Exodus 19:4-6

"Ye have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles' wings, and brought you unto myself. Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be mine own possession from among all peoples: for all the earth is mine: and ye shall be unto me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel."

These verses, along with the first three, are a single paragraph, in fact constituting a summary of Exodus 19-24. Honeycutt outlined these chapters thus: "Meeting God ... Exodus 19; the Law of God ... Exodus 20-23; and Sealing the Covenant ... Exodus 24."[7] This organization of these chapters is exceedingly important, for as Fields observed, the order of the procedures here follows the pattern of covenants dating well into the 2millennium B.C. (1,500 B.C.), and not the pattern of covenants after 1,000 B.C.[8] The distinctive earmarks of the older type of covenant in evidence here are: (1) there is a historical prologue (Exodus 19:4); and (2) the divine witness appears between the stipulations and the curses. Thus, we have here another solid proof that Exodus is a document dating from the second millennium B.C., and not a period of about 900 B.C. or later.[9]

"I have brought you on eagles' wings ..." This is a tender and beautiful metaphor attached to the historical prologue of the divine covenant (Exodus 19:4), in which the illustration is drawn from nature. When the young eaglets have reached a time when they should fly, the old eagle stirs up their nest and forces them to begin the experience, supporting their first attempts by flying under them when they are about to fail, thus bearing them upward and enabling their first flight! What a beautiful picture of the way God supported and helped Israel during those terrible days of their infancy as a nation!

"Now therefore, if ye will obey my voice ..." This is another step in the making of ancient covenants; there must first be a promise to abide by the terms of it. Here, God, "entices Israel to their own advantage by his loving promises."[10]

"Ye shall be mine own possession from among all peoples ..." God's choice of Israel from all the peoples of the earth has been a difficult pill to swallow for some rationalists who can find nothing in it except a capricious and arbitrary blessing of one nation at the expense of others, but that is altogether false as an adequate understanding of this. We should not believe that there was anything unfair, capricious, or arbitrary in this choice of Israel.

1. God chose Israel because, as events proved, and as God knew when He chose them, that Israel would be able, in time, to deliver the promised Messiah. They did this. As Dummelow put it:

"The Jewish nation fulfilled its destiny ... Through its rejection of the Messiah, however, the sacred function of Israel passed over to the Christian church, to which St. Peter transferred the titles given to Israel in these two verses (Exodus 19:5-6). See 1 Peter 2:9 and Revelation 1:6."[11]

2. Another primary reason why God chose Israel was the peculiar and amazing ability of Abraham to "command his children after him" (Genesis 18:19), an ability which no Gentile people had in those days, nor in the present days either!
3. The choice of Abraham had, as its purpose the evangelizing of "all the families of the earth" (Genesis 12:3), a reason made known upon the occasion of Abram's call, and reiterated again here in Exodus 19:6. Huey commented on God's choice of Israel thus: "In response to a frequently heard comment, `How odd of God to choose the Jews?' any Christian could add, `How odd of God to choose me'"[12]
4. "And ye shall be unto me a kingdom and priests ..." Kingdom meant that God would rule over them. Priests indicated what Israel was to do. "The priest is a mediator between God and man, so Israel is called to be the vehicle through whom the knowledge and salvation of God would come to the nations."[13] That profound reason for the choice of Israel is next recorded in the words, "for all the earth is mine (Exodus 19:6)."

ARE THE JEWS STILL GOD'S CHOSEN PEOPLE?

Unqualifiedly, the answer is NO! They simply refused to fulfill that vital function of theirs to be the teachers of all mankind regarding the way of salvation. They were commanded here to be a holy nation, but as Fields put it:

"The `fly in the ointment' (Ecclesiastes 10:1) in this glorious honor for Israel was that Israel was as sinful and as far from God as the nations to whom they were to be priests and lights (Romans 2:19).[14] Israel, in fact, became worse than Sodom (Ezekiel 16:47)."

All of these glorious promises to Israel were conditioned upon the Gargantuan "IF ye will obey" (Exodus 19:5). They did NOT obey; they did NOT keep the covenant; and the unanimous testimony of all the prophets of God is that Israel FORFEITED every one of these promises through repeated, stubborn and rebellious disobediences. In fact, the entire O.T. is primarily an account of the frequent rebellions of Israel against God. As Rawlinson expressed it, "Their unfaithfulness soon forfeited both privileges."[15]

The testimony of the inspired writers of the N.T. removes all doubt regarding this question:

1. There is now no distinction between Jews and Gentiles (Romans 10:12).
2. There is no distinction (Romans 3:22).
3. Is God the God of Jews only? Is He not the God of Gentiles also? (Romans 3:29).
4. "God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation, he that feareth God and worketh righteousness is acceptable to God." (Acts 10:34).
5. Peter explained his going to see the Gentile Cornelius by saying, "The Spirit bade me go with them, making no distinction" (between Jews and Gentiles) (Acts 15:12).

The tragedy of all ages is the gross misunderstanding of God's gracious and magnificent honors heaped upon the nation of Israel in these verses. The obligations incumbent upon them as the recipient of so great blessings were totally withheld from their vision. A glimpse of the inordinate conceit that possessed their minds is seen in this passage from a Jewish publication of the present day:

"(God said) You (the children of Israel) will not be `Mine own treasure' (Exodus 19:5) only as long as all the other nations worship idols. That would be no great distinction. Your distinction lies in that even when the time will come when `all the earth is mine,' when all the world will turn to Me and all the nations will acknowledge the sovereignty of God, you, the Children, of Israel will still be My favorite people from among all the nations."[16]

"A kingdom of priests ..." This says in tones of thunder that the Jewish priesthood which the Lord later gave to Israel was NOT the original intention. God's purpose for Israel, as indicated here, was exactly that which was later fulfilled in the church. The magnificent doctrine of the priesthood of EVERY believer, as unfolded in the N.T., has its beginning right here. Before that week was out, the people would reject the responsibilities incumbent in such a promise. And, in this connection, it is absolutely certain that a group of 9th century B.C. priests could never in a million years have put together such a devastating downgrading of their own office as that which appears here. "There is an increasing readiness to accept the Mosaic authorship of the Decalogue (and, by inference, all of Exodus 19-24)."[17] This "readiness" should be extended to every word of the Pentateuch. Only Moses was present for the great scenes recorded. Only Moses knew the things related here. The true evaluation of the Jewish priesthood, as glimpsed in this passage, is an illuminating comment on Malachi 2:1-9, where God finally repudiated and cursed the priesthood. "I have cursed them ... the priests shall be taken away ... ye are turned aside out of the way ... I have made you contemptible ... ye have wearied Jehovah with your words" (Malachi 2:2-16). (For a fuller discussion of this issue, see my commentary on the minor prophets.)