God Wants to be Our... Friend?

If I had no faith and I were reading the Bible as narrative what would I make of the character, Yahweh? He creates man and woman in his likness and hangs out with them. It's almost like he was lonely and there wasn't anyone like him, so he created beings that were like him so that he could be not so alone.

I get this sense over and over again.  I've gotten it recently in my reading of Exodus.  It's almost like, Yeah, this Exodus thing is good.  This could work.  They've been lost for so long, but they could become my people again. It could work this time.  

I've missed having friends since Adam and Eve... and since Cain killed Abel.  After that, whoa, it got real bad.  I figured I'd start over with Noah.  Noah was cool; we could've been friends, but then his kids were such screw-ups. And then we were back to how things were before the flood. 

There were some good times with Abraham, and his kid Isaac was cool.  And Jacob too (Esau... not so much).  But the the cylce started again in the next generation. Joseph was cool, so his brothers decide, what?  Let's kill him!  Deja vu. Levi -- I could work with him and his descendants -- but the rest...

Fast forward to all that idolatry, inner-marrying, mucking about in Egypt.  Boom.  Slavery.  All right, let's try again with Moses.  Geography is important.  You know what they say: "Location, location, location!' Let's get these people somewhere they can call their own.  Somewhere where there's not so much outside influence.  Somewhere where I can dwell (hang out) with them again.  Although it won't be like with Adam and Eve.  It's not like they can stand being with me face to face... so we'll have to build, like, a sanctuary or something.

Which is where I'm at in my Bible reading which makes me think what I'm thinking, especially with these  passages: 

Exodus 23:14

¹⁴ “Three times a year you are to celebrate a festival to me.

Exodus 24:1; 9-11; 15-18

1 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance, ² but Moses alone is to approach the Lord; the others must not come near. And the people may not come up with him.”...

⁹ Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up ¹⁰ and saw the God of Israel. Under his feet was something like a pavement made of lapis lazuli, as bright blue as the sky. ¹¹ But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God, and they ate and drank....
¹⁵ When Moses went up on the mountain, the cloud covered it, ¹⁶ and the glory of the Lord settled on Mount Sinai. For six days the cloud covered the mountain, and on the seventh day the Lord called to Moses from within the cloud. ¹⁷ To the Israelites the glory of the Lord looked like a consuming fire on top of the mountain. ¹⁸ Then Moses entered the cloud as he went on up the mountain. And he stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights.

Exodus 25:8-9
⁸ “Then have them make a sanctuary for me, and I will dwell among them. ⁹ Make this tabernacle and all its furnishings exactly like the pattern I will show you.

It's these verses especially that have me thinking:

[They] saw the God of Israel... But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God, and they ate and drank...

I know I'm bordering on sacrilege, but doesn't it seem like God has a double standard?  It's like he's saying on the one hand, I'm too holy for these people.  Moses, take your sandals off; you're standing on holy ground.  Moses, tell the people that if anyone -- man or beast -- touches the mountain where I live, they'll surely be put to death... but Moses you and your buddies can come on up for dinner.

So what's my take away? Maybe it's not only us who live with the tension of God being holy and inexorably beyond us and God being manifest in his son Jesus and his Holy Spirit who want to be our friend and brother...