Mercy Allows
Us to Be Bold
1. Bold with
God through a plea for forgiveness
2. Bold with
others through a plea for repentance
Exodus 32:7-14 And the LORD said to Moses, "Go,
get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted
themselves. 8 "They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I
commanded them. They have made themselves a molded calf, and worshiped it and
sacrificed to it, and said, `This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out
of the land of Egypt!'" 9 And the LORD said to Moses, "I have seen
this people, and indeed it is a stiff-necked people! 10 "Now therefore,
let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them.
And I will make of you a great nation." 11 Then Moses pleaded with the
LORD his God, and said: "LORD, why does Your wrath burn hot against Your
people whom You have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with
a mighty hand? 12 "Why should the Egyptians speak, and say, `He brought
them out to harm them, to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from
the face of the earth '? Turn from Your fierce wrath, and relent from this harm
to Your people. 13 "Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your servants, to
whom You swore by Your own self, and said to them, `I will multiply your
descendants as the stars of heaven; and all this land that I have spoken of I
give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.'" 14 So the
LORD relented from the harm which He said He would do to His people.
You can
picture the scene, I’m sure you’ve all been there before. A young child grows
defiant with a parent and barks outs a trite demand. It’s a moment of anger and
emotion, but nonetheless, something recorded for all to hear. Whether the child
regrets it or not, the natural response from the parent is, “how dare you talk
to me like that!” And they have a point. Parents do so much for children. Some
of the most important things go continually unnoticed and without thanks or
even recognition. For that child to be disrespectful and ungrateful is a major
breach of good conduct and common sense.
We get that
picture today in this account from the giving of the Ten Commandments on Mount
Sinai. After all God had done for His people: leading them out of slavery, destroying
Pharaoh’s army, and keeping them safe and well fed, they react like this. They
create a molded image, a baby cow of all things, and they bow down and worship
it. What apostasy! What disrespect! We can surely understand why these words
keep on telling us that God’s anger burned hot against them.
But here’s the
real kicker. When God informs Moses that He is going to destroy the people,
Moses intercedes. He pleads, almost to point of demanding, that God not bring
this strict judgment. We kind of feel the same way here as we did with the
story of the disrespectful child. What
gives Moses the right? How dare He talk to God like this! In a sense, that
natural reaction is correct. Moses had no right to address God like this. In a
different context this might have been considered out of line. But, in another
sense, Moses not only had every right, it was demanded of him to address God
like this because of Moses’ calling and office.
Moses was the
peoples’ intermediary. He was specifically given this task by God. God wanted
him to plead for these people. Perhaps this was really the first time in his
career as God’s prophet that Moses actually did the right thing right away
without looking for an alternative. Ah, yes, good old soft-spoken Moses. The
one who was too nervous to go before Pharaoh because he wasn’t a good enough
speak. Moses, the one who hemmed and hawed, looked for every opportunity out of
God’s calling. This Moses, was now challenging God directly. What a change!
It all goes
back to mercy. Both Moses’ right to speak and the way in which he spoke stemmed
from his trust of God’s merciful nature. Let’s be clear, if God wanted to
destroy these people, or in the very least severely punish them, He had every
right. By nature, people often think that God owes them something; that He
isn’t allowed to do whatever it is He wants to do. But, this is just another
lie and ploy of Satan. God is holy. Whatever He does, even a strict punishment,
is indeed right and just. Once a sinner, you have no right to shake your finger
at God and complain, “no fair!”
Now think
about this also. Moses seems calm and collected here, but perhaps even he
doesn’t fully understand the situation. As soon as he came down from the
mountain and saw what was happening, he cast the freshly scribed stone tablets
to the base of the mountain where they broke. Like God in our text, we’re told
here that Moses’ anger burned hot. The punishment that was levied against the
people that day was given by Moses, not God. He was the one who commanded that
the idol be ground into powder, mixed into the water, and drunk by the people. In
addition to this, Moses declared to those present that they needed to declare
their allegiance to the LORD. Those who refused were killed; and 3,000 died.
Remember that these
events of chapter 32 began all the way back in chapter 20. From chapter 20 to
chapter 32, Moses is on the mountain receiving instructions from the LORD. By
the time chapter 32 rolls around, most people forget what the Israelites promised
in chapter 20. Before ascending Sinai, Moses said (directly from God), “If you will obey My voice and keep My
covenant, then you shall be a special treasure to Me above all people, and you
shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” The peoples’
response? “All that the LORD has spoken
we will do.” A monumental promise made and an even bigger betrayal as
chapter 32 arrives.
Both Moses’
anger and God’s was just. We call it righteous anger. God doesn’t condemn all
anger as sin. There is a proper way to be upset about something. Think of
Jesus’ driving out the merchants in the temple as another example. When we
consider the entire context there was nothing for the Israelites to fall back
to as a defense for their actions. So, what right did Moses have to be bold?
The only answer was in the merciful nature of God. Only because God was loving
and compassionate did Moses have the right to intercede for the people. At
first glance we may think that God finally came to His senses and realized He
was overreacting, like we so often do when we get angry. But, God wasn’t in the
wrong. He had every right to respond the way He did.
We’re told in
verse 11 that Moses “pleaded” with the LORD. The sense of this word helps us
understand the attitude in which Moses approached the LORD. Moses was not
arrogant or defiant. He was humble, yet bold. The word for “plead” contains the
idea of becoming ill over something that is so distressing. It conveys the
attitude of someone who is so overcome with grief that they show it physically
in their body. That was Moses’ disposition as He approached the LORD, and it is
the true attitude of repentance. We don’t know if Moses became physically ill.
That’s not the point. What we do know is that he so loathed what his people had
done that he was offering repentance on their behalf.
The thing is,
repentance doesn’t work if mercy is not on the other side. We only have
opportunity to plead and repent because God is merciful. Somewhere along the
line in his dealings with the Israelites, Moses understood how merciful God was
with them time and time again. There were plenty of times to learn this lesson
as this was not the first time Israel fell into sin, nor would it be the last.
Along with understanding God’s mercy, Moses also realized that that very mercy
demands bold action. And so, Moses was able to demand that the LORD forgive His
people. Seems a bit out of line at first, but truly understanding faith in
Christ and what that means for our relationship with God means that we can be
bold and persistent in demanding that forgiveness.
Moses listed
his forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob as examples of the LORD’s mercy in
the past. Each of their lives were full of depictions of God’s mercy. Abraham
was called from obscurity to be the father of all believers. He was given the
ultimate test when called to sacrifice Isaac, yet received a tremendous
reminder of mercy through the bigger promise of the Substitute, Jesus Christ.
Jacob was renamed, because he boldly wrestled with God and persistently
demanded the blessings of mercy that God had promised.
This story is
really synonymous with the Parable of the Persistent Widow which Jesus spoke in
His ministry. God’s mercy allows, and even demands, that we be bold to receive
blessings through our Savior’s name. The widow had to go again and again to the
judge to have her case heard. God wants us to seek His grace with the same
tenacity and need in our lives and not to give up the moment we make a mistake
or the moment adversity hits us in the face.
It is not
disrespectful to hold God to His promises, rather it’s an act of faith. We
trust that God will keep His word to us. This means that we not only show this
boldness in our relationship with God, but also as Moses did, we show it to one
another. Sometimes that involves pleading for others before God. At other times
it means bringing a message of repentance to someone who is caught in sin. We
hardly can say that we care about someone if we turn the other way when they
rebel against God. But it’s also tough to exercise the love of admonishment. It
takes boldness.
Though the
message of repentance begins in the law, it should find its completion in the
gospel. No one likes hearing the initial call to deny themselves of whatever
sinful activity they are doing. But, much like Moses and the Israelites, there
is hope on the other side of repentance because there is mercy from God. The
true motivation behind repentance is not being able to say, “told you so,” or
showing yourself to be a better person than someone else. If it was all about
the condemnation of the law then those things would be true. The real
motivation is in the love of God. It’s in the truth and hope that we can
announce forgiveness as mediators just like Moses, because we have an eternal,
righteous Mediator in Jesus Christ. It takes boldness to preach repentance, but
it is an act of love.
A very
striking part of our text comes right at the beginning of the description of
Israel’s idolatry. From verse 4-5: And
he received the gold from their hand, and he fashioned it with an engraving
tool, and made a molded calf. Then they said, "This is your god, O Israel,
that brought you out of the land of Egypt!" 5 So when Aaron saw it, he
built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said,
"Tomorrow is a feast to the LORD."
From these
verses it seems as though Israel hadn’t completely forgotten about the LORD.
Instead, what they wanted was to see God on their terms; to have God express
Himself in the manner that they chose. They still claimed to believe in the
LORD who had rescued them from Egypt. Aaron proclaimed a feast to Jehovah, the
I AM God, yet they had relegated Him to their creation, a golden calf. Refusal
to repent works the same way. It doesn’t necessarily deny God’s existence.
It simply tries to put a human image on Him. People say, I believe in God, I
show love, I know the Bible; but I won’t repent. People find ways to put their
own stamp on things that God has long-called sin by saying, that’s the old
interpretation, that was for that culture, that was archaic, and so on.
In contrast,
God wants to have all of the effect on us. He does not need us to put our
identity on Him, for He puts His identity on us. A well-known hymn verse speaks
to that effect: “On my heart imprint
Thine image, blessed Jesus King of Grace, that life’s riches, cares and
pleasures, have no power Thee to efface, this the superscription be, Jesus
crucified for me. Is my life my hope’s foundation, and my glory and salvation.
To have God’s
image on our hearts, to have His identity means that we must change. That means
repentance and forgiveness. We can be bold to request that before God and one
another. Amen.
The peace of
God which surpasses all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ
Jesus. Amen.
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