The Covenant Confirmed

So in just a moment we're going to be continuing in Exodus.

So if you have a Bible or you pulled a Bible out of the pew in front of you and you want to turn to Exodus 24, you can go ahead and start turning there.

But just before we get into the text, here we are in this season of Advent.

We have already kind of reminded you what it is, but one of the things that we typically do in Advent is we preach a sermon series in the book of Advent.

We have already kind of reminded you what it is, but one of the things that we typically do in Advent is we preach a sermon series in the book of Advent.

And if this is your first time here, we have been in a series in the book of Exodus that we have actually come back to several times, and we do like to preach through whole books of the Bible here.

But we also don't like to be in Exodus for three years.

We try to go around to different areas of Scripture and so this sermon is the last sermon in the book of Exodus that we're going to be preaching for a while.

Our intention is to come back to it at some point, but we're going to look today at this chapter or, yeah, the whole chapter, chapter 24 of Exodus and the confirmation of the covenant.

You probably, if you have your Bible open, you probably see that the title there is the covenant confirmed, and you might say, well, we usually do Advent sermons, is this an Advent sermon?

And this is what I would say is that, yes, this is an Advent sermon.

And why is this an Advent sermon?

And this is what I would say is that, yes, this is an Advent sermon, and why is it an Advent sermon?

Well, it is an Advent sermon because it teaches us some things about the promises that God makes.

There in this text is the confirmation of a covenant, or a promise that is sealed in blood, and this is what I would say is that we are living also under a covenant that is sealed in blood, and a part of that covenant is that Christ is coming again so we can live out in confidence.

Because the reality is is the covenant that I'm going to explain to you from the scriptures here.

The people of Israel didn't keep it.

They couldn't uphold their part.

Ultimately, god fulfilled Israel's obligations in the covenant through Christ.

But remember, this covenant does not stand alone.

As you read Scripture.

It's helpful sometimes to look from covenant to covenant, because the way that we see that, we see the way that God is giving His people instruction, as well as the way that he is committing to them.

But what we have already seen in Scripture, even at this point in Exodus, is that God has made a commitment, a covenant, that one day the adversary, the serpent, will have his head crushed One day.

God is going to see that through, and you see this covenant kind of as a step towards that.

But ultimately, though, the nation of Israel as a people are not able to fulfill that.

But ultimately, though, the nation of Israel as a people are not able to fulfill that.

Christ is sent, he comes, and he is the one who is able to deliver victory over the enemy of darkness.

And so, when we look at this, we're not looking at this in isolation, as just this text, but we're going to look at this in the light of scripture, as kind of a preview covenant for a covenant that we come around the table and celebrate every week when we take of the juice.

We are reminding ourselves that this is the new covenant in Christ's blood.

We are reminding ourselves that God has made promises to us.

So at Advent we remind ourselves of the promised deliverance that we have through Christ, both the first Advent, the first coming, and the second Advent, the fact that Christ is coming again to bring all things into completion, that one day, in every way imaginable, sin and death and darkness will be defeated and done away with and God's creation will live, as designed and intended to bring glory to God, to live in fellowship and worship with Him.

So is this an Advent sermon?

I would say yes, it is, though it's very much not a traditional Advent sermon.

So I'm going to read and I'm going to read all 18 verses here and then we're going to dig into the text together.

So, starting in verse 1,.

Then he said to Moses come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, nadab and Abihu and 70 of the elders of Israel, and worship from afar.

Moses alone shall come near to the Lord, but the others shall not come near and the people shall not come up with him.

Moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules, and all the people answered with one voice and said all the words that the Lord has spoken, we will do.

And Moses wrote down all the words that the Lord has spoken.

We will do.

And Moses wrote down all the words of the Lord.

He rose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain and 12 pillars according to the 12 tribes of Israel.

And he sent young men to the people of Israel who offered burnt offerings and sacrificed peace offerings of oxen to the Lord.

And Moses took half of the blood.

Has spoken, we will do do and we will be obedient.

Then Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and said behold the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words.

Then Moses and Aaron, nadab and Abihu and 70 of the elders of Israel went up and they saw the God of Israel.

There was under his feet, as it were, a pavement of sapphire stone, like the very heaven for clearness, and he did not lay his hand on the chief of men of the people of Israel.

They beheld God and ate and drank.

The Lord said to Moses come up to me on the mountain and wait there that I may give you the tablets of stone with the law and the commandment which I have written for their instruction.

So Moses rose with his assistant, joshua, and Moses went up into the mountain and he said to the elders wait here for us until we return to you.

And behold, aaron and Hur are with you.

Whoever has a dispute let him go to them.

Then Moses went up on the mountain and the cloud covered the mountain and the glory of the Lord dwelt on Mount Sinai and the cloud covered it six days and on the seventh day he called to Moses out of the midst of the cloud.

Now the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel.

Moses entered the cloud and went up on the mountain.

Moses was on the mountain 40 days and 40 nights.

This is the word of the Lord.

Word of the Lord.

You know, this text is a lot like a lot of other texts in Exodus in some ways, in that you see a pretty impressive sight if you visualize what you're hearing as you read.

Sight if you visualize what you're hearing as you read, when you see this mountain covered with smoke and fire and thunder and lightning and whatever else it is.

Whatever this text and the other text, whatever that picture is, it's pretty impressive, but sometimes we don't realize what it is.

That this was like, and I don't think we fully can.

But I want you to imagine for a second what it's like, and just imagine this with me.

What is it like when you walk into a worship service?

Now, don't think like a worship service you're familiar with.

It doesn't even have to be a Christian worship service.

Maybe that makes it a little different.

You're walking into a group of people who are having some kind of a gathering, where there's a liturgy, there's elements to what they're doing and they're offering some kind of worship.

The atmosphere in there is solemn and sacred.

The people gather there with a sense of awe because as they gather in that place, they are gathering in the presence of their God in some way.

But in this text, this is not just some God, it's not just any old worship service.

The people, particularly the leaders of Israel, are being invited to come to a special worship service.

And I'm using these words on purpose because, as you're going to see, there are going to be elements within this text that we would typically associate with a worship service, and it all starts with this call to worship.

But before we look at that call to worship.

I want you to realize that these people are being invited to a worship service on the mountain of God, covered in fire and smoke.

This is not like, hey, yeah, I'm going to go, just go up to this mountain.

No, this is a dangerous, scary place, and these people are being invited to come.

And it's not just a regular worship service.

This is actually a covenant ceremony.

Today, you might think of a covenant ceremony along the lines of something where there is a significant amount of formality and commitment, such as like a wedding, or you might think of a citizenship ceremony, if you've ever been to a naturalization ceremony where people make a commitment to become like American citizens, for example.

I imagine other countries have similar things.

Well, in Exodus 24, we step into this scene that is both deeply worshipful as well as covenantal, a time where there is being made a promise or a commitment.

It is a moment where God and his people formally enter into a relationship with each other that is sealed by blood.

Now, the truth is, when you read this text, as a 2024, almost 2025 person living in America, it seems pretty odd.

Right?

They're killing these animals, they're putting the blood in pools and they walk up to a table and he reads it and he throws blood on the table and then they make a commitment and he turns around and he throws the blood on the people and you're like this is weird, this is really odd.

Well, I want to remind you, when we read the scriptures, we are reading it as 2024 humans on earth, but it wasn't written specifically to 2024 humans on earth.

It was written in a particular time in a particular place, and that particular place was time and place we often refer to as the ancient Near East, the time you know.

Ancient Near East, the time you know, quite a couple thousand years before Christ, in the what we might call the Middle East today.

And though God's people, as Israel, are unique and they have so far, exodus has been shaping those people to be unique they're also not entirely unique and they are like, in a lot of unique.

They're also not entirely unique and they are like, in a lot of ways, the peoples that are around them.

So, as you look at the ancient Near East, what you should know is that a covenant idea like this is not a foreign concept at all, but it is very much a commonplace way that kind of business gets done, so to speak.

You might have a very formal covenant like this with, like, say, a king that has conquered, led his country and they've conquered another country, but they don't utterly destroy it.

They create like a vassal state and that vassal state has a king, but they don't utterly destroy it.

They create like a vassal state and that vassal state has a king, and they might make a covenant to say, okay, well, you're going to be a part of us, under our protection, you're going to pay us these taxes or whatever, and they might have a ceremony very similar to this, or you might have, you know, lesser ceremonies done in a smaller way, between businessmen, or whatever.

The point is this is that this idea of a blood-bound covenant was not a foreign concept, and I think our best illustration of what this is today is perhaps a contract.

We have signing of contracts.

We watch professional athletes sometimes and we like to see the draft, and then we like to see them go and sign their contract or whatever.

Well, why, if you're a fan of pick your team, I'm a fan of the Oakland A's Sorry, no city anymore the athletics, and if they become Las Vegas, I don't think I'm a fan anymore.

But one of the things that was annoying to me this week is like if you follow baseball at all and if you don't follow baseball at all, forgive me, but I think it'll still make sense.

As an A's fan, I have been frustrated for years that they never pay their players.

They have a good player.

He comes up, it's time for his contract to be renewed and it's like, well, that's sad because he's not going to be here next year.

Sure enough, they trade him while they can get whatever value out of him, and they never pay players.

And they go and they're officially city-less and they're going to play in Sacramento, supposedly next year, and they just signed their biggest contract that they've ever signed in the history of the Oakland or, sorry, of the athletics.

All of that to say, that's the kind of thing I've been wanting to see, because what does it mean when they actually sign the contract?

Well, you can have rumors all you want about this team's going to get this person, this team's going to get that person, but until the ink is dry, until they've actually signed it, it's not the real thing yet.

But once it's signed, not the real thing yet, but once it's signed, there's a commitment.

And so when we look at this covenant here, what we see is a commitment that, by being bound in blood, you're basically saying I am going to fulfill my end and if not, let me be like the animal whose blood was spilled.

It's basically saying, hey, my word as good as my word is, I'm going to do this, you know?

I mean, you hear about people hiring contractors and not paying the contractor, or the contractor taking a payment and then not completing the work, and we look at that as very despicable.

Well, it is despicable, why?

Because someone gave their word and then they don't complete the task.

Well, this right here, what we have is a covenant between God, the creator, and his redeemed people to have a special relationship with them, to make them his treasured possession.

And so, as we look at this special covenant here, I'm going to preview the fact that the reality is that, yes, though they made these commitments, ultimately they could not fulfill them.

Yet Christ did.

And then Christ made for us a covenant where he is the one who shed the blood.

It wasn't an animal, it wasn't an alternative sacrifice, it was him.

And by doing that, he said, hey, I am putting it all on the line to make this happen.

Putting it all on the line to make this happen.

It's an unconditional covenant, unlike this conditional one, and this covenant ultimately points us forward to that.

But let's now step into this worship service that we see in Exodus 24, and we're going to see what it teaches about God, about His covenant, faithfulness and how we are called to live in response.

So the first thing that we have here is we have the call to worship.

The call to worship, or this, is where we draw near to God.

So you may know you probably know if you're a part of our church, you probably know that we start every service with a call to worship.

And a call to worship is not just, hey, let's read a Bible verse to start off our time of worship.

It's something so much more.

It is an invitation to come in a special and unique way into the presence of Almighty God, to gather with the saints and worship Him, to look on Him, to be in awe of who he is and what he has done.

It is an invitation to come into worship before an almighty God.

You see it here in verse 1 of Exodus 24.

Then he said to Moses come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, nadab and Abihu and 70 of the elders of Israel.

So like basically all the leadership, he says come up to the Lord.

Remember, this is a scary sight.

There's this very intimidating, smoking, fiery mountain and it's saying hey, you guys come on up.

There's an invitation.

Previously it's been like nobody come except Moses, but now there's a unique invitation to approach the mountain.

And then it says verse 2, it says the leadership come and worship from afar.

So come up to the mountain, but stay back.

Moses alone shall come near to the Lord, but the others shall not come near and the people shall not come up with him.

So I think we get this, that if you're invited to come before an important person or come to see the president, or whatever it may be, if you have a special invitation, that's an honor.

Well, this is more of an honor than you could ever imagine.

And the reality is is that they kind of knew that because they're looking at this massive mountain of fire, they're looking at this and they're intimidated.

They've been led out of Egypt and through all of these trials they've been provided for miraculously and they're saying, hey, come and worship God.

I want you to think about this because, as amazing as this invitation would be as amazing as this invitation would be, and it was amazing.

You have a unique privilege of being invited into God's presence through Christ, into God's presence through Christ.

We've worked hard to make this building nice.

We like to make it nice, but we don't compare to the mountain of fire.

But you know what?

Through Christ, we get to come into the presence of God.

So I'm going to encourage you, as you come to worship, to approach worship with awe and gratitude, that you get to be in the presence of God and though we don't have a mountain of fire, we're indwelt by the Holy Spirit who is here with us.

Let's keep going.

The second section of this worship service that I want you to see is the reading, and in this case writing, of God's word.

The reading and writing of God's word.

It tells us in verse 3, moses came and told the people all the words of the Lord.

So we just read as a church over the last several weeks, both the Ten Commandments and then the Book of the Covenant, and we talked about how these are kind of special instructions for the people of God to live out as God's people.

But presumably up till this point that had been an oral teaching from Moses.

And so he basically tells them all the words in verse three and then in verse four.

Then it says he wrote down all the words.

You see, like I said, until the ink is dry, the contract doesn't mean much, right?

So you know, you could say all you want, like, and it's happened before.

You know, there's a player and he's like I'm going to be on this team for my whole life, I'm not playing for anyone else.

And then you know, free agency comes and someone's like hey, we'll give you a couple extra million.

It's like okay, where do I sign?

It's like well, what did you say before?

I thought I bought a jersey because you said you were on my team for life.

Why are you there now?

What's up with that?

Well, there was no ink, there was no paper.

It had to be written down.

And so Moses here writes down the words of this covenant, after they make this verbal commitment to it.

And then he, so he writes down all these words.

The reality is this we still have these words and so many more words.

So, even as we look here at at these who were reading and and learning about god, we have so much more in the complete, uh collection of scriptures.

But what do they do with this message from god, that he has it spoken, and then they have it written.

What do they do?

What do the people do?

Well, they make a double commitment to the covenant.

Did you catch that when we read it through?

That they make a promise two times, not just one time.

So in verse 3, it says all the words that the Lord has spoken we will do After he gives them to him.

They say we will do them.

And then, if you look down to verse seven, it says and he took the book of the coven and he read it in the hearing of the people.

So not only did he write it down, but he read it again.

It's kind of like hey, let me give you the words that I'm going to write.

Do you agree to that?

Yes, we agree.

Okay, let me write them.

Okay, now I wrote them, let me read them to you to make sure that that's really what you agree to.

And what does he?

What?

What do the people say?

It says and they said all that the Lord has spoken.

We will do the same thing again.

But then there's an added phrase.

And we will be obedient when we repeat a promise, when we repeat a commitment.

If I'm preaching a sermon and I repeat a line two times, I'm usually like really trying to emphasize something.

Well, it took us how long to go through the book of the covenant.

Now we are preaching it, not just reading it.

But it's not a small bit of writing.

It's not a small bit of speech.

They took time and energy to make this happen and the people hear it and, in seriousness, they commit to it.

They promise we're going to do it and they double down by saying and we will be obedient.

Now we know that they weren't obedient.

Does anybody know how long it took them before they just flat out were disobedient to all of this stuff.

Disobedient to all of this stuff?

At the most generous, less than 40 days.

Okay, because we're not going to get there this round through Exodus.

But in Exodus 32, I think it's 32.

In Exodus 32, we know the story of the golden calf, where Moses goes up into the fiery mountain and God's going to give him the stone tablets and all this, and within just a very, very short time, the people are like well, moses is dead.

So, aaron, you need to make us a new God.

So you know?

So he says give me all your gold.

And he makes a calf and he says people of Israel, this is your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt, let's worship it.

I mean very, very quickly.

They basically completely give up on this entire covenant that they have this whole ceremony for, and we could give them a hard.

But I think sometimes, if we're honest, we can look at our own lives, the commitments that we make to God and to people, and sometimes how quickly do we fail?

How often do we not maintain our covenant relationship with God?

The good news is that Christ has made a new covenant through the shedding of his blood, so that our relationship with God is not dependent on our obedience, but it is dependent on Christ's obedience.

It's because he fulfilled all of this that we can be in the presence of God.

So remember when you fail that first of all, you weren't working for your salvation, but because of all that Christ has done for you, you love him and you want to live for him.

It's also a good reminder when we think about how quick these people turned and we reflect on our own tendency to turn against our own commitments that as we deal with other flesh and blood, people that hurt us, that sin against us.

We do that.

We hurt each other.

Let's be forgiving people, because God, in his graciousness to preview a little bit more of the story again doesn't just wipe the people out and start over with Moses.

But Moses goes to God and he says God, didn't you promise, isn't this what you did through Abraham and through Isaac and through Jacob?

Didn't you make a commitment?

God says yes, and though these people so quickly abandoned the God who did so much for them, he shows the mercy and grace, because God is a God of mercy and grace and we see that ultimately through Christ.

So the next part of this what I'm calling a worship service that they had that we see is the shedding of blood, a covenant sealed.

So in verse 8 it says Moses took the blood and threw it on the people and we say, well, what's that all about?

And I already kind of said it's a.

The sacrifice and the blood that is shed on these covenants is a symbolism of the importance or the level of commitment that people are making in the covenant.

It's like, hey, if I break my word, let me be like this.

But it's so much more than that when we look at it in the light of Christ Hebrews 9.22, a verse we quote often that we know says without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sin the reality is this that, in whatever way it is, we can't quite understand how God works in all the various ways.

But the reality is this is that the actual shedding of Christ's blood is what was necessary for us to have relationship with God.

That, rather than us who it's like okay, let me be like the animal that was slain.

Christ steps in and he says you're supposed to be slain because you didn't hold up the covenant.

You're supposed to say let me be like that.

But Jesus says but I didn't break the covenant, but let me be slain instead, you can live.

You can have life Because through the shedding of blood, a covenant is sealed.

Rejoice that Christ's blood has sealed the new covenant, that it offers forgiveness covenant that it offers forgiveness, that we can rest in his work and not our own work for salvation.

I'm going to try to wrap this up with two more quick points that are connected.

Try to wrap this up with two more quick points that are connected.

The next piece that they have in verse 11 is that they celebrated a holy meal.

Now, I am not trying to overplay the connection here, I'm using this as an illustration, but I think it works, because how do we end our service?

We end our service also with a holy meal, where we gather around the table and we partake of these elements that remind us that Christ has sealed the covenant.

We say it every week this is the new covenant in my blood.

So they ate, they beheld God, it says, and they ate and drank.

Now, later, in Exodus, it says if anyone sees God basically can't live, he's going to die.

Somehow, in some way, god reveals himself to this group of people in a miraculous and amazing way, in a way that they see him and know he is actually there, present with them, which makes their so near term turning away from God that much more seemingly unbelievable, except for the fact that, like I already said, we do it all the time.

So they gather around the table.

You know, a few years back we actually did a series about meals with Jesus and gathering around the table.

The truth is that all throughout Scripture there are special times gathered around tables.

In our church we have community groups where every week we come together and we try to do it every week.

My community groups had a lot of distractions.

I try to do it every week.

My community groups had a lot of distractions, but we try to gather together around a table and share a meal.

And you know what we like food.

But it's not about the food, it's about sharing a vulnerable, vulnerable, open time with people.

And when you sit down with someone and like or if you just like say you meet someone and you're like getting to know them, the relationships you know just at a very, very high level.

But then someone says, hey, you want to grab lunch, you automatically know that after that lunch the level of your high-level relationship is going to get much more narrowed, much more focused.

You are going to know each other that much better because you know what.

You sat around a table, you ate together, you had an intimacy with each other.

The scriptures are filled with people gathering around a table and sharing life together.

And so these elders of Israel, these leaders of the community, they gather and, in the presence of God, share a holy meal, commune with him in a unique and special way.

And similarly, we try to end our services as we come and gather around the Lord's table.

So my encouragement to you today would be to realize that, as we gather around this table, that we are gathering with reverence to God, joy in the new covenant, knowing that we share fellowship with God through Christ, and fellowship with one another through Christ, with one another through Christ.

The last thing is this and it's not specifically only from this text, it's more a New Testament thing but the last point is this that this covenant is fulfilled in Christ.

Because Christ creates a better covenant, because Christ creates a better covenant Though, yes, here we see a blood-sealed, miraculous, amazing covenant remember and rest with the assurance that the new covenant that Christ made, that he took on the role of Israel, he fulfilled this covenant and the new covenant is an unconditional, secured covenant that is made entirely by Christ, covenant that is made entirely by Christ.

So live in gratitude and worship as God's redeemed people.

We follow Christ.

We seek to obey him, not to fulfill our side of the covenant.

Follow Christ and seek to obey Him because we love Him, because he has drawn us to Himself and done in and through us what we could never do.

We love Christ because he has gifted us with love.

We love him because he loved us first.

So my encouragement to you this week is to remember.

Remember the covenant that Christ made with you.

Remember that he wrote it down.

Remember that he paid it all.

Remember that he rose again.

Remember that he left yet didn't leave us alone.

Remember that he's coming again.

Remember that one day, all sin, all death, all evil will be utterly and completely defeated and removed.

God's creation will be a glorious, perfect place, and that is the hope we have to live for as we live our lives today, live our lives in a confident expectation that that reality is coming, and so take the steps of faith that you need to in all of the areas of life that you live.

Let's pray, father, god, thank you.

Thank you for the book of Exodus and that we could read it.

Thank you that we come here to the end of a season for our church in the book of Exodus, but thank you that we get to end it with this covenant promise, and though we know the failure of Israel, even in the next chapters that we will read when we come back to Exodus, we know more than just Exodus we know Jesus.

So we thank you for the new covenant that we have through Christ.

Help us remember, as we gather around the table, that reality.

It's in his name we pray, amen.