In the third month after the departure of the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they [into] the wilderness of Sinai
In the third month after leaving Egypt, Israel camps in the desert of Sinai. Why did God bring a redeemed people to this mountain, and what changed when they arrived?
This was not a random stop on the route to Canaan. God had named this mountain to Moses long before Israel reached it.
They had started from Egypt for Sinai; for God had told Moses, "when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain" (Ex. 3:12). But called out as they were from Egypt to go to Canaan, their road to it was to be by the mount of God. So their arrival at Sinai was, as it were, the completion of the first stage of the journey. The second stage ended at Kadesh Barnea, before the end of the second year after they left Egypt. The third was the plains of Moab, reached when they crossed the brook Zered and left the wilderness for good (Deut. 2:13-14).
The date can be measured. The trip from Rameses to Sinai took only weeks, and that count of days matches a later count of years.
The length of the journey to Sinai also matters. "They departed from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month" (Num. 33:3), and they came into the wilderness of Sinai on the first day of the third month, where a new order of things opened for them. Remember that the first stages of their journey were inside Egypt itself (vv. 5-7). That leaves about thirty-eight or forty days for the period in view — the same number in days as the years Israel later spent in the wilderness.
Look back over the road just travelled. Nothing on it came to Israel because they had earned it.
Up to this point all the dealings of God have been the simple application and outflow of His own grace. This is all the more striking, because even after the redemption of the people from Egypt there are grievous faults, unbelief, complaints, and murmurs. Still, not a blow, not a single answer on God's part except in tender mercy towards a poor and failing people. All changes now.
So what changed? At this mountain Israel took on a promise.
Sinai would make them remember those awe-inspiring displays of the holiness and majesty of that law. They had pledged themselves to obey it as the basis of their relationship with God, and that pledge proved fatal… From Sinai, by taking this place of responsibility, they completely changed the whole character of their relations with God and put it on an entirely different footing. It was no longer a question of what God was for them, but of what they should be for God.
If grace was already working, why introduce terms at all? God had a question to settle in the open.
It was a perfectly righteous thing for God to propose terms of law. If He had not, one solemn question would never have been squarely raised: can anyone stand before God on the ground of his own faithfulness?… Ever since man fell, God has presented grace as the only hope for a sinner. But man had no sense of this. His heart kept taking the place of self-righteousness, so God's law put him fully to the test.
The place itself teaches:
The people are now at Sinai. The scene is still a wilderness, and the throne of the almighty Lawgiver is a barren mountain. Law cannot bring into the land, nor produce fruit from the barren heart of man; and God would surround us with reminders of this.
This mountain also carried an offer, and the offer came with a condition.
God promised Israel, on condition of obedience, "you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Ex. 19:6). They failed in obedience, and Levi's special priesthood was the result of that failure. As part of a failed people, not even the priests could go behind the inner curtain. Grace has now given us as Christians that access to God which was denied to them — access to God fully revealed as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.
- Arrival — Sinai was the appointed goal. God had named this mountain to Moses in advance, and the road to Canaan ran through it.
- Grace — everything from Egypt to this camp was pure kindness: faults and murmuring met with mercy, never with a blow.
- Change — from this mountain the question shifts from what God is for His people to what they will be for Him.
- Test — God set terms of law in perfect righteousness, to settle one question: can anyone stand on his own faithfulness? A barren mountain answers it.
- Fulfilment — the priesthood offered here on condition of obedience is now ours in Christ, with access to God as Father.
they departed from Rephidim, and came [into] the wilderness of Sinai, and encamped in the wilderness; and Israel encamped there before the mountain.
The journey out of Egypt has an address. The whole nation halts in front of one mountain, and from that spot God will speak the law and the covenant.
The stop at Sinai was not a chance halt. At the burning bush God named this very mountain to Moses as the proof that He had sent him. One writer reads the arrival as that promise kept.
The opening verses of our chapter show God's faithfulness. They witness to the promise He gave Moses in Exodus 3:12: "And He said, Certainly I will be with you: and this shall be a token to you, that I have sent you. When you have brought forth the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God upon this mountain." Mount Sinai is a range of high hills. It is sometimes called Horeb, as in chapter 3. Horeb may be a more general name for the whole range, with Sinai as one of the peaks.
The verse says they encamped in the wilderness. How much room did that wilderness give them, and how long did they stay?
The Israelites camped in the wilderness of Sinai, which must have been a large place, able to hold two million people. Comparing Exodus 19:1 with Numbers 10:11 shows that they stayed there nearly a year. Modern surveys of the mountains in this area have found a plain about two miles long and half a mile wide. It gave ample room for the people to gather. There they could hear the thunder and see the fire and smoke coming out of the mountain. The plain is now called er Rahah.
They came from Rephidim, one more stop on a road that began in Egypt. One writer sums up God's dealings along that whole road in a single word.
The blood of the Passover lamb was the sign of their shelter from judgment. It was also the sign of their separation to God Himself. Then the crossing of the Red Sea brings out the song of salvation. And from the Red Sea to Sinai it was all grace. God dealt with them in grace. They murmured again and again, but they got the quails and the water without any reproach. It was perfect and unmingled grace.
Israel already knew that voice. One writer asks what it had been saying to them, right up to the moment named in this verse.
Notice, it is "My voice" and "My covenant." What was that voice saying? And what did that covenant involve? Had the Lord's voice made itself heard to lay down the rules of a severe and unbending lawgiver? Not at all. It had spoken to demand freedom for the captives. It had spoken to provide shelter from the sword of the destroyer, to make a way for the ransomed to pass over, to bring down bread from heaven, and to draw water out of the hard rock. Such had been the gracious and clear words of the Lord's voice, up to the moment when "Israel encamped before the mountain."
The terms change at this camp. Writers read the arrival at Sinai as the opening of a new order.
A new dispensation is opened in these chapters. Up to the close of chapter 18, as pointed out before, grace reigned. It marked all God's dealings with His people. From this point on, the people came, with their own consent, under the strict requirements of law. Sinai is the expression of this way of dealing, and is linked with it for all time.
The change lies in what blessing now rests on.
We shall see the terms of God's proposal to them. The enjoyment of blessing and relationship now depended on their obedience to the word of God, on their faithfulness. It no longer rested only on the faithfulness of God, as it had during the period of grace.
Why would God propose terms of law at all? One writer answers from what Israel had already shown of themselves.
They left the ground of the grace of God, which they had in no way valued. Their conduct proved that His grace had not at all entered their hearts. It was therefore a perfectly righteous thing that God should propose terms of law. Had He not done so, one solemn question would never have come out into the open: can man stand before God on the ground of his own faithfulness?
- Brought. God led them from Rephidim to the exact mountain He had named to Moses at the bush — the arrival was His promise kept.
- Carried. From the Red Sea to this camp, all was grace: shelter, deliverance, bread, water, and no reproach for their murmuring.
- Camped. The plain before the mountain gave a whole nation room to stand, see and hear, and they stayed there nearly a year.
- Tested. At this camp blessing came to rest on their faithfulness, not on God's alone. That put man's own competence to the test.
- Marked. Sinai stays linked with this way of dealing for all time — a standing question over man's own faithfulness, set beside the grace that carried Israel there.