“Doc Notes” Exodus Study Lesson 3 part 1

“Doc Notes” Exodus Study Lesson 3 part 1

“To wisdom belongs the intellectual apprehension of things eternal; to knowledge, the rational apprehension of things temporal.”

Gentle Reader,
What is needed is a depth of understanding of Scripture not only just a wee bit of surface understanding. For example many read ‘the Good Book” but never spend time thinking about what they read. Rather like prayer where we run in before the father and say gimme this that and the other but never wait for His answer. If your now smiling a wee bit then you are thinking , “Yes I have done that too”!
I have spent some time looking at the book of Exodus and wondering why at least one commentator has not picked up on this fact.

In the Book of Exodus nothing is commenced, nothing is finished. To read it, having no acquaintance with the book preceding it, or with those following, would be conscience of incompleteness. The first word “Now” might be with equal accuracy be translated “And”; which immediately suggest relation to something which has gone before. The last phrase “throughout all their journeys” [Exo 40:38 For the cloud of the LORD was upon the tabernacle by day, and fire was on it by night, in the sight of all the house of Israel, throughout all their journeys] connects with what is to follow, for the book contains no account of the journeys referred to.

These facts will help us to understand the message of this book. It is part of a larger whole, and its supreme value is its revelation of the procedure of God in human History. There are two ways in which we may think of it as a record of the doings of men, or as a record of the doings of God. To adopt the former method is to be impressed with a sense of failure. The story of Moses is one in which we find failure and weakness on Moses (mans) part, save when he was victorious and strong as a result of his relationship with God.

The greatness of a man can only be accounted for in the that illuminative word of the psalmist, “ . . . thy gentleness hath made me great” (Psm 18).

Aaron is a perpetual revelation of weakness. The story of the people is one of unceasing failure, caused by their inability to rise to the height of the revelations they received, and manifest in their eager haste to confess themselves able to keep the commandments of God, and their equally eager haste to break those commandments.

To take the other standpoint, that of Divine procedure, is to discover the line of progress, and to observe the method by which God was moving forward towards the accomplishment of an ultimate purpose. This them gentle reader is the value this Book for us to see ourselves in the light of reality, human progress has ever been the result of the grace and patience of God. Exodus permanent value is the revelation of God and His method used here and the responsibilities of man Let’s consider these values and from them deduce the living message of the Book we have called Exodus ...

To be continued....