Mountains — Mount Sinai

We tend to picture God as a maker of rules waiting to punish us. This message, sweeping through Exodus to Mount Sinai, argues the opposite: God's blueprint exists because he desperately wants to dwell with his people. At Sinai, God gave three requirements for that relationship: guidelines to live by, the Ten Commandments, vertical toward God and horizontal toward one another; a place for his presence, the tabernacle; and atonement for sin, since where a holy God dwells, sin cannot remain. The golden calf shows how quickly hearts wander and how God hates sin because it breaks relationship. The new covenant fulfills all three: Christ's once-for-all sacrifice atones, the torn veil opens his presence, and his guidelines still bring life.