical of the Christ, Head and Body; while the Mosaic Law, given to Israel, looks forward to the New Covenant which God has promised to make with Israel and, indeed, with all mankind during his thousand-year Millennial Kingdom. And the graphic, fearful sights and sounds which surrounded Moses on the mount, preceding the giving of the Law, foreshadowed the prophetic time of ‘trouble such as never was’, which will usher in the New Covenant.

While the Law Covenant which God gave Israel promised life to those able to obey the provisions of the Law upon which it was based, all those of Adam’s fallen race were unable to keep it because that Law was the measure of a perfect man’s ability. The perfect man, Jesus Christ, therefore, proved to be the only human capable of living up to its provisions.

The New Covenant, which also promises everlasting life to the obedient, is another matter entirely. Jesus, the Mediator of that agreement has, unlike Moses, not only the authority but also the ability to bring all the willing and obedient of mankind up ‘the highway of holiness’ to the point of human perfection, and possessing the ability to comply with God’s perfect Law upon which the New Covenant will be based.—Isa. 35:5-10; I Tim. 2:3-6

The Apostle Paul says concerning that glorious day: “I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be my people. No longer will a man teach his neighbor … Know the Lord … All will know me from the least of them to the greatest.”—Heb. 8:8-11; Jer. 31:31-34, New International Version

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