The significance of Israel's encampment at Mount Sinai, drawing parallels to the formation of the United States. It highlights that God's stops in our lives, like Israel's year-long stay at Sinai, are purposeful for teaching and ordering. The message details the giving of God's law in three phases—moral, civil, and ceremonial—and emphasizes that the failure of humanity to keep this law, as demonstrated by Israel's breaking of the tablets, points to the necessity of Christ. Ultimately, the sermon concludes that Christ alone fulfilled the law and offers redemption from its curse, urging listeners to place their trust in Him for spiritual rebirth.
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Now we're going to resume our studies, but we do not have the chart up. We have the very splendid banner that was used at our recent workers' conference last week, and I asked them just to leave that up because we're going to tie in the message we have this morning we here in America this year are celebrating our 200th anniversary. And not very many of us remember about that, so we have to go by what the history books tell us, but there are some very important links, I think very interesting and instructive links between what we are going to be thinking about this morning and the bicentennial celebration of the beginning of our nation here.
I repeat what Dick said, we had a very, very fine workers' conference here, and so many attributed to it that it would just be impossible to personally thank all who had a very real part in it. Much of that was seen, very much it was unseen, and I might say that in the recording room they were busy taking down not only the messages that were given but also the discussions all of that handled here in a very excellent way by means of a roving neck so practically everything that occurred at the conference of a public nature was recorded and can be secured if you're interested in this see my brother Willard Feeley and he is transferring all this to cassettes and it very, very interesting and instructive to listen to.
Now we'll read just the first 10, 9 verses rather, of Exodus chapter 19. In the third month, when the children of Israel were gone forth of the land of Egypt, the same day came the influence of Sinai, for they were departed from Rephidim and were come to the desert of Sinai, and had pitched in the wilderness, and there Israel and camped before the mount. And Moses went up unto God, and the Lord called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel, ye have seen what I did unto the nations, and how I bear you on eagle's wings, and brought unto myself.
Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people, for all earth is mine. And ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel. And Moses came and called for the elders of the people, and laid before them of their faces, all these words which the Lord commanded him. And all the people answered together and said, Oh, if the Lord has spoken, we will do. And Moses returned the words of the people unto the Lord.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee forever. And Moses told the words of the people unto the Lord. Now those of you who have been with us for these studies will have a mental picture of the chart. And you remember we had watched the Lord bring the children of Israel out of their bondage, their slavery, in Egypt, out from under bloodstained door, through the Red Sea. into the wilderness. Then we saw them moving on not in a direct line toward the land of Canaan, but rather being led by the Lord down into the southern part of what we could call the peninsula of Arabia.
Until they come to Mount Sinai. Now, that section that has to do with the children of Israel at Mount Sinai is one of the very important parts of our Bible. Just how long we're going to linger on that, I do not know, because there's so much that we should learn about that, and so much we could learn that we'll just have to go on from study to study. But let me try this morning and point out a few interesting and important matters connected with this.
It took approximately two months for them to get from, when they went through the Red Sea, down to Mount Sinai. Now remember, there was likely several million in that camp, some places high, three, and a half billion even. And those would be of all ages. They would have their flocks and their herds with them. And so you could understand that those two months would be spent in different account months. Now, Numbers chapter 33 tells us they made seven different account months From the time they came through the Red Sea, until they pitched at Mount Sinai, they stopped and made camp seven times.
Now, two months, that would mean that each of those stops would average about nine days. I don't know. No one knows it's not recorded. Whether they stayed one place longer than another, in our probability they did. But the average for that would just be a little less than nine days. Now, in the book of Exodus that we've been studying, we are not given those seven encampments. We have noticed just a few of them that are recorded because of those places they learned important lessons.
God has something to teach them at each place. It's recorded in the book of Exodus. Just as you and I, after we are saved, we are saved when we come under the blood. I hope you all understand that. You are not a saved person until you have come under the protective, saving, redeeming blood of Christ. But once you put your trust in Him and in His blood, you are saved. You are a Christian, you are a child of God, you are a pilgrim, and a stranger on your way toward your heavenly home.
Now, God has many lessons to teach us during our pilgrimage. Some of these lessons were learned while they were marching. Some of them were learned when they stopped, but now here we come, just think of it, I believe they were about halfway, approximately halfway to Canaan, coming the way that they had come. Now they make the journey, we'll say approximately halfway in two months. you say, and according to that, they'll get there in about four months. Well, the sad story is they didn't get there over 40 years, and some of them didn't get there at all.
A great many of them didn't. But we're going to leave that for future studies. But now here is God. Get it in your mind. He's leading his people from Egypt to Canaan. They've covered half the distance in two months, and he stops them. He stops them for approximately a whole year. I think it's just a few days short of a year that he stops them at Mount Sinai. They make no progress so far as moving on toward the land of Canaan.
And you might ask, well, why did God do that? And what can he learn from that? In the 30th Psalm, I believe it's the 23rd verse. There is a verse which says, The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord. And I have written in the margin my Bible that which is not original with me by any means, but I have it there to remind me, and the stops also. Not only are the steps of a good man ordered by the Lord, but the stops are ordered.
And there are times in our Christian life when God stops us. We are not making any outward progress, and we're stopped. Our activities come to an end. We might have to give up a Sunday school class temporarily that we're teaching. We might have to stop preaching if we've been preaching. We might have to stop visiting if we've been visiting. And you can think of the many activities that God's people engage in, and it may be that time comes when temporarily it's impossible for us to carry that on.
Now, what should we learn from that? We should remember that our stops are ordered by the Lord just the same as our steps. And there are certain things that God had to teach his people, Israel, that he could only teach them when they were stopped, not when they're on the march. Now, none of us likes to be stopped. None of us like to lie in bed, sick. None of us like to be incapacitated in such a way that we can't do what we once did. But the thing for us to do is realize, If I'm saved, if I'm a child of God, my Heavenly Father has a lesson to teach me that are so important that he has stopped me to listen to him.
Now that's why what occurred at Mount Sinai here is very, very important. You could sum it all up like this. Now on July the 4th, There was the signing of the Declaration of Independence. We date the beginning of our nation here, the United States of America. We date that to July the 4th, 1776. That's what we're doing this year. Two hundred years of national existence and history we speak of.
But now, while that was a tremendous thing, and the Declaration of Independence naturally was the beginning of our nation as a nation. Yet we've only to go back and read of those days to realize that we weren't much of a nation after all. There was a great deal that needed before we became an orderly nation, even though a small nation. Much had to be done before we became an orderly nation.
So it was approximately 12, 11 or 12 years after that, before our constitution was written. Up until that time, we really had no constitution as a nation. And the Constitution had to be written, it had to be accepted, and as you know it was first of all by a number of states, then later accepted by others, and there have been amendments almost from the beginning to that Constitution, and it was not until the turn of the century, about there, were before the executive mansion was built, and even when the then president moved into it, it was far from being finished, and you may recall your history well enough to know that when we were thinking of building what we call now the White House, there was a request made or an opportunity given for various plans to be presented by different architects.
I'll suggest what kind of a building our chief executive should live in, and there were a number of plans presented, including one by Thomas Jefferson, and so on. So it was, frankly, the turn of the century before our chief executive really had an official residence. But these things brought the nation into what you might call more or less of an orderly form. Now I'm using that to illustrate what we have before us here. God brought his people out of Egypt to the Red Sea.
He totally broke the military power of the Egyptians at the Red Sea, and as we studied in Exodus 14, they sang their declaration of independence. You remember that song of victory and triumph in the 14th of Exodus as they stood on the wilderness side of the Red Sea? You could call that Israel independence. They were free. But while God was leading that, and they had the pillar cloud to go before them, it's only at Mount Sinai, but they receive what you might call their constitution.
Now, these actors, I know they don't look interesting at first sight. They are very interesting and very instructive. The more I read them, the more I wish I could linger over them. And you know, you learn a lot of things. Suppose I were to ask you, how many times did Moses go up to Mount Sinai to talk to God or to have God talk to him? went up at least six times and maybe seven. At least six times and maybe seven. Now, remember, he was an 80-year-old man. I don't expect to be doing any mountain climbing at 80.
If I'm climbing around at all, I think I'll climb out of a chair. I'll be about the limit of my feet when I get to be 80 if I ever do. But here's a man, six or seven times, he goes up into that rugged mountain and comes down again. If I were to ask you again, how long at one period of time did Moses spend with God? You would say 40 days and nights. That's right and that's wrong, because he did that twice.
was with God on the Mount twice for 40 days and 40 nights. If I asked you how many tables of stone were there, you'd say, well, there were two, as we understand it, or maybe just one, but likely two, with the Ten Commandments on. Well, you're wrong, what he said, one or two. There were, in all probability, You say, How many times are to ask you, How many times did God write on the table of stone? You say, Once?
No, twice. Twice. There's so much one here that is of tremendous importance and interest and instruction. Here we were reading, God offers to them the covenant of the Lord that if they would obey him in connection with his law they would become as we're reading a kingdom of priests and they never did because they disobeyed even before they got the law in written form they had broken it but as I repeat there is so very much here instructive that I just want to try and pick out to you what I will be what I feel will be the most instructive to you and the most helpful to you in a practical way.
But let's begin with us. I hope we've got hold of it now. God is stopping his people at Mount Sinai, and he's getting things in order so that when they move on from there, they are an orderly nation. They are what we call a theocracy. Now, we, in America, we became 200 years ago, a democracy. A democracy, as we all know, is that form of government where the people rule through their elected representatives.
That is democracy. Now, a theocracy, coming from Theos, the great word for God, theocracy is where God rules according to his laws and through the men that he has chosen. That is, God didn't say to Israel, now get your best man to write up a constitution for your, with rules and regulations for your nation. No, that's what was done in our country. But God himself wrote the Constitution for Israel.
God didn't say at Sinai, now look, you have an election and elect a leader and a high priest and mother official. No. God said, now, I'm giving you your leaders. and they're my representatives, and they'll see that my law and my will is carried out. Now, I hope that's enough to set this in its proper setting. Going over this, and I have read this passage many times of late in preparation for this message, because I want you to put your finger, Have you got it open at Exodus 19?
All right, keep your finger up. Now turn all the way through Exodus, all the way through Leviticus. Are you getting it? All through Leviticus. In numbers. Numbers 1, keep on going. Numbers 10. Got numbers 10? All right, verse 10. Now look, hold that much to your Bible. of it. There it is. See? Exodus 19 to Numbers 10 10. There it is. My Bible. Now all of that took place at Mount Sinai. Remember that now when you're reading your Bible from now on, everything in there, Exodus 19 and 1, to Numbers 10 and 10, it all took place at Mount Sinai.
and the first ten chapters of Numbers, up to verse 10, all took place at Mount Sinai. Now, you better settle back. I'm going to preach on all that. So, just good farewell to your Sunday dinner, supper, any food you had in mind for Monday or so, just settle back. But seriously, I have gone over this. And what I want to do this morning is just to try and give you a little capsule of what you have here under seven headings.
Very simple, because I've worked hours, I have to try and simplify it. You know, it's very easy to get up and to deep, difficult message. All you have to do is get up, open your mouth, keep on talking, people know what you're saying, couldn't care less. That's all there's to it. But if you want a message that people will be able to understand, and that's it takes hours of preparation before the Lord. Now, what happened at Mount Sinai? Well, let me give it to you in this way. Seven simple but very important things. Now, just how much we'll touch on these things later will leave to the I want you to notice that ninth verse of Exodus 19, I'm not going to take time to point out all the verses, but you'll notice here, God says to Moses, now look, I'm going to come and I'm going to speak to you, and everybody's going to hear it.
You see, the first time the law was given, it was given orally. God spoke it from the mountain, and they all heard Now, why did God say, Now, Moses, I'm going to speak this, so everybody hears. He tells us in 9th verse that they may hear when I speak with thee and believe thee forever. Do you ever read about the beginning of Mormonism? Well, you know, there was a supposed angel by the name of Moroni, M-O-R-O-N-I. think, if you just leave the eye off, you're beginning to get close to the truth.
Well, this angel appeared to one Joseph Smith, and he gave him some golden plates, or told him where he located them. And those golden plates had the Book of Mormon on them. And then the angel disappeared, and so did the golden plate. do you believe that if you do you've got a bigger throat than Jonas whale has if you can swallow that now I don't leave a word of it the only I believe about it is the name of the angel with the eye off that's the only I believe in the whole story now look why am I referring to that and you know other cults have started with someone saw vision nobody else saw it.
How do you know these things happen? Now, you see what God is doing? I call this the endorsement of God's servants. If you'd asked any Israelite from that day on, how do you know that God speaks to your leader, Moses? Well, they said, we heard him. We heard him. We To our leader Moses, we heard the whole thing. You see, that's what God does. God authenticates. He endorses his servants that we could follow that line of thought, but there isn't time to do it.
So you see, this isn't based on visions or dreams or anything like that somebody supposed to have had everything of Christianity and the truth of God in the Bible, the Old of the New Testament, it rests upon a solid, provable foundation. Now that's the first thing. The endorsement of God's servant Moses. That's what took place, first of all. Then you had, secondly, the enunciation of God's statutes. God from the mountain enunciated laws, his statutes.
Now, when nine out of ten people who know anything at all about Christianity of the Bible, when nine out of ten people think about the law, they think of the Ten Commandments. Now that's rightly so up to a point. There were three phases of the law. The Ten Commandments moral was the, the, not the moral law, but the ten, the, it was the moral requirements, let's put it that way, the moral law, the moral requirements of God are all condensed into those ten commandments.
God's moral requirements are guiding God man. But then when you come to chapter 21 and verse 1, you read of what is called in that verse the judgments. Now the judgments was the civil law. See, we have a civil law in our land, so God gave them a civil law. That is, this was the social restrictions that God and there are certain things in their social life that God restricted and regulated very carefully.
Now that's the civil law. So you've got God's moral law. That has to do with morality. You've got God's civil law, that which has to do with society. And then you come to chapter 25 and verse 1, I'm referring to Book of Exodus, you have what is called the ordinances. Now that was the ceremonial law. That had to do with the tabernacle and the priesthood and the sacrifices. Now you see, all of these were spelled out. I can't linger on it, but be very, very interesting structure.
As I said, God, first of all, spook it. Then God wrote it, and Moses came down with the tables of stone, and what had happened? They had already broken at least the first two commandments. And what do you? He took those tables of stone, and he just hurled them to the ground, and naturally they broke in pieces. Jesus. Was that a fit of temper? No, I don't believe so. It could have been righteous indignation at their sin. They had just said all that the Lord has said we will do and be obedient.
And here they were. While he's absent from them for 40 days, they go ahead and start thinking the law already that they'd heard from the mouth. But it does emphasize this. Get What else could he do? Could he say, well, now look, you've broken the first two commands. Now, try and keep the other eight. That was the only alternative to breaking them all together. And there you have a graphic illustration of what you get in James chapter 2 and verse 10. Whosoever shall keep the whole law, now listen, and yet offended, in one point, he's guilty of all.
You see? Ten commandments, one law. And you may be guiding yourself on the fact that there are some of the commandments you have broken. God is going to hold you accountable for the ones you have broken. You see? And a lawbreaker is one who has broken one of the laws. Now he goes back again. Moses goes back again. And he gets a say, he takes with him this time at the command of God, another set of tables that he shoo not at all. He takes these stone tables up there, God writes on them again, he cut down the second time.
And what does he do with a second set of stone tables? Does he give it to the people? No, because you don't get a second chance with God. You see, they had broken it. And Moses couldn't say, now look, you broke these first two commandments the first time, but here's a second chance. Try again. No, no. The second table Tables of stone were put in the ark, that chest of wood that was in the tabernacle with a mercy seat over it and the blood on that they were never given to Israel.
And you have heard enough, most of you, messages on a tabernacle to know that that ark, with its mercy, was a picture of Christ. you have in Psalm 40, quoted in Hebrews 10, Christ saying prophetically, in Psalm 40, The law is within my heart. The only man that ever lived that could keep and did keep the law of God was Jesus Christ, the son of God. The first time it was spoken to authenticate Moses, to endorse him as God's leader.
The second time was broken to reveal the failure of man. He can't keep God's law. He's under the curse of a broken law. And the third time, the second tables, they're put into that which speaks Christ. Because he alone could keep the law. And that's what he did. That's my first two points. I've got seven. You're not going to get the other five this morning, but I just want to leave this with you, friends. Let's leave our first study from Mount Sinai with this in mind.
Man has broken God's holy law. It's in the wilderness, preacher. I'm not an Israelite. I wasn't at Mount Sinai? How can you charge me with having broken God's law? Does that prove to me and about me? God had taken a little sample. Years ago, I was sent to get a soil testing kit. Shortly after I moved to our present residence, I sent for a soil testing kit, I was going to test the soil in the lander to see what it needed to build it up.
And I read the instructions, like that's all done yet. But I read the instructions. And the instructions said, now, if you have a neighbor of land, I have four and a half, a vessel that will hold four and a half acres of land and put all your land in it." Well, you say it didn't say anything at all like that. No, it didn't. It said take a sample. Take a little bit here, a little bit there, a little bit there, mix it together, take the sample and use that in your test as to what your soil contains or what it needs. That's what God did when He selected Israel.
took a little sample of humanity, and he put them in the crucible and tested them. And what he found proves for the whole thing. If I took a sample of my soil and tested it in that kit, then I would know what kind of soil I had in my four and a half acres out there. God took the sample and put it in his crucible and tested it has proven just exactly what Romans 3 and verse 19 says now we know that what things where the law says it saith to them that are under law that's the Jew the Gentile was never under law to them that are under that Every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.
You see, the sample has proven what is true of the whole thing. And man has broken the law, some at one point, some at another. But every man has broken the law and is under the condemnation and curse of. heaven, a holy, sinless, spotless Son of God. And he could say, Thy laws within my heart. He could say, I do always, speaking of His Father, in heaven, I do always those things that please Him.
None of us could say that. I believe I please God sometimes in my 50 years of Christian life, but I know I displeased him on other occasions. I know I have badly displeased my Heavenly Father, but here's one that is saying, I do always those things that please him. He had the law on his heart, and after living the sinless, spotless, holy life, he went to Calvary and died of the curse of the law that you and I have. have broken. And Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law being made a curse for us as it curses everyone that hangeth on a tree.
And now thank God. The law has been satisfied. God has been satisfied. Christ is back at the far right hand, and I am here as one of his servants to urge you to put the trust of your heart in the only man who kept the law and who died under its curse and is now willing to become more savior. I hope you'll do that. Then, my friend, you'll be born into God's family. We've been thinking of the birth of Israel We've been thinking of the birth of our country.
What about your birth? Your spiritual birth. When you accept Christ as your Savior, and you become a new creature in Christ Jesus, I hope every one of you has such a spiritual birthday. Let us pray.