Exodus 32:33-35

There is a verse in Exodus 32 that might help us to understand this just a little bit. This is after the golden calf incident. Remember, this was a huge sin. God had brought them out of Egypt and brought them to Sinai. Moses went up the mountain to speak with God, and while he was away, the people pulled Aaron out of his tent and made him make a golden calf. And we know that he lit the fire and out of it sprang this calf. They had done some abominable things before this calf, and God sent Moses down. There was a great slaughter there. Moses called all of Israel to him, and only the Levites came, and they slaughtered a good many people. God was “hopping mad,” He wanted to just wipe Israel out. Moses interceded, and said please do not do this. This is God’s reply.

Understand what had happened. The sin had occurred in the very recent past, and God pronounced upon them this curse that He would blot them out of His book, for doing what they did. But He said that there will come a day in which He will visit for punishment, meaning their sentence had already been given. They had been judged, and He was going to give them the death penalty. But He delayed it. He put it off until a certain time. Some of them died fairly immediately, when He sent this plague. But as we understand, the way it worked through the whole wilderness period, He killed them off one at a time, all the way through that entire journey. By the time they came to the edge of the Promised Land that whole generation had died in the wilderness.

For some, God gave the death penalty almost immediately. But for others, it was delayed, and delayed, and delayed, maybe for 38 years or so, or 39 or 40, but they all died. At this point, they were like Adam and Eve: they were as good as dead.

Exodus 32:35

Now there is a very interesting episode that took place in the life of Moses, recorded back here in Exodus 33 and 34. The context here is right after that horrible incident with the Golden Calf. That was a terrible mark on the Israelites' integrity before God. He was quite upset, and justly so, about what they had done, and He executed some punishments upon them.

What He did before Moses was rehearse His nature. And that was so encouraging to Moses, because he knew then that they were not abandoned - that He would be with him - because of what He is (what God was, and what God is). Not because Israel deserved in any way, shape, or form for God to be with them, because every single one of them deserved to be dead! But because God is God, He would continue through with His purpose; and these names exemplified what He would be doing.