Come to Sinai
By: Deji Yesufu
In the late 16th century and early 17th century, Europeans – mostly English men – began to go to the New World to escape religious persecution at home. Many people who came to America in those days were Protestant Christians. When these people settle into a community to live there, three things become essential to their communal life: the land they work to grow the food they eat; building community with their neighbours who sometimes could be far or near; and the local church. There would usually be one local church in a given community that served all the people. This church could be Baptist, Methodist, or Anglican – the three leading protestant denominations in those days. Roman Catholicism is a later development in American history. If you were Baptist in persuasion, you live in a community with a Baptist Church, etc. In other words, the local church, not where you work or how much you earn, determines where you live.
At Providence Reformed Baptist Church Ibadan, the local church is becoming increasingly central to our lives. The reason is that we began the year 2024 with a commitment to expositional preaching, and we have found out that all of our lives revolve around what we are learning from the scripture. One thing this engenders in us is obedience to God. Another thing it does is make the Bible more and more real to us. At some point in the life of our local church, we saw the need to engage in apologetics through our para-church ministry – Reformed Naija TV. We began to teach the “doctrine of God” and that led us to study Moses – his encounter with God; the wrath of God on Egypt; and then we came to Sinai. At about the time we reached Sinai, we were also studying the London Baptist Confessions 1689, and we saw written in chapter 14, paragraph two:
“By this faith, a Christian believeth to be true whatsoever is revealed in the Word for the authority of God himself, and also apprehendeth an excellency therein above all other writings and all things in the world, as it bears forth the glory of God in his attributes, the excellency of Christ in his nature and offices, and the power and fullness of the Holy Spirit in his workings and operations: and so is enabled to cast his soul upon the truth thus believed; and also acteth differently upon that which each particular passage thereof containeth; yielding obedience to the commands, trembling at the threatenings, and embracing the promises of God for this life and that which is to come…”
This part of the confession deals with the characteristics of those who have true saving faith. It says among many things that they hold the Bible as true, they obey the command of scriptures, and they tremble at God’s threat. As we meditated on what it meant to tremble at God’s threatening, we came to Sinai. Why is Sinai significant to this discussion? I will explain.
When God sent Moses to deliver the children of Israel from Egypt, he told them that he would bring them to a mountain where they would worship him. He said all these things to them without giving them any other details. Up until Israel’s encounter with God at Sinai in Exodus 19, these people had been riding high on the wings of God’s grace and mercies. They had stood by watching God bring all his terrors on their oppressors; he even killed all their first-born sons; and it all culminated in the dance, singing and rejoicing of Exodus 15 which Mariam led: “… sing unto the Lord, for he has triumphed gloriously. The horse and its riders have he thrown into the sea…” What they did not factor was that Sinai was going to be a different kettle of fish entirely. While God had terrorised his enemies in Egypt, at Sinai he came down to terrorise his people. Three aspects of this encounter are worth examining:
- Stated Purpose of God Appearing at Sinai – verse 9
“I am going to come to you in a dense cloud so that the people will hear me speaking with you and will always put their trust in you.”The first and chief error and sin of all humanity is this: “Did God say?” This was how Satan deceived Eve, and this is how he deceives all humanity today. If you and I are sure that something is a clear commandment from God, there is a likelihood that we will obey it. It will be doubly so if God were to appear to us today and speak from heaven in all of his glory and state to us what he wants us to do. This is the purpose of God appearing at Sinai to the children of Israel: that they will hear God speak to them directly, and that they will appreciate the fact that Moses was God’s spokesman. Whatever Moses says to them, they must obey. In a similar vein, this was the challenge with the Jews in the days of Jesus’ ministry: they simply would not accept that Christ was God’s spokesman who had essentially come to fulfil God’s word through Moses to them. And today, while we no longer have Moses on earth, and we no longer have Jesus and his apostles on earth, we have the very words of God written for us in the Bible. The point of coming to Sinai is to appreciate the fact that God has revealed himself; he has spoken and has ensured that his words are written in the Holy Bible. Our duty, as God’s people, is to hold scripture sacrosanct and obey its commands. We ought not to just obey it, we must also tremble at its threat.
2. Holiness and the Third Day Encounter – verse 10-13
As the God of the whole earth announces his coming encounter with Moses, he also leaves numerous injunctions to the people to the people to sanctify themselves. In other words, they were coming to meet a holy God and he would not tolerate any disorderliness or unholiness. Along with this, he gives them a stated time that this encounter will occur: on the third day. Thinking deeper into this matter, I realize that if the Bible is true it means that all of us human beings have only three days to meet with our God. That this awesome and holy God is going to call us into an encounter with him in three days. These three days, by biblical numerology, could be three hours, three days, three weeks, three months, three years, thirty years, or three hundred years. The point however is that our time is already ticking: prepare to meet with this awesome and holy God.
3. God Appears in Terror – verses 16-19
Finally, God appears to these people and he appears not as a loving, cuddling Father; but as a terrible God. The people are shaking; the New Testament records that even Moses was shaking (Hebrew 12:21); there is smoke on the mountain, bellowing up like from a furnace; and God finally speaks. And when he speaks, he continually warns that the people do not break his commands, lest he breaks out against them. Hebrew 12 describes it best: our God is a consuming fire!
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When I write about “coming to Sinai”, what exactly is the point I am trying to make? It is simply this: I wish to remind my readers that Exodus 19 is a precursor to Exodus 20. In the latter, God enumerates his ten commandments. That chapter tells us that Exodus 20 is a continuation of the Exodus 19 encounter. God speaks the Ten Commandments to these people – and leaves them shaking in terror. The point of it all is that the fear of God may be etched upon the hearts of these people, and that way they would not sin. It is the same with us today: The God of Exodus 19 has not changed. He is still the same God we will have to encounter when we die. We had better have found cover for our sins in Christ Jesus.
The most important point of this encounter however is that nobody is living that can come face to face with this holy God: no one. We are sinful creatures, and if we are to encounter God even in our best deeds – we will walk away from him happily and embrace hell instead. The only way to meet with this awesome and holy God of Sinai is to meet with him through an Advocate: Jesus Christ. Coming to Sinai is a reminder of the Christian gospel. It is a reminder of the blessing of the deeds of Christ in becoming our substitute on the cross and taking the wrath of God upon himself on our behalf. We need not fear meeting an angry God at our death – Christ has taken his wrath. If, however, we have rejected Christ as our Saviour, we have every reason to be afraid of what lies after now.
Finally, Sinai reminds us of the kind of attitude we must have as we come to God’s presence, particularly in church, to worship. Our worship must carry some gravity, fear, and reverence. We must never forget that despite the blood of Jesus that speaks better things on our behalf, we cannot take God for granted. Our worship every Sunday must be biblical – as God has commanded in the Bible. We must also have reverence for the preached word. We must commit to obeying God’s commands to our hearts. The preacher must be grave: understanding that he is God’s mouthpiece to the congregation. Church is Sinai; the church is serious business – when we come to church, we come to Sinai. This is why God’s people of past generations took the church seriously. They made the mountain on which they worshipped a priority wherever they lived. We can imitate this also.
Deji Yesufu is the pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church Ibadan. He is the author of HUMANITY.
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