Moses On The Mountain With The Lord - Part 15 Series

Moses on the Mountain with the Lord - Part 15

Who Is on the Lord’s Side?

Exodus 32:15-29

Sermon by Rick Crandall

McClendon Baptist Church - Oct. 6, 2010

BACKGROUND:

*Moses’ fifth meeting with the Lord on Mount Sinai lasted for 40 days. There the Lord gave Moses the Ten Commandments and other laws for the people. The Lord also gave Moses detailed plans for the Tabernacle, the priesthood and much more. (1)

*But while Moses was away, the people rebelled against God and began to worship an idol made of gold. They were totally oblivious to the great danger they were in, but we know because we see the Lord’s anger starting in Exodus 32:7.

7. 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.’’

*A lot of men would have said, “Great idea God. That sounds good to me!”

-But Moses loved those people, so he started pleading for them in vs. 11.

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.

*God didn’t vaporize them with fire from Heaven, even though He surely could have. Instead, the Lord sent Moses back to the people to try to straighten things out. Moses also needed to find out just who was on the Lord’s side.

*With this background in mind, let’s read vs. 15-19.

15. And Moses turned and went down from the mountain, and the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand. The tablets were written on both sides; on the one side and on the other they were written.

16. Now the tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God engraved on the tablets.

17. And when Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, "There is a noise of war in the camp."

18. But he said: "It is not the noise of the shout of victory, Nor the noise of the cry of defeat, But the sound of singing I hear."

19. So it was, as soon as he came near the camp, that he saw the calf and the dancing. So Moses’ anger became hot, and he cast the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain.

INTRODUCTION:

*During the savage violence of the Civil War, a preacher from the North told the President that he hoped “the Lord is on our side,”

-Lincoln replied, “I know that the Lord is always on the side of the right. But it is my constant anxiety and prayer that I and this nation should be on the Lord’s side.” (2)

*Who is on the Lord’s side?

-Moses needed to know 3,500 years ago.

-Lincoln needed to know 150 years ago.

-And we need to know today.

*Am I on the Lord’s side? -- We can find out by answering 4 questions tonight.

1. First: “Am I stubborn to sin against God?”

*Many of the Children of Israel were stubbornly sinning against God. We see this in vs. 19-22:

19. So it was, as soon as he came near the camp, that he saw the calf and the dancing. So Moses’ anger became hot, and he cast the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain.

20. Then he took the calf which they had made, burned it in the fire, and ground it to powder; and he scattered it on the water and made the children of Israel drink it.