Exodus 32:1

Exo. 32, 33, 34. There are many things in the circumstances of this second giving of the law that we have an account of in these Chapter s, that are arguments that these two transactions did represent the two great transactions of God with mankind in the covenant of works and covenant of grace.

It was in this last covenanting of God with the people, especially, that Moses appeared as a mediator, to which the apostle has respect, Galatians 3:19. It was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator, when the people had broken the covenant given at first with thunder and lightning; the law then was made use of as a school-master to convince them of sin. God threatened to leave them, and not go up with them, and when the people were overwhelmed by it, and mourned when they heard the evil tidings, God then further awakened them and terrified them, sending such a message as this to them, "Ye are a stiff-necked people; I will come up into the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee; therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee." Thus this awful threatening was given forth with some hope and encouragement that peradventure they might live, given in that last clause, that I may know what to do unto thee. By thus applying the terrors of the law, God brought the people to put off their ornaments, which were typical of their own righteousness. Exodus 33:5; Exodus 33:6.

Moses now acted as a mediator, and not merely as an intermessenger, as he did in the first giving of the law. He offers his life for theirs; he offers up himself to be accursed and blotted out of God's book for them, after he had told the people that they had sinned a great sin, and peradventure he should make atonement for their sin, which is to do the part of a mediator. See Exodus 32:30-32.

On this occasion, the Lord speaks to Moses face to face as a man speaketh unto his friend, when he came to speak to God in behalf of the people; well representing the intercourse of our Mediator with the Father, Exodus 33:11. And on this occasion God made all his goodness pass before Moses, and proclaimed himself "the Lord, the Lord God, gracious and merciful, forgiving iniquity," etc. Exodus 33:19; Exodus 39:5-7.

The covenant the first time was written on tables that were the workmanship of God, as the soul and heart of man in innocency was; which workmanship of God was destroyed by man's apostasy; so, upon the children of Israel's apostasy, Moses brake the tables that were the workmanship of God. The covenant now was written in tables that were the workmanship of Moses, the mediator, as the law of God after the fall is written in the fleshly tables of the heart renewed by Christ.

God promises, that in fulfillment of the covenant he now the last time enters into with his people, he will do wonders, such as have not been done in all the earth, and that all the people should see the work of the lord. So God in the way of the new covenant that he entered into with Christ, did those great things by Christ in the work of redemption which are so often spoken of in Scripture as being so exceeding wonderful.

God made this covenant with Moses, the typical Mediator, as the head and representative of the people, and with the people in him or under him as his people, that he showed mercy to for his sake. Exodus 34:27. "And the Lord said unto Moses, Write these words, for after the tenor of these words I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel;" and verse 10. "Behold, I make a covenant before all thy people; I will do marvellously."

Before Moses came down from the mount in wrath with the tables broken; so Christ comes as God's Messenger to execute wrath for the breaking of the covenant of works. Now he comes down with the tables of the testimony in his hand, with his face shining. This being typical of the light of grace with which Christ's face shines in God's Israel. See Note on Exodus 32:19; Exodus 33:1.