Moses was called by the Lord and made a prefigure of One who was to come and save his people from their sins, as the Lord said unto him, “I will raise [Israel] up a Prophet (Messiah) from among their brethren, like unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. And it shall come to pass that whosoever will not hearken unto my words, which he shall speak in my name, I will require it of him.” (Deuteronomy 18:18-19).

The man spoken of in this scripture is the Son of Man who is the Son of God.

As a foreshadowing of Christ, Moses was made a mediator between God and Israel. He was chosen to receive the word of God and deliver it to the people. And he was given two tables of stone made by God, who engraved the Ten Commandments on them with his finger, as it is written.

“And Moses turned and went down from the mount, and the two tables of the testimony were in his hand: the tables were written on both sides; on the one side and the other were they written. ” And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, graven upon the tables.”

Note that they were written on both sides.

Might we find the answer as to why they were written on both sides in 1st Corinthians 9:14?–which states, “Even so hath the Lord ordained that they which preach the gospel should live of the gospel.”

When Moses presented the commandments to the people, he also faced them. For those who preach the word of God are also subject to it. Judgment starts at the house of God; we can’t preach God’s laws and be free from them.

Nonetheless, Moses broke the first tablets when he came down from the mount and found the people eating and drinking, dancing naked, worshiping a golden calf, and engaging in sensual immorality.

“And it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing: and Moses’ anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands, and brake them beneath the mount.”

“And the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first: and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables, which thou breakest.”

The first tablets, which were broken, were both made by God and inscribed by his finger. Moses was commanded to make the second set. Thus, Moses became a participant in making the new tablets. However, Moses did not engrave the commandments into the stone tablets on either set. The Lord reserved that work for Himself; for the commandments come directly from God, not from man.

Moses, as a prefigure of the Prophet who was to come later, hewed out a new set of tablets to replace the ones that were broken. Likewise, Christ brought a New Covenant to replace the one that was broken. Unlike the commandments written on the tablets of stone, the word of God delivered by Christ is engraved on the heart.

However, the law did not change; Jesus said he did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill it. Once the Mosaic law was fulfilled by the life and death of Christ, it was completed; mankind was made free from the Sinai covenant so that righteousness might come by faith in the One who kept that covenant perfectly.

Jeremiah prophesied, by the word of the Lord, that a new covenant would be given, not according to the covenant that God made with their fathers in the day that he took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, for they broke that covenant. (Jeremiah 31:31-34)

As Moses was commanded to make new tablets to replace the first that were broken, so Christ would provide a new covenant to replace the first.

The New Covenant provided that the law would not be written in tables of stone but on the tables of the heart, as spoken by the Psalmist, “Then said I, Lo, I come: in the volume of the book it is written of me, I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart.” (Psalm 40:7-8)

Jeremiah wrote, likewise, “But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel: After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.” (Jeremiah 31:33)

As Moses broke the first tablets and was commanded to make others to replace them, Christ fulfilled the picture by replacing the covenant that was broken by Israel. Christ, as the Son of Man and Son of God, participated with the Father through obedience in bringing the New Covenant, making him the mediator of the New Covenant to be written on the hearts of his people. For there is only one mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ.

The law of God, first written in stone and later on the fleshly tables of the heart, required a mediator between God and man because of sin. In both cases, God chose a man as an intermediary to deliver his covenant, beginning with Moses as a prefigure of Christ and then sending Christ himself to fulfill that which was spoken by Moses of Him.

However, Moses at the waters of Meribah smote the rock twice to bring forth water—Christ was to be smitten only once. And although Moses was called faithful in all his house, he fell short of perfection by smiting the rock twice and not giving glory to God alone for the miracle. For this sin, Moses was not allowed to lead the people into the promised land—nor was he allowed to enter.

Christ, on the other hand, being the Word of God, walked in perfect obedience; neither did he fail in any point, giving him full rights to lead those who follow and obey him into the kingdom promised by God.

“For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved​.” (1 Timothy 2:5– Acts 4:12)