Wilderness of Sinai.
Lessons
1. Months and days from Egyptian bondage are fit to be recorded.
2. Days are set by God for the Church’s gradual progress to their rest; it fails not (Exodus 19:1).
3. From Rephidim to Sinai, or from straits and trials to some rest and doctrine God removes His Church.
4. The Church’s camp and God’s mount are sweetly joined together (Exodus 19:2). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
The wilderness of Sinai
After their long halt, exulting in their first victory, they advanced deeper into the mountain ranges, they knew not whither. They knew only that it was for some great end, for some solemn disclosure, such as they had never before witnessed. Onward they went, through winding valley, and under high cliff, and over rugged pass, and through gigantic forms, on which the marks of creation even now seem fresh and powerful; and at last, through all the different valleys, the whole body of the people were assembled. On their right hand and on their left rose long sucessions of lofty rocks, forming a vast avenue, like the approaches which they had seen leading to the Egyptian temples between colossal figures of men and of gods. At the end of this broad avenue, rising immediately out of the level plain on which they were encamped, towered the massive cliffs of Sinai, like the huge altar of some natural temple; encircled by peaks of every shape and height, the natural pyramids of the desert. In this sanctuary, secluded from all earthly things, they waited for the revelation of God. (Dean Stanley.)