Wesley Corpus

The circumstances of time and place, ver. 1, 2. The covenant between God and Israel settled in general. The gracious proposal God made to them, ver. 3 - 6. And their consent to the proposal, ver. 7, 8. Notice given three days before of God's design to give the law out of a thick cloud, ver. 9. Orders given to prepare the people to receive the law, ver. 10 - 13. and care taken to execute those orders, ver. 14, 15. A terrible appearance of God's glory, ver. 16 - 20. Silence proclaimed, and strict charge given to the people to observe a decorum while God spake to them, ver. 20 - 25. In the third month after they came out of Egypt. It is computed that the law was given just fifty days after their coming out of Egypt, in remembrance of which the feast of Pentecost was observed the fiftieth day after the passover, and in compliance with which the spirit was poured out upon the apostles, at the feast of Pentecost, fifty days after the death of Christ. Mount Sinai was a place which nature, not art, had made conspicuous, for it was the highest in all that range of mountains. Thus God put contempt upon cities and palaces, setting up his pavilion on the top of a mountain, in a barren desert. It is called Sinai, from the multitude of thorny bushes that over - spread it. Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and the children of Israel - The people are called by the names both of Jacob and Israel, to mind them that they who had lately been as low as Jacob when he went to Padan - aram, were now grown as great as God made him when he came from thence, and was called Israel. Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on Eagle's wings - An high expression of the wonderful tenderness God shewed for them. It notes great speed; God not only came upon the wing for their deliverance, but he hastened them out, as it were upon the wing. Also that he did it with great ease, with the strength as well as with the swiftness of an eagle. They that faint not, nor are weary, are said to mount up with wings as eagles, Isa 40:31.