Exodus 24:18 - Now the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain in the sight of the people of Israel. Moses entered the cloud and went up on the mountain. And Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

What was Moses doing on the mountain for forty days and forty nights? Is he up there in silence?

He’s not. Because the very next verse says:

Exodus 25:1 - The Lord said to Moses…

God was speaking to Moses. And God tells Moses an incredible number of detailed things to do with extreme specificity between Exodus 25-31, accounting for about 7,000 English words.

Moses comes down the mountain at the end of the forty days with the two stone tablets God has written the Ten Commandments on and the Israelites are worshiping the Golden Calf:

Exodus 32:19 - and he threw the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain

Moses chastizes and disciplines the Israelites and then sets up his Tent of Meeting outside the camp:

Exodus 33:9,11 - When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses… Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.

Eventually, Moses goes back up the mountain to get new tablets:

Exodus 34:1 - The Lord said to Moses, “Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke.”

And God makes a covenant with Moses, asking the Israelites to observe some feasts and statutes:

Exodus 34:27a - And the Lord said to Moses, “Write these words…”

How is it possible we know what happened in creation all the way up to the time of Moses (i.e. all of Genesis)?

Could it be that an oral tradition passed the information down from generation to generation. Could be. Maybe that’s the whole story. Maybe part of it. But…

Who was the only witness at creation? God. So surely only his testimony about it can be truly valid.

Who talked with Moses on the mountain for forty days TWICE (i.e. for 80 days)? God.

Who talked with Moses regularly in the Tent of Meeting “as a man speaks to a friend”? God.

What did God tell Moses to do? Write down what he was told.

Could it be that we know what happened at Creation simply because God told Moses. And Moses wrote it down.

God speaks and Moses writes. Moses becomes God’s first ghostwriter.

2 Peter 1:21 - For no prophecy was ever produced by the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.

2 Timothy 3:16 - All Scripture is breathed out by God…

Oh, Father, teach us all you meant when these words were put down. Teach us the true meaning. Don’t let us know the words and miss the heart. Don’t let us recite them perfectly and live like dogs. Align us inside so you speak to us now increasingly how you did with Moses - personally and often.

John 10:27 - My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.