Exodus 20-23

Last year we spent 9 weeks in Exodus 1-20. So this term, we are going to do the second half of Exodus. To get an overview of what's to come, start by watching this Bible Project video:

https://youtu.be/b0GhR-2kPKI?si=X5LW4q1lANtcQimX

• What stood out to you in the video? Was there anything in there that you didn't know before? Anything that didn't make sense to you? Share your initial thoughts and reflections

• Read Genesis 12:1-3 and Exodus 19:16. Why does God choose to make covenants with this family - what is his big-picture purpose here?

• Read Exodus 34:6-7. How does the character of God described here find expression in the actions of God in the Book of Exodus?

We are going to read a series of excerpts from Exodus 20-23. These chapters detail the laws God gave his people to live by - laws for society, governance, economics and worship. Read a many or as few of these as you like...

• 20:2

• 20:24-26

• 21:2-6

• 21:22-27

• 22:5-6

• 22:21-27

• 23:1-5

• 23:10-13

• From these quotes, what sort of people does God want the Israelites to be? What do you imagine these laws would have done in this ancient context, to make God's people different to the peoples they met in the Sinai peninsula, or in the 'promised land' of Canaan?

• In what way (if any) are these laws applicable to us as Christians living in Australia today?

Read Hebrews 4:12-13

The writer of Hebrews is primarily making a statement here about the Old Testament, and the covenant laws and promises God made with his people in that time.

• How do you think we apply these words to the laws we've been reading in Exodus 20-23?

• What distinctive ways does God want us to live and relate to one another in the New Covenant he has made with us through Jesus? How does this change our relationship with these Old Covenant laws?

N.T. Wright writes of God's Words:

When people read them or hear them, they find themselves, as we say, ‘opened right up’, made aware not only of new truth coming in from the outside but, perhaps more worrying, of what was going on inside them, things they had managed to keep hidden even from themselves.

(Hebrews For Everyone, p.40)

• How has God's word 'opened you right up'? Share any stories you have from your walk with God recently where you have been particularly convicted or challenged.

• Spend some time reflecting and praying, that God's Word would do its work in your heart by the Holy Spirit, uncovering what his hidden...