4.10.26 ~ Grace-Filled Solidarity

The function of grace through the one who is called righteous (tzadik) extends to the people he identifies with. Before we move on, on this preparation day, there is one other thing from the last part of this pattern. Righteous Moses—Moses the righteous—is demonstrating this in Exodus 32 after the calf incident. In verse 32, before the tentative meeting, Moses says, "But now, if You will forgive their sin..." Stop. Read the text. The sentence cuts off in the middle:

Yet now, if thou wilt forgive their sin—; and if not, blot me, I pray thee, out of thy book which thou hast written.
(Ex. 32:32)

This is very intense! Can you imagine it? There is a fancy term for not being able to finish a sentence because the emotion is just too large. Then he continues: "But now, if You will forgive their sin... but if not, please blot me out of Your book which You have written. Blot me out now!"

We need to stop for a moment, because you and I have to know what he does not say, and what informs the rest of the stories we read in the narratives of the Bible. He does not say, "Take me instead of them." He does not say, "Punish me instead of them." That would be penal substitution—"I will take their penalty and release them." Nope. What he says is, "If they go, I go. If they have no standing before You, then I have no standing before You. My fate, their fate. My destiny, their destiny." It is not a transaction. He is declaring solidarity with these unworthy people.

In this moment, he takes all of the accumulated favor and lays it before God and says, "Forgive us." How can he say this? He can say this because he knows something about God from early on, from the burning bush (Ex. 3:1–12). He knows that God said, "You have My favor," and Moses trusts that! And he is going to stake everything on it. It is not some kind of gamble.

The Apostle Paul actually does something similar. In Romans chapter 9, Paul says, "I can wish that myself be accursed and cut off from Messiah for the sake of my people, those of my own race." Listen: he is emphasizing, "I could wish," but he does not have to because he knows God. And he continues this incredible section of Romans 11 by saying, "I could, but I do not have to, because God is faithful and all Israel will be saved" (Rom. 11:25–26).

It is the passion—the willingness to be bound to a people before God. Moses does not speak here in the language of transaction as much as solidarity. I want you to hear that... it is not about transfer. This is what it looks like when a tzadik (righteous person) stands with people before God—not instead of them, but with them. Do you understand how significant and different that is?

It is not about replacement; it is about solidarity.

Think about Yeshua, the One like unto Moses (Deut. 18:15), who did not just come to perform penal substitution, but to fully identify with us so that we could walk toward our destiny together.

Happy Preparation Day and counting the Omer!

Shalom,
Alan

P.S. If you want more on the grace topic, you can go to lightinthetorah.wordpress.com for this and much, much more.

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