Deuteronomy 10:2 And I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke; and you shall put them in the ark.’

Some years back I went with the HS band to Washington D.C. While there we visited the National Archives and saw, among other things, the Declaration of Independence. It’s kept in a highly secure vault of sorts. If, for some reason, you were there when they opened it up and they removed it and handed it to you, how would you react? Wouldn’t most people almost be frozen with fear that they might damage it?

Moses had been on Mt Sinai for forty days. He was not on some personal journey of investigation, he was meeting with God! The culmination of that time was seeing God cut stone tablets, write His very words on them and instruct Moses to take them to the people! Unimaginable! What must he have thought and felt as he walked, carrying those stone tablets?! But as he got to the people, everything went wrong. They were involved in a terrible display of idol worship. In anger and frustration, Moses threw the tablets down and they were broken in pieces!

What?! Moses took that unimaginable gift and threw it to the ground? Yes. God must have been so angry. God must have decided to make Moses pay. Yet what was God’s ultimate response. He told Moses to cut two more tablets and He would write His words on those. What grace!

All of us are given a gift of unimaginable value - our lives. And in all the ways that matter for eternity, we throw them down and break them in pieces. God must be so angry! But that’s not His reaction. Instead, amazingly, His reaction is this:

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

We can bring the broken pieces of our lives to Him and He will not only not turn away from us with a “How could you be so careless!” attitude, but He will accept us and bring wholeness and peace to our lives. Amazing grace indeed!

 

Blessings,

Pastor Russ