Saturday, June 7, 2014
Exodus 19:19-20
Saturday, June 07, 2014 |
And when the voice of the trumpet
sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by
a voice. And the LORD came down upon mount Sinai, on the top of the mount: and
the LORD called Moses up to the top of the mount; and Moses went up.
The passage of Scripture for our reading today is
an illustration of the next main event in God's calendar of activities for the
last days. I will get back to that but first let's learn from that which God
was revealing to Moses and the Jewish people some 3,500 years ago.
The scene is at the foot of Mt. Sinai with all of
Israel encamped awaiting word from the Lord. It is three months since the
Exodus out of Egypt and the bondage that the Jews had been under for more than
400 years. It is just before the Lord would meet with Moses and give him the
Ten Commandments. It was a significant time in the total history of the Jewish
people.
Before the Lord gave His law to the Jews, He met
with Moses to explain what He had planned for the Israelites, among the peoples
of the world. In verse 5, God
reminds Moses that “obedience” is essential for a right relationship with Him.
If the Jews will obey Him then He will make them “a peculiar treasure, a people
above all people, a kingdom of priests and a holy nation”.
When Moses returned to the Jewish people, he told
them of his conversation with the Lord and they responded with, "all that
the Lord hath spoken, we will do." The rest of the Old Testament and the
Gospels will record the history of the Jewish people and reveal that the Jews
spoke too quickly at Sinai.
The truth is that they did not keep their
commitment to the Lord. The Jewish people, as a whole, have not been obedient.
However, there has been a remnant, those who have
been faithful and obedient. God has a plan for the Jewish people that included
giving them the Scripture to preserve and transmit to the world, Romans 3:1-2. And of
course, the Messiah was born of a young Jewish woman, Mary. God will use the
Jews in the future, because He still has a plan for them.
Now, back to that thought I left you with at the
beginning of this devotional. The next event on God's calendar of events for
the end times is the “Rapture”. That is when Jesus will descend from the Third
Heaven where He is seated on the right of God the Father.
Somewhere, "in the air, " He will shout,
the archangel will shout and the trump of God will sound to call all Christians
on earth to be with the Lord for evermore, I Thessalonians 4:13-17.
In our reading for today, the Rapture is depicted
in how the Lord meets with Moses, verses 16-20. This
event in the life of Moses is a foretaste of things to come. Remember, the
Rapture could happen today, so keep looking up...until!
PRAYER THOT: Thank you for
making me a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nations, a peculiar
people (I Peter 2:9) so that I can show forth the praises of Him who has called us
out of darkness into His marvelous light.