There is some question about whether the text before us properly belongs to the section of Exodus that we have been studying called the Book of the Covenant. After all, it is notably different from list of rules, judgments, and commandments that we have seen so far. However, I believe that this very much is the conclusion of the Book of the Covenant that Moses wrote down for Israel. Indeed, I would argue that the Book of the Covenant began properly in 20:1 with the giving of the Ten Commandments with 20:18-21 being an explanation for why the covenant needed to be written down by Moses and read to Israel. This means that the Book of the Covenant began with Yahweh recounting His redemption of Israel from Egypt (see 20:2) and concludes with His promise to give them the land of Canaan. Douglas Stuart gives a wonderful overview of this passage:

Motivation is what the present passage is especially about. It forms the conclusion of the Covenant Code, reminding the Israelites of who they were, where they were going, and how they were to get there… The special motivating force behind this concluding section the Covenant Code is Yahweh himself. The angel he sent to guard and lead his people (vv. 20-22) was his angel (“my angel,” v. 23), and God promised to oppose personally any who opposed themselves to his people (v. 22). The promise of abundant life he offered (vv. 25-26) came from his own grace, in response to his people’s worshiping him exclusively (vv. 24-25). The terror he would send on the nations opposing Israel’s conquest (v. 27) represented his own direct fighting for his people in a manner as irresistible as the flight of a hornet (vv. 28-30), so from the Israelite point of view he would simply have handed the land to them as a gift (v. 31) so little would have been their military contribution and so great his. Israel was a small and weak nation who would have to grow over time into the size and strength necessary to control all of Canaan (vv. 29-30). And the greatest danger of allowing the inhabitants of the promised land to live was not the threat they could do harm to Israel’s peace but that they might keep Israel from being close and faithful to God, who was to be their exclusive focus (v. 33).

The Covenant Code is thus a means to an end: fidelity to the one on whom Israel’s wellbeing entirely depended. Without Yahweh, they were nothing, could do nothing, and would end up as nothing. With him leading and them following obediently, however, all would fall properly into place, and their purpose as a people would come to fulfillment.

Exodus, 542

AN ANGEL BEFORE YOU // VERSES 20-22

Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him.

But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.

Here Yahweh promises to send an angel before Israel into the Promise Land. Of course, the question that immediately presents itself is: who is this angel? A number of answers have been made, and we only know as much as the text itself has told us. This could certainly have been one of the angels from heaven, perhaps Michael who would be sent before the Israelites.

It is also possible that a human is in view here. Like the Greek word for angel, angelos, the Hebrew word mal’ak means messenger and can refer to heavenly messengers (what we call angels) or human messengers. So, it could be that God was pledging to send one of His prophets before the Israel to lead them into the land of Canaan. Since Moses was not allowed to enter Canaan, he would not have been the angel being described. The prophet who would lead them into the Promise Land was Joshua, who we first met as the captain of Israel’s military in Exodus 17. Furthermore, the LORD clearly had plans for Joshua to be their future leader since after defeating the Amalekites; we read:

Then the LORD said to Moses, “Write this as a memorial in a book and recite it in the ears of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the memory of Amalek from under heaven.” And Moses built an altar and called the name of it, The LORD Is My Banner, saying, “A hand upon the throne of the LORD! The LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.”

Exodus 17:14–16

Augustine took this view, noting that Joshua and Jesus are the same name. Joshua is Hebrew, and Jesus is Greek. Thus, the statement for my name is in him was quite literally true, though God’s people would not discover it for many centuries.

A third view, and the one I think best, is that this was the Angel of Yahweh, who is very likely the preincarnate Christ. That view makes the most sense of verse 21’s command to pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. As the Pharisees rightly noted, no servant of God, either in heaven or on earth, has the authority to forgive sin; God alone can do so. Of course, even though He is a distinct Person from God the Father, Jesus claimed the same authority to forgive sins because He is also God. I think Ryken is right to conclude:

Whether this is the right interpretation or not, the angel of the exodus certainly points us to Christ. This is one of the many places where the Old Testament reveals what kind of Savior God was promising to send. Like Israel’s angel, Jesus is our guardian along the way. By the presence of the Holy Spirit, he is always with us to save us. He says, “And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). Like Israel’s angel, Jesus is our guide. When his disciples wanted to know the way to glory, Jesus simply said, “I am the way” (John 14:6). Now we are called to follow him every step of the road, until we reach the promised land.

Exodus, 725

 I WILL SEND MY TERROR BEFORE YOU // VERSES 23-33

When my angel goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. You shall serve the LORD your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from among you. None shall miscarry or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days. I will send my terror before you and will throw into confusion all the people against whom you shall come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites from before you. I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the wild beasts multiply against you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and possess the land. And I will set your border from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the Euphrates, for I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you. You shall make no covenant with them and their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.

The overall point of these verses is that God would give Israel the land that was inhabited by the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites. The time was nearing for God to fulfill His promise to Abraham back in Genesis 15:13-16:

Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

The conquest of Canaan would be a gracious gift of God to Israel and an act of judgment upon the inhabitants of the land. And God Himself would ensure that it was done. In verse 23, He says, and I blot them out. In verses 27-28, He promises, I will send my terror before you and will throw into confusion all the people against whom you shall come, and I will make all your enemies turn their backs to you. And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivites, the Canaanites, and the Hittites from before you. In verse 30, God says, I will drive them out before you. Their victory would be by the hand of God.

Yet also notice that God would not just use His angel to work His conquest, He would also use the Israelites themselves. In verse 24, He says, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. Look at verses 27-28 again and notice the phrases before you… against whom you shall come… turn their backs to you… before you… before you. Verse 31 says, for I will give the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you. Yahweh was the source of their victory, but Israel would be His instrument for doing so.

Chapter 17 already gave us a miniature picture of such a victory. When the Amalekites began to attack Israel, God gave His people victory over their harassers, but He did so through the swords of Joshua and the other military men within Israel. Both that battle and the conquest of Canaan are marvelous images of the process of sanctification.

Let us remember that whenever the Bible speaks of salvation; it does so on three fronts. There is the past act of having been saved, which we call justification. There is the present act of being saved called sanctification. And there is the future act in which we will be saved, that is, glorification. All three pieces form our overall salvation, and sometimes the Bible speaks of that wholistic work from beginning to end. However, at other times, the Bible speaks of salvation and is particularly describing one of those three major aspects of salvation. This is all important to remember because our justification is a unilateral work of God to deliver us. Indeed, Israel’s exodus from Egypt is a grand picture of justification because God did all the work and Israel only needed to be silent. They had nothing to contribute to their redemption from slavery; it was purely the work of Yahweh their God.

Sanctification, however, is not the unilateral work of God. Instead, our progressive growth in godliness is a work of God being accomplished through us. Philippians 2:12-13 is the great expression of this act: “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.” As with their battle with the Amalekites, Israel would need to actually use their swords against the Canaanites, and many Israelites would likely fall in those battles. However, though Israel was an insignificant nation of former-slaves, their enemies would melt before them because God was giving them victory. And the same is still true of us. We no longer have the command to take our swords and slay the wicked; rather, we have been given the sword of the Spirit to war against the spiritual wickedness all around us and within us.

Indeed, because we have our own spiritual conquest to fight, we should take to heart God’s good promises in verses 29-30:

I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the wild beasts multiply against you. Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and possess the land.

Philip Ryken gives an excellent explanation:

No doubt the Israelites wanted the victory to come right away. They wanted to march in one day, watch their enemies march out the next, and then take over the Promised Land. However, that was not God’s plan, and for the very practical reason that the Israelites were not ready to take full possession. If their enemies left right away, the fields would grow wild, predators would take over, and the land would become desolate. So God, in his infinite wisdom and mercy, ordained that the “process of occupation and colonization was to be a progressive one in order that they might maintain complete control over that land.”

Eventually the whole land would be theirs. God said, “I will set your border from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the wilderness to the Euphrates” (v. 31a). This was a huge territory, and God’s promise was not fulfilled until the reign of Solomon, when the kingdom of Israel extended to its widest boundaries (1 Kings 4:21). But that was centuries later. So the conquest came—as God promises—little by little.

Exodus, 729

That is not how we would prefer for God to work, but as always, He knows best. God does not destroy all the sin in our lives as soon as we confess our faith in Christ. In fact, He does not even reveal all the sins that He is rescuing us from. One of the most interesting aspects of sanctification is increasingly discovering just far deeply rooted our sins are and even the multitude of sins that we never noticed. Indeed, the Lord mercifully reveals those sins to us over time, little by little, so that we are not overwhelmed and lose heart.

We should also note that God does not give Israel battleplans here, nor does He provide them with a strategic map of Canaan. No, He assures them that He will give them victory over the Canaanites in warfare, so long as they obey Him and refuse to worship the gods of the Canaanites. Verses 24-26 give such a warning and a promise of blessing for worshiping Yahweh alone:

you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. You shall serve the LORD your God, and he will bless your bread and your water, and I will take sickness away from among you. None shall miscarry or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days.

Consider also the warning in the final two verses:

You shall make no covenant with them and their gods. They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against me; for if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you.

For the Israelites, the greatest threat that the Canaanites posed lay in their great walls, their deadly weapons, and even their fearsome giants; however, here God is assuring Israel that none of those physical dangers will be a problem for them. The real danger was in becoming like the Canaanites themselves. Even Balaam, the wicked prophet, understood this and counseled Balak the king of Moab to provoke Israel to idolatry, since he warned that Israel could not be beaten with the Yahweh on their side.

Again, this is still true for us today. Our greatest threat is not physical or even spiritual enemies; it is the wickedness within our own heart. With Christ on our side, we can boldly say before any threat: “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21). Indeed, we can look upon any challenge and answer with Paul’s words in Romans 8:31-39:

What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written,

“For your sake we are being killed all the day long;
            we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.”

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

In Christ, we have nothing to fear, for we now belong to the household of God, as co-heirs with Christ and sons and daughters of God the Father. But like Israel often did, if we reject Christ and choose to obey our own desires rather than His perfect and holy will, what will be the result? That was what the author of Hebrews repeatedly warned about in passages such as this one:

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Hebrews 10:26–31

Those are the two roads before all people. Through Christ and Him alone is joy, peace, and blessedness forevermore. Apart from Him is judgment and death under righteous wrath of God. In Christ, we have nothing to fear. Apart from Christ, there will soon be nothing but fear. For those who confess Christ as Lord, He is the good Shepherd who has laid down His life to ransom and redeem us from our sins, while those apart from Christ will forever be sheep without a shepherd, consumed by ravenous wolves.

In 1 Corinthians 1:26, Paul calls the act of the Lord’s Supper a proclamation of our Lord’s death until He comes again. Let it, therefore, be a visible call for each of us to place our faith in the finished work of Jesus. All who have been baptized are invited to eat and drink in remembrance of our Lord. Those who have not been baptized but do acknowledge Christ as Lord should refrain from observing the Lord’s Supper until being baptized. Doing so is not a declaration that you are not a Christian, but just as justification comes before sanctification, baptism ought to precede the Lord’s Supper. And for any who have not yet called upon Christ as Savior and Lord, do so today. Brothers and sisters, as we eat this bread and drink this cup, let us taste and see the goodness of our God through Jesus Christ who has delivered and forgiven us of every sin and will being a Guardian and our Guide until He brings us safely to Himself forevermore.