Meditate

Exodus 34

34. The New Stone Tablets

Moses Makes New Tablets

34

The Lord said to Moses, “Cut two tablets of stone like the former ones, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the former tablets, which you broke.²Be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai and present yourself there to me, on the top of the mountain.³No one shall come up with you, and do not let anyone be seen throughout all the mountain; and do not let flocks or herds graze in front of that mountain.”⁴So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the former ones; and he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand the two tablets of stone.⁵The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name, “The Lord.”⁶The Lord passed before him, and proclaimed,

“The Lord, the Lord,

a God merciful and gracious,

slow to anger,

and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness,

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keeping steadfast love for the thousandth generation,

forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin,

yet by no means clearing the guilty,

but visiting the iniquity of the parents

upon the children

and the children’s children,

to the third and the fourth generation.”

⁸ And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth, and worshiped.⁹He said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, I pray, let the Lord go with us. Although this is a stiff-necked people, pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”

The Covenant Renewed

¹⁰ He said: I hereby make a covenant. Before all your people I will perform marvels, such as have not been performed in all the earth or in any nation; and all the people among whom you live shall see the work of the Lord; for it is an awesome thing that I will do with you.

¹¹ Observe what I command you today. See, I will drive out before you the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.¹²Take care not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land to which you are going, or it will become a snare among you.¹³You shall tear down their altars, break their pillars, and cut down their sacred poles¹⁴(for you shall worship no other god, because the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God).¹⁵You shall not make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, for when they prostitute themselves to their gods and sacrifice to their gods, someone among them will invite you, and you will eat of the sacrifice.¹⁶And you will take wives from among their daughters for your sons, and their daughters who prostitute themselves to their gods will make your sons also prostitute themselves to their gods.

¹⁷ You shall not make cast idols.

¹⁸ You shall keep the festival of unleavened bread. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month of Abib; for in the month of Abib you came out from Egypt.

¹⁹ All that first opens the womb is mine, all your male livestock, the firstborn of cow and sheep.²⁰The firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. All the firstborn of your sons you shall redeem.

No one shall appear before me empty-handed.

²¹ Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest; even in plowing time and in harvest time you shall rest.²²You shall observe the festival of weeks, the first fruits of wheat harvest, and the festival of ingathering at the turn of the year.²³Three times in the year all your males shall appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel.²⁴For I will cast out nations before you, and enlarge your borders; no one shall covet your land when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year.

²⁵ You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven, and the sacrifice of the festival of the passover shall not be left until the morning.

²⁶ The best of the first fruits of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God.

You shall not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.

²⁷ The Lord said to Moses: Write these words; in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.²⁸He was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten commandments.

The Shining Face of Moses

²⁹ Moses came down from Mount Sinai. As he came down from the mountain with the two tablets of the covenant in his hand, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.³⁰When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, the skin of his face was shining, and they were afraid to come near him.³¹But Moses called to them; and Aaron and all the leaders of the congregation returned to him, and Moses spoke with them.³²Afterward all the Israelites came near, and he gave them in commandment all that the Lord had spoken with him on Mount Sinai.³³When Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil on his face;³⁴but whenever Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he would take the veil off, until he came out; and when he came out, and told the Israelites what he had been commanded,³⁵the Israelites would see the face of Moses, that the skin of his face was shining; and Moses would put the veil on his face again, until he went in to speak with him.

1 Corinthians 1:22-25

1. Divisions in the Church

²²For Jews demand signs and Greeks desire wisdom,²³but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles,²⁴but to those who are the called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.²⁵For God’s foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God’s weakness is stronger than human strength.

Psalm 89:30-52

89. Psalm 89

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If his children forsake my law

and do not walk according to my ordinances,

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if they violate my statutes

and do not keep my commandments,

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then I will punish their transgression with the rod

and their iniquity with scourges;

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but I will not remove from him my steadfast love,

or be false to my faithfulness.

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I will not violate my covenant,

or alter the word that went forth from my lips.

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Once and for all I have sworn by my holiness;

I will not lie to David.

36

His line shall continue forever,

and his throne endure before me like the sun.

37

It shall be established forever like the moon,

an enduring witness in the skies.”Selah

 

38

But now you have spurned and rejected him;

you are full of wrath against your anointed.

39

You have renounced the covenant with your servant;

you have defiled his crown in the dust.

40

You have broken through all his walls;

you have laid his strongholds in ruins.

41

All who pass by plunder him;

he has become the scorn of his neighbors.

42

You have exalted the right hand of his foes;

you have made all his enemies rejoice.

43

Moreover, you have turned back the edge of his sword,

and you have not supported him in battle.

44

You have removed the scepter from his hand,

and hurled his throne to the ground.

45

You have cut short the days of his youth;

you have covered him with shame.Selah

 

46

How long, O Lord? Will you hide yourself forever?

How long will your wrath burn like fire?

47

Remember how short my time is—

for what vanity you have created all mortals!

48

Who can live and never see death?

Who can escape the power of Sheol?Selah

 

49

Lord, where is your steadfast love of old,

which by your faithfulness you swore to David?

50

Remember, O Lord, how your servant is taunted;

how I bear in my bosom the insults of the peoples,

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with which your enemies taunt, O Lord,

with which they taunted the footsteps of your anointed.

 

52

Blessed be the Lord forever.

Amen and Amen.