SOVEREIGN GRACE AND MERCY

“I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion”– Exodus 33:19b

It is important that we appreciate God’s SOVEREIGN GRACE and MERCY! In Exodus 33:18, Moses pleaded with God, “Please, show me Your glory!” God answered, “I will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the LORD before you. I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion” (v.19). In requesting to see God’s glory, Moses encountered His Name. Once you grasp His Name, you have seen His Glory. His names are the manifestations of His Glory. His Name in this text is Yahweh, the same which in Exodus 3:14 was explained with the words, I AM WHO I AM. Here, His Name is given a different explanation: “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious…”

The resemblance in these sentences is interesting. Exodus 3:14 focuses on God’s existence – He is WHO HE IS without anything outside Himself determining His Personality or Power. Exodus 33:19 focuses on God’s gracious action – He does WHAT HE DOES without anything outside Himself determining His choices or decisions. We can deduce that: the Glory of God is manifested as His Sovereign Freedom. It is the Glory of God to be gracious to whomever He pleases apart from any constraint originating outside His own will. Sovereignty is essential to His Name. He is utterly free from the constraints of His creation. The proclivities of His Will move in directions that He alone determines. His choice to show Mercy to one and not to another originates in the Mystery of His Sovereign Will not in the will of His creatures.  His Self-determining freedom resides in His Name and His Glory.

Earlier, the Israelites had rebelled against God by making a golden calf to worship, and He was about to consume them in His Holy Wrath (Exo.32:9-10). But Moses desperately interceded for them, making his case not on the basis of Israel’s worth but on the basis of God’s worth (Exo.32:11-13). God relented, and rather than destroy the entire people, He appointed the sons of Levi to kill three thousand men, and sent a plague among them (Exo.32:25-29,35). God then resumed His purpose to send the Israelites to the Promised Land, assuring of the presence of His Angel (Exo.32: 34). Moses would however not be satisfied with an angel: “If Your Presence does not go with us, do not bring us up from here” (Exo.33:15). What an amazing request! God had said that if He went up with them, He will wipe them out along the way (v.3). Yet, Moses pleaded that God would have so much mercy upon a stiff-necked people that He will go up with them to the Promised Land, and also make them distinct among all the people on the earth (v.16).

If Moses’s request was unthinkable, God’s answer was doubly so: “I will also do this thing that you have spoken; for you have found Grace in My sight, and I know you by name” (v.17). God decided to go up with this stiff-necked people and let the grace that He gave Moses flow over to them. This was pure Mercy. They did not deserve the blessing of His Presence. But in Mercy God gave them another chance to follow Him in obedience. Moses prayed to see God’s glory because for him to be assured that God would actually be gracious to Israel he needed his ground in God and not in himself or the people. He needed a glimpse into the divine nature. The declaration of God’s absolute freedom to be gracious to whomever He pleases gave Moses hope and assurance that He indeed could and would be gracious to the stiff-necked people of Israel and lead them to the Promised Land. The revelation of God’s Name and Glory helps us to revere, love, trust, and obey Him. The uncovering of His innermost core – the Glory of His Sovereignty and absolute freedom – gives hope and encouragement to the undeserving. The God of Exodus 33:19 is still my God!