"Speak to us yourself and we will listen," they said to Moses. "But do not let God speak to us, or we will die." Sermons
- their design and their effects. I. THEIR DESIGN. 1. Not to slay the people. The people dreaded that if God spoke to them again, they would die (ver. 19). But Moses said - No; this was not the design of the manifestation. "Fear not" (ver. 20). The voice of the law in Scripture, though it is felt in the conscience to be a voice of death (Romans 7:9-11), is not intended to be really so. It is meant to lead to Christ. 2. To prove the people (ver. 20). God gave this awful manifestation, that his fear might ever after be before their faces. They had heard with their own ears the proclamation of the law, and they had seen these terrors. If anything could awaken fear in them - a salutary fear - and keep them from apostasy, these things should. But, alas! terror is a very ineffective instrument of conversion. These Israelites soon forgot their terrors, and within forty days were dancing in mat[ glee round their golden calf (ch. 32.). II. THEIR EFFECTS. 1. They inspired the keenest alarm. This is the invariable result in the sinful breast of any near approach of God. A fear akin to that of the Israelites has often been manifested - (1) In presence of unusual appearances of nature (comets, eclipses, etc.). (2) Under the powerful preaching of the realities of judgment. (3) In prospect of death. 2. They awakened the cry for a mediator (ver. 19). However much, under ordinary circumstances, the unbeliever may scout the idea of being indebted to a mediator, it will be strange if there do not come times in his life when he feels that he needs one. Three principles in our nature give birth to this feeling - (1) The sense of weakness and finitude. (2) The sense of sin. (3) The feeling of need. The longing for fellowship with God gives rise to the desire for one to mediate that fellowship, to bring it about by making peace. 3. They impelled the self-convicted Israelites to flee from God's presence (vers. 18, 21). This is what will take place at the last judgment. How different with Moses, who had "boldness" to enter even into the thick darkness! The good man need not fear to be anywhere with God - J.O. They removed, and stood afar off. Homilist. I. THAT ALL MEN AS SINNERS MUST BE BROUGHT INTO CONSCIOUS CONTACT WITH MORAL LAW. The guarantees of this conscious contact are found — 1. In the law of our spiritual nature. 2. In the special Providence that is over us. 3. In the provisions of the gospel. 4. In the transactions of the final retribution. II. THAT THIS CONSCIOUS CONTACT IS EVER ASSOCIATED WITH FEELINGS OF THE MOST TERRIBLE ALARM. III. THAT UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF THIS MOST TERRIBLE ALARM THERE WILL ARISE A CONSCIOUS NECESSITY FOR A MEDIATOR. IV. THAT HEAVEN HAS GRACIOUSLY PROVIDED SUCH A MEDIATOR, WHO IS EQUAL TO THE EMERGENCY. () I. SUPERFICIAL VIEWS OF DIVINE PROCEEDINGS INDUCE FEAR. II. PROFOUND VIEWS OF DIVINE PROCEEDINGS ENCOURAGE CONFIDENCE. III. PROFOUND VIEWS OF DIVINE PROCEEDINGS LEAD TO A CORRECT UNDERSTANDING OF DIVINE PURPOSES. IV. THE UNENLIGHTENED AND THE FEARING STAND AFAR OFF. "And the people stood afar off." There is no reason to keep away from God. Why should we shut out the light of a Father's compassion? V. BUT THE HEAVEN-TAUGHT ARE TAKEN INTO THE THICK DARKNESS WHERE THE TRUE LIGHT APPEARS. Moses drew near, or more correctly, was made to draw near, unto the thick darkness where God was. () 1. Such a mode was necessary.(1) To reveal God's majesty — to men familiar with the puerilities of heathen worship;(2) to show that God was not to be trifled with, and His laws broken with impunity;(3) to meet the case of those open only to impressions made on their fear. 2. Such a mode served some of the most important functions of the old dispensation. (1)Preparatory;(2)symbolic.3. Such a mode was appropriate, as accompanying judicial proceedings. II. THE RECEPTION OF THIS REVELATION WAS WHAT GOD INTENDED IT SHOULD BE. 1. Intelligent. 2. Reverent. 3. Prayerful. III. THE COMFORT OF THIS REVELATION DISARMED IT OF ALL ITS TERRORS. 1. The God of their fathers had spoken. 2. God had spoken for their encouragement. 3. God had spoken but to prove their loyalty to Him. If they could stand the test, what could harm them? (Romans 8:39). 4. God had spoken for their moral elevation. (1)"That His fear may be before your faces."(2)"That ye sin not" (1 John 2:1, 2).Learn —1. Not to dread God's revelation. 2. To approach God through the one new and living way which is ever open. 3. To keep all God's laws in the strength of the comfort which His presence brings. () The Hebrews had come up out of Egypt, and were standing in front of Sinai. They turn to Moses and beg him to stand between them and God. At first it seems as if their feeling were a strange one. This is their God who is speaking to them. Would it not seem as if they would be glad to have Him come to them directly, to have Him almost look on them with eyes that they could see? That is the first question, but very speedily we feel how natural that is which actually did take place. The Hebrews had delighted in God's mercy. They had come singing up out of the Red Sea. They had followed the pillar of fire and the pillar of cloud. But now they were called on to face God Himself. In behind all the superficial aspects of their life they were called on to get at its centre and its heart. There they recoiled. We are willing to know that God is there. We are willing, we are glad, that Moses should go into His presence and bring us His messages. But we will not come in sight of Him ourselves. Life would be awful. "Let not God speak with us, lest we die!" I want to bid you think how natural and how common such a temper is. There are a few people among us who are always full of fear that life will become too trivial and petty. There are always a great many people who live in perpetual anxiety lest life should become too awful and serious and deep and solemn. There is something in all of us which feels that fear. We are always hiding behind effects to keep out of sight of their causes, behind events to keep out of sight of their meanings, behind facts to keep out of sight of principles, behind men to keep out of the sight of God. We have all known men from whom it seemed as if it would be good to lift away some of the burden of life, to make the world seem easier and less serious. Some such people perhaps we know to-day; but as we look abroad generally do we not feel sure that such people are the exceptions? The great mass of people are stunted and starved with superficialness. They never touch the real reasons and meanings of living. They turn and hide their faces, or else run away, when those profoundest things present themselves. They will not let God speak with them. So all their lives lack tone; nothing brave, enterprising, or aspiring is in them. For we may lay it down as a first principle that he who uses superficially any power or any person which he is capable of using profoundly gets harm out of that unaccepted opportunity which he lets slip. You talk with some slight acquaintance, some man of small capacity and little depth, about ordinary things in very ordinary fashion; and you do not suffer for it. You get all that he has to give. But you hold constant intercourse with some deep nature, some man of great thoughts and true spiritual standards, and you insist on dealing merely with the surface of him, touching him only at the most trivial points of living, and you do get harm. The unused capacity of the man — all which he might be to you, but which you are refusing to let him be — is always there demoralizing you. But — here is the point — for this man with his capacities to live in this world with its opportunities and yet to live on its surface and to refuse its depths, to turn away from its problems, to reject the voice of God that speaks out of it, is a demoralizing and degrading thing. It mortifies the unused powers, and keeps the man always a traitor to his privileges and his duties. Take one part of life and you can see it very plainly. Take the part with which we are familiar here in church. Take the religious life of man. True religion is, at its soul, spiritual sympathy with, spiritual obedience to, God. But religion has its superficial aspects — first of truth to be proved and accepted, and then, still more superficial, of forms to be practised and obeyed. Now suppose that a man setting out to be religious confines himself to these superficial regions and refuses to go further down. He learns his creed and says it. He rehearses his ceremony and practises it. The deeper voice of his religion cries to him from its unsounded depths, "Come, understand your soul! Come, through repentance enter into holiness! Come, hear the voice of God." But he draws back; he piles between himself and that importunate invitation the cushions of his dogma and his ceremony. "Let God's voice come to me deadened and softened through these," he says. "Let not God speak to me, lest I die. Speak thou to me, and I will hear." So he cries to his priest, to his sacrament, which is his Moses. Is he not harmed by that? Is it only that he loses the deeper spiritual power which he might have had? Is it not also that the fact of its being there and of his refusing to take it makes his life unreal, fills it with a suspicion of cowardice, and puts it on its guard lest at any time this ocean of spiritual life which has been shut out should burst through the barriers which exclude it and come pouring in? Suppose the opposite. Suppose the soul so summoned accepts the fulness of its life. It opens its ears and cries, "Speak, Lord, for Thy servant heareth." It invites the infinite and eternal aspects of life to show themselves. Thankful to Moses for his faithful leadership, it is always pressing through him to the God for whom he speaks. Thankful to priest and church and dogma, it will always live in the truth of its direct, immediate relationship to God, and make them minister to that. What a consciousness of thoroughness and safety; what a certain, strong sense of resting on the foundation of all things is there then! Oh! do not let your religion satisfy itself with anything less than God. Insist on having your soul get at Him and hear His voice. Never, because of the mystery, the awe, perhaps the perplexity and doubt which come with the great experiences, let yourself take refuge in the superficial things of faith. It is better to be lost on the ocean than to be tied to the shore. Therefore seek great experiences of the soul, and never turn your back on them when God sends them, as He surely will! The whole world of thought is full of the same necessity and the same danger. A man sets himself to think of this world we live in. He discovers facts. He arranges facts into what he calls laws. Behind his laws he feels and owns the powers to which he gives the name of force. He will go no further. He dimly hears the depth below, of final causes, of personal purposes, roaring as the great ocean roars under the steamship which, with its clamorous machineries and its precious freight of life, goes sailing on the ocean's bosom. You say to him, "Take this into your account. Your laws are beautiful, your force is gracious and sublime. But neither is ultimate. You have not reached the end and source of things in these. Go further. Let God speak to you." Can you not hear the answer? "Nay, that perplexes all things. That throws confusion into what we have made plain and orderly and clear. Let not God speak to us, lest we die!" You think what the study of Nature might become if, keeping every accurate and careful method of investigation of the way in which the universe is governed and arranged, it yet was always hearing, always rejoicing to hear, behind all methods and governments and machineries, the sacred movement of the personal will and nature which is the soul of all. The same is true about all motive. How men shrink from the profoundest motives! I ask you why you toil at your business day in and day out, year after year. I beg you to tell me why you devote yourself to study, and you reply with certain statements about the attractiveness of study and the way in which every extension or increase of knowledge makes the world more rich. All that is true, but it is slight. This refusal to trace any act back more than an inch into that world of motive out of which all acts spring, this refusal especially to let acts root themselves in Him who is the one only really worthy cause why anything should be done at all — this is what makes life grow so thin to the feeling of men who live it; this is what makes men wonder sometimes that their brethren can find it worth while to keep on working and living, even while they themselves keep on at their life and work in the same way. "Let us be quiet and natural," men say, "and all will be well" But the truth is that to be natural is to feel the seriousness and depth of life, and that no man does come to any worthy quietness who does not find God and rest on Him and talk with Him continually. The whole trouble comes from a wilful or a blind under-estimate of man. "Let not God speak to me, lest I die," the man exclaims. Is it not almost as if the fish cried, "Cast me not into the water, lest I drown"? or as if the eagle said, "Let not the sun shine on me, lest I be blind"? It is man fearing his native element. He was made to talk with God. It is not death, but his true life, to come into the Divine society and to take his thoughts, his standards, and his motives directly out of the hand of the eternal perfectness. We find a revelation of this in all the deepest and highest moments of our lives. Have you not often been surprised by seeing how men who seemed to have no capacity for such experiences passed into a sense of Divine companionship when anything disturbed their lives with supreme joy or sorrow? Once or twice, at least, in his own life, almost every one of us has found himself face to face with God, and felt how natural it was to be there. And often the question has come, "What possible reason is there why this should not be the habit and fixed condition of our life? Why should we ever go back from it?" And then, as we felt ourselves going back from it, we have been aware that we were growing unnatural again. And as this is the revelation of the highest moments of every life, so it is the revelation of the highest lives; especially it is the revelation of the highest of all lives, the life of Christ. Men had been saying, "Let not God speak to us, lest we die"; and here came Christ, the man — Jesus, the man; and God spoke with Him constantly, and yet He lived with the most complete vitality. And every now and then a great man or woman comes who is like Christ in this. There comes a man who naturally drinks of the fountain and eats of the essential bread of life. Where you deal with the mere borders of things, he gets at their hearts; where you ask counsel of expediencies, he talks with first principles; where you say, "This will be profitable," he says, "This is right." And in religion, may I not beg you to be vastly more radical and thorough? Do not avoid, but seek, the great, deep, simple things of faith.()
People MosesPlaces Mount SinaiTopics Death, Die, Ear, Ears, Fear, Lest, Listen, Speak, VoiceOutline 1. The ten commandments are spoken by Jehovah
18. The people are afraid, but Moses comforts them
21. Idolatry is forbidden
23. Of what sort the altar should be
Dictionary of Bible Themes Exodus 20:18-19 1349 covenant, at Sinai
5567 suffering, emotional
6636 drawing near to God Exodus 20:18-20 1454 theophany Exodus 20:18-21 4810 darkness, natural Library The Decalogue: I --Man and God
'And God spake all these words, saying, 2. I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 3. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 4. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in the heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy ScriptureThe Decalogue: ii. --Man and Man
'Honour thy father and thy mother; that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. 13. Thou shalt not kill. 14. Thou shalt not commit adultery. 15. Thou shalt not steal. 16. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour. 17. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his man-servant, nor his maid-servant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's. 18. And all the people saw the thunderings and …
Alexander Maclaren—Expositions of Holy Scripture May the Third Other Gods!
"Thou shalt have no other gods before Me." --EXODUS xx. 1-11. If we kept that commandment all the other commandments would be obeyed. If we secure this queen-bee we are given the swarm. To put nothing "before" God! What is left in the circle of obedience? God first, always and everywhere. Nothing allowed to usurp His throne for an hour! I was once allowed to sit on an earthly throne for a few seconds, but even that is not to be allowed with the throne of God. Nothing is to share His sovereignty, …
John Henry Jowett—My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year The Mediator --The Interpreter
To us, that day at Horeb is a type of the action of the law in our nature: thus doth the law deal with our consciences and hearts. If you have ever felt the law spoken home to you by the Spirit of God, you have heard great thunderings within. You have been forced to cry with Habakkuk, "When I heard, my belly trembled; my lips quivered at the voice: rottenness entered into my bones." And God intended it to be so, that you might look to the flames which Moses saw, and abandon forever all hope of acceptance …
Charles Haddon Spurgeon—Spurgeon's Sermons Volume 35: 1889 Weighed in the Balances
In the fifth chapter of Daniel we read the history of King Belshazzar. One chapter tells us all we know about him. One short sight of his career is all we have. He bursts in upon the scene and then disappears. THE EASTERN FEAST. We are told that he made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and drank wine before them. In those days a feast would sometimes last for six months in Eastern countries. How long this feast had been going on we are not told, but in the midst of it, he "commanded to bring …
Dwight L. Moody—Weighed and Wanting Traditionalism, Its Origin, Character, and Literature - the Mishnah and Talmud - the Gospel of Christ - the Dawn of a New Day.
In trying to picture to ourselves New Testament scenes, the figure most prominent, next to those of the chief actors, is that of the Scribe ({hebrew}, grammates, literatus). He seems ubiquitous; we meet him in Jerusalem, in Judæa, and even in Galilee. [437] Indeed, he is indispensable, not only in Babylon, which may have been the birthplace of his order, but among the dispersion' also. [438] Everywhere he appears as the mouthpiece and representative of the people; he pushes to the front, the …
Alfred Edersheim—The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah Covenanting Sanctioned by the Divine Example.
God's procedure when imitable forms a peculiar argument for duty. That is made known for many reasons; among which must stand this,--that it may be observed and followed as an example. That, being perfect, is a safe and necessary pattern to follow. The law of God proclaims what he wills men as well as angels to do. The purposes of God show what he has resolved to have accomplished. The constitutions of his moral subjects intimate that he has provided that his will shall be voluntarily accomplished …
John Cunningham—The Ordinance of Covenanting Beam on us Brightly, Blessed Day,
"The Lord blessed the Seventh day and hallowed it." -- Exodus 20:11. Beam on us brightly, blessed day, Dawn softly for our Savior's sake; And waft thy sweetness o'er our way, To draw us heavenward when we wake. O holy life that shall not end, Light that will never cease to be -- May every Sabbath-day we spend, Add to our happiness in Thee. …
Miss A. L. Waring—Hymns and Meditations For, Concerning False Witness, which is Set Down in the Ten Commands of The...
36. For, concerning false witness, which is set down in the ten commands of the Law, it can indeed in no wise be contended that love of truth may at heart be preserved, and false witness brought forth to him unto whom the witness is borne. For, when it is said to God only, then it is only in the heart that the truth is to be embraced: but when it is said to man, then must we with the mouth also of the body bring forth truth, because man is not an inspector of the heart. But then, touching the witness …
St. Augustine—On Lying On the Other Hand, those who Say that we must Never Lie...
6. On the other hand, those who say that we must never lie, plead much more strongly, using first the Divine authority, because in the very Decalogue it is written "Thou shall not bear false witness;" [2306] under which general term it comprises all lying: for whoso utters any thing bears witness to his own mind. But lest any should contend that not every lie is to be called false witness, what will he say to that which is written, "The mouth that lieth slayeth the soul:" [2307] and lest any should …
St. Augustine—On Lying What Then, if a Homicide Seek Refuge with a Christian...
22. What then, if a homicide seek refuge with a Christian, or if he see where the homicide have taken refuge, and be questioned of this matter by him who seeks, in order to bring to punishment a man, the slayer of man? Is he to tell a lie? For how does he not hide a sin by lying, when he for whom he lies has been guilty of a heinous sin? Or is it because he is not questioned concerning his sin, but about the place where he is concealed? So then to lie in order to hide a person's sin is evil; but …
St. Augustine—On Lying Thus Has the Question Been on Both Sides Considered and Treated...
12. Thus has the question been on both sides considered and treated; and still it is not easy to pass sentence: but we must further lend diligent hearing to those who say, that no deed is so evil, but that in avoidance of a worse it ought to be done; moreover that the deeds of men include not only what they do, but whatever they consent to be done unto them. Wherefore, if cause have arisen that a Christian man should choose to burn incense to idols, that he might not consent to bodily defilement …
St. Augustine—On Lying The Old Testament Canon from Its Beginning to Its Close.
The first important part of the Old Testament put together as a whole was the Pentateuch, or rather, the five books of Moses and Joshua. This was preceded by smaller documents, which one or more redactors embodied in it. The earliest things committed to writing were probably the ten words proceeding from Moses himself, afterwards enlarged into the ten commandments which exist at present in two recensions (Exod. xx., Deut. v.) It is true that we have the oldest form of the decalogue from the Jehovist …
Samuel Davidson—The Canon of the Bible The Preface to the Commandments
And God spake all these words, saying, I am the LORD thy God,' &c. Exod 20: 1, 2. What is the preface to the Ten Commandments? The preface to the Ten Commandments is, I am the Lord thy God.' The preface to the preface is, God spake all these words, saying,' &c. This is like the sounding of a trumpet before a solemn proclamation. Other parts of the Bible are said to be uttered by the mouth of the holy prophets (Luke 1: 70), but here God spake in his own person. How are we to understand that, God spake, …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Right Understanding of the Law
Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.' Exod 20: 3. Before I come to the commandments, I shall answer questions, and lay down rules respecting the moral law. What is the difference between the moral laud and the gospel? (1) The law requires that we worship God as our Creator; the gospel, that we worship him in and through Christ. God in Christ is propitious; out of him we may see God's power, justice, and holiness: in him we see his mercy displayed. (2) The moral law requires obedience, but gives …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The First Commandment
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' Exod 20: 3. Why is the commandment in the second person singular, Thou? Why does not God say, You shall have no other gods? Because the commandment concerns every one, and God would have each one take it as spoken to him by name. Though we are forward to take privileges to ourselves, yet we are apt to shift off duties from ourselves to others; therefore the commandment is in the second person, Thou and Thou, that every one may know that it is spoken to him, …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Second Commandment
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am o jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of then that hate me; and shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments.' Exod 20: 4-6. I. Thou shalt not …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Third Commandment
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: For the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.' Exod 20: 7. This commandment has two parts: 1. A negative expressed, that we must not take God's name in vain; that is, cast any reflections and dishonour on his name. 2. An affirmative implied. That we should take care to reverence and honour his name. Of this latter I shall speak more fully, under the first petition in the Lord's Prayer, Hallowed be thy name.' I shall …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Fourth Commandment
Remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God; in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath-day and hallowed it. Exod 20: 8-11. This …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Fifth Commandment
Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.' Exod 20: 12. Having done with the first table, I am next to speak of the duties of the second table. The commandments may be likened to Jacob's ladder: the first table respects God, and is the top of the ladder that reaches to heaven; the second respects superiors and inferiors, and is the foot of the ladder that rests on the earth. By the first table, we walk religiously towards God; by …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Sixth Commandment
Thou shalt not kill.' Exod 20: 13. In this commandment is a sin forbidden, which is murder, Thou shalt not kill,' and a duty implied, which is, to preserve our own life, and the life of others. The sin forbidden is murder: Thou shalt not kill.' Here two things are to be understood, the not injuring another, nor ourselves. I. The not injuring another. [1] We must not injure another in his name. A good name is a precious balsam.' It is a great cruelty to murder a man in his name. We injure others in …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Seventh Commandment
Thou shalt not commit adultery.' Exod 20: 14. God is a pure, holy spirit, and has an infinite antipathy against all uncleanness. In this commandment he has entered his caution against it; non moechaberis, Thou shalt not commit adultery.' The sum of this commandment is, The preservations of corporal purity. We must take heed of running on the rock of uncleanness, and so making shipwreck of our chastity. In this commandment there is something tacitly implied, and something expressly forbidden. 1. The …
Thomas Watson—The Ten Commandments The Eighth Commandment
Thou shalt not steal.' Exod 20: 15. AS the holiness of God sets him against uncleanness, in the command Thou shalt not commit adultery;' so the justice of God sets him against rapine and robbery, in the command, Thou shalt not steal.' The thing forbidden in this commandment, is meddling with another man's property. The civil lawyers define furtum, stealth or theft to be the laying hands unjustly on that which is another's;' the invading another's right. I. The causes of theft. [1] The internal causes …
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