New Tablets and Eternal Inheritance

Exodus 34:1-9 

1 And the Lord said to Moses, “Cut two tablets of stone like the first ones, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke. 2 So be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself to Me there on the top of the mountain. 3 And no man shall come up with you, and let no man be seen throughout all the mountain; let neither flocks nor herds feed before that mountain.” 4 So he cut two tablets of stone like the first ones. Then Moses rose early in the morning and went up Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him; and he took in his hand the two tablets of stone.
    5 Now the Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. 6 And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, 7 keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children's children to the third and the fourth generation.”
    8 So Moses made haste and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshiped. 9 Then he said, “If now I have found grace in Your sight, O Lord, let my Lord, I pray, go among us, even though we are a stiff-necked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us as Your inheritance.”

Moses did not see all of God’s glory as he asked, just a gaze from behind as He passed by and God uncovered his eyes just enough to glimpse from behind.  Moses would soon shine with the Lord’s glory from being in His presence, yet even that was not a full gaze into the face of God.  Now he is instructed to cut two more stone tablets to take back up the mountain for God’s finger to etch out His commands once more.  The sin of Israel caused the first tablets to be broken, yet God’s covenant of promise remained intact.  As Moses ventured back up the mountain and the Lord came down from heaven to touch the earth out of a cloud, he saw God go before him and announce who He is.  He is the Lord God, Yahweh El, the one who exists from before and after forever, the self-existing and uncreated ruler over the entire created universe.  He shows mercy and grace, for He is those things by nature and character; He suffers long in patient endurance over man’s sin and failures; He overflows with absolute truth and goodness.  He is the only God, and loudly proclaimed these truths to Moses to remind him of His mercy over the people by forgiveness of sin acted against Him, yet holding sinners accountable.  The repercussion of consequences would be felt through man’s descendants as ripples in the pond of humanity from Adam to Cain and until the second Adam’s coming.  When Moses heard all of this, he made haste to bow down in worship and pleaded for mercy.  He asked that God would come among His people in spite of their sin because of these character attributes of Himself.  He pleaded for pardon and begged that He would still take these as His inheritance.  We see how Christ did these things for us, holding us accountable for sin while assuming the penalty for all of His people who are His inheritance in Himself.  He stepped in to do what we could not to forgive and accept us in Christ despite our continued failures; He came in our midst and even further - into our souls to inhabit us and not just our dwelling place.  He is Emmanuel, God both with and in us, and we are His eternal inheritance by grace (1 Peter 1:3-4, Colossians 1:12, Ephesians 1:11-18, Matthew 1:23, Colossians 1:27).  He has taken us as His people and inheritance; we have new tablets of flesh in place of stony hearts where His Law is written by His very finger, and the promised eternal inheritance in Christ with all the saints.  All by grace and mercy.