way God dealt with him, Abraham shows himself to be a great intercessor. God knew in advance,
however, what He would do to the cities, and how He would spare Lot and his family. In Luke 24, the
resurrected Christ seems to take a position of ignorance in responding to the question of the two men,
whether or not He knew about what had transpired in Jerusalem. Jesus simply replies, "What things?" He
knew everything, but replies as He does to have the men articulate their disappointments and concerns, as
the background for Christ then ministering to them from Scripture.
In Exodus 32 God speaks one way initially, because He is putting Moses to the test, but later
nacham's, backs off from His threat, from what He suggested as a course of action.
27
As God intended,
Moses benefits mightily from this test.
Moses rejects ungodly pride, which would have prompted him to jump at the chance to become a
new patriarch. Humility remained a characteristic of his life and work.
Through this test Moses emerges as the great intercessor for his people, and takes on in a decisive
manner his role as their true shepherd, under God. All that he relates to God concerning the Israelites has
meaning also for Moses. Because of this test he sees in clearer fashion the importance of his people, and
learns to identify more closely with them. As Maxie Dunnam explains, we see on the part of Moses "a
commitment that had moved almost unbelievably from long argument against God's call to standing toe to
toe with God for the sake of what God had called him to do in the first place ..."
28
God uses the test to
shape and prepare Moses for his work in the years ahead. Moses will have to put up with these Israelites,
in a wilderness setting, no less, for some thirty-eight-plus years.
God, through this experience in Exodus 32, leads Moses to stand in an even firmer manner on God's
Word, with its promises. Moses recalls what God had said to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: "I will multiply
your descendants." He reasons, "How, God, can You wipe out the Israelites and make of me a great
nation? These future people would be called the descendants of Moses, and not of Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob."
27
Calvin, in his Exodus commentary, pp. 340-341, has this pertinent comment: "Nor is there any reason
why slanderous tongues should here impugn God, as if He pretended before men what He had not decreed
in Himself; for it is no proof that He is variable or deceitful if, when speaking of men's sins, and pointing
out what they deserve, He does not lay open His incomprehensible counsel."
28
Maxie Dunnam, Exodus (The Communicator's Commentary, Volume II; Waco, TX: Word Books,
1987), pp. 352-353.