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The Story of Redemption
to bring thee into the place which I have prepared. Beware of Him,
and obey His voice, provoke Him not; for He will not pardon your
transgressions: for My name is in Him.”
Exodus 23:20, 21
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Moses took glory to himself which belonged to God, and made it
necessary for God to do that in his case which should forever satisfy
rebellious Israel that it was not Moses who had led them from Egypt,
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but God Himself. The Lord had committed to Moses the burden
of leading His people, while the mighty Angel went before them
in all their journeyings and directed all their travels. Because they
were so ready to forget that God was leading them by His Angel,
and to ascribe to man that which God’s power alone could perform,
He had proved them and tested them, to see whether they would
obey Him. At every trial they failed. Instead of believing in, and
acknowledging, God, who had strewed their path with evidences of
His power and signal tokens of His care and love, they distrusted
Him and ascribed their leaving Egypt to Moses, charging him as the
cause of all their disasters. Moses had borne with their stubbornness
with remarkable forbearance. At one time they threatened to stone
him.
The Heavy Penalty
The Lord would remove this impression forever from their minds,
by forbidding Moses to enter the Promised Land. The Lord had
highly exalted Moses. He had revealed to him His great glory. He
had taken him into a sacred nearness with Himself upon the mount,
and had condescended to talk with him as a man speaketh with a
friend. He had communicated to Moses, and through him to the
people, His will, His statutes, and His laws. His being thus exalted
and honored of God made his error of greater magnitude. Moses
repented of his sin and humbled himself greatly before God. He
related to all Israel his sorrow for his sin. The result of his sin he
did not conceal, but told them that for thus failing to ascribe glory to
God, he could not lead them to the Promised Land. He then asked
them, if this error upon his part was so great as to be thus corrected of
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God, how God would regard their repeated murmurings in charging
him (Moses) with the uncommon visitations of God because of their
sins.