The two characteristics of God
revealed throughout the scriptures is the characteristic of his
love and the characteristic of his holiness. His love, the scripture's
very clear about that. The love of God is displayed
in his mercy and in his grace to chosen sinners in and by and
through Christ. But God is also holy. The severity
of his law, the severity of his justice must be satisfied before
his love and his mercy and his grace can ever be shown to those
that he purposed to save. Now, our holy God cannot just
simply wink at sin. He can't just simply turn his
back to it as though it never existed. He's too holy. I wish folks knew that, I really
do. God's holy law demands that the soul that sinneth, it shall
die. That's what a holy God and his
holy law and his holy justice requires. And we see God's characteristics
of love and holiness all through the Bible, all through the scriptures.
Matter of fact, we must, it's imperative that we do. The God
whom we have offended, is holy and we have offended him. Our
sin has offended God. Against him and him only have
we sinned and done evil in his sight. We've sinned against God. We've offended his law. We've
offended his justice. And he demands that the offenses
of the sinner be judged, sentenced and executed. It's only in Christ
our substitute and by His perfect righteousness and obedience that
a holy God can love the sinner. Salvation is of the Lord and
salvation is in the Lord. Now in the Garden of Eden, we
behold God's love and His goodness and the promising of the woman
seed that would come forth to crush the serpent's head. That
speaks of our Lord, the Messiah, who was to come and to save his
people from their sin. But also in Genesis chapter three,
we see God's severity that caused him in holy judgment to drive
the man out of the garden. Yes, God is love, but first and
foremost, he's holy. God, in his love, provided a
shelter, provided a refuge for Noah and his family. But God,
the same God, in holy judgment, sent the flood and destroyed
those who had corrupted their way on the earth. The goodness
of God commissioned two angels to deliver Lot, but God's holy
severity rained down fire and brimstone and consumed the wicked
in Sodom. God is love preserved his people
under the blood of the Passover lamb in the land of Goshen. But the same God, the Holy God
of the Bible slew all the firstborn in Egypt. Yes, God is love, but
his love never comes at the expense of his Holy justice. It must
be perfect for God to accept it. And he won't accept anything
less than perfection. Holy and Reverend is His name.
And there's only one way that sinners like you and I can be
perfectly holy, perfectly just, perfectly righteous before Him,
and that's in Christ. In Exodus chapter 32, a week
or two back, we saw the love and the goodness of God in His
response to the intercession of Moses. God in love, God in
mercy and in grace, he spared idolatrous Israel and their worship
of the golden calf. But also his holiness and his
severity called for the sword of the Levites to do the work
of judgment. And we're told that 3,000 men
fell that same day. Yes, God is love, but God is
first and foremost, holy. This love and holiness is the
same with God the Son. The Lord Jesus Christ came to
earth not full of grace alone, but full of grace and truth,
the scripture says. And the truth is this, God so
loved his children in the world that he gave Christ, his only
begotten Son, to those that he purposed to save before the world
began. And Christ the God-man died for
the ungodly that God had purposed to save, making God a just God
and a savior. God didn't just simply forgive
your sin. Your sin was paid for by a substitute,
and that substitute is Christ. That's why he is the gospel.
That's why salvation is of the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ was
the friend of publicans and sinners, but he was the enemy of self-righteous
hypocrites. And he gave sight to the blind
who could not see, and he blinded those who claimed that they could.
The same Lord who was moved with compassion on the multitudes
was also the same one who in Mark chapter three looked around
on some in anger in the temple. In Ephesians 3.19, we read of
the love of Christ, and then in Revelation 6.16, you can read
about the wrath of the Lamb. The truth is this, dear friends,
Jesus Christ and His heavenly Father are first and foremost
holy, and His love, along with all His other sovereign attributes,
must take the back seat to His holiness. God cannot be loving. God cannot be gracious. God cannot
be merciful at the expense of his holy law and his holy justice. Now we see these two characteristics
of God in the text before us tonight. Exodus 34, look at verse
six. Here we're told, the Lord, the
Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abundant in
goodness and in truth. The Lord is merciful and He's
gracious and He's long-suffering and abundant in goodness and
truth to all who deserve nothing but death, hell, and the grave.
What great mercy that is that God would have such mercy, grace,
and compassion on anyone. Verse seven, keeping mercy for
thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin. And
at the same time, the same Lord that will by no means clear the
guilty. We see his love, but we see his
holiness. We see his mercy and his grace,
but we see his wrath and his judgment as a holy God. He will
by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the
fathers upon the children and upon the children's children
until the third and to the fourth generation. And though God in
love forgives iniquity, Though he forgives transgression and
sin by putting that on his own son and his son justifying his
law and his justice, yet he also visits the iniquity of the fathers
upon the children. So how does God do both? How
does he forgive the iniquity of some and punish the iniquity
of others? because he loves only in Jesus
Christ, the sinner substitute. There's no love of God apart
from the Lord Jesus Christ. There's just not. If you're not
in him, God does not love you. Now I know what you've been told
all your life, but you've been told wrong. Those who trust in
Christ alone are referred to as holy men and women who trusted
in God. God is holy. His words, the Holy
Bible, the Holy Scriptures, His ministering spirits are holy
angels. His prophets were called holy
men of God. God's holy. He's so holy that
He cannot simply just forgive sin. Sin must be punished either
in you or in a substitute. The sin of Ham was visited upon
his descendants in Genesis 9.25. The sin of Korah and his company
resulted in the earth opening its mouth and swallowing them
up and their houses. When Achan, remember Achan? when he was punished for his
sin. God told him not to take anything when they overtook their
enemies in Canaan. And Anand stuck a few things
under his coat and hid them in his tent. Achan was punished
for his sin and stoned with him was his sons and his daughters,
according to Joshua chapter seven. God is holy. In Matthew chapter
27, when the Jews crucified the Lord Jesus Christ, they cried,
His blood be upon us and upon our children. And you know what?
God in justice took them at His word. And there are many today
who preach a God of love, but seem to never tell sinners that
God's love for a sinner can never be at the expense of His holiness,
at the expense of His justice. There are many who speak of God's
love, yet never mentioned His holiness. There are many who
preach of His grace, but never speak of His justice. There are
many who rejoice in His forgiveness, but seem to be ignorant of His
wrath and His judgment and eternal condemnation. And if they're
not ignorant of it, then they must just not believe it. Does
God love too much to hate sin? Does God love too much to judge
sinners? Does God love too much to carry
out His law? Does God love too much to condemn
our offenses against Him? Did Christ die in vain? Do we
behold His holiness the same as we do His love? Do we see
His severity? Do we see His justice the same
as we do His grace and His goodness? Men and women should be greatly
concerned about offending this holy God. And yet they don't
seem to give it much thought. Why? God loves me too much to
send me to hell. God loves me too much to condemn
me for my sin. Does he? Are you in Christ? If
you're not, he doesn't. God could have never loved any
sinner apart from Christ justly paying the wages of sin, which
was death. He paid our wages by dying in
our place. In heaven itself, the saints
not only sing the praises of God, but the scripture is very
clear that they fall down before the Lord in holy reverence, because
He's holy. And we can only work out what
God has worked in, we know that, but we must work out our own
salvation with fear and trembling, with reverence and all. Philippians
2.12. Why? Because God's holy. He will by no means clear the
guilty. We must be found in Christ, the
innocent one. We see the holiness of God in
verse eight by the worship of Moses. Look at it. And Moses
made haste and bowed his head toward the earth and he worshiped. Moses here filled with adoration
and awe and wonder. He takes his place in the dust
before God Almighty. That's where we have to go. We
have to come, to come to Christ. To come up, we got to go down
at his feet. That's where you'll find a believer
at Christ's feet, begging for mercy every time. And the words
there, the Holy Spirit used made haste. That shows us something
of the urgency of this worship. Worshiping God, who is a holy
God, who will by no means clear the guilty, yet in Christ, he
loves and has compassion for those that God gave him before
the foundation of the world. That's always the result when
the Lord condescends to reveal himself to one of his own. God
appeared to Abraham and said, I am the almighty God. Walk before
me and be thou upright. And we're told that Abraham fell
on his face. When God appeared before Joshua
as the captain of the host of the Lord, we're told that Joshua
fell on his face to the earth and did worship. When God's glory
filled the temple that Solomon built, all the children of Israel
bowed themselves with their faces to the ground upon the pavement
and worshiped and praised the Lord. Second Chronicles 7.3. I wish I could preach Christ
in such a way that it would cause all of us to worship him on our
faces. He's deserving of it. Why? Because he's holy. Look at verse
nine, and he, Moses, said, if now I have found grace in thy
sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray thee, go among us, for it is
a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and
take us for thine inheritance. That's the message that's been
declared from this pulpit for nearly 50 years, if not longer.
And that's the revelation that God always causes his people
to take sides with him against themselves. That's what Moses
did here. Let me show you that. Look back
a couple of pages to Exodus chapter 32. Look at verse nine, Exodus chapter
32. And the Lord said unto Moses,
I've seen this people and behold, it is a stiff neck people. Now,
therefore, let me alone that my wrath may wax hot against
them and that I may consume them. But now here in Exodus chapter
34, Moses agrees with God. He takes sides with God. He acknowledges
the truth of God's charge. And with wondrous faith, Moses
turns God's own charge against Israel into a plea to God to
continue with him. He said, God, you're right. We
are a stiff-necked people. We're undeserving of the least
of thy mercy and grace. That's why we need you all the
more. And that's how it works with
chosen sinners. It's all grace from the first
to the last. Christ came not to call the righteous,
but sinners to repentance. The proud Pharisees resented
it. They murmured against it. And
they said, well, this man received sinners and eateth with them.
Thank God that he does. Oh, if you're a sinner, that's
the best news you ever heard. The more the Holy Spirit reveals
to us the plague of our hearts, the sin of our hearts, the inability
of our will, the unwillingness of our flesh, the more we're
enabled to apprehend the wonders, grace of God. The more we see
that we are by nature a stiff-necked people, for we are, the more
we desire and we crave His presence. The more we discover the true
nature and the character of our flesh, the more we'll long for
an almighty and everlasting arm to lean on. Now back in Exodus
chapter 34 verse 10, we see something of God's love for his people. And we also see something of
God's holiness and his holy wrath and judgment on all others. Look
at verse 10. God said, behold, I make a covenant
before all thy people I will do marvels such have not been
done in all the earth nor in any nation and all the people
among which thou art shall see the work of the Lord for it is
a terrible thing that I will do with thee. God said, what
I'm fixing to do should cause the whole world to fear. It should
cause the whole world to reverence me. There'd never been anything
done like it before. It's something only God can do.
The Lord God of heaven and earth, He's a covenant God, and God
deals with all men in a covenant relationship. In the day of judgment,
all will be found under one of two covenants, either the covenant
of works in Adam or the covenant of grace in Christ. The covenant
in our text was a covenant of words. As we saw last time, God
promised what he would do, and God gave commandment to Israel
what they were to do. And here God promised in verse
11, behold, I drive out before thee the Amorite, and the Canaanite,
and the Hittite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite,
all those that dwelt in the land that God had promised Israel.
Now for Israel's side of the covenant, God demanded some things. And we see what they are in verse
12. He said, take heed to thyself, lest thou make a covenant with
the inhabitants of the land whither thou goest, and lest it be for
a snare in the midst of thee. Oh, take heed to yourself, dear
friends. Problems with us, take heed to
thyself. Israel here was not to enter
into any covenant of any kind with their enemies. And it wasn't
just enough to be neutral. To be neutral is to be lukewarm. And we all know what Christ does
with lukewarm water. He spews it out of his mouth.
God commanded here in verse 13. He said, but ye shall destroy
their altars. You shall break their images.
You shall cut down their grove for thou shall worship no other
God for the Lord whose name is jealous is a jealous God. Did you know that God is a jealous
God? He is so much so that his name
is jealous. God's name is jealous. God is
a jealous God. God will have no rivals. Let me say that again. God will
have no rivals. He alone must have all the glory. He must have all the praise,
all the devotion. God demands that we don't even
have a curious thought concerning the idols of this world. In verse
15, we see what a serious charge and what a horrific offense it
is against our jealous God when we do. He said, lest thou make
a covenant with the inhabitants of the land and they go a whoring
after their gods and do sacrifice under their gods. "'And one called
thee, and thou eat of his sacrifice, "'and thou take of their daughters
unto thy sons, "'and their daughters go a-whoring after their gods,
"'and make thy sons go a-whoring after their gods. "'Thou shalt
make thee no molten gods.'" The word jealous here in our text
is a word very closely akin to the word zealous. Jealous with
a J and zealous with a Z. Matter of fact, the Hebrew word
translated jealous actually means zealous. You remember what Paul
said to the Corinthian church? He said, I'm jealous over you
with a godly jealousy. He said, for I have espoused
you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin
to Christ. Now that's what we're going to
have to be, to be joined with Christ, a chaste virgin. How
are we going to be that? We went whoring after other gods.
How are we going to be a chaste virgin to Christ? Paul here has
an earnest and an anxious concern that the Lord Jesus might be
honored in the believer's life. You know, there is such a thing
as godly jealousy. Jealousy, even like anger, is
not evil in itself. But man's jealousy and man's
anger, why it resides and comes from the lowest depths of man's
wicked heart, that when it comes from man's heart, that jealousy
and that anger becomes evil. But that's not so with God. Man's
jealousy provokes wrath and it stops at nothing to get its own
way. God says man's jealousy is as
cruel as the grave. But God's jealousy is a zealous
thing. You know what the word zealous
means? God's jealousy is a passionate, it's a devoted, it's a committed
and dedicated and wholehearted zeal. God jealously required
Israel to keep the covenant in perfect chastity through faith
in Him. They were not to have a thought
of another God. That word chastity means celibacy. It means self-restraint, abstinence,
innocence, purity. It means virginity. God requires
that we be pure, that we be innocent virgins when it comes to sharing
our love with anyone other than Him. God is a jealous God. Well, who are represented by
these enemy idolaters? Most folks would say Satan, his
demons, sin, death, and hell are our greatest foes. But you
know, really, as I've already alluded to, our greatest enemy
is self. It really is. We're born in the
state that the children of Israel were already in when God gave
them the law. They were already guilty of breaking
God's law when God made this covenant with them. And you and
I are born guilty in that. While we come forth from the
womb speaking lies, we're estranged from the womb. The children of
Israel were already guilty of making an idol with their own
hands, but so were we. We've all worshiped the golden
calf of our own making, whatever it might be. So what was God's
purpose in giving Israel a law that they'd already broken? The
law was given to show us our inability. The law was given
to show us our unwillingness. The law shuts our mouth. The
law makes us guilty before God. The law shows us that none can
be justified by the deeds of the law. You can't do enough
and you can't do good enough. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. That's why God gave the law to
show us that we're sinners. Until we see what we are, we'll
never see who we need. Only the sick need a physician
and Christ is the great physician. The problem we have today is
that most people aren't sick. They're doing okay. Yeah, I'm
doing all right. My, my, Lord, show us what we
are. This is the gospel of God's grace,
dear friends. This is the covenant of his grace
and his love. God says of those who believe,
you're not under the law, but you're under grace. God says,
I'll no longer deal with you under the curse of the law, but
I'll deal with you now under the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ. All who are under the law, the
law declares them to be guilty. I ask you sincerely, shouldn't
the promises of God who cannot lie, he's not a man that he should
lie or son of man that he should change his mind about anything
that he's promised, shouldn't the promises of God alone cause
us to obey him and worship him? God promised that he would do
unprecedented miracles for Israel, never seen before in or on the
earth. God promised that he would destroy
every single enemy under Israel's feet, all of them. He's promised
the same to us. There's not one enemy that a
stand against God's people. Shouldn't that be enough to cause
chastity to God? Sadly, it's not. Israel had God's
word that if they destroyed the enemy's idols, that God would
destroy their enemies. Wasn't that enough for them to
obey God? No, it's not enough for us either.
God plainly and clearly told Israel that these enemies would
lead them and their children into idolatry. His word was for
their good. Isn't God's word true and faithful
enough to make men and women obey God? Yes, it certainly is. But the problem is with us. The
problem is with self. We're weak and we're unable to
believe anything because we're dead in trespasses and sin. But
if you think that you can be saved by your own will and work,
then you're still lost because you can't be. Only Christ can
provide the perfect righteousness that God requires. and it's a
free gift from him to you. You can't get it any other way.
So let me remind us one more time what Israel had seen. They'd seen God deliver them
out of Egyptian bondage through the blood of the Passover. They
had seen this holy God destroy Pharaoh and all his army at the
Red Sea. They had seen God's very presence
in the pillar of the cloud and the pillar of fire leading them
safely all the way to Mount Sinai where they received the law of
God. They saw with their own eyes as God began to drive out
those nations. Shouldn't that have made them
obey God's covenant? It should have, but it didn't.
And sadly, it won't be enough for us either. When Christ came,
he did nothing but good all his life. How many times have we
read that passage that says of all the things our Lord did,
all the good things, all the loving things that he did, if
they were recorded in a book that my, the world itself wouldn't
have the space to contain all those things that Christ did.
Everything he did was good. Everything he did was holy, just,
and righteous. He worked miracles that only
God could work. And isn't it enough for us today
to hear the amazing wonders that God's grace has done for us? To hear those things preached
to us? Nope, not without a divine intervention from God. God's
gonna have to divinely intervene in our lives and reveal these
things to us, divine revelation. Divine intervention, that's what
we have to have. Israel had the covenant of God's
word, but they broke God's covenant and they went whoring after other
gods. So did you, and so did I. But God is a jealous God. His
name is jealous. He requires that we be faithful
and true to him. Can we be? Only in Christ, no
other way. No other way. The covenant of
works will never get it done. We cannot provide the perfection
that God requires. And by Adam and our own sin nature,
I might add, that's all we are, idolatrous harlots. Well, let
me finish up by telling you of a great conqueror. What a conqueror
he is. He wiped out all the enemies
of Israel by himself. God in love and mercy found you
and I enemies against God ourselves in our hearts and in our minds.
We were unchaste, we were idolaters, we were worshiping our idol of
self. But in love and in mercy and
in grace, God sent a preacher. telling us of the amazing work
of God in Christ, that Christ has done for us. Christ did for
us that which had never been done in the earth before or since. Yet sadly, we heard the everlasting
covenant of grace, much like Israel heard the covenant of
works. We heard it with natural ears.
We heard it with enmity in our hearts. And we went whoring after
the idol of self and sin and unbelief. Some of us boasted
that we were chaste to a jealous God, and we imagined that we
kept the law of Sinai. Some of us got a head full of
doctrine. We love the doctrines of grace,
but not the God of the doctrines. Some love the election of God,
but not the elect himself, Jesus Christ. The doctrine of election
will not save you, but Christ his elect can, and Christ his
elect will. Some love the sovereignty of
God, but not the sovereign Christ who works all things together
for the good of his people and the glory of his father. And
there is one, a conqueror, a spotless sacrifice, a perfect substitute,
one who was perfectly chased in faith and in love to God the
whole time that he walked on this earth. As our head, as the
last Adam, because of his love for us, He causes us to walk
with Him in this perfect faith and love before God under the
law. And Christ is both just and justifier
of those who believe in Him. He died the just for the unjust
to bring us to God. The only hope that you and I
have of being brought to God is that Christ, the just and
holy one, died for us, the unjust and the ungodly. No other way. And you're kidding yourself if
you think that you can work up this righteousness that God requires. You cannot do it. This salvation
that we enjoy is the result of Christ, our conqueror's finished
work. And now God says, for I've espoused
you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin
to Christ. Christ broke down those images.
Christ broke down those altars. Christ cut down those groves
in our sinful hearts. So we see that our weapons are
not carnal, but they're mighty through God. Mighty to the pulling
down of strongholds. Christ is the power of God who
came and knocked down those walls of our Jericho walled hearts. Man, we've built them high, haven't
we? And we feel so secure behind them, but God comes and with
one note of the gospel trumpet of Christ and Him crucified,
the walls fall down. Oh, how I rejoice that my God
is a God of love, but oh, how I rejoice even more that he is
first and foremost, a holy God who accepted the just and righteous
work of his beloved son, and now has accepted you and I in
the beloved. We're accepted in Christ, the
beloved. And that's who I trust, Jesus Christ. That's where I
rest. I rest in Him. He's where I find
peace. He is all my peace before God.
He's that peace that passes all understanding. He's all my salvation,
all of it. Oh, if I lean on anything, the
most minor thing that I've done, thinking that that somehow or
another gives me credence with God, then I've deceived myself.
He's all my salvation. And as our jealous husband, he
loved his church and he gave himself forth that he might sanctify
and then he might cleanse it with the washing of water by
the word that he might present to himself a glorious church. You're a glorious church, shout
of God. not having spot or wrinkle or
any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish."
Now that's what we are in Christ. We're holy and without blemish. We're unreprovable in His sight.
We're unblameable in His sight. We're a chaste virgin for our
jealous and zealous husband. Are you rejoicing that with me?
Thank God that he's made under you wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. All you need before God, everything
that God requires, you are in him.