At the close of this chapter, Jehovah asserts His rights, in moral government, in the following words: "Whosoever hath sinned against Me, him will I blot out of My book. Therefore now go, lead the people unto the place of which I have spoken unto thee: behold, Mine Angel shall go before thee: nevertheless, in the day when I visit I will visit their sin upon them." This is God _in government_, not God _in the gospel_. Here He speaks of blotting out _the sinner_; in the gospel He is seen blotting out _sin_. A wide difference! The people are to be sent forward, under the mediatorship of Moses, by the hand of an angel. This was very unlike the condition of things which obtained from Egypt to Sinai. They had forfeited all claim on the ground of law, and hence it only remained for God to fall back upon His own sovereignty and say, "I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy." CHAPTERS XXXIII. & XXXIV. Jehovah refuses to accompany Israel to the land of promise.--"I will not go up in the midst of thee, (for thou art a stiff-necked people,) lest I consume thee in the way." At the opening of this book, when the people were in the furnace of Egypt, the Lord could say, "I have surely seen the affliction of My people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters; for I know their sorrows." But now He has to say, "I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiff-necked people." An afflicted people is an object of grace; but a stiff-necked people must be humbled. The cry of oppressed Israel had been answered by the exhibition of grace; but the song of idolatrous Israel must be answered by the voice of stern rebuke. "Ye are a stiff-necked people: I will come up into the midst of thee in a moment, and consume thee: therefore now put off thy ornaments from thee, that I may know what to do unto thee." It is only when we are really stripped of all nature's ornaments that God can deal with us. A naked sinner can be clothed; but a sinner decked with ornaments must be stripped. This is always true. We must be stripped of all that pertains to self ere we can be clothed with that which pertains to God.