In this passage, as I said, I
wanted you to particularly notice the word jealous. God said his
name is Jealous. And he is jealous. But every
word of this text revolves really around that word. So it's important
that we see all of it. In this passage we have two sides
of a relationship. of commitment and love and covenant
union. And I couldn't help but think
of marriage. It's almost like an exchange
of vows when I read this. And we know we have scriptural
reason to think of marriage when we see the relationship into
which God has been pleased to enter with us. On Moses' side, he represents,
of course, the bride of Christ, us, his church, his people, those
that believe. We have this submissive, humble
plea to never leave us. Did you notice the way he worded
it? Oh, Lord, let my Lord, I pray Thee, That's our play. That's what
we... submissive and humble. I pray thee. And said the Lord
twice. You know, Paul said in Ephesians
5 3, let every one of you in particular so love his wife even
as himself. That's got to... there's no marriage
at all if there's no love. The man has to be the man. A
true husband. And when he is, and the wife
see that she reverence her husband. And that's the place Moses is
taking here, a place of reverence. And said, Lord, don't leave me. I just want to be with you and
you with me from now on. You see this? And then the Lord
says what he says to Moses and says, I make a covenant. That's
what marriage is. It's a covenant. But he says, don't leave me,
stay with me. I can't live without you. That's
what Moses is saying. I can't live without you. He knew, he said, take us as
your inheritance. That word there is possession.
I want to be yours. I want to belong to you. Didn't
that, do you see that? And Moses knew that for God to
be with him and his people he knows what that means that means
provision it means protection it means blessing it means comfort
it means peace and promise and moses said everything that
he said from the dust lord oh lord let my lord i pray thee
don't go away don't leave me and make me yours We, as the bride of the Lord
Jesus Christ, we do reverence Him as Moses did here. And we look to Him for all we
need as a bride to her husband. Don't leave us, Lord. Make us
Yours. And then the Lord speaks on His side of this relationship. And the first thing He says,
Behold, I make a covenant. A man that's not willing to commit
not worth having. And the Lord, he's our bridegroom. I make a covenant. That's first
and foremost. I make a commitment. I make a
pledge. A covenant is entered into, promises
are made. And he said, the first thing
he said, I'm going to do marvels for you. I'm going to do wonderful.
That word there means wonderfully. I'm going to do wonderful things
for you. And he said, I'm going to do
it before all peoples. I want everybody to know how
much I love you. I'm going to do everything I
can for you. What a, what a marvelous relationship. And he said in verse 10, nobody
has ever done or seen things like I'm going to do for you.
It's going to be terrible. That word there is awe inspiring.
People are going to look and see what I do for you, and they're
going to be in awe of the love that I have for you. It's going to cause fear and
reverence of the Lord that he would do such a thing. And not
fear in the sense of being afraid of wrath, but it's his acts of
love for them that are going to cause reverence and fear in
people. 1 Peter 1, let's look at this together.
We'll look at a couple of passages of Scripture and take the time
to do that. 1 Peter 1, verse 8. He's saying now that what I'm
going to do for you, I'm going to make a covenant with you and
I'm going to do wonderful things for you. And people are going
to be in reverential awe. when they see what I do for you.
Look at 1 Peter 1 verse 8. Whom having not seen, you love,
in whom though now you see him not yet believing, you rejoice
with joy unspeakable and full of glory. We fall in love with
him. We see, we don't, we don't see him now, but we love him
because he loves us. Hungry joy causes joy, unspeakable
joy. I can't even talk about it. And
full of glory, receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation
of your soul. There's the covenant. It's covenant
salvation. Of which salvation the prophets
have inquired and searched diligently. who prophesied of the grace that
should come unto you. They told how the Lord Jesus
Christ was going to come. Unto us a child is born, unto
us a son is given, and his name shall be wonderful. Counselor,
the mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.
They told about the salvation that was coming to us, the grace
of God that should come. Searching what or what manner
of time the Spirit of Christ, which was in them, did signify. When it testified beforehand
of the sufferings of Christ, there's salvation. Salvation
is Christ crucified. That's the story, that's the
gospel, that's what they prophesied of. That's the revelation, that's
the grace that's coming to us. the Lord Jesus and His precious
blood, the sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow.
Glory for Him and glory for us. Unto whom it was revealed, verse
12, that not unto themselves but unto us they did minister
the things which are now reported. Even that which was spoken thousands
of years ago, that ministering to us right now here tonight. which are now reported unto you
by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy
Ghost sent down from heaven, which things," here we go, awe-inspiring, the things that
God has done for us, even the angels desire to look into them. Think about what the angels have
seen. But the Lord said, I'm going to do wonderful things
for you. that nobody's ever done or ever
seen. And even an angel who was born in the very presence of
God, who glorified God with their first utterance, and saw Him
with their first glance as He is. They look at the Lord Jesus
Christ suffering and dying in the stead of His people, and
they're in awe. And then the Lord said in verse
11, observe thou that which I command thee this day. Behold, I drive
out before thee the Amorite and the Canaanite and the Hittite
and the Perizzite and the Hivite and the Jebusite. Now think of
the spiritual teaching of this. He's gonna drive out all of our
enemies and we're gonna inherit the land. That's what was accomplished
by the sufferings of Christ that we just read about, by the Lord
Jesus Christ. We inherit and all of our enemies
are destroyed because of him and what he did. He's our champion.
You know, these judges, Gideon and the others that championed
the nation of Israel, they pictured the Lord Jesus Christ, our champion. And that's what he accomplished
for us. And he gave the Israelites a land that other people had
tilled and reaped from and stored up in barns, and they just moved
in. They came and killed them. He gave them the power, the ability
to overcome, greater numbers, greater skills, greater everything.
Gave them the victory. They didn't, they possessed the
land, the land flowing with milk and honey. They didn't even have
to build houses for themselves. They're already there. No need
to make plows, they're already made for you by somebody else.
Just hitch it up and get behind it. It's your land now. No need
to build a storage barn, already got one. No need to dig a well,
there it is, right over there. And what's going to happen to
all those people? God's going to drive them out, he said. Drive
them out. These were idolatrous people.
They were wicked, vile, God-hating people. They shut their eyes to the light,
just like Paul talks about in Romans 1. God, when they knew
God, what could be known of God, they glorified Him not as God.
They deserved exactly what they got. The thing about it is, so
did the Israelites. They were just as idolatrous
and stiff-necked. They were worse than anybody
else. Rebellious and stiff-necked and superstitious and idolatrous. God said, when you go in there,
destroy all the graven images, destroy the houses that they
worshipped in, even the groves, even the place where they...
You know why he told them that? Because he knows how they are.
Lest you go a-whoring after their gods. That's what you're going
to do. He knows what's in our hearts
by nature. The marvel is not that all these people were slaughtered.
It seems cruel, it seems extreme, it seems... It's violent, it's
a violent thing, yes. that that's what we deserve too.
That's the marvel is that God had mercy on us, on his people. Instead of putting us all in
hell, he's going to drive all of our enemies there and give
us the land. Do you understand what the Lord
said when he said, blessed are the meek for they shall inherit
the earth. Blessed of God, blessed of God. Everything that is done in this
earth by other people right now is for the benefit of God's people
All of it everything that's going on In this world. God runs this
thing for your good and mine If you're his Scripture says
he turns the heart of the king as the rivers of water He turns
the heart of the king whether so ever he will that king woke
up and said I'm gonna do what I want to do today, but he ended
up doing what God wanted him to do And what was that? For
your good, whatever it was. Whatever it was. Your boss on
your job, if you have one, is going to make every decision
he makes with your best interest in mind. And he's not going to
have any idea that that's what he's doing. All of your enemies,
in spite of themselves, are going to serve your good. That's what
God said. All of these ites, They're going
to form weapons, God said. They're not going to just come
in and let you take it. They're going to form weapons to keep you out
of their land, to keep you from taking what's theirs. But they're
not going to prosper against you. And I hope I'm being clear
in the comparison here. God drove these people out with
the sword so that his sheep could inherit their land. And the spiritual
equivalent of that is what Paul talked about in 1 Corinthians.
Let's look at 1 Corinthians chapter 3. This is the teaching here. 1
Corinthians chapter 3 verse 18. Paul said, let no man deceive
himself. If any among you seemeth to be
wise in this world, let him become a fool that he may be wise. Don't
be like this world. Acknowledge yourself to be a
fool by nature and that God may make you wise. For the wisdom
of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written,
he taketh the wise in their own craftiness. The trap that they're
building against God and against his people, they're going to
fall into it themselves. The very things that they do
to defy God are going to promote God's glory and their own destruction. He taketh the wise in their own
craftiness. And again, the Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise,
that they are vain. They're empty. They can't...
Everybody, the whole earth, rose up against God's Christ, and
they ended up doing what He foreordained and determined before would be
done. And ended up promoting the glory of God and the eternal
good of His sheep, who they despised. Okay, the Lord knoweth the thoughts
of the wise, that they are vain. Therefore, let no man glory in
men. Don't be impressed by this world,
the strong and the wise according to this world, and don't be afraid
of them. And don't rejoice in them, don't glory in them, for
all things are yours. It looks like the world belongs
to the strong and wise and mighty in this world. No, not that way,
it's yours. The meek, the fools, the babies. It's all yours. What are you
talking about? Well, Paul, Apollos, Cephas,
we're all servants. God sent us to serve you, Apollos
said. Or the world? You think he's
exaggerating maybe there? The world? Why'd God make a world?
Because he had a people. God so loved this world because
his elect are in it. He loves his garden because his
trees and plants and spices and vegetables are growing in it. or life or death. That's going to work
for you too. That's going to be to your advantage
too. Death is swollen up in victory, Paul said. It's all. Life or
death, things present, things to come, all are yours. That's what's being taught in
our text. It's yours. And you are Christ's. And Christ
is God. If that don't help you sleep
tonight, you're just not going to get any sleep. Everything is yours and you're
his. Well, that helps me a little
bit. It's to my everlasting shame
that it doesn't drive out every worry that I have. And every fear and every every anxiety, all things work
together for good. To them that love God, to them
who are the called, according to his purpose. And now God said,
take heed to yourself. And back in verse 12 of our text,
he said, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land,
whither thou goest. This is a covenant that's between
me and you. You're not going to be any other
covenant with anybody else. Lest it be for a snare in the
midst of thee, but you shall destroy their altars, break their
images and cut down their groves. Anything that even smells like
an idol has got to go. For thou shalt worship no other
God. For the Lord, whose name is jealous, is a jealous God. Jealousy. I don't remember ever
preaching on this or even referring to the fact that God's a jealous
God. And this is why it was so important
to see what we're going to see here, this word jealous in its
context. Because God said, I'm going to
go with you. He said, I'll be your God and
you'll be my people. In Exodus 6, 7, he said, I will
take you to me for a people and I will be to you a God. I'm going
to be for you and you're going to be for me. And I will do wonderful
things for you. And I will give people for you.
I'm going to drive out all these nations before you and give you
what's theirs, what they think is theirs. You remember in Isaiah
43, for a verse that we refer to some, why he said he was going
to do that. He told him there too, Isaiah
prophesied of this, that he's gonna drive out others and overthrow
kings and peoples for the sake of his people. And here's why,
Isaiah 43, four, since thou was precious in my sight, thou has
been honorable, and here's the key, and I have loved thee. Therefore will I give men for
thee. That's why the Havats can't stay
where they are. They got to go. They got to die. The Perizzats, all of them, they
got to go because I love you. Therefore will I give men for
thee and people for thy life. And now in the very context of
him telling them that he would drive out these other nations
for them, we have this word jealousy. And this is the key thing that
I want us to see tonight. Jealousy is a product of love. There can't be this kind of jealousy. There are other kinds of jealousy,
but there can't be this kind without love. All these ites, as I said, they
were worshiping other gods. They were idolaters. They built
these altars that the Lord was telling His people to go in and
break them down in these images that He said, you're going to
break them up. And then they'd establish these groves as places
of worship. But God didn't send any word
to them saying, don't you worship those gods, I'm jealous. Angry,
yes. Wrath, yes. But jealousy over
them, no. No, not jealousy in their case.
There's got to be love in order for there to be this kind of
jealousy. And that's why God said, you're not going to worship
anybody else because my name is Jealous. Jealousy is usually
understood as a bad thing. That's because it usually is
a bad thing in us. We're jealous of other people's
success and things like that. We're envious of what people
have and what they're able to do. And we're often jealous when
we got no good reason whatsoever to be jealous. But the exclusivity
and distinguishing nature of love always produces jealousy. And true love is always distinguishing
and is always jealous. The best illustration that I've
ever heard of this, and I've preached it to you before, but
it's still the best illustration I've ever heard of this, is if
I express to Vicki my love for her, like God did here to Moses,
I'm gonna go with you, I'm gonna be with you, I'm gonna bless
you, I make a covenant with you. And I'm gonna give you the land,
I'm gonna drive all your enemies out and give you the land. But
if I express my love to Vicki and told her that I love you
dearly. I love you like nobody else can
love. And I went on and on about my
love for her. She would, I hope, be glad to
hear that. But what then if I said, I also
love all other women the same way I love you? That would kind
of ruin it, wouldn't it? That would utterly ruin it. Love
is distinguishing by its very nature. And it's jealous. We saw in Hosea 3 what Hosea
said to Gomer after he had bought her. But we never did turn there
Sunday. Let's turn there and look at
this language. Hosea 3 verse 1. This is exactly what we're talking
about now. And this is interesting because
we referred to Hosea 3 Sunday because we were talking about
marriage. We were talking about love. God's
love for His people is seen in marriage in this question the
Pharisees asked. And how the Lord showed them,
you don't know what love is. That's your problem. And He taught
them. And here we're seeing the same
thing in the book of Exodus. The kind of love that God has
for His people is a jealous love. It's an exclusive love. And in
Hosea 3.1, Then said the Lord unto me, unto Hosea, Go yet love
a woman. That word yet has so much in
it. Though she's been unfaithful to you. Though she hasn't given
you any respect as her husband. Or any regard even. She hasn't
appreciated all that you've done for her. attributed to her lovers,
to her own fleshly doings, the things that she was provided
by her husband. But go yet and love her, a woman
beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress according to the love
of the Lord toward the children of Israel. Just like God loves
you, If God cast off those that he loved for unfaithfulness,
we'd all be goners. He's teaching Hosea what real
love, what the love of God is. That's love. Herein is love.
Not that we love God, but that he loved, he yet loved us. He so loved us and sent his son
to be the propitiation for our sins. That's herein is love. According to the love of the
Lord toward the children of Israel who look to other gods. That's
what he said. You're not gonna do it The first
covenant said you're not gonna do it and we broke it unfaithful
No respect for God no fear of God no reverence for our husband
Bless God He made two more tables of stone And he wrote his law
again. He made a covenant with us that
we can't break because we can't even touch it. It's unconditional
for us. This is what unconditional love
is. We look to other gods, but he
came and bought us anyway. Hosea said, so I bought her to
me. I bought her, I redeemed her. I made her mine. Isn't that what
Moses said? Make me, make me yours. I want
to be your possession, Lord. Make me yours. And he said, all
right, here's my covenant. So I bought her to me for 15
pieces of silver and for an omer of barley and for an half omer
of barley. And I said unto her, my name is jealous. The Lord, whose name is jealous,
is a jealous God. Thou shalt be, thou shalt abide
for me. Many days. Thou shalt not play
the harlot. That's what God is saying to
Moses here. Thou shalt not worship any other
gods. When you go in that land, destroy
them, destroy the house that they're worshiped in, and destroy
the grove that the house is in. Thou shalt not be for another
man, and so will I also be for thee. If you ever experience
anything remotely like that in this world, temporally, physically,
thank God every day, every hour. But this is something way beyond
that. This is something far grander
than any earthly love. a woman or for her husband. I will also be only, only, only,
only for thee. Our text here in Exodus 34 is repeated right there in Hosea.
That's the covenant that God made with us. We're exclusively
for one another. It's because of God's covenant
distinguishing infinite love for us that he says, you will
not be for another. Did you notice the word love?
The two key thoughts in our text in Exodus are right here. Go
yet love a woman, beloved of her friend, according to the
love of God toward the children of Israel. There's love. And so there's jealousy. Nobody else can have you. And I'm just for you. His name is Jealous, and as we've
seen and said so many times, his name is who he is. Jealous,
when he saves us, he says, you're mine. You are mine. When did he say that? You remember
in Ezekiel 16? When did he say you're mine?
And I've said to you before, this thing about people saying, oh, you don't
own me, and things like that. I don't know where that comes
from. It ain't about ownership. But let me tell you something,
Vicki is mine. She's mine, and I'm hers. That's what Solomon
said of the Lord. My beloved is mine, and I'm his. I don't know what you're talking
about, that you don't own me. I don't even know what that's
about. And that doesn't sound like much love there. If you
even have to say that, there's something wrong. I want Vicki
to own me. I'm her possession. She's mine. That's what love is. And God
said, you're mine, and he said it at a certain time. And that's
what I'm trying to so pitifully to not to teach is that this
jealousy. God said I'm jealous. It's because
of His love. It's because He got to have us. He got to have us all to Himself.
Got to have us forever. And He said in Ezekiel 16, 8,
Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy
time was the time of love. And I said, You're mine. He said
some other things before he said that. Let me read the whole thing.
Your time was the time of love, and I spread my skirt over you
and covered your nakedness, yea, I swear unto thee, and entered
into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and you became
mine. Aren't you glad that the Lord
God is jealous over you? And may we, by God's grace, be
for Him. Like Hosea said, you shall not
be for another man. You're going to abide for me,
and me for you. That's what Paul said in 1 Corinthians
6-12. He said, all things are lawful
unto me, but all things are not expedient. There's some things that I'm
not under the law. I'm under grace. But there's
some things I can't do. I'm not going to do it. All things
are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power
of any. Meats for the belly and the belly for meats, but God
shall destroy both it and them. Now, he said, the body is not
for fornication. And he was talking to a group
of people where that was a problem in that congregation. But he
said this, the body's not for fornication, but for the Lord. For him. That's what Hosea said. You're going to be for me. And
that's what God said to Moses. You're mine. You're for me. You're
not going to go after other gods. You're not going to go a whore.
You're for me. That's what, that's what Paul
is saying here. It's not, the gospel is not about
meats and the drink and all that kind of stuff. And we're not
under the law, but there's some things because I love him. The
love of Christ constraineth me. My body's not for me or anybody
or anything else, but for the Lord, for the Lord, for the Lord. And this is more than just physical
abstaining from sin that Paul's talking about here, to have no
other gods. To be faithful to Christ is to
be faithful to His word, His doctrine, His gospel. It's to
be true to Him as He's revealed in this book. May He make us
so. That's what Paul said in 2 Corinthians
11, 1. He said, would to God that you could bear with me a
little in my folly and indeed bear with me for I am jealous
over you, Paul said. With a godly jealousy. What are
you jealous about, Paul? He's talking to the believers
at Corinth. He said, I'm jealous over you. What are you jealous
about? It's a godly jealousy, he said,
for I have espoused you to one husband. That I may present you
as a chaste virgin. Now what's jeopardizing that?
What's making you jealous? Jealousy rises up when there's
a threat to that relationship. What is it, Paul, that's making
you jealous here? He said, I want to present you
as a chaste virgin to Christ, but I fear, lest by any means,
as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, so your minds should
be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. I'm jealous
over you, lest you, in your mind, be enticed away like the serpent. What did the serpent do? He questioned
the word of God and then he out and out denied the word of God.
The simple truth of God. The very simple and clear what
God had commanded. The gospel that way too. The
gospel is described here as the simplicity that is in Christ. And Satan beguiles people with
these sentimental doctrines that religion has concocted. They
teach him for doctrines the commandments of men. And they sound good to
men. They itch ears of those who have
itching ears for such things, for the glory of man, for the
will of man, the worship of man. That's what it boils down to.
But that's what Paul was jealous over here. It's not just about...
And that's what he's talking about other gods here. They may
be named Jesus. There are many false Christs,
John said, even now. And more so now than then. And that's what we're talking
about here. God so loved us that when we broke his first covenant
with us, as Gomer did with Hosea, he made a second. And in this
one, he bought us. That's what Hosea did. He bought
us. And this is the gospel that we
will not, we cannot, we must not be removed from. The simple
truth that Christ came and did what the law could not do. All
the law could do is condemn us. The law had no mercy for us.
He did what the law could not do, made us righteous. He did
what the law could not do by obeying the law. as our representative. He did what the law could not
do. Justify us. How did he do that? By being,
he was made under the law that he might redeem them that were
under the law by living in their stead. He was subject to his
own law. It was Christ that wrote on those
tables of stone. And he was born under that very
law. Not just those 10 commandments, but all of the law. That he might
fulfill it and redeem us who are under the law. paid for our
breaking of it. He kept the law and paid for
our inability to keep it. Fulfill the terms of the covenant
so that the blessings of it are ours unconditionally. He's our righteousness, our sin
offering, our surety, our redeemer, our justification, all in all. And he's our bridegroom. We're
loved exclusively of our Lord Jesus Christ. And he, when he bought us, after we'd
broken this first covenant, he bought us, he said, this new
covenant, I'm gonna write my law on your heart. And he did. And instead of the law being
this austere standard that we can never, it's a yoke that Paul
said none of our fathers were ever able to bear and you're
not going to bear it either. It's not about that anymore.
Since he wrote on my heart, I love him. And therefore I love his
word. I love his character. I love
his holiness. I love all of that that I can never measure up to.
I love even his justice. and his judgment that must put
me in hell as I am by nature. But I see in the Lord Jesus Christ
the fulfillment of his law and I see justice done and yet mercy
for me. He's caused me, he wrote on my
heart and caused me to fall in love with him. And now because of what he did
when he yet loved me, and bought me with his precious blood, I'm
able honestly to say with Paul, his love constrains me. And by his grace, I want to be
for him, for him. May he make it so of everyone
here tonight that we might be for him. With his loving kindness, may
he draw us to himself and cause us from our very heart to say,
my beloved is mine and I'm his. Let's bow together and pray.