Missions Paul

“If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free. But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’ then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life.” (Exodus 21:2-6)

After God had rescued his people from slavery through the Exodus, he gave them his law. One of the first things he unpacks is the freeing of slaves. Every seventh year a servant was to go free, “without paying anything.”

Then comes the hard case. The servant’s master has given him a wife, and she and the children belong to the master. The man can walk free, but only by walking away from his family.

Some choose to stay. “I love my master… I do not want to go free.” The servant is taken to the door or the doorpost, and his ear is pierced with an awl. He becomes a bondservant, one who has chosen to be owned, for life.

The Hebrew word for this servant is ebed, and the Greek word used in the New Testament is doulos. Our English translators (most probably to avoid the negative associations of the modern slave trade) use “servant” or “bondservant”, but the word is slave.

When Paul begins his letter to the Romans, he does not lead with his calling, his commission or the purpose of his life. Before all the “doing”, he starts with who he is: “Paul, a doulos of Christ Jesus” (Romans 1:1). He had been to the door and had his ear pierced. He belonged to Christ, for life.

Who is the door? Jesus (John 10:9).

Jesus is the doorway into a new season for your life.

There is no breakthrough without pain. Paul bore on his body the marks of Jesus (Galatians 6:17). Perhaps you bear those marks also. Maybe you have marks that no one can see. Marks are healed wounds, and they become the vehicle of hearing God. The ear is pierced, and he speaks powerfully and intimately, as he would later tell Paul, “My power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Corinthians 12:9).

There is no other way to more of God and more of his power and work in our lives. There is only one prayer: “…pierce my ear…”

So insert your name: (your name), a servant of Christ Jesus. I have chosen to be owned by Christ Jesus. I belong to him. Tell Jesus this today. He has your ear. That mark is now the opportunity for intimacy. It has repositioned you. The Lord opens the door of new seasons to those who have been pierced to the door.

That is the greatest introduction of yourself that you will ever give.

Before God speaks about community living, he first speaks about the person with the least power in the room. And here we find a man who is free to walk away and chooses not to.

“If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. ³ If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. ⁴ If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free. ⁵ “But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’ ⁶ then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life.” (Exodus 21 v 2-6)

The first law for daily life concerns a servant. Are we surprised that God chooses this category first? Here is the vulnerable person who has fallen into debt and become another man’s servant.

The seventh is the year of freedom for the slaves, “without paying anything.”  God will not let them build a society that forgets that they had begun as slaves in Egypt.

Then comes the hard case. Something that will test this law.

The servant’s master has given him a wife, and she and the children belong to the master. The man can walk free, but only by walking away from his family. So the servant faces a heartbreaking choice: freedom without them, or life with them in servitude.

If the servant chooses love. He is taken to the door or doorpost, and his ear is pierced with an awl. The mark of that choice stays with him for life.

It points forward to Christ, who could have gone free. “Though he was in the form of God,” he did not cling to it, but took the form of a servant (Philippians 2:6-7). He stayed because of love (just like the servant). The door where the awl fell was a picture of the wooden cross on which he was pierced for us.

That leaves a question for us. Are we serving God as people who are only waiting for the seventh year, or as people who love the Master and have chosen the door?

Chapter 20 ends with the experience of thunder, and trembling people keeping their distance from the mountain. Chapter 21 opens with something much less dramatic: the law. Already, just a scan of it looks boring to read about the laws for slavery, injury, compensation, and property. We already are longing for the glory of Mount Sinai again.

“These are the laws you are to set before them:” Exodus 21 v 1

We are going to read of how God spoke into the everyday life of a community. He will say something about the disputes, and He will show He has His eye on the vulnerable.

Israel has just been delivered from slavery and God now teaches them how a redeemed people are to live. Freedom from Egypt was not freedom to live however they pleased; it was freedom to live God’s way.

God’s holiness has practical consequences. It affects how we treat people.

We can worship passionately on Sundays and yet fail to honour God in our conversations, or our finances, and our relationships.

Our worship has to reach the marketplace.

The God who thundered from Sinai is the same God who speaks into the ordinary details of life.

He is not only Lord of the mountain. He is Lord of every morning.

Here is a warning about what happens the moment you try to climb toward God on your own strength. But have you ever read stranger verses than this?

“ And do not go up to my altar on steps, or your private parts may be exposed.” (Exodus 20: 26)

Some scholars think that the pagan altars stood on elevated platforms reached by steps. Presumably, climbing higher meant you were closer to the gods. But God reveals that He doesn’t want any steps on His altar, for they would expose themselves. You cannot climb toward God without laying something bare about yourself.

In Canaanite worship practices, elevated altars and ritual exposure were intertwined. God is drawing a line: that is not how I am approached.

The shame of religious self-effort is not just ineffective; it leaves you more exposed, not less. Only grace covers us. Only descent saves us. Trying to get higher will do nothing but reveal your need for covering.

The altar is not a monument to human religious effort. It is a designated place of divine descent. You do not go up to God. You come, on level ground, and He comes down to you.

An important message from a very strange verse!

Something can look like the real thing but not be, right? A version of Christianity can look exactly like real faith: the practices are the same, the worship can look attractive, and the building can even be full on Sunday. Yet along the way, the heart of conviction is gone, and all that remains is a list of instructions.

“Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Tell the Israelites this: You have seen for yourselves that I have spoken to you from heaven: Do not make any gods to be alongside me; do not make for yourselves gods of silver or gods of gold. Make an altar of earth for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and fellowship offerings, your sheep and goats and your cattle. Wherever I cause my name to be honoured, I will come to you and bless you. If you make an altar of stones for me, do not build it with dressed stones, for you will defile it if you use a tool on it. And do not go up to my altar on steps, or your private parts may be exposed.'” (Exodus 20:22-26)

We’ll come back to verse 26 in part two. For now, look at what comes before it.

God opens with a warning about idols we build with our own hands. Then, almost in the same breath, he tells Israel how not to build his altar. The moment we start shaping the altar to our own taste, we’ve built something a little too close to an idol.

That’s why it’s an altar of earth. Dirt. God is not interested in what our hands can add to the meeting place. He’s interested in whether we show up with a broken and contrite heart.

Let’s think for a moment about what has become of the Church in some places.

Churches can be managed where once they were moved by the Spirit. They can be great on dogma while devotion quietly slips away.

God spoke into this exact problem through the prophet Hosea: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice, and acknowledgement of God rather than burnt offerings” (Hosea 6:6). The altar was still standing, but the heart had gone cold; all they had was activity.

The altar is not the point. God is the point. Performance will never produce what he is actually after.

We have rules. We have things we’ve learned over the years that, if we do them, prove we are good and acceptable to God. But we step into performance the moment we behave as if Christianity brings man to God.

Central to the Christian faith is the opposite truth: it is the story of God coming to man. Every other religion has it the other way round. Sadly, the church sometimes follows suit, because we all like a good performance.

We cannot get our own way with God by performance.

Every religion in the world is built on the same instinct: climb higher and try harder. But the Bible runs in the opposite direction entirely. The story of Scripture is not humanity ascending to God; it is God descending to an altar of dirt. This brings us to the strange verse 26, but that’s for tomorrow!

Today’s lesson is this: smoke can rise from a cold altar. Don’t mistake the rising smoke, or a polished worship service, for a beating heart of devotion.

The commandments are not something to achieve, like a badge of honour; rather, they are a gift enabling us to live our best life.

“And God spoke all these words: 2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. 3 “You shall have no other gods before me. 4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments. 7 “You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. 8 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labour and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. 12 “Honour your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the Lord your God is giving you. 13 “You shall not murder. 14 “You shall not commit adultery. 15 “You shall not steal. 16 “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbour. 17 “You shall not covet your neighbour’s house. You shall not covet your neighbour’s wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbour.” 18 When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance 19 and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning.” 21 The people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the thick darkness where God was.” (Exodus 20:1-21)

He begins with His rescue, already accomplished: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt” (v.2). The commands come after that event. These commands were never to get His people out of slavery but the culture that this freedom gave them after the slavery.

The first four commands focus on getting this one thing correct: love God rightly. Whilst the remaining six focus on this: love your neighbour well.

Love God rightly, love your neighbour well.

In the middle is the Sabbath (v. 11), rooted in creation itself. The invitation of Rest isn’t earned; it will be fulfilled in the One who says, “Come to me, all you who are weary… and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

Terrified by the thunder and the smoke, the people pull back from the holiness of God’s presence. They want God’s word without God’s direct presence. So Moses steps into the thick darkness on their behalf, one man approaching so the many don’t have to. Again, a pointer to Christ, who walked into far greater darkness so that we could walk right up to the mountain and not die, but live.

So what does this look like this week?

1. Take an honest look at what actually competes for first place. Of course it won’t be the gods carved from wood, but the ones built from ambition, comfort, approval, and control.
2. Build rest back into your rhythm.
3. And remember that the distance created by guilt has already been closed. You don’t need a Moses to go in your place. You have a better Mediator, and the way to Him is open.

Before the commandments comes a reminder.

“And God spoke all these words: ^‘I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” (Exodus 20 v 1-2)

Can you see the order? Redemption first and then Law second. The rescue came before the commandments. Israel did nothing to be rescued. Obedience was never the price for grace. Obedience was the outcome of grace’s inner work.

We so easily reverse the order. We can treat the commandments as a ladder to climb toward God’s favour, when they are actually the lifestyle of rescued people.

“Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law.” (Galatians 3: 21) In other words, obedience is not the opposite of grace. It’s what grace produces.

Every command that follows comes from the God who has already brought you out. He is not negotiating with slaves but is instructing sons and daughters.

Grace first.

There are moments with God so rich we wish we could stay in them forever. Moses had just such a moment on Sinai. But God’s first concern was for the people below. It always is.

“So Moses went up ²¹ and the Lord said to him, “Go down and warn the people so they do not force their way through to see the Lord and many of them perish. ²² Even the priests, who approach the Lord, must consecrate themselves, or the Lord will break out against them.” ²³ Moses said to the Lord, “The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, because you yourself warned us, ‘Put limits around the mountain and set it apart as holy.’” ²⁴ The Lord replied, “Go down and bring Aaron up with you. But the priests and the people must not force their way through to come up to the Lord, or he will break out against them.” ²⁵ So Moses went down to the people and told them.” (Exodus 19 v 21-25)

It would be understandable if Moses had wanted to linger in God’s glory rather than return to the complaining multitude. But God sends him back to the crowds. He has to warn the people, especially the priests, who were already set apart to approach God; they must consecrate themselves.

Sometimes God calls us down from the mountaintop experience because people are waiting to hear what we have seen and to experience what we have experienced.

The mountain is where Moses hears from God, but the people are where Moses has to obey God.

It is easy to enjoy God’s presence while avoiding the responsibility that comes with it. But true encounters with God are never simply for our own benefit. He calls us upward, but often sends us downward again.

Sometimes the most spiritual thing we can do is come down from the mountain and faithfully do what God has asked.

Every mountaintop moment is a commissioning, not a destination.

When God calls you, He doesn’t want you to figure it all out. He just wants you to meet Him in that place of the calling.

“The Lord descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the top of the mountain. So Moses went up.” Exodus 19 v 20

The Lord descends, and Moses ascends.

Sinai is wrapped in thunder, smoke, and trembling. But Moses goes up.

Obedience here precedes understanding; it always does.

Every believer has their own Sinai moment, a stretch of faith higher than we would naturally choose.

Can you trust God today even if you don’t understand? He is still calling you to meet Him.

There is a mountain for every wilderness season: a call to climb higher than our circumstances, to meet with God and to come down changed.

“On the first day of the third month after the Israelites left Egypt—on that very day—they came to the Desert of Sinai. ² After they set out from Rephidim, they entered the Desert of Sinai, and Israel camped there in the desert in front of the mountain. ³ Then Moses went up to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain and said, “This is what you are to say to the descendants of Jacob and what you are to tell the people of Israel: ⁴ ‘You yourselves have seen what I did to Egypt, and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. ⁵ Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, ⁶ you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.” ⁷ So Moses went back and summoned the elders of the people and set before them all the words the Lord had commanded him to speak. ⁸ The people all responded together, “We will do everything the Lord has said.” So Moses brought their answer back to the Lord. ⁹ The Lord said to Moses, “I am going to come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people will hear me speaking with you and will always put their trust in you.” Then Moses told the Lord what the people had said. ¹⁰ And the Lord said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. Have them wash their clothes ¹¹ and be ready by the third day, because on that day the Lord will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people. ¹² Put limits for the people around the mountain and tell them, ‘Be careful that you do not approach the mountain or touch the foot of it. Whoever touches the mountain is to be put to death. ¹³ They are to be stoned or shot with arrows; not a hand is to be laid on them. No person or animal shall be permitted to live.’ Only when the ram’s horn sounds a long blast may they approach the mountain.” ¹⁴ After Moses had gone down the mountain to the people, he consecrated them, and they washed their clothes. ¹⁵ Then he said to the people, “Prepare yourselves for the third day. Abstain from sexual relations.” ¹⁶ On the morning of the third day there was thunder and lightning, with a thick cloud over the mountain, and a very loud trumpet blast. Everyone in the camp trembled. ¹⁷ Then Moses led the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. ¹⁸ Mount Sinai was covered with smoke, because the Lord descended on it in fire. The smoke billowed up from it like smoke from a furnace, and the whole mountain^[b] trembled violently. ¹⁹ As the sound of the trumpet grew louder and louder, Moses spoke and the voice of God answered him.” (Exodus 19 v 1-19)

1. You can survive the desert so long as you’re facing the mountain. (v2)
   Look to the mountain today — look higher than your present circumstances. This chapter could have stayed a story about the desert, but it became a story about the mountain. Which will you make yours?
2. You can look at the mountain, but to know it you must climb it. (v3)
   Knowing God is not a spectator experience. It costs you something—it means wrestling with yourself and spending real energy to ascend.
3. You can know the mountain, but the experience will be judged by the person you are when you come down. (v5–6)
   Will you be better for it? Moses understood that the climb had to produce an increase — in rulership, in ministry, in holiness.
4. You may have experienced the mountain, but the mountain still has more to show you. (v15–16, 19)
   God is a third-day God. He is always saying, “There is something coming.” He is the God of resurrection. Get ready.
5. You can know more of the mountain, but can you lead others there too? (v17)
   You can only lead people to where you’ve been.
6. You can lead people to the mountain, but bringing someone onto it is the work of the disciple-maker. (v20)
   That is our calling. Who are you bringing?