³ Then Moses went up to God. The Lord called out to him from the mountain. He said, “Here is what I want you to say to my people, who belong to Jacob’s family. Tell the Israelites, ⁴ ‘You have seen for yourselves what I did to Egypt. You saw how I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to myself. ⁵ Now obey me completely. Keep my covenant. If you do, then out of all the nations you will be my special treasure. The whole earth is mine. ⁶ But you will be a kingdom of priests to serve me. You will be my holy nation.’ That is what you must tell the Israelites.”

⁸ All the people answered together. They said, “We will do everything the Lord has said.” So Moses brought their answer back to the Lord.

³ Moses went and told the people all the Lord’s words and laws. They answered with one voice. They said, “We will do everything the Lord has told us to do.”

⁶ As he passed in front of Moses, he called out. He said, “I am the Lord, the Lord. I am the God who is tender and kind. I am gracious. I am slow to get angry. I am faithful and full of love. ⁷ I continue to show my love to thousands of people. I forgive those who do evil. I forgive those who refuse to obey me. And I forgive those who sin. But I do not let guilty people go without punishing them. I cause the sins of the parents to affect their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.”

The Glory of the Lord

³⁴ Then the cloud covered the tent of meeting. The glory of the Lord filled the holy tent. ³⁵ Moses couldn’t enter the tent of meeting because the cloud had settled on it. The glory of the Lord filled the holy tent.

³⁶ The Israelites continued their travels. Whenever the cloud lifted from above the holy tent, they started out. ³⁷ But if the cloud didn’t lift, they did not start out. They stayed until the day it lifted. ³⁸ So the cloud of the Lord was above the holy tent during the day. Fire was in the cloud at night. All the Israelites could see the cloud during all their travels.

¹⁴ The Word became a human being. He made his home with us. We have seen his glory. It is the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father. And the Word was full of grace and truth.