Three months after the nation of Israel left Egypt, they found themselves in the middle of the Sinai Wilderness. They’ll camp at a nearby mountain for the next several weeks (nearly 60 chapters Biblical real estate happens in this location). It’s in this place that God delivers His first covenant to the people en masse.
According to Old Testament scholars, there are over 600 laws contained inside the Old Testament. The vast majority of them deal with everyday life: what they ate, how they handled commerce, personal relationships, and the like.
But all of them revolved around a central idea: faithfulness to God. If they kept His covenant, they would be special, holy, and unique amongst all the peoples of the earth.
God doesn’t offer this without context. Immediately before, He reminds them of how He utterly annihilated the Egyptians (an example of His justice), and also how He had “bore them on eagles’ wings” (an example of His mercy). All of that depended on their willingness to focus on Him and resist conforming to the nations around them. If they were to be holy to God, they needed to be holy in their life.
I love how God phrases His language here (as if my opinion really matters in that department). He tells the people that they will be “His own possession” among the peoples. The subtle command is that, in order to keep the covenant, that attitude needs to be reciprocated. If they’re special to God, then God needs to be special to them. Otherwise, there’s no covenant.
He also tells them that He wants Israel to be a “kingdom of priests.” Considering the fact that eventually the tribe of Levi will literally be a tribe composed of priests, this statement alludes to the idea that all of Israel will live in perpetual service to God. They’ll all minister to Him, in a sense.
Peter picks up on this concept in 1 Peter 2:5 when he calls the church a “royal priesthood.” Surely all of us serve God in unique ways (Ephesians 4:10-12), but all of it should be done within His authority and to His glory. Otherwise, we become a priest unto ourselves.
If you’ve read any further into Scripture, you know that eventually the people will break this covenant. That brings on the punishments that God lays out over the next several books, but for now, in the wilderness, the terms of the covenant are laid out. God has done His part (and promises to do more). It’s up to them to hold up their side.
