Commuter Bible

Well, if you hadn’t quite it together just yet, the book of Acts gets it’s name because it is packed with action. The apostles continue to preach, the crowds continue to turn to Jesus, and the leaders of the Israelites (especially those of the Sadducees who deny the resurrection) continue to rage against Christ’s followers. The section ahead of covers to unique firsts in the life of the church, including the first installation of deacons and the testimony of Stephen, the church’s first recorded martyr. As we pick up our text where we last left off, we’ll see what happens when a couple conspires to lie to the congregation (and thereby lies to the Holy Spirit) for the sake of personal gain and notoriety.

The book of Acts is an account of the beginnings of God’s church written down by Luke; yes, the same Luke who wrote the gospel of Luke. Christianity has always been marked by life together with other believers. Here in these opening chapters we see how the church began, how it spread throughout God’s people, and continued on to redeem those who were outside God’s covenant with Israel. The signs and wonders performed by the apostles proved to the world that although the followers of Jesus were ordinary men, their message was by no means an ordinary teaching.

Have you ever talked to someone who’s really into their work, and they’re so excited about it that it seems they just can’t stop talking about it? Maybe you’ve done that with your own work, with a hobby you enjoy, or with player stats from your favorite team. To our ears it may seem like the book of Exodus is simply repeating itself, but in actuality it’s communicating the excitement, the gravity, and the importance of the tabernacle. God Himself gave instruction to build it, God’s covenant people built it, and God Himself would occupy it. By the end of today’s episode, work on the tabernacle reaches its conclusion and the Lord shows up in power.

In our last episode, Israel had turned away from the Lord while Moses was with the Lord on Mount Sinai. Even though they had just committed themselves to following the Lord God, they quickly lost their resolve and turned to Aaron, who in turn gave them a golden calf to worship. After this grave sin, God tells Moses He will no longer go with Israel to the land He had promised Abraham and his descendants after him. Today, Moses intercedes on their behalf, assuaging God’s anger and garnering his favor. Later, God’s appointed craftsmen get to work assembling the tabernacle according to the Lord’s instructions.

By the end of our reading Moses will have spent 40 days on Mt. Sinai, and in that amount of time, the Israelites will have given up on Moses and on the Lord. Not long beforehand, the nation of Israel had promised that they would do all that the Lord had commanded, but in short order, they turn away from God. They instead turn to Aaron, who caves to the crowd’s demands, making them a golden calf for them to worship. The Lord’s anger burns against Israel, but Moses steps in as a redeemer for his people, interceding on their behalf. Before we get to that part of the narrative, we first return where we left off as God gives further instruction about worship in the tabernacle.

Some episodes are going to be action-packed and some are going to sound like you’re reading an instruction book, and this episode may tend toward the latter of the two. It’s important to remember, however, that the tabernacle is the place where the God of the universe, perfect in all His ways, matchless in power and authority, would meet with His people in a unique way. If it were up to you to build that, wouldn’t you want detailed instructions? Right worship is important to God, and these detailed instructions gave the Israelites the freedom of knowing their worship was pleasing to God Almighty.

On today’s episode God begins to give very specific commands to the Israelite people on what it looks like to be fair, kind, and gracious to one another. The Lord’s justice is severe for those who are selfish and outright rebellious, but gracious toward those who have no intention of causing harm. As you listen, it can be tempting to think that these are dry or irrelevant, but put yourself in the shoes/sandals of the original audience, whose livelihood wasn’t based on cash or money, but on livestock, crops, and community with one another. Imagine yourself in each situation, & the text becomes much more interesting.

As the nation of Israel begins their journey into the wilderness, they find themselves without food and water, but rather than turn to the Lord, they complain to Moses. The Lord graciously provides for his people despite their grumbling, giving them, not only food and water, but a moral code by which they might live; this Decalogue, more commonly known as the Ten Commandments, allowed Israel to know how they could live a life that pleased the Lord. After witnessing the plagues on Egypt, the columns of cloud and fire, and the Red Sea’s parting, it would have been no small thing for Israel to receive this sense of assurance.

Pharoah finally releases Israel from Egypt, but not before the Lord devastates the people of Egypt with a final plague that kills the firstborn of every family. The lord distinguishes between Israel and Egypt once again by giving them a new to be passed down from generation to generation as a testament to the power of God. By covering their doorways with the blood of a prescribed sacrifice, the people of Israel indicate that they are covered by the blood of another and the Lord passes over them. Throughout the history of Israel through both prose and poetry, God’s people remind each other of the Lord’s power and deliverance by observing the Passover. Later, Christ becomes the ultimate fulfillment, for he is both the sacrificial lamb that covers us and the firstborn who dies for the sins of the rebellious.

Today we begin to examine the ten plagues sent upon Egypt that testify to the power of the great I AM. It has been suggested that each plague is designed to show pharaoh, and all of Egypt along with him, that their gods are no match for the God of Israel, systematically robbing them of any power they claimed to have. When Pharaoh refuses to let Israel go into the wilderness to worship the Lord, God sends plagues of blood, frogs, gnats, boils, and darkness, but the king of Egypt will not back down. While he is bested by God Almighty over and over again, and His own people beg him to relent of his stubborn opposition, Pharaoh’s heart remains hardened.