The Israelites had been I slavery for 400+ years and had seen pagan worship in its most elaborate form. Egypt had hundreds of gods it “worshipped”. Worship was a means of manipulating the gods to do what you wanted by going through rituals to make them beholden to you. These demonically empowered idols had eyes but couldn’t see. They had mouths, but couldn’t speak. God had shown them to be unworthy of consideration, let alone worship when He decimated them by the 10 judgements/plagues in Egypt.

 

They had been accustomed to the counterfeit for so long, they had difficulty believing the Real Thing, even though they could hear, see and even tangibly touch the evidence that God was with them…the True God.

 

Exactly two months after the exodus, God brought them to Sinai. He revealed Himself in glory and power not to terrify them, not to destroy them, but to convince them that the One Who had chosen them in Abraham, the One who had judged their enemies, the One who had liberated, rescued and saved them was not Someone that could be manipulated for self-gain. God called them to Sinai to formally introduce Himself to them: the True God Who loved them.

 

God spoke, and they heard Him. The Words that He spoke we know as the 10 Commandments. Those 10 Commandments…not 10 suggestions…were and are 100% relational. They defined a real and living relationship with God, with others and with ourselves. The defined the parameters of behaviors and choices that would make for life as God intends it to be. It was a list of liberation from the topsy-turvy world of self-indulgent, self-centered, sin-soaked life that was normative for the rest of humanity. God’s Words revealed a way of living that would make living a blessing and a joy.

 

The problem was that apart from God being the strength, power and source of that way of living, it could not be done. As Martin Luther put it, “If we in our own strength confide, our striving would be losing.” When the Israelites heard the Words, they realized that they had already broken all 10 Commandments. They were all utterly guilty of living habitually in opposition to what God was saying would make for life, either by intent or by act.

Exodus 20:18-20 reads, “When the people heard the thunder and the loud blast of the ram’s horn, and when they saw the flashes of lightning and the smoke billowing from the mountain, they stood at a distance, trembling with fear. And they said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen. But don’t let God speak directly to us, or we will die!” “Don’t be afraid,” Moses answered them, “for God has come in this way to test you, and so that your fear of him will keep you from sinning!”

How strange. They had already heard God speaking and they weren’t dead! What they were saying was, “We don’t want to hear directly from God (because then we’ll have no excuse for our contrary actions). You, Moses, hear from God and then tell us what He said (because then we can just say you misheard what we don’t want to hear or say it’s just man’s word and we can ignore what we don’t like).

Many people complain that they’ve never heard from God, even though the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the God who does speak, does see and does hear. I think they can’t hear Him because they have already made an internal vow that they will not do what He says if it conflicts with their own will.

The Apostle John writes in his first letter, “The One Who existed from the beginning, Whom we have seen with our own eyes, Whom we have heard, Whom our hands have actually touched, He is the Word of Life.”  

The Israelites didn’t rescue themselves. God did. It’s what He has done that makes true life possible. The relationship God offers to us through what He has already done in Jesus Christ will give us a new heart, a new spirit, the Resurrection Power of the Holy Spirit to transform how we live and enable us to follow, trust and obey the God Who loves us.