Verses 5-9 “5And the LORD descended in the cloud, and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the LORD.
6And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,
7Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.
8And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped.
9And he said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O LORD, let my LORD, I pray thee, go among us; for it is a stiffnecked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance.”
6And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth,
7Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.
8And Moses made haste, and bowed his head toward the earth, and worshipped.
9And he said, If now I have found grace in thy sight, O LORD, let my LORD, I pray thee, go among us; for it is a stiffnecked people; and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for thine inheritance.”
Here is Jehovah’s amazing self description. This is what God says about His own transcendent attributes. Surely these are thoughts about God that we should repeat to ourselves very often, because they will cause us to worship Him properly and appropriately. This portion of God’s Word caused Moses to bow his head and worship the Lord.
The old Jewish scholars considered these verses to be a key statement of the attributes of God, a statement that shows a remarkable balance in God’s character, a balance between God’s redemption and God’s retribution. In these verses God reveals that He is loving and kind, yet holy and just.