For how then can it be known that Your people and I have found favor in Your sight, unless You go with us? How else will we be distinguished from all the other people on the face of the earth?”
Parallel translations
- WEB For how would people know that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Isn’t it that you go with us, so that we are separated, I and your people, from all the people who are on the surface of the earth?”
- KJV For wherein shall it be known here that I and thy people have found grace in thy sight? is it not in that thou goest with us? so shall we be separated, I and thy people, from all the people that are upon the face of the earth.
- NKJV For how then will it be known that Your people and I have found grace in Your sight, except You go with us? So we shall be separate, Your people and I, from all the people who are upon the face of the earth.”
- NASB For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are on the face of the earth?”
- NLT How will anyone know that you look favorably on me—on me and on your people—if you don’t go with us? For your presence among us sets your people and me apart from all other people on the earth.”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Moses argues that only God's presence sets Israel apart from all other peoples. God dwelling with them is their true distinction.
Overview
What makes Israel God's people is not their location or prosperity but God's presence among them. Moses understands that this is the mark of divine favor that distinguishes them from the nations. This anticipates the church as God's dwelling by the Spirit (Ephesians 2:22), set apart by God's indwelling presence in Christ.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Deut 4:7For what nation is great enough to have a god as near to them as the LORD our God is to us whenever we call on Him?
- Num 14:14And they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have already heard that You, O LORD, are in the midst of this people, that You, O LORD, have been seen face to face, that Your cloud stands over them, and that You go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.
- 1 Kgs 8:53For You, O Lord GOD, as Your inheritance, have set them apart from all the peoples of the earth, as You spoke through Your servant Moses when You brought our fathers out of Egypt.”
- Matt 1:23“Behold, the virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call Him Immanuel” (which means, “God with us”).
- Exod 34:10And the LORD said, “Behold, I am making a covenant. Before all your people I will perform wonders that have never been done in any nation in all the world. All the people among whom you live will see the LORD’s work, for it is an awesome thing that I am doing with you.
- 2 Sam 7:23And who is like Your people Israel—the one nation on earth whom God went out to redeem as a people for Himself and to make a name for Himself? You performed great and awesome wonders by driving out nations and their gods from before Your people, whom You redeemed for Yourself from Egypt.
- Exod 8:22But on that day I will give special treatment to the land of Goshen, where My people live; no swarms of flies will be found there. In this way you will know that I, the LORD, am in the land.
- Exod 19:5–6Now if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, you will be My treasured possession out of all the nations—for the whole earth is Mine.
- 2 Cor 6:17“Therefore come out from among them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.”
- Deut 4:34Or has any god tried to take as his own a nation out of another nation—by trials, signs, wonders, and war, by a strong hand and an outstretched arm, and by great terrors—as the LORD your God did for you in Egypt, before your eyes?
- Num 23:9For I see them from atop the rocky cliffs, and I watch them from the hills. Behold, a people dwelling apart, not reckoning themselves among the nations.
- Ps 147:20He has done this for no other nation; they do not know His judgments. Hallelujah!
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Christ at the center
The Passover lamb whose blood turns away death, the exodus through the sea, the manna, the rock, and the tabernacle where God dwells with his people all foreshadow Jesus — our Passover, our redemption, the bread from heaven, and God-with-us in the flesh.
How Exodus 33:16 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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