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Acts 7:38
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36 aHe brought them out, after he had bshown wonders and signs in the land of Egypt, cand in the Red Sea, dand in the wilderness forty years.  

Israel Rebels Against God

37 “This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel, a‘The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from your brethren. bHim you shall hear.’  
38 a“This is he who was in the1 congregation in the wilderness with bthe Angel who spoke to him on Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, cthe one who received the living doracles to give to us,  
39 whom our fathers awould not obey, but rejected. And in their hearts they turned back to Egypt,  
40 asaying to Aaron, ‘Make us gods to go before us; as for this Moses who brought us out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’  
41 aAnd they made a calf in those days, offered sacrifices to the idol, and brejoiced in the works of their own hands.  
42 Then aGod turned and gave them up to worship bthe host of heaven, as it is written in the book of the Prophets:
c‘Did you offer Me slaughtered animals and sacrifices during forty years in the wilderness,
O house of Israel? 
Commentaries:
Forerunner Commentary
What is the Forerunner Commentary?
<< Acts 7:37   Acts 7:39 >>

What Does Acts 7:38 Mean?



Acts 7:38

The speaker, Stephen, is most specifically alluding to Exodus 19:3, where

Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain, saying, "Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel."

See also Psalm 147:19, where the psalmist avers that God "declares His word to Jacob, His statutes and His judgments to Israel."

The living oracles in Acts refers specifically to the Ten Commandments, more broadly to the Torah, which were to be given "to us," to the church of God. God's Old Testament utterances are for us today.

Charles Whitaker
The Oracles of God



Acts 7:38

Multitudes of organizations in the Protestant world have no idea of what the church actually consists. This illustrates that even on the simplest of levels, the Bible is a "coded" book. Many refer to a physical building or a legal corporate structure as the church. Few seem to understand the church consists of the members themselves. The word "church" is translated from the Greek ekklesia, meaning "called-out" or "assembly." The "church in the wilderness" consisted of those called out of physical Egypt; the New Testament church are those called out of the spiritual Egypt of false belief and practice dominating this world. Without this knowledge, it is extremely difficult to identify the church Christ built.

Staff


 
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