A covenant involves the idea of a twofold agreement between the parties making it. Even though God himself be one of the parties, he will not refuse to be explicit in his words of covenanting. And so we find it to be in the record on the tables of the covenant which were given to Moses at Mount Sinai. We call the opening words of that record the "Preface to the Ten Commandments;" but they are more properly God's covenanting words with his people. "I am Jehovah thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."[267] The very name "Jehovah" includes the idea of a covenant-making and a covenant-keeping God. The declaration of Jehovah's eternally existing personality as Jehovah is in itself a covenant promise, for all time to come, to those who are his covenant people. It is as though he were to say: "I, who was and am, and am to be, the same yesterday and to-day, yea and forever, will be your God unfailingly. As I have given you a loving deliverance out of Egyptian bondage, so I am ever ready to deliver you from every evil that enthralls you." [267] Exod. 20 : 2. Man, when he promises for the future, needs to say, "I will do;" but God can say nothing stronger than "I do," or than "I am." Thus the promise of promises of Jesus to his disciples as their ever-present, all-sustaining Lord, is, "Lo, I am with you alway;"[268] not "Lo, I _will be_," but "Lo, I _am_." And so it is that God's covenant promise to Israel, to be their loving, guarding, and guiding God for all time to come, is in the words: "I am Jehovah thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."[269] And this is the promise of "the party of the first part," as we would say in modern legal parlance, in this covenant between God and his people Israel. [268] Matt. 28 : 20. [269] Exod. 20 : 2. Then there follow the covenant agreements of God's people, as "the party of the second part" in this loving compact. As it is God who prescribes or defines the terms on which this covenant is to be made, the indication of those terms is mainly in the form of such prohibitions as will distinguish the people of God from other peoples about them, in the bearing of that people toward God's personality, toward God's institutions, and toward God's representatives. This is all that is needed in the fundamental articles of covenanting. The details of specific duties may be defined in special enactments under the terms of this covenant, or they may be inferred from its spirit.