Lesson #22

RETURN TO SYLLABUS

EXODUS 19
Lesson #22
ANOTHER COVENANT BY A HOLY GOD

• Memory Verse: 1Peter 2:9
• In Exodus 6:6-8 God began to show Moses what He would do for His people. That was to prepare Moses for God’s redemption of His people.and the beginning of a new covenant that the Bible calls The Law.
• Fifty days after they left Egypt they came to Mt. Sinai. Here they would stay for approximately a year. Moses made 7 trips up the mountain to meet with God. Three trips are in this chapter.
• God reveals to Moses His standards and His will for His people.
• This is what the Bible calls The Law. This is the covenant that God made with Moses, and it was given on the Jewish Pentecost (50 days after the Passover).
• God accomplished two things when He gave the Law to Moses:
• He provided a way of life.
• He provided a way of worhip.

• Read Exo 19:1-8

• “Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself.”

(4)

• At the end of a period of grace begun with Abraham, God, by grace, delivered the Israelites out of Egypt and brought them to Him at Mt. Sinai.
• The eagles’ wings are symbolic of the Deity.
• The mother eagle flies under the baby eagle when it leaves the nest to protect the baby eagle from falling to the rocks below.
• The location of Mt. Sinai:
• Most Bible maps and Bible commentaries show the location of Mt. Sinai on the Sinai Peninsula at a mountain callel Jebel Musa (Mountain of Moses).
• The major problem with this location is that the geography does not match the geographic descriptions in the Bible.
• For example, there is no level plain around Jebel Musa where 2-3 million people could camp.
• Most likely Mt. Sinai was the same location as Mt. Horeb where Moses experienced the burning bush. This means that it was located in Midian. There is one specific mountain in Arabia that corresponds with the geographic descriptions in the Bible.
• This mountain in Arabia is called Jabal Al Lawz:
• Next to this moutain is a huge rock that appears as though it were cut in two pieces. Some believe it is the rock that Moses struck to receive water for the people.
• In front of this mountain is a large stone altar on which animal sacrifice was done.
• The top of this mountain is blackened as though by fire.
• The preparation for another covenant (5)
• Conditional and unconditional covenants:
• The Bible records 8 covenants that God made with man. The amazing thing is that a Holy God makes any covenant with sinful man. Some of these covenants are conditional and some are unconditional. What is the difference?
• An unconditional covenant is a legal agreement between two people. However one person agrees to fulfill his part of the agreement even if the other person does not fulfill his part.
• In the unconditional covenants, God says to man, “I am going to do this even if you do not do your part.”
• Therefore, the responsibility for the fulfillment of the unconditional covenants is on God.
• A conditional covenant is a legal agreement between two people. Each person must fulfill his part of the agreement. If one person does not fulfill his part, the other person is not required to fulfill his part.
• In the conditional covenants, God says to man, “If you will do this, then I will do that.”
• Therefore, the responsibility for the fulfillment of the condition covenants is on man.
• Some of the covenants are temporary and some are permanent.

God’s Eight Covenants with Man

Covenants in the Bible	Conditional or Unconditional Temporary or Permanent	Scriptures
#1 Edenic Covenant in the Garden of Eden made with Adam	Conditional God intended it to be permanent but sin made it temporary	Gen 1:28-29 Gen 2:15-17, 19
#2 The Adamic Covenant made with Adam and Eve after the fall	Unconditional Permanent until the Millennial Kingdom begins	Gen 3:14-24
#3 The Noahic Covenant made with Noah after the flood	Unconditional Permnanent until the Millennial Kingdom begins	Gen 8:21-22 Gen 9:1-17
#4 The Abrahamic Covenant made with Abraham	Unconditional Permanent through time and Eternity	Gen 12:2-3 Gen 13:15-17 Gen 15:1, 5-6, 18 Gen 17:1-11
#5 The Mosaic Covenant made with Moses on Mt. Sinai	Conditional Temporary until Christ’s First Coming and as long as Israel is in the Promised Land	Exo 19-31
#6 The Land Covenant made with Israel	Conditional Permanent until the Millenial Kingdom ends	Deu 30:1-8
#7 The Davidic Covenant made with King David	Unconditional Permanent through time and eternity	2Sam 7:11-16
#8 The New Covenant made with Israel and the Church	Unconditional Permanent through time and eternity	Jer 31:33-34 Heb 8:7-13

• The covenant that God is about to make with Moses in the book of Exodus is a conditional covenant and it is called the Mosaic Covenant.
• We see that conditional nature stated by God in verse 5.

• “…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:”

(5)

• The people had to be obedient.to what God told them. (5)
• The people had to keep the covenant that God was about to give to Moses. (5)
• If the people met those conditions, what did God want the people to be?
• A peculiar treasure (5)
• If they met the conditions, God would bless them so abundantly, they would stand out from all others in the world.
• A kingdom of priests (6)
• If they met the conditions, God would use them as priests to bring Gentiles to God, and to bring God to the Gentiles.
• A holy nation (6)
• If they met the conditions, the end result would be a holy nation without sin.
• The people’s response to the covenant:
• The people agreed to these two conditions even before they knew all the points of the covenant that they were going to have to keep. (8)
• The Israelites had a choice to continue under the past covenant made with Abraham, which was a covenant of grace, or to go forward under another covenant made with Moses, which was a covenant of law.
• Read Gal 3:17-19
• In other words, the people arrogantly chose law instead of grace.
• The promises of grace given to Abraham remained in force even during the time of the Law, but because of sin, God added the law temporarily to show man how sinful he really was. .
• Many people today choose law instead of grace because, like the Israelites, they think that they must do something to gain their own salvation, and they think they can be good enough.
• Many chuches today choose law instead of grace in an attempt to control people’s actions.

The Differences Between Law and Grace

Law	Grace
Law demands obedience	Grace gives obedience freely
Law says “Do this!”	Grace says “Believe this!”
Law takes away freedom	Grace gives freedom
Law says “Work”	Grace says “Rest”
Law threatens punishment and a curse	Grace pronounces blessing
Law says, “Do this and you shall live!”	Grace says, “Live and you shall do!”
Law condemns the best of men	Grace saves the worst of men
Law reveals the character of God	Grace reveals the love of God
Law reveals the weakness of man	Grace covers over the weakness of man
Law promotes fear	Grace promotes love

• Read Exo 19:9-15 Preparations for an encounter with God

• “…sanctify them to day and to morrow, and let them wash their clothes. “

(10)

• God told Moses to sanctify the people.
• The word, sanctify, means = to set apart for holiness.
• Then they were to wash their clothes.
• The people were literally to wash their clothes. However, the spiritual meaning is symbolic.
• Clothes, in the Bible, is symbolic of a person’s lifestyle, which is the outward expression of an inner life. (Rom 13:12 Col 3:8-10 Rev 3:5)
• God is a God of holiness, order, and cleanliness both inside and outside. He, therefore, calls His people to be holy, morally pure, inside and outside.
• Why did God tell the people not to touch the mountain?
• In verse 4 we see God’s desire to draw people into a personal relationship with Him.
• When He took the Israelites through the Red Sea, he was close to them in the cloud.
• However in verse 12 we see God set boundaries over which the people were not to cross.
• Therefore, we see the balanced nature of our God:
• He is a loving God who desires an intimate daily relationship of love with Him.
• This is the kind of relationship that God had with Abraham in a period of grace that was just ending at this point in the book of Exodus..
• He is a holy God who cannot tolerate the presence of any sin.
• It is sin, then, that separates man from having that close personal relationship with God. When the sin problem is dealt with, then we can draw close to God.
• It is only through faith in the Messiah, Jesus Christ, that sin is forgiven.
• This is the kind of relationship that God has with man during a period of law which is just beginning at Mt. Sinai in the book of Exodus.
• We clearly see the difference between a time of grace and a time of law. However, in both periods of grace and law, God is still a God of love.
• When God tells the people not to come too close to the mountain or touch it, it is God’s merciful love that prompts the warning as a protection of His people.
• God wanted to demonstrate to the people that He is a holy God and they are a sinful people.
• God emphasizes His holiness in the following verses of Exo 19:
• (verses 9, 10, 12, 14, 21, 22, 23, 24)
• Read Heb 7:18-19
• According to these verses, man does not draw close to God through the Law. Instead, the Law points out the sinfulness of man and shows us how far we are from holiness.
• When Jesus came, God established a new covenant in the blood of Christ that brings man close to God through the forgiveness of sin.
• God set boundaries over which the people must not cross because He is about to give them the Law..The giving of the Law was a terrifying experience that frightened the people.
• Violation of the boundaries meant death to the violator.
• Sinful man cannot approach a holy God.
• God promised to come down to the people in a cloud on the third day. (11)
• The pupose of the cloud was to protect the people because no man can see God and live. (Exo 33:20 Jdg 6:23)

• Read Exo 19:16-25

• “…the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud…”

(16)

• On the third day, s tremendously loud sound called the people’s attention to the mountain. This loud trumpet sound was actually the voice of God. (Deu 4:33-34)
• “And the LORD came down upon mount Sinai, on the top of the mount: and the LORD called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up.”

(20)

• Why was Moses allowed to approach God but the people were not?
• Remember that a sinful person cannot approach a holy God. Therefore, because Moses had faith in the promised Messiah, his sins were forgiven. He was able to approach God by faith.
• The people still lacked faith and their sins were not yet forgiven.
• The priests: (22)
• These priests were the firstborn in the tribes who were set apart to serve God.
• This was before God established the Levitical Priesthood when He set apart the tribe of Levi to be the priests instead of all the firstborn.
• Application and Summary:
• When we consider that God desires an intimate relationship with man, but that man cannot achieve it because of sin, we see God’s great frustration. However, nothing is beyond God’s great power to solve.
• He sent Jesus Christ to die for the forgiveness of sin.
• Because God solved this great dilemna for us, it is up to us to decide how close we want to be to God and how much of our lives we want to relinquish to Him.
• The important lesson in this chapter is the difference between a period of grace and a period of law. This difference will become more clear to us as we see God give the Law to Moses from Mt. Sinai in the coming lessons. We are going to consider the following themes and more:
• The purpose of the Law.
• The limitations of the Law.
• The obligation of the Law
• The results of the Law.
• The relevancy of the Law.
• The duration of the Law.

HOMEWORK
EXODUS 20:1-17
This is a self-study. Please do not send homework answers to the teacher forcorrection.

• Application of Exo 19
• On a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 being the closest), how close is your personal relationship to God?
• How close do you want it to be?
• What can you do to make your relationship more intimate with God?

• Preparation for Exo 20:1-17
• Read Exo 20:1-17
• What should be the Christian’s relationship to the Ten Commandments during this time of grace in which we now live?

• Memory Verse: Mark 12:30