Exodus 34:6–7
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I was talking with a friend recently who was giving it a shot to read the Bible for the first time. Unsatisfied with what he'd found in the world or any answers or solutions he could get. But he'd found a whole set of problems, issues, and predicaments. He'd known that something had gone terribly wrong for him, for the world that he's in.
He'd been reading Proverbs, some of the Gospels, and we talked about those. But he told me, and I think all of you have heard this, and maybe even felt it, that he can't help but wonder if it's all just some book of rules, of do's and don'ts. Is that it? What's the answer? All the religions of the world, as we know, they identify a problem and they give a list of so that.
That's how the world deals with it. Islam says to do these things so that you might be accepted. Hinduism, Buddhism, the religions of the East, all the religions of the world give man-centered solutions to man-centered problems they perceive. It's much of what I heard from students in Guadalajara doing campus ministry there in a Roman Catholic world. So what is the answer? Open your Bibles with me if you haven't already to Exodus chapter 34, verses 6 and 7.
The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who by no means will clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.
As we heard a little bit this morning, God heard the cries of his people in Egypt. He freed them from captivity, led out by Moses. And not long after, they turned their backs on him. They have an idol of a gold calf. Moses goes up to the mountain to see God, and this is what we hear. If you'd like any more details on just all the book of Exodus, you can email at aduke at thirdavenue.org.
I think he loves Exodus, and he can tell you why. What I'm trying to convince you of tonight is that the Lord is abounding in what we aren't like and what we need most, which is why we're guilty, so run to him. The Lord is abounding in what we aren't like, in what we need most, which is why we're guilty, so run to him.
We're not going to have points, but we'll have drum beats throughout tonight. Takeaways, if you will. One, the Lord's grace and the Lord's love and his mercy go deeper than any one of our sins do. The Lord's grace and the Lord's love and his mercy go deeper than we think any one of our sins do. Second, we are no different than the Israelites who would turn everywhere but the one who had exactly what they needed.
We are no different than the Israelites who would turn everywhere but the one who had exactly what they needed. Third, the Lord's justice goes deeper and His justice is better than anything we could come up with on our own. The Lord's justice goes deeper and His justice is better than anything we could come up with on our own. Fourth, you can only be satisfied if you admire and are ultimately satisfied in the most admirable and satisfying being in all of existence.
You can only be satisfied if you admire and are ultimately satisfied in the most admirable and satisfying being in the universe. The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. I don't know anyone quite like that, at least not a human.
By God's grace, we have people that can look like that at times, maybe some more than others. But that doesn't sound anything like the world to me. The world's not merciful and gracious. The world's not patient, slow to anger. The world's certainly not abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. That's why it's the way it is, isn't it? So many of us spend so much time looking for admiration, looking for something to admire, to be wowed by, or looking for others to admire us, something to satisfy.
That's what Israel did just before these words in Exodus. Moses went up to the top of the mountain wanting to see God, and God still had to stoop down to see him. What did we get? What was important for us to know from it? Not an image, not a description of what he looks like, but what his heart is. Israel was concerning themselves with gold calves after everything he'd done for them.
But he tells us what he's like. He tells us who he is. And that shows us exactly why we need him. We're no different than the Israelites who would turn everywhere but the one who had exactly what they needed. Maybe it's you. Maybe it's somebody you know and you need to talk to. But you spend so much time trying to drink from a cup that's already empty.
Drink from the well. Stop craving for and chasing desperately after empty cups. There's an endless spring. You can only be satisfied if you admire and are ultimately satisfied in the most admirable and satisfying being in the universe. Can God be arrogant and prideful? Can so much praise and admiration be owed to?
We call it pride or arrogance for someone that's undeserving of it. But what could be more serious than to turn your back on the one that is deserving of it? Your joy and your true satisfaction is found and made complete in proclaiming exactly who he is.
And God tells us who he is right here. And that will change your whole life if you hold that. He's never needed grace. He's never needed forgiveness. Yet he's full of grace, full of forgiveness, and he gives it freely. Look at verse 6 again. Abounding, abounding in what we lack so deeply, abounding in what we could never have on our own, not giving us the worst of what we deserve but giving us the best of what we could never earn that's why we sing to him that's why we pray to him that's why we make our lives about him he tells us who he is and who we are what else would our response be?
that's the only way to respond we make our lives about him not so that but because because of who he is because he took it all he took it all in christ all the iniquity and rebellion all the suffering all the punishment on himself. Abounding in faithfulness when we weren't, he kept his promise.
That's why he, King Jesus, can say, I have overcome the world. In his abounding, steadfast love, he came as a man, God the Son. And in his abounding, steadfast love, in faithfulness, he lived, and died. And by his grace and by his mercy, he trampled death and left it in that tomb in Jerusalem. That's why when we try solutions for the problem on our own, that's us trying to overcome the world. Sounds a bit ridiculous. The Christian life is marked by verse 6.
It just simply will be. Talk to people about it if you don't enough. Are you only holy when you're happy? Are you only feeling good about the Lord when you're feeling good about your life? Does your time with the Lord increase in times of happiness? Does it decrease in times of distress? For Moses and the Israelites, the God of Exodus was ordering, orchestrating every event for their ultimate good, even in the midst of their wavering, in the midst of their suffering.
Of their sorrow. His abounding steadfast love and faithfulness is what orders our times of distress. It's what directs us, grounds us in our pains and our sorrows. Don't go distant in those times. Pay attention in those times. Lean in in those times. Remember what God says about himself.
Don't ruminate on yourself, on the problem, on the pain, on the distress. Rest in the character of your king. Not to belittle the distress, but to magnify Jesus. The world puts the spotlight on you, on the problem, on the pain, on the distress. Put the spotlight on your Lord, who's abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
And he's orchestrating everything for your ultimate good, just as he did in Exodus. We're no different than the Israelites who would turn everywhere but the one who had exactly what they needed. And you can only be satisfied if you admire and are ultimately satisfied in the most admirable and satisfying being in the universe. You know another way the Lord is abounding in steadfast love?
He gave you something precious to him. He gave you his church. There's a reason why we talk so much about the church, in case you're skeptical. God is about his church. There's a reason why. It changed everything for me. It was like seeing color for the first time. I mean, how amazing is it? And I know this personally for me.
Since the day I was baptized here, many of you, we've laughed together. We've cried together. Celebrated together. Mourned together. Lived out the church covenant in each other's lives. You cook meals. You move each other into houses. You've given sacrificially. You've prayed for each other tonight. And if you haven't found yourself doing much of that yet, start tonight, today. The Christian life is marked by verse 6.
The God of Exodus, the God of all the greatness of existence has given you, has given me exactly what we need every step of our lives. Just as he gave Moses exactly what he needed every step of away because he's abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. He knows your needs better than you know yourself. Do you think much about how you can be the means of God's grace and mercies and faithfulness in the lives of the people around you at your church?
Do you think about it? Think about it. Invite someone over. Invite yourself over. I've done that. Take people out to coffee, to lunch. If you're going to Costco, bring somebody, please. Have them know your life and you know theirs. Look at verse 7. Keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clue the guilty.
Visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children to the third and fourth generation. We've got a problem. Keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity, but by no means will clear the guilty. The Israelites, right after God delivered them from slavery, repeated the same sin that their father, Adam, committed.
Sin is deeply costly. More so than we even realize, its effects and consequences roll on. It did for Adam's sin, and it did for the Israelites' sin with a gold calf. It's a sobering thought for our own lives and our own sin. You may never know the cascading effects of your own sin in this life.
it would crush us. Not only does it affect or hurt others in ways we may never fully know, but it compounds a debt so terrifying that we could never repay, especially because of the who. Of who that debt is with, And it's with verses 6 and 7.
Both heartbreaking in who we've turned our backs to at the beginning of verse 6. And terrifying in who we've made enemies with at the end of verse 7. So what's the answer? The Lord's grace and the Lord's love in His mercy go deeper than we think any one of our sins do.
So don't fall into either pit of thinking that you don't need grace and mercy. Or living like God isn't who He is and He hasn't done what He said He's done. Don't fall on either one. Does the Father forgive you begrudgingly? I had a lot of questions about this problem. So I got lunch with Greg.
I talked to his PA at the time and asked him, I said, what's his schedule? I approached him physically, in person. And I said, clear it. I got questions that need answers. So we went to Joella's, Greg and I. Joella's, where all sorts of greatness happens, great chicken and great conversations. Was I just barely making it because Jesus just squeaked me in and the Father begrudgingly put up with it?
He told me, no, look at our text. It was the Father's plan all along to have your rebellion, all your wrongs, paid for. Canceling the record of debt that stood against us, this he set aside, nailing it to the cross. And that cross had a person on it. The debt extinguished in his son, the Lamb of God, nailed to the cross.
We'd never die for someone that did what we did to God. A lot of people try to make claims about the purposes of Jesus. But this is what the first Christians understood. The God of Moses, the God of Abraham, upheld his promises in the person of Jesus Christ, God the Son. He would be our king.
He'd be our champion. And it was the Father's plan the whole time. No ladder, no methods, no fix-it-up path, no mere moral teachings, but a person. He wasn't a rebel or a political revolutionary. He was a king, and he is a king. And he's a king that came to save rebels. The Lord's justice goes deeper, and his justice is better than anything we could come up with on our own.
When I first got saved, I had this image that I couldn't get out of my mind when thinking about salvation. that I was just this kid covered in mud and in filth from a mess of my own making. And the king just brought me in his castle and cleaned me up. He just brought me in. I don't know why, but he cleaned me up. He let me live with him, and he even calls me his own son.
You see, we like to make things transactional because that's how we are with relationships. We make a list of so that's. But God's never needed anything from you or I. There's nothing you could ever give him, ever. Yet you need him completely. And yet he gives us everything. He's abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
So, of course, he's gracious. He's abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness. So, of course, he's just. The Lord is abounding in what we aren't like, in what we need most. So, run to him. Let's pray. Father in heaven, we thank you that you paid our debt. That you were faithful. You were abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, even though we weren't.
So, Lord, we pray that our lives would reflect that. Not so that, but because of. We pray these things in the name of your Son. Amen.