Original Meaning

THIS PASSAGE IS briefer than any of the others we have looked at. It is a fitting end to this book, however, and so it deserves to be treated separately. It rounds off some preceding elements and poises the reader to enter the remaining stories that will bring the Pentateuch to an end.

As we come to the conclusion of the Exodus story, we find God present with his people in a powerful way. The description of his presence in this passage is reminiscent of what we have seen throughout Exodus. Reference to the cloud, glory, and the Tent of Meeting/tabernacle causes us to glance back at much of what has transpired.

The reappearance of the cloud in particular attracts our attention. God was with his people in the form of a cloud at a number of important places in Exodus: 13:21–22; 14:19, 24; 16:10; 24:16–18; 33:9–10; 34:5. It has been a near constant reminder to Israel that God is with them, his special people. The cloud was with them when they left Egypt and when they came to Mount Sinai. Now, as Israel is poised to continue on to the land of Canaan, it is here again. The recurring appearance of this symbol ties various parts of the book together and communicates loud and clear that the God of the Exodus is still with his people.

The same can be said for the use of the Hebrew root nsʿ, which means to travel or set out on a journey. This root appears, both as a verb (“set out”) and as a noun (“travels”), in verses 36–38. As with the cloud, this word has occurred a number of times previously in Exodus (12:37; 13:20; 14:15, 19; 15:22; 16:1; 17:1; 19:2). It, too, indicates that God is moving ahead with the plan he announced earlier. This same root is also a bridge to the rest of the Pentateuch, for it will appear about a hundred more times, particularly in Numbers 9–10 and 33.

Exodus 40:36–38, in other words, prepare us for what will become a dominant element in Numbers and Deuteronomy, the relentless push toward the land of Canaan. The purpose of these closing verses of Exodus is to explain how this will happen. When God moves, the people move. When he stays put, so do they. It is, after all, God’s plan and purpose that are being fulfilled. Israel’s eventual arrival in the Promised Land will be solely by God’s guidance and direction, by his will and in his time.

God’s presence is manifest now specifically in the tabernacle, which has been the main topic since chapter 25. God is both over the tabernacle in the cloud and in it (40:34). We have no doubt arrived at a climactic moment. Note especially verse 35: God’s presence is so “thick,” as it were, that even Moses cannot enter. I do not think this means that Moses is waiting for an invitation to enter.1 This may have been the case earlier (24:16), but not so here. Moses is unable to enter because of the cloud and the glory. If the author’s intention is to imply that Moses is waiting for an invitation to enter, his choice of words is a roundabout way of putting it.2

Moreover, such an explanation dulls the impact these verses should have. This passage as a whole implies a heightening of God’s presence. Something powerful is happening in the midst of the community, and it is fitting that it should be so. In light of what we have seen in chapters 32–34, it is important to remind the people of God’s holiness, that there are times when even Moses may not come near. This is a lesson the Israelites, unfortunately, will be slow to learn.

Nevertheless, the fact that God is still present with his people, and in such an intense way, reminds the people of something else: All is forgiven. The Exodus-God, the God who has led his people out of Egypt with fire and cloud (14:19, 24) is still at work (40:38). The mission, at least the first stage, has been completed and the plan is proceeding full steam ahead.

Thus, the first phase of Israel’s story comes to an end. Throughout the book we have seen the author’s concerted attempts to remind his readers that Israel’s deliverance should be seen in light of the events of Genesis, namely, creation and the promise to the patriarchs. Now, one chapter of this grand story is closing and another is beginning, so our gaze is directed forward to the next phase in Israel’s journey.

Along that journey, Israel’s prophets and psalmists will from time to time call Israel back to remember what God did in bringing them out of Egypt. They will be challenged to remember that neither Egypt’s might nor Israel’s stubbornness—nor even God’s own anger—have been able to thwart his plan. After all, he made a promise to Abraham. Nothing will get in the way. This is the story of the Exodus.

Bridging Contexts

SINCE THIS PASSAGE is the conclusion of the book, its purpose is not to introduce new themes but to bring old ones to an end. This stands to reason, and so the discussion here will not be drawn out. The bridging of contexts for 40:34–38 is connected both logically and thematically to the flow of the action not only of the preceding section but of the entire book.

Saying this, however, does not end the matter. One may still wonder why, of all the ways to end the book, the writer has chosen this conclusion. What is he saying? Is there some point he wants to leave with the readers before moving to the next phase of the story? This central thrust to his conclusion, I think is this: The God who brought the Israelites out of Egypt is at the same time both holy and near.

(1) Verses 34–35 are a final reminder of God’s holiness. Access to God, even by Moses, is not something that can be taken for granted. In a manner of speaking, God is too present in the tabernacle and so Moses cannot enter. There is a point that Moses himself cannot cross, a boundary set by God that keeps even his chosen redeemer at a distance. The fact that Moses is kept away is not the result of residue wrath after the golden calf incident. That is long past. In the interim the tabernacle has been built, and what we read in 40:35 should be seen in this light.

The reason Moses cannot enter is because the tabernacle is the portable Mount Sinai, the earthly representation of God’s heavenly throne, the microcosm of creation. In other words, the point of verse 35 is to highlight the holiness of God as it is manifest in his earthly dwelling place, not Moses’ shortcomings or God’s anger. Approaching God in his tabernacle is done on his terms because he is holy.

(2) The guiding function of the cloud and fire tells us that this holy God is nevertheless very near his people. He is with them every step of the way. Moreover, he is in charge of their journey to Canaan. This has been God’s story since the beginning. It was he who made the promise to Abraham. It was he whose power was challenged by Pharaoh. It was he who brought Israel to his mountain and gave them his law. They are now not free to go wherever they please and do whatever they want. This is not what they have been redeemed for. They have been set apart by God to be his people, to “serve” him, as we read so often in Exodus.3

The description of God in this passage is one that is well at home in the pages of the Old Testament, and one that any reader will recognize. A holy God who directs and guides his people in his own time and in his own way is a thread that runs through so much of the Old Testament that to amplify this theme would require us to study nearly every major section. Furthermore, we have seen these same characteristics in so many places in Exodus that to repeat these efforts here is pointless. What is important is the finality of this passage for the book as a whole. It does not introduce a new picture of God but puts an exclamation point on what the book has been trying to communicate since the beginning.

In the same way, the Christological perspective has been explored throughout this commentary. Christ fulfills so completely what Moses’ ministry was set up to do that the comparison between the two figures in the New Testament is often made by way of contrast. Christ is not simply a “new Moses,” in the sense that he does the same things only better. He is more. Yet Christ also does what Moses could not do and is thus a better mediator.

This is evident in view of Moses’ inability to enter the tabernacle (40:35). Christ, by contrast, is himself the fullness of God’s glory. Even Moses, who earlier reflected God’s glory so intensely that he had to wear a veil because the people were afraid, cannot bear the weight of God’s glory in the tabernacle at this point. True, the point of 40:34–35 is not to highlight Moses’ inadequacies. Rather, their focus is to show us, at the close of the book, the holiness of God presented throughout. But looking at this passage from the vantage point of the gospel we see how Christ “goes one better.” He is the final mediator of the covenant and the glory of God fills him. There is never a question whether he is able to enter fully into the Father’s presence.

Contemporary Significance

WHAT DO THE closing verses of Exodus have to say to us? In a number of places in this commentary I have appealed to the book of Hebrews to help us understand what the Christian’s understanding of the Exodus should be. This is because Hebrews 3:1–4:13 is an explicit and relatively extensive “commentary” on the Exodus, at least more so than any other portion of the New Testament. The basic analogy that the writer of Hebrews draws is that Israel’s desert wanderings correspond to the daily life of the church on its way to “Canaan.”

In a manner of speaking, the end of Exodus is among the more applicable parts of the book. Verses 34–38 have something to say to us, since we, too, have been delivered and are waiting to arrive at the final destination. We, like the Israelites, are poised to reach our rest.

On this journey, we follow our holy Redeemer as he guides us to the Promised Land. Admittedly, there is no cloud overhead, but we have the Spirit of Christ dwelling in us. He brings us to the goal of our salvation just as surely as the cloud guided the Israelites to their ultimate destination. The people of God should take great comfort in this. The God of Exodus is still guiding. God is present with his people wherever they go, for he still leads and guides them, not to Canaan but to a “better country—a heavenly one” (Heb. 11:16).

As I turn the final page of the book of Exodus, after struggling to come to grips with its meaning (and I will continue to struggle), I begin to see something I had not noticed before. The end of Exodus is not just the end of the story but the beginning of many others. This is true not only for the Israelites, whose ups and downs are catalogued for us in Scripture, but for us as well. We who have been redeemed by Christ are also poised daily for the journeys we take toward our final goal. Israel’s Exodus, as ours, is for a purpose, to bring us “onward and upward.” This is a recurring theme in C. S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia series. And as we reach the end of Exodus, I am reminded of how Lewis ends his series, on the final page of The Last Battle:

Now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story, which no one on earth has read; which goes on forever; and which every chapter is better than the one before.4

This is the message of Exodus. This is the message of the gospel.