Sabbath: Covenant at Sinai
Image © Pacific Press
Sabbath Afternoon
Read for This Week’s Study: Deuteronomy 1:29-31; Hosea 11:1; Revelation 5:9; Deuteronomy 29:10-13; Exodus 19:5-6; Romans 6:1-2; Revelation 14:12; Romans 10:3.
Memory Text: “You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself” (Exodus 19:4, RSV).
“A little boy, one of seven children, met with an accident and was taken to the hospital. In his home there was seldom enough of anything. He never had more than just a part of a glass of milk. If the glass was full, it was shared by two of the children, and whoever drank first had to be careful not to drink too far. After the little fellow was made comfortable in the hospital, the nurse brought him a large glass of milk. He looked at it longingly for a moment and then, with the memory of privations at home, asked, ‘How deep shall I drink?’ The nurse, with her eyes shining and a lump in her throat, said, ‘Drink it all, child, drink it all!’ ” — H. M. S. Richards, “Free Grace,” Voice of Prophecy News, June 1950, p. 4.
Like this boy, it was the privilege of ancient Israel, as it is our own, to drink deeply from the wells of salvation. Israel’s deliverance from centuries of slavery and oppression was a marvelous exhibition of divine grace. Likewise, divine grace is involved in our own emancipation from sin.
The Week at a Glance: What imagery did the Lord use to describe His relationship with Israel? In what ways do the stories of the Exodus and Sinai parallel personal salvation? What was the role of the law in the Sinai covenant?
Study this week’s lesson to prepare for Sabbath, May 15.
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More than anything else, the Exodus was a defining event in the history and development of Israel as a nation. Taken from bondage and given freedom, they were forged into a nation with direction and purpose. One would think that the experience of deliverance would give them a new respect for God. Yet they rebelled and went their own way. Stephen, in his speech before he was stoned to death, had this to say about them:
And in the complacency of the twenty-first century, we sit in judgment on Israel as we stand on our own perceived high ground of knowledge and understanding. Or, do we humbly learn lessons from history?
thanks for the commentary Mr. Ashton. The additional question is, What lessonsdid we learn from the history of nation of Israel ??
Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts; and see if there be any wicked ways in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. Ps 139: 23-24.
Covenant at Sinai
I always pray for great memories. I always pray not to get dementia. Dementia is a condition in which people have their short term memories removed but their long term memories remain intact. Israel had spiritual dementia. They kept forgetting the things the Lord were doing for them in the immediate but kept going back to what they thought were great moments in their
lives, e.g, the worship of gods of stone, animals, etc. They forgot how the Lord brought them out of Egypt with a mighty hand but remembered what they ate in Egypt and wanted to have those same things in the wilderness.
What about us, Christians in these times. Do we remembered how the Lord had brought us a mighty long way (I usually write about some, there are many others I did not mentioned because of this being a pubic site). Do we, Christians have spiritual dementia?
God’s covenants with man have an element of obedience to His Word and an element of God’s care.
As we enter the agreement He initiated, He fulfills His promises to us and we respond by surrendering to His will. By the power of Christ we keep our part of the covenant.
God keeps His Word no matter what. The whole nation can go reprobate but God is still faithful to the remnant. Full of forgiveness through His grace and mercy, He will forgive our mistakes.
This doesn’t mean though, that He will excuse those who persist in wickedness and rebellion. Those who choose to worship some iniquity, preferring to have it rather than what God asks.
1 Corinthians 10:1-6
Moreover brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; and did all eat the same spiritual meat; and did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ. But with many of them God was not well pleased: for they were overthrown in the wilderness.
Now these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things, as they also lusted.
As I read through the bible references for this upcoming lesson, Rom.10:3KJV caught my eye. For context, I expanded it to include Rom.10:1-13KJV.
The children of Israel started their long spiritual journey from ignorance about who God is to reaching understanding that their God provides salvation by faith. This journey started with the Covenant at Sinai, taking hundreds of their generations to be completed; many believed and are save, but many remained in unbelieve.
Rom.10:3-4KJV – ”For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth.”
The children of Israel where saved out of their own spiritual ignorance and placed into the hands of God who declared to Moses that He will go before him(them) and continue to fight for him(them), and carry him(them) in the wilderness as “a man carries his son, in all the way that you went until you come to this place.”
The Father’s Grace is a marvelous thing, it sustains us in our wilderness as it sustained Moses and the children of Israel in their wilderness journey. Yes, we will always be able to ‘drink from the glass of Grace; we - those who love God and are called according to his purpose.
Rom.8:26-28KJV - ”Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. (27) And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because (that) he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. (28) And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
The Covenant made at Sinai was a promise by The LORD to the nation of Israel and a Covenant to The Remnant Church. The nation of Israel was promised by The LORD freedom and prosperity in their own land if they obeyed His laws for their nation. The Remnant Church was promised salvation from this world and a home in The New Earth.
Mark- you said . 'The Remnant Church was promised salvation from this world and a home in The New Earth.' Is that only what the spiritual Remnant was promised? Do you mean/inferred that we, the Remnant cant or should not have prosperity in this present world?
Do anyone thought that the Lord wants to see his people suffered in constant poverty, hunger, starvation, struggling to pay bills of all sorts etc. It that a sign to the Remnant to show that they belong to Jesus? Bible says the earth is the Lord and the fulness thereof. What is on earth were given for us to enjoy in the right way. Psalms 24:1-10.
In keeping with His promise to Abraham, God visited Israel in their Egyptian bondage and brought them to Himself to make them His people. At Sinai, God delivered His covenant of grace to these former slaves, and today we are to “earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints” while probation remains open to all who would “repent and believe the Gospel”(Jude 3, Mark 1:15). God is now preparing a remnant to stand and deliver the final appeal to this world to accept and keep this covenant of Grace.