Exodus 34:1-9 picks up after the golden calf, with God telling Moses to carve two new stone tablets and come back up Mount Sinai alone. This sermon walks through the renewal of the covenant, the descent of Yahweh in the cloud, and the proclamation of his own name and character.

Much of the sermon sits on verses 6 and 7, where God describes himself as compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in loving kindness and truth, forgiving iniquity and yet not clearing the guilty. The preacher traces this same confession through Numbers, Nehemiah and the Psalms, explains the Hebrew image behind "slow to anger," and works carefully through what it means for God to visit iniquity on the third and fourth generations while showing loving kindness to thousands.

The closing turns to Moses as mediator and priest, praying that God would go in the midst of a stiff-necked people and take them as his own inheritance. That prayer is then set alongside the high priestly prayer of John 17, where Jesus prays not only for the apostles but for all who would believe through their word.

In this sermon

• Why Moses carves the second tablets while God still writes the words
• God's law does not change even when his people fail to keep it
• The parallels with Exodus 19, and why Aaron and Joshua are barred from the mountain
• Forty days and forty nights as a pattern of testing in Scripture
• God's condescension in descending in the cloud rather than speaking from afar
• The proclamation of Exodus 34:6-7 repeated in Numbers 14, Nehemiah 9 and Psalm 86
• The Hebrew image behind "slow to anger" as long of nostrils
• Loving kindness to thousands set against iniquity visited to the third and fourth generations
• Moses praying as mediator, including himself in "our iniquity and our sin"
• The request to be taken as God's own inheritance, echoing Exodus 19:5
• Moses as a type of Christ, and John 17 as the better prayer for future believers
• Psalm 103 and sins removed as far as the east is from the west

Chapters
0:00 Recap and the plan of chapter 34
2:53 Reading Exodus 34:1-9
5:15 New tablets, unchanged law
7:28 Parallels with the giving of the law
10:07 Yahweh descends and passes by
12:50 Compassionate, gracious, slow to anger
13:24 The same confession across the Old Testament
18:07 Why the name Yahweh is repeated
23:00 Third and fourth generations explained
27:57 Moses bows and prays for God's presence
34:45 Moses as a type of Christ
35:50 The high priestly prayer of John 17
40:15 As far as the east is from the west

Scripture: Exodus 34:1-9 · Exodus 32:19 · Exodus 19 · Exodus 33:18-23 · Numbers 14 · Nehemiah 9 · Psalm 86 · Exodus 20:4-6 · Deuteronomy · Exodus 33:3-5 · Exodus 19:5 · John 17:9-23 · Psalm 103:12 · Romans

About Mercy and Grace Church
Mercy and Grace is an expository preaching church in National City, California, committed to preaching Christ, and him crucified, by Scripture alone, to the glory of God alone. Each week Pastor Bobby Lugo and our teaching elders walk verse by verse through God's Word.

Join us in person — Sundays at 12:00 PM, 1200 E. 8th Street, National City, CA 91950.
Website: mercyandgracechurch.com
Email: ncmercyandgrace@gmail.com