Tag: obstinate

45.d. “Wilderness” – 9.j. “For it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin”

 

Exodus 34:9  And he said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.”

 Exodus 33:13   Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.”

 Exodus 33:17    And the LORD said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.”

 Isaiah 48:4   Because I know that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew and your forehead brass,

 Exodus 32:9    And the LORD said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people.

 Exodus 33:5     For the LORD had said to Moses, “Say to the people of Israel, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.’”

 Numbers 14:19     Please pardon the iniquity of this people, according to the greatness of your steadfast love, just as you have forgiven this people, from Egypt until now.”

 Psalms 25:11    For your name’s sake, O LORD, pardon my guilt, for it is great.

 Psalms 28:9    Oh, save your people and bless your heritage! Be their shepherd and carry them forever.

 Psalms 33:12   Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people whom he has chosen as his heritage!

 Psalms 78:62    He gave his people over to the sword and vented his wrath on his heritage.

Moses asked for the goodness, grace, and mercy of God be extended to himself and the nation. Moses knew they did not deserve it (we are a stiff-necked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin), but he asked for God’s grace and not His justice. (Guzik)

Yea, saith Moses, the rather go along with us; for the worse they are, the more need they have of thy presence. Moses sees them so stiff-necked, that he has neither patience nor power enough to deal with them; therefore, Lord, do thou go among us; else they will never be kept in awe; thou wilt spare, and bear with them, for thou art God and not man. (Benson)

It is a stiff-necked people, and therefore need thy glorious and powerful presence to rule them. Or rather, though it be a stiff-necked people, deal with us as men do with their inheritances, dwell among us, protect us, improve us. (Poole)

For it is a stiffnecked people; and therefore have need of such an one to be with them, to rule and govern them, to restrain and keep them within due bounds; or though it is a stiffnecked people”; for this is the reason given by the Lord why he would not go among them, wherefore Moses prays that he would go, notwithstanding this; he owns the character of them was just, yet humbly prays that God would nevertheless grant, impart, reveal, make known, confer, his presence and pardon our iniquity, and our sin; which he had the greater reason to hope he would, since he had just proclaimed his name, a God pardoning iniquity, transgression, and sin; and, the more to gain his suit, makes himself a party concerned, calling the sin committed, “our iniquity, and our sin”; even his among the rest, who had found grace in the sight of God, and therefore entreats others might also, since they were all sinners, and there was forgiveness with him and take us for thine inheritance; to possess and enjoy, protect and defend, cultivate and improve, keep and preserve for ever. (Gill)

On this manifestation of mercy, Moses repeated the prayer that Jehovah would go in the midst of Israel. It is true the Lord had already promised that His face should go with them (Exodus 33:14); but as Moses had asked for a sign of the glory of the Lord as a seal to the promise, it was perfectly natural that, when this petition was granted, he should lay hold of the grace that had been revealed to him as it never had been before, and endeavour to give even greater stability to the covenant. To this end he repeated his former intercession on behalf of the nation, at the same time making this confession, “For it is a stiff-necked people; therefore forgive our iniquity and our sin, and make us the inheritance.” Moses spoke collectively, including himself in the nation in the presence of God. The reason which he assigned pointed to the deep root of corruption that had broken out in the worship of the golden calf, and was appropriately pleaded as a motive for asking forgiveness. (Keil)

When I look at the way of our country and the number of people who deny and reject God and things of God, I do fear God’s Holy judgment. However, when I look at those who are “called” by His name and their trust, reliance, and obedience I am encouraged and hopeful. 

Surely Satan has a grip on many in our nation, states, cities, and neighborhoods, but God and the Word of God are more powerful. He is able to pierce the hearts and minds of lost souls, heal a nation, state, city, and neighborhood, and bring about a manifestation of holiness, servitude, reverence, and reliance in people who are now lost and in darkness. 

Let our prayers be continuous for the power of God to bring a bright overwhelming light to the sinfulness of sin and lead and direct the course of our nation, states, cities, and neighborhoods into reverence and worship of Him.

46. Can a Christian life can be lived without any binding obligation?

Deuteronomy 9:13   “Furthermore, the Lord said to me, ‘I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stubborn people. Let me alone, that I may destroy them and blot out their name from under heaven. And I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they.’ So I turned and came down from the mountain, and the mountain was burning with fire. And the two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. And I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the Lord your God. You had made yourselves a golden calf. You had turned aside quickly from the way that the Lord had commanded you. So I took hold of the two tablets and threw them out of my two hands and broke them before your eyes. Then I lay prostrate before the Lord as before, forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all the sin that you had committed, in doing what was evil in the sight of the Lord to provoke him to anger. For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure that the Lord bore against you, so that he was ready to destroy you. But the Lord listened to me that time also. And the Lord was so angry with Aaron that he was ready to destroy him. And I prayed for Aaron also at the same time. Then I took the sinful thing, the calf that you had made, and burned it with fire and crushed it, grinding it very small, until it was as fine as dust. And I threw the dust of it into the brook that ran down from the mountain.

Romans 2:5   But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.

Joshua 11:20     For it was the LORD’s doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the LORD commanded Moses.

1 Samuel 6:6     Why should you harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts?

2 Chronicles 30:8    Do not now be stiff-necked as your fathers were, but yield yourselves to the LORD and come to his sanctuary, which he has consecrated forever, and serve the LORD your God, that his fierce anger may turn away from you.

Proverbs 29:1    He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing.

Isaiah 48:4    Because I know that you are obstinate, and your neck is an iron sinew and your forehead brass,

Ezekiel 3:7     But the house of Israel will not be willing to listen to you, for they are not willing to listen to me: because all the house of Israel have a hard forehead and a stubborn heart.

Hebrews 3:13    But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Do you ever think about the wrath of God?  Do you think there is a time of unleashing His wrath?  Do you ever wonder on whom His wrath will fall?  God’s silence does not mean indifference, but the desire to give an opportunity to repent.  We hear of the grace, mercy, and love of God.  We speak of joy, peace, hope, comfort, strength, courage, and refuge but, are they taken the light that though our redemption is through Christ alone and without His sacrifice every last one of us would be separated from God and certainly in a direct path of His wrath.  We can do nothing to deserve this redemption from our sin and sacrifice for our sin.  This is a gift of God.  “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

I think we make a hard stop on grace and mercy and give no thought to obedience.

Here are a couple of excerpts from Steve Lawson:  “Many who profess Christ today emphasize a wrong view of grace that makes it a free pass to do whatever they please. Tragically, they have convinced themselves that the Christian life can be lived without any binding obligation to the moral law of God. In this hyper-grace distortion, the need for obedience has been neutered. The commandments of God are no longer in the driver’s seat of Christian living but have been relegated to the backseat, if not the trunk—like a spare tire—to be used only in case of an emergency. With such a spirit of antinomianism, what needs to be reinforced again is the necessity of obedience.

For all true followers of Christ, obedience is never peripheral. At the heart of what it means to be a disciple of our Lord is living in loving devotion to God. But if such love is real, the acid test is obedience. Jesus maintained, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15). Genuine love for Christ will always manifest itself in obedience.

And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules. (Ezek. 36:26–27)

In this heart transplant, God causes the believer to pursue Spirit-energized obedience.

When John says believers “keep” the commandments, this pictures a guard or watchman watching over a priceless treasure. In like manner, the one who knows God will keep a sharp watch over all that His Word requires. “And his commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3), but they are a blessing (Ps. 1:1). Every step of heart-prompted obedience leads to experiencing abundant life in Christ. Conversely, every step of disobedience takes us away from the joy of divine goodness. Far from being optional, grace-fueled obedience is absolutely necessary for Christlikeness.”