God's Peace Treaty - Exodus chapter 24
This article is based on a talk first given by David Couchman at Above Bar Church, Southampton, on Sunday 5th June 2005. It may be reproduced in print or on other web sites, subject to the copyright notice below.
There was a man who fell over a cliff. On the way down, he grabbed a branch that was growing out of the cliff face. It was a very small branch, and it began to pull away from the rock under his weight.
He shouted out: 'Help! Help! Is there anyone there?'
A voice came from the sky: 'Just trust me, my child. Trust me and let go. I will take care of you.'
He looked down - at least five hundred feet. There was a pause. Then he began to shout again: 'Help! Help! Is there anyone else there?'
I wonder whether you have ever been in some kind of desperate situation where you have cried out to God for help.
Perhaps you have tried to give him an incentive: 'God, I know I haven't always been as good as I could, but if you help me now, I'll really try harder. I'll do anything you want. I'll even be a missionary to Mongolia, if that's what it takes - but please get me out of this mess.'
And we try to cut a deal with God. I am not sure whether God is very impressed by our efforts to cut a deal with him. If he rescues us, it is out of his own sheer kindness, not because of anything we have to trade with him.
We cannot cut a deal with God - but he makes a deal with us, on his own terms. What kind of deal does God make with his people? That's what this Bible passage is all about. In the Bible, of course, it is not called a deal. It is called a covenant. There are various covenants in the Old Testament - God made covenants with:
- Adam
- Noah
- Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
- king David and Solomon
But the most important covenant is the one that God established with Moses and the Israelites, here in Exodus.
What is a covenant?
What exactly is a covenant? We do not use this word too often today.
It is an agreement
We might think of a covenant as being something like a business contract. And this is a helpful idea. But business contracts are usually between people who are (more or less) equals, and they have a very limited range of activities they apply to.
It is a promise
When my wife and I bought the house where we now live, the title deed included some 'restrictive covenants.' These were things we had to promise not to do - not to keep pigs, not to build more houses in the back garden, and so on. So these covenants were legally binding promises. One of the ways we talk about covenants today - a legal promise.
It is a commitment
Perhaps you have heard people describe marriage as a covenant - a 'covenant of companionship,' it is sometimes called. This is getting a bit closer, because it affects all your life, not just your bank balance, and it is meant to be permanent. And the Bible does describe the relationship between God and his people as a marriage.
So a covenant is a bit like an agreement, a promise, or a commitment. But anyone in the ancient world who read the covenant here in Exodus would have recognised what it was straight away.
It was a peace treaty
It was a treaty between a Great King and the people he had conquered. Although it involved agreements and promises and commitments, it was not an agreement between equals, and it was not something that you could choose to sign up for or not sign up for. Peace treaties from this part of the world, at this time, had a definite format. They included:
- an introduction that says who the Great King is
- a review of what the Great King has done for the people he is making the treaty with
- Requirements - what the Great King demands from the people he is making the treaty with. This usually included them swearing total loyalty and service to the King. They will fight his battles; oppose his enemies and so on
- Promises - what the Great King will do for the people he is making the treaty with - he promises to look after them in the future
- Signed, sealed and delivered - the treaty is put in writing, witnessed, and stored safely
This peace treaty between God and the Israelites that begins in Exodus chapter 19 and goes on to chapter 24, includes all these important elements. Here in chapter 24, we get to the bit where the treaty is signed, sealed and delivered.
At this point, if you are anything like me, you are beginning to say, 'Yes, right. What difference does a three-thousand year old peace treaty make to me today?'
But God does not change. The God you have already prayed to today is the same God who made the treaty with the Israelites in Exodus.
And what happened when God rescued his people from Egypt is a picture of what he does for us today through Jesus.
So what do these chapters say about how we can relate to God - how we can have peace with God? We are going to pick out four key things - things that cut across a lot of how we think today about God and how we can relate to him.
(1) 'I can choose'
One idea that's very common is that 'I can choose.' I can choose my own idea of what God is like.
The actress Dervla Kirwan said:
I don't need an institution to enable me to commune with the god of my choice.
And this is how a lot of us think about God today. I can choose whether I want to believe in God at all. I can choose what kind of God I want to believe in.
People say, 'I like to think of God as...'
But you only have to give this a moment's thought to see just how hollow it is. If God is real - if he is there at all - we do not get to choose what he is like, do we? He is not someone we can invent or re-invent. We may have our ideas of what he is like, or what we would like him to be like - but what matters is what God is really like. And if God is real - if he made the whole Universe, and rules over everything that happens in it, well, we may have our ideas of how we can come to him, but what matters is what he says about how we can come to him.
This peace treaty says that God is the Great King. He is powerful. He is majestic. He is glorious.
Look for a moment at what it says here:
You are to worship at a distance, but Moses alone is to approach the Lord; the others must not come near. And the people may not come up with him. (verses 1-2)
You get something in this of the idea that God is special, and that we cannot choose how to come to him - he is the one who sets the agenda.
In verses 9-10, Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel...
... went up, and saw the God of Israel. Under his feet was something like a pavement made of sapphire, clear as the sky itself. But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God and they ate and drank.
And in verses 15-17:
When Moses went up on the mountain, the cloud covered it, and the glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai... (v. 17) To the Israelites the glory of the Lord looked like a consuming fire on top of the mountain...
There is a tremendous emphasis here in this chapter on how great and majestic and in a right sense, how unapproachable God is. He decides how people can relate to him.
What about us? How do we think about God? Do we think we can choose what he is like? He is the Great King. He rules over the world, and over all our affairs. He sets the agenda.
Then, what about the idea that...
(2) 'I've earned it!'
The standard folk-religion way of thinking about God is that you earn his favour by living a good life, and if you are good enough, perhaps God will be nice to you. This is a view that is alive and well in Britain today.
But these ancient peace treaties start with what the Great King has already done for the people he is making the treaty with.
As he had often just conquered them in battle, this could involve a certain amount of spin-doctoring -- but not in this case. In one of the greatest deliverances the world has ever seen, God has just rescued his people from slavery in Egypt - and that is where this treaty starts. Exodus chapter 19 verses 1-8 is a sort of introduction to the treaty, and in verse 4, God says:
You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles wings and brought you to myself...
In chapter 20 verse 2, at the beginning of the Ten Commandments, he says:
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
The key theme of Exodus is rescue - God rescues his people from slavery in Egypt. And it is so important to see that he rescued them first, and then he made the treaty with them. He did not say, 'Here's a list of requirements - and if you keep these for a few years, maybe I'll think about rescuing you from the Egyptians.'
In the New Testament, God's great rescue is that he saves his people from sin and guilt and death and darkness. He does this through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
We can so easily think that we have to earn God's goodness by keeping a lot of rules and regulations, and that if we do this really well, maybe God will rescue us. But this is not how it is. God has already provided the rescue that we need. This rescue is the basis on which we can have peace with God.
Jesus said,
I haven't come to call the righteous, but sinners. (Luke chapter 5 verse 32)
In other words, not people who have earned peace with God, not people who deserve it, but people who need it. And as the apostle Paul put it,
God demonstrates his own love for us in this: while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans chapter 5 verse 8)
Not people who have been good enough, but sinners.
God takes the initiative. He rescues people first. He rescues people who do not deserve it, and have not done anything to earn it.
Rescue is the key theme of the Bible: Today God rescues people who are in trouble - who have made a complete mess of our lives morally and spiritually and in all kinds of other ways.
I do not know what kind of mess your life may be in, but God offers to rescue you - he offers you peace with him; ho offers to forgive you, to clean you up, and to give you a hope for the future. Not because you deserve it - none of us do. Not because you have done anything to earn it, but because this is the kind of person God is.
'I can choose!'
'I've earned it!'
How about...
(3) 'It's my life!'
Today we do not like being told what to do. We say, 'It's my personal decision. You don't have any right to criticise me, or to tell me how to live. If I'm not harming anyone else by what I do, it's up to me.'
But the picture here in this peace treaty is that the Great King has rescued his people, and now because of this, this is how he wants them to live.
There are requirements. If you want to live in peace with God, 'terms and conditions apply.' And the list of terms and conditions is there in the Ten Commandments, at the beginning of chapter 20. They are also in the more detailed laws of chapters 21-23. We are not going to look at these chapters. But if you do read through them, what comes out very clearly in the detailed laws is that God is concerned about justice and fairness in society. Faith in God is not just a private hobby or a personal preference.
God's requirements reflect who he is - what he is like. And although the details may have changed, the principles have not changed. God is as concerned for justice in society today as he was in Moses' day.
God says to us, 'I've rescued you. Now this is how I want you to live.' And we need to see that there are no private choices. Every decision we make has its consequences.
You may have seen the new advertising campaign that says, 'If you smoke, I smoke.' I might think it is OK for me to smoke - it is a personal decision; I am not harming anyone else. But we are beginning to see that it does harm other people - it harms the children around us. It costs all of us, in the health service bill for treating smoking-related illnesses.
Every choice we make affects other people. We are not just individuals. We are not just islands. We are part of a web of relationships and connections, where every decision is like a stone thrown into a pool - the ripples spread and spread. The choices you make at work tomorrow, the choices you make in your business, the choices you make in your personal relationships, all matter. There is no such thing as a private decision.
The challenge to us is, if we recognise that God is the Great King, if we recognise that he has rescued us through Jesus Christ even though we do not deserve it, how are we going to live? Do we think our decisions are just our individual lifestyle choices? Or do we accept the king's terms and conditions?
These ancient peace treaties included the Great King's requirements for the people he was making the treaty with. They also included promises of what the Great King would do for the people in the future - promises that depended on them keeping his requirements.
And in 23:20-33, there is a promise of what God will do for his people in the future.
'See, I am sending an angel ahead of you to guard you along the way and to bring you to the place I have prepared...' (verse 20)
He says, I am going to guard you, and guide you, and I am going to bring you in to a good place to live. And he has a place prepared for us, and he promises to bring us there.
So how can I relate to God? We have looked at the idea that
'I can choose!'
'I've earned it!'
'It's my life!'
How about...
(4) 'I can take it or leave it!'
Today we like the idea of freedom and flexibility, and we do not want to be tied down to anything. But this chapter says that we need to take the deal that God makes with us very seriously. We cannot come to it with a take-it-or-leave it attitude.
I do not know if you have ever seen those ancient, flickering black and white films of the Allied Generals receiving the German surrender at the end of the Second World War. You can watch the generals actually signing the treaty.
In the ancient world, they had rather more complicated ways of confirming treaty arrangements. Some of them would strike us as downright weird.
In verses 3-8, you get some of the arrangements for confirming the treaty:
- In verse 3, the people promise to obey everything God says.
- In verse 4, Moses writes down all the terms and conditions - probably all the detailed laws of chapters 21-23.
- He builds an altar, and puts up twelve pillars, representing the twelve tribes.
- In verse 5, he offers sacrifices
- Then in verse 6, he does a strange thing - he takes half the blood of the sacrifice, and puts it in bowls, and he sprinkles the other half on the altar.
- In verse 7, he reads the agreement to the people...
- ... and again, they promise to obey everything God says.
The way this is organised is important:
- Verse 3 (The people promise to obey what God says) parallels the end of verse 7 (the people promise to obey what God says)
- The beginning of verse 4 (Moses writes down the terms and conditions) parallels the beginning of verse 7 (Moses reads out the terms and conditions).
- In the second half of verse 4 he builds an altar and puts up the twelve pillars, and in verse 6 he sprinkles half the blood on the altar.
This kind of structure is a common 'focussing' structure in the Bible - and the focus is on what happens in the middle. In this case, it is on the sacrifices in verse 5. These sacrifices involved shedding blood. Animals had to die to confirm the peace treaty.
In verse 8, Moses takes the other half of the blood and sprinkles it on the people. In the ancient world, when a treaty was formalised, it often involved shedding blood.
Treaties were also formalised through eating a meal together. We still get something of the same idea today with a wedding reception. For us, of course, weddings have come to be a personal arrangement between the bride and the groom. But for hundreds of years, weddings represented the joining of two families. And the joining was marked by a massive meal - a party, a celebration.
There is a hint of this in verse 11, where it says that the Israelite leaders saw God and ate and drank. (The idea in the Old Testament was that God is so holy that no-one could see God's face and survive.) But now, God is making peace with them, and they do see his face, and live.
All of this probably seems alien to us - but we must not bog down in the details. We need to grasp the heart of what is going on: they are signing the treaty, in the most serious way they can.
And what it says to us is that we need to take very seriously the deal that God makes with us. It is not something that we can casually take or leave, accept or reject.
A new agreement
In the end, the treaty that God made with the Israelites here in Exodus chapters 19-24 was a failure. They did not keep the terms of the covenant.
But nearly a thousand years later, God promised the prophet Jeremiah, in Jeremiah chapter 31 verses 31-34, that he would do something different:
'The time is coming,' declares the Lord,
'when I will make a new covenant
with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant I made
with their forefathers
when I took them by the hand to lead them out
of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant, though I was [their master],'
declares the Lord.
'This is the covenant that I will make with the house
of Israel after that time,' declares the Lord.
'I will put my law in
their minds and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God and they
will be my people.
No longer will a man teach his neighbour, or a man
his brother, saying 'Know the Lord,'
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,'
declares the Lord,
'For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no
more.'
So God promises through Jeremiah that one day there will be a new treaty, a new covenant, and this one will work. And of course, this new covenant is the New Testament - the agreement that God makes with us through Jesus:
- Like the treaty here in Exodus, it is a treaty with a Great King. He is the ruler of the whole Universe. We do not get to choose what he is like. He is not 'the God of our choice.' He is the God who really is there
- Like the treaty here in Exodus, God has already provided the rescue that we need from sin and death and all the powers of darkness. We do not deserve it, and we cannot earn it
- Like the treaty here in Exodus, there are requirements. God says, 'This is what I've done for you - now this is how I want you to live.' Our choices matter. They are not just personal lifestyle decisions
- Like the treaty here in Exodus, God promises to guide us and guard us, and to bring us safely to a good place to live
- Like the treaty here in Exodus, it is not something that we can casually take or leave. It is a serious agreement, sealed in blood
Jesus picks this up on his last night with his followers, when he says, in Luke chapter 22 verse 20:
This cup is the New Covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you.
There was a price to pay for making peace with God - and he paid it for us.
This theme runs all through the New Testament. In Colossians chapter 1 verse 20, Paul says that through Christ,
God has reconciled to himself all things... making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.
How can we relate to God? He offers us peace with himself. It is a peace agreement that has been sealed in blood - what the New Testament calls 'the precious blood of Christ.' When you stop to think about it, isn't that amazing?
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