Three months after the Red Sea crossing the Hebrews arrived at Mount Sinai, the mountain of God. It was here that they made camp. Here they were about to have a terrifying service of worship in the very Presence of God. Worship is always scary business.

Prayer - O God, we have come into Your Presence this morning by the grace of Jesus. Lift our eyes above the spilled blood of Abel to see the sprinkled blood of Christ behind us, and above us, and before us that we may become Your own priests and people for the nations. Amen.

The Hebrews had traveled for three months and finally had come to meet their God at the foot of the holy mountain. At the top of this mountain is their Creator, the one who parted the waters of the Red Sea, the one who is holy and righteous and expects holiness and righteousness. The call to worship at this mountain begins this way: “You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now therefore, if you obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession out of all the peoples. Indeed, the whole earth is mine, but you shall be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” (Exodus 19:4-6). The Hebrews, God says, will be a holy nation—partake of his holy nature—and be a kingdom of priests. The whole nation will serve as the mediators of God’s Presence to the rest of the world. They will be the face of God, if you will, to all the people they will bless. Now that is a high calling.

But this calling is not about them. It did not begin with them. It is always first a narrative about what God already has done. It is as if God is saying to them, “I know you are confused about how to get to the Promised Land. Don’t worry, because it was never about you. It always has been Me that carried you on eagle’s wings. It was true when you saw it, and when you didn’t. God always has carried you, and He will carry you all the way home.” That is God’s end of the covenant. Now what you must do given that promise of God’s Presence is to obey the Voice of God.

At the bottom of the mountain you and I tremble because if the point of life’s journey is to learn to obey God’s voice and thus to become God’s holy people, we don’t hear it most of the time. It is drowned out by all the other voices around us, voices that tell us that we’re on our own in the desert, and we’ll never make it to the Promised Land unless we try harder and achieve more. Or try consuming more things or try a different job or have a different relationship. Eventually, we realize that we’ve tried so many different things and heard so many voices that we have wandered a long way from God and His voice.

That is when God desires to meet with us so that we can find Him and hear Him again. That is exactly what God does for these Hebrews who have been accustomed to listening to themselves a bit too much lately. God tells Moses that he wants to make an appearance before the people—let them actually experience God Presence in their midst. And so “on the morning of the third day, there was thunder and lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled. Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet God.” (Exodus 19:16) Every Sunday morning we gather again at the mountain where we finally hear God’s Word read and proclaimed. Here we experience again the Presence of this God who desires to meet us. If we really pay attention, we ought to be a little concerned, if not scared. The Holy One is present and speaking to us.

Let us now come before the holy Presence of God in worship and praise, bowing before him with worship and awe. Let’s begin with a few moments of silence, and just being in the Presence of God then we’ll sing [Hymns]

Before they could experience the God Presence, the people had to cleanse and consecrate themselves. “The LORD said to Moses: ‘Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes and prepare for the third day, because on the third day the LORD will come down upon Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. You shall set limits for the people all around, saying, ‘Be careful not to go up the mountain or to touch the edge of it. Any who touch the mountain shall be put to death. No hand shall touch them, but they shall be stoned or shot with arrows; whether animal or human being, they shall not live. When the trumpet sounds a long blast, they may go up on the mountain.’ So Moses went down from the mountain to the people. He consecrated the people, and they washed their clothes.” (Exodus 19:12-14)

Consecration is always your first step into the Presence of a holy God. Confession is the natural work of those who understand their own unholiness as they come to worship in the Presence of an awesome and righteous God. Until we can tell the hard truth about ourselves and give ourselves again to God, we cannot hear His voice that comes to us from the mountain, or the deeper Truth that the Gospel speaks to us than the truth about ourselves.

This week begins the season of Lent. Lent is a time for cleansing, consecration and confession. I encourage you to especially consecrate yourselves in these forty days until Easter, and even now as we come into the Presence of God together:

Most holy and merciful God, we confess to You, to one another, and to the whole communion of saints, that we have sinned by our own fault in thought, word and deed, by what we have done and what we have left undone.

We have not loved You with all our heart, mind, soul and strength. We have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We have not forgiven others as we have been forgiven.

O God, have mercy upon us. Lord Jesus, have mercy.

We confess to you, O God, all our past unfaithfulness. We confess our pride, hypocrisy, and impatience. We possess self-indulgent appetites and exploit others and the creation. We envy those more fortunate than ourselves. We love worldly goods and comforts. We are dishonest in our daily life and work, negligent in prayer.

      O God, have mercy upon us. Lord Jesus, have mercy.

Restore us, O God, and let Your anger depart from us. Forgive us, and cleanse us from all our unrighteousness, for Your mercy is great.

Once the people are consecrated and ready to hear the voice of God, God speaks what we now call the Ten Commandments. You are probably familiar with them. They are Israel’s obligations to God but they are not obligations because they are enforceable. Rather they grow out of Israel’s relationship with this God who had delivered them. “I am The Lord Your God.” (Exodus 20:1). This is an appeal for a deeper obedience than the kind that would result from fear of what God would do if they didn’t obey them. This is the kind of obedience that results from love and gratitude for God – a relational obedience.

The first four commandments all have to do with the people’s relationship to Yahweh—They are to have no others gods before Him, make no idols or bow down and worship other gods, nor are they to misuse His Name; they are to spend time in devotion to that relationship by observing the Sabbath.

The other six commands all have to do with how they treat one another in community. These are not suggestions for individuals to teach them how to live a better life. They are instructions for the preservation and health of community. They are to honor their parents—advice not so much given to small children as to adults regarding the care of aging parents. Murder, adultery, stealing, lying, and coveting are all stated in the negative—“Thou shalt not.” To state the commands in the negative is not to shut down life but to open it to all kinds of possibilities within these boundaries.

But again, they all have to do with mistreating, abusing other people in relationship. The right ordering of life with God always leads to the right ordering of society and our relationships in community. So it is no surprise that people being formed in the Presence of God will learn to treat their family, spouse and neighbor well. That is why Jesus said that all of the law can be summarized in two statements: Love The Lord Your God. Love your neighbor as yourself.

Remember God’s offer when they arrived at Sinai. God has delivered them on eagle’s wings, saved then and called them to Himself and now wants to reveal Himself and His ways to them. God does not then reveal the commandments as a means by which the people can earn their salvation or earn their relationship their relationship with Him. Salvation and God Presence have already been given. The commands are given so that the people may live in harmonious relationship with God and one another as a kingdom of priests, a holy nation. They describe what it means to live a rightly ordered life where God is present and you are properly present to others – and not just to “not harm” but to bless.

If you know that God is in your midst, you won’t desire to sin! Live in constant awareness of His Presence, and you won’t have other gods before Him. You won’t fall prey to idols or idol worship. You won’t misuse His Name if you know He is present in your midst. You’ll treat other people right—your parents and your neighbors. It’s all about learning to live in the Presence of God who has come out to meet you. God’s Presence is not a threat it’s a promise. You are invited to be a kingdom of priests, a holy nation!

Thankfully, the failure of Israel to accept God’s loving invitation did not annul God’s desire to create a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Centuries later, He sent His son—He became flesh and tabernacle among us, John says. This time, the redemption was from the bondage of sin and death, not just slavery in Egypt. This time the invitation to God's Presence was not that of Mount Sinai, with the earth shaking, and a dense cloud and trumpet blast and thunder. As the author of Hebrews continues, “You have not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them.” (Exodus 12:18-19). Notice that the mountain is no longer to be feared. No longer do we cower before The Lord’s Presence because of our sins. “But you have come to Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.” (Exodus 12:22-24).

In Jesus Christ we now have a better covenant than the one given to Israel through Moses. It is a covenant not based on our obedience but on the forgiving mercy of God. Accepting that mercy will change your life with gratitude, and the Ten Commandments will be a new way of life for you. You will even exceed the Ten Commandments and become a blessing. Obedience isn’t about refraining from bad behavior. It is about accepting a new vocation to be priests proclaiming mercy to a world dying to find it. To be priests to a hurting world is your holy vocation, and you begin hearing that calling as you assemble in worship and sit in the Presence of God.

When Christ came down from the mountain and the Presence of God, he brought the beginning of a new kingdom that cannot and will not ever fall. “Therefore since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us give thanks, by which we offer to God an acceptable worship with reverence and awe; for indeed our God is a consuming fire.” (Hebrews 12:28). A consuming fire? Maybe you thought that was an Old Testament God and not the kinder, gentler God of the New Testament. Has God not changed. No. He is still perfect in His holiness. But what has changed from the old to the new covenant is you. In Christ God has come to you, He has met you and invites you into His Presence. He even welcomes you around His table and offers you holy communion with Him. To receive even a taste is to become a new creation and part of the new Israel of God, with one consuming passion to be priests who proclaim mercy to all the world.

» Back to top