Go Hear It On the Mountain

Exodus 24

So God tells Moses- you, Aaron, Nadab and Abihu and 70 of the elders come closer- but not too close. Worship at a distance- and then you alone Moses- come and approach Me- but come alone.

Moses reports to the people and they call out "we'll do everything God has told us to." This seems to be human nature to some degree- we talk a good game, but carrying out God's will is often another matter. It was for them, it is for us.

Moses documented all that God said. He got up early the next morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain. He set up twelve pillars to represent the twelve tribes and had young men offer burnt offerings and sacrifice young bulls as "fellowship offerings". Moses divides the blood in half- half in a bowl and half on the altar. The first half was then sprinkled on the people, Moses calling it the "blood of the covenant".

This is some major pageantry. To show the heavenly contract, the Israelites "washed" in bull blood. Sounds like a party your mother wouldn't approve of- but in order to show their allegiance, the people of God submitted themselves voluntarily to a less than enjoyable act.

This seems to be a foreshadowing of Christ's blood serving as our "blood of the convenant". Our rituals are a little less messy, but they serve the same function- drawing us closer to our Protector and proclaiming our allegiance to serve Him.

So Moses and company head up the mountain and see God. I bet those tickets could have been scalped for a pretty penny. I wonder how much of Him they saw though , since Moses' description consists of the sapphire-like pavement under His feet. A cool image, but if you've just seen God, you might be bit more descriptive- unless you only get a glimse, which seems pretty consistent with the way God sightings seem to work.

So they have a meal, or at least a snack and God tells Moses to come up with Him and get the tablets of commandments. Moses and Joshua his aide (is this THE Joshua?) start up for the private conference. I guess when God told him to come alone, He meant that his servant could come too.

Moses tells the group to wait- and if they have a disgreement while he's gone, Aaron and Hur could deal with it. This indicates to me that either Moses expected to be gone for a long time, or these were amazingly disagreeable people.

So Moses went up and a cloud covered the mountain for six days. On the seventh day, God called to Moses from within the cloud. From the Israelites perspective, it looked like a consuming fire. He stayed on the mountain 40 days and 40 nights. I don't know if that included the first six, but either way, it must have been an amazing experience to spend a month with God. I would assume that Joshua stayed behind after the sixth day, but Moses doesn't specify.

I can't even imagine what that would be like. What would you talk about? Would there be long silences spent in meditation? Would there be any moments of laughter or frivolity? Or would it be all business?

And more interestingly, what will it be like for us when we get our chance to be in His presence?