God, through Moshe (Moses), consecrates His mediator, Aharon (Aaron). There is a clear transfer of spiritual authority from Moshe to Aharon at this point. This is a foreshadowing of God’s consecration of Yeshua, our Messiah as our High Priest, who had to walk a sacrificial walk for us that we could hear, do and walk in God’s word as He does. After Moshe consecrated Aharon and his sons, there was no longer any doubt as to how God has chosen to be the mediator between Himself and His people.
If we can choose just one word to summarize the book of Exodus, it’s reconciliation. God used Moshe (Moses) to bring the descendants of Israel out of Egypt to be His people. Even after the golden calf was made, God still wanted to reconcile to His people Israel, and Israel wanted to reconcile to Him. The people of Israel were willing to give much to be reconciled to Him to the point that Moshe had to tell the children of Israel to stop giving because the coffers were overflowing with gifts. They wanted Him to dwell with them.
God said through Paul that He began a good work in us. God will complete the good work. We are to be living stones. We will surround the Creator of Heaven and Earth and His Son, Yeshua (Jesus) the Mashiakh (Messiah). There will be no temple there, because the temple will be there all the time. The only temple will be the people He saved.
God ultimately used the Messiah to reconcile the world to Himself, no longer recognizing their transgressions. A clean slate, it’s all new. He doesn’t pay attention to our sins, transgressions and iniquities. We are to be ambassadors to reconcile people to God.
The territory of Sin — a place name, not the term for moral malady — that Israel transversed after leaving Mitsraim (Egypt) was a very large place. It’s in the area where Mt. Sinai is located.
Yet, Yisra’el did sin at Rephadim, so it was called Massah and Meribah. But God still gave the people water from the rock — “living water” preceded law at Sinai — and defeated Amalek.
The account of Moshe (Moses) encountering God via the burning bush has spawned a number of interpretations and explanations about who Moshe encountered, how the bush could be burning yet not consumed, etc. Yet the declaration of the Name of God there and the signs God gave Moshe to show the leaders of Yisra’el is the important element. The Name and the signs would strengthen not only Moshe but the leadership for something powerful God would do on Earth via Yisra’el in the mighty empire of Mitsraim (Egypt).
This study also explores the seeming strange vignette of God on the warpath against Moshe’s family, placated only by Tsipporah’s circumcising the son. This appears to be a foreshadowing of the 10th plague against Mitsraim.
Why is it that God specifically told Moses to write down these places? We may not have a complete picture of it but God did not ask Moses to write this down just for the sake of history. There’s a bigger picture to be found in the names of these places that Moses records and we endeavor to discover God’s picture.
We will look at this chapter carefully. The events of this chapter occur near the end 40 year wilderness exile. After nearly 40 years, the people still complain about being removed from Egypt and “dying in the wilderness.”
This section could be titled, “The Three Stories of Rebellion”: of a man collecting firewood on Shabbat, of Korah, of two families of the tribe of Reuben. God dealt with each rebellion in a different way. All imprinted in the minds of the people over and again God was the one in charge, and it was God’s prerogative to choose Moses and Aaron.