It is 1450 BC. The people of Yahweh have been camped at the base of Mount Sinai for about a year. They are about to pull up stakes and walk through hostile territory to the Promised Land. Moses goes to the Tent of Meeting to speak with Yahweh.
He says to Yahweh, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight and your people. Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?” (Exodus 33:15-16, English Standard Version).