Let us pray. Father God, as we come before your word this morning. This is a section in Scripture. At certain areas we believe we already know well. But let your word speak to us in new ways this morning. Ways that are true. From your word. There are other areas in this passage which sometimes have caused confusion to others and to maybe even us. Let us better understand those things which might confuse us this morning. We ask you to do this through the power of your spirit. It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. By show of hands, if I were to say, who are the Houthi? How many of you know what I'm talking about? The Houthi. Okay. That was actually more than I expected. You guys keep up on your current events. If I were to say the Houthi in Yemen, I would guess a few more of you might know what we're talking about or what I'm talking about. 40 days ago, the Houthi attacked a Greek vessel, and the US launched its first of four barrages of missile strikes thus far against the Houthi people. That started 40 days ago. I guess they just did it again about last night. Another barrage of launches. 40 days. January 16th, I believe. That's the span of time. Here we come to a passage where it's been 40 days since the people of God received the law of God from the mouth of God, the presence of God abiding at the top of God's holy mountain, where elders, 70 elders actually had communion with God and through an incredible The act of God got to see a glimpse of God's heavenly throne room. Forty days. The amount of time you've known who the Huthi are. And they had this experience. Two, where we reach at this moment today, the utter abandonment of God. The utter leaving of God. And forsaking of God. It doesn't take long to abandon God. God has just finished his instructions on how to build out the tabernacle and how this sanctuary will serve to provide a place for his presence to be. He's explained that as how important the Sabbath is as a covenant sign of of this covenant promise that the Sabbath is actually a sanctifying force in the lives of his lives of his people. And he's now handed Moses a finger carved copy of the Ten Commandments. After Moses had already previously written them down, providing them to the people and the people had heard. All these threads are coming together at the top of the mountain, but at the bottom of God's holy hill, we find things are beginning to unravel. The other side of the thread is becoming undone. And we know this story well, or we believe we know this story well, and we go, oh yeah, that's the golden calf story. That's the golden calf episode. But the first thing I want you to realize, and I really think it totally changes how we look, especially at the verses we're in today, is does it really begin with a golden calf? Does this abandonment of the God in which they just had communion with 40 days earlier? Moses is only up the mountain, by the way, if you remember from Exodus 20, because when they heard from God, they found him terrifying, and they didn't want to hear from God anymore. he revealed his commandments. And they said, Moses, will you go and speak to him? We don't want to hear directly from him anymore. And the problem starts earlier than the golden calf for these people. You could maybe in one sense say the problem might start when they don't want to hear from God anymore, and they would rather, you know, you pastor, you elder, you do those study things, you get into the Word of God, we don't need it. But in our text today, we can see the idolatry happen far before the golden calf. Let's see if we can stop. Let me read it. When the people saw that Moses was delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him. Did you spot it? Did you spot the idolatry? Who saved this people from slavery? Was it Moses? No, it was not Moses who saved these people from slavery. If we just went back to Exodus chapter 20 and we read the preamble of the Ten Commandments, the commandments that say, keep the Lord first, do not build idols, do not use the Lord's name in vain, keep holy the Sabbath, that same law before God gives it, what does he declare? In verse two, I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, The people moved on from crediting the Lord who saved them right here at verse 1. Right here at verse 1, they no longer credit the Lord who saved them, but rather They are looking to Moses. They are attributing their salvation to this fallen individual, Moses. And the amazing thing, one of the amazing things I discovered in my study this week, I told people how I've been reading Jewish commentaries along with Christian commentaries, and I could not believe the number of rabbis that actually take the position that the golden calf is a sinful event, not because of the idolatry that it displays in worshiping God, but that they're trying to replace Moses. And I'm reading them, their commentaries are going, you're falling into the same trap. Moses didn't save this people. And so at the very start of Exodus chapter 32, it goes off track because they forget who they've been saved by. If you forget who you've been saved by, the whole thing, you've lost the whole plot. You've lost the whole redemptive narrative. It doesn't matter if you're an Old Testament individual. It doesn't matter if you're a New Testament individual. If you do not know it is God and God alone who saves you out of the slavery of life, you've missed it. You've already committed the sin of idolatry. You've already committed the sin of forsaking God and the salvation that he provides. And so it actually happens at the very beginning here in this passage. Here was Moses only up the mountain again because the people no longer wanted to hear directly from God. They didn't want to hear his word. And 40 days later, this same people that didn't want to hear directly from God. They didn't want to hear directly from the Word of the Lord anymore. They absolutely get devastated by the problem of sin. They forget who saved them. They distort who God is. They distort what He has done for them. And they no longer even care to consider the Word that He has given them. And without any great deliberation, any great plotting, people start going the way of the world. The drift happens. It's sort of like the dangers of texting while driving on a cell phone, or using your cell phone while driving. You can drift right into an accident. The drift just happens. They take their focus off of God, off of the salvation that He has offered, off of His Word, and they just go the way of the world. And that is the great idolatry that begins our passage. The golden calf is just a natural expression of the idolatry that they fall into. And how does this all happen? Who starts it all? What starts it all? Well, the passage moves us down the mountain. And really, the first person to blame for this, and Moses will eventually make it clear, is Aaron. Both he and her were put in charge of the camp. as we saw earlier in Exodus. And Moses had left Aaron with the laws that God wanted them to obey and follow. A God that Aaron had communion with. A God that let Aaron see a glimpse of His heavenly tabernacle. His heavenly throne. A God who saved them from Egypt. A God who allowed Aaron to hold the great staff that the Lord did great things through. And Aaron folds. from his pastoral duties. And why does he do it? Because that's what the people wanted. We're living in a scary time geopolitically, not because of the Houthi. We're living in a scary time politically. We have all these kind of unique potential powder keg areas of the world, and even our country is a powder keg. But you know the most frightening thing of all? It is pastors who, under the pressure from people who want the faith to be more worldly, are caving left and right. are absolutely folding. They're committing the sin of Aaron. They're boldly coming up with a new idea, a new way. You know, that God with those laws, He makes those people so salty. They're like those salty curmudgeons, those people. We got a better way. We got a we got a more vibrant way, a more fun way, a more acceptable way. Everybody can participate. Everybody is welcome. Whatever you want, whatever you want to go goes. And it's terrifying. Because this kind of sin. is powerful and it moves quickly, as we can see from this passage, and it can utterly devastate societies. 23,000 people will die from this sin and the consequences of this sin. Sin leads to death. Pastor, it feels boring. It feels irrelevant. I don't like waiting on God. It seems so quiet. I'm unmoved. I'm unimpressed. I don't want a salvation offered by God alone. I don't want to heed His commands. His commands really aren't relevant today. And that pressure is devastating our church. all throughout the world, but especially America. And this elder who lacks courage and errant in this moment, who couldn't wait upon God or heed his word, starts making up commandments of his own, as you can see. He actually, we often talk about like an anti-Christ, he's making an anti-tabernacle. God had designed a tabernacle he wanted to live in, he wanted to abide in, he wanted to put his presence in. These people create a tabernacle of their own design that They believe God will want to live in, and it's exactly the opposite of what God wanted. And notice the first thing that Aaron asks for. He makes a commandment. Well, first he actually uses a worldly symbol. He uses a golden calf. You know, I'm Teaching the middle school class all through history, we're literally going from creation to 9-11 in 28 weeks, and you know I'm a long-winded person. That's a very tall task to do. But I remember a couple lessons in after we talked about, you know, the Indus River Valley civilization, which is in India. And we talked about the Mycenaeans and the Macedonians and others. And we saw how they kind of worshipped, and that's modern day kind of Greece area. And we looked at the Egyptians, and we've looked at the Romans, and we've looked at the, you know, the Babylonians and others. How there was this moment where all of a sudden, the students realized, all these people worshipped cows. There's like some pagan god to cows. And it's true, even in Egypt, one of the plagues was a plague essentially a little bit against the god Abbas in Egypt, who was a cow god. He was represented by a bull. Even Baal, when they get into Canaan, while Baal is a rider on the clouds, he's kind of the sky god, he's represented in a bull. These people want a worldly god. A worldly God made in the image of other religions. I think about the question C.S. Lewis was asked. Oh, when all those theologians and scholars and philosophers from Oxford were in the same room and they had all decided from whatever background they came from, oh, all religions are the same. They all lead to the same conclusion, these sorts of things. Can you see any difference, C.S. Lewis? And C.S. Lewis had one of the greatest lines I think the Lord ever inspired him to say. Said oh yes. There's something different about Christianity grace. There's grace in Christianity. We have a different faith. Our faith isn't called to look like the world it is, but that grace also comes at a cost. And it also comes at a cost for those who refuse it as this passage shows. And Aaron now, he would have made Karl Marx proud. He commands for the heads of households to take all the earrings from the children and the spouses and the wives, because they're going to make an idol. They're going to make a cow, the world symbol of lordship, the world symbol of leadership, the world symbol of strength, the world symbol of vitality and energy and fertility and all these things boiled into it. They're going to make a God in the world's image that the world wants to worship. And as Aaron receives this gold, he fashions it into a mold. And notice what the people now say. They're taking steps into the dungeons of sin. No longer are they accrediting Moses with their salvation. Look how it changes. These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Now they've fallen into a form of paganism. It's bad enough when they were accrediting Moses with their salvation from slavery, but that's the pattern of sin. It just keeps getting darker and deeper and more depressing. Romans 1 helps summarize this towards the later verses of that chapter. A new counterfeit religion has been born. There's an anti-tabernacle with an anti-gospel, with a gospel that falsely claims a litany of gods paganistically came together in order to save these people out of Egypt. And now Aaron and seeing his cow, we see in verse five he needs an altar in front of that cow, so he builds an altar too. And Aaron seeing it all gets so impressed, he looks at it and says, so you know, tomorrow we're gonna have a festival. Tomorrow we're gonna have a feast day. Tomorrow we're gonna have a celebration. See how quickly sin deteriorates? First, they got salvation wrong. When you get salvation wrong, it's not easy to correct. And then they didn't consult the Word of God in order to correct their mistake, nor did they heed His commandments. Rather, they took the initiative, instead of waiting on God, the initiative to create a demonic tabernacle. And then they demanded offerings not freely given as the Lord wanted for his tabernacle. They did not prepare themselves inwardly for worship as the Lord wanted to prepare themselves for worship in his tabernacle. They did not regard God's presence as holy to be guarded and to respect be respected. No, rather, God was a simple thing. You really don't need much thought to it. You can come up with a good God to worship in a matter of a couple seconds if you try hard enough. The invisible transcendent God was replaced with a visible earthly image. And a living personal God who had been speaking to them had been replaced with a mute, lifeless idol. And much of today's church mirrors this first congregation of the Lord's idolatry. We often disregard scripture's teachings on worship or on what the law is, and we want to just do it our way. Consequently, many churchgoers approach worship as consumers and leaders to often indulge preferences rather than what we all should strive for, greater faithfulness in the worship that we present before God. And the problem is, people get excited about these kinds of things, as we can see in the text. And yet all the while, the God who saves through his word that gives life is lost in midst of it all and becomes an afterthought. And so Aaron calls for this feast day and they're so excited for it. We can see in that verse 6. I believe it is. They wake up early. Not a moment too soon, right? It's kind of like Christmas morning here in this this camp. They want to celebrate and they brought out burnt offerings and they brought out peace offerings and they sat and they ate and they drank. And after eating and drinking, verse 6 says they rose up to play. As the ESV translated plates it. What does to play mean? Remember the story of Potiphar's wife with Joseph? Which she falsely accused Potiphar of, of raping her? I'm off again. Again, either longer or... I guess I gotta look through my headset. Don't worry, Potiphar. The same word that Moses will use to describe what Potiphar's wife did, that same word is used here in Exodus 32, verse 6. Are we okay now? What? Not quite right. Okay. It is what it is at this point. All right. I already feel weird enough wearing a different headset. If you think I'm wrong on this allusion, all you need to know is what the Apostle Paul writes on this in 1 Corinthians 10, verses 7 and 8. When he's talking to a Corinthian church that is struggling because it continues to accept sexual sin, that is, the Lord finds perverse and wrong, notice what the Apostle Paul says. Do not be idolaters. As some were, as it is written, the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. We must not indulge in sexual immorality, as some of them did, and 23,000 fell in a single day. And so here God is, and as He's wrapping up the loose ends of the tabernacle on top of the mountain, here down the mountain is a great multitude unraveling, living as one's headed for destruction. And it struck me this week how much this passage is an illustration of America. God's still in Zion. God's still in His heavenly throne. He's still seated on His throne. And how many people in this land have stopped wanting to hear from him? Have stopped wanting to hear from his words? I've gotten bored with the entire idea. And they've just gone their own way. And our nation has embraced the idols of sexual debauchery and wickedness in the aftermath. I was just reading a statistic this week. In the year 1990, Trinity College, which sort of does its own Pew Research poll, they started tracking the Wiccan religion in America. If you don't know, Wiccanism was really kind of invented in the peace-love era of the 1960s as a feminist movement. It's a feminist witchcraft. Woman witches. There were 9,000 Americans. 9,000 American women in 1990 who identified as Wiccans. It's probably, like, roughly around the people in Harleysville, maybe? Do you know how many there are today? They last checked in 2021. They're roughly at, they're over 2 million, they're approaching 3 million. By the way, the city proper of Philadelphia has 1.5 million people in it. You could put the city of Denver, San Francisco, and Seattle, they're city areas, together. And those cities would not add up to how many Wiccans we now have in our country. Because when you depart from the Word of God, when people wholesale stop wanting to hear from the Word of God, they create their own religion. There is no atheists, there's just other new religions. You get a gathering of ten people claiming to be an atheist, you get a gathering of ten different religions. That's what you get a gathering of. It's just people who want to be their own God and create their own idea of God. That's what happens down the mountain. That's what happens down here on earth when we stop heeding the words of our Lord and Savior upon the holy hill. When we forsake the word of God. That's what we find. And this people that God has previously in the Exodus said, these are my people. All throughout the early chapter, starting in chapter three and several times, about six or seven times, my people, my people, my people. The Lord shifts them in his words. He actually says this to Moses, as we shift back now, as we look what's going on down the mountain, up down the mountain, we go back up. Notice what God says, and the Lord said to Moses, go down to your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt. They have corrupted themselves. Did you notice at that time? Did Moses bring them up out of the land of Egypt? No. God's actually speaking sarcastically, but for those of you who don't like when I use that word, ironically, but the reality is the prophets and God sometimes speak sarcastically. He's speaking tongue in cheek. But the reality is this people, have no remembrance of the salvation that God had provided and who provided that salvation that they received. Is it any wonder that, for instance, God is going to look at some people who consider themselves lifelong Christians and say to them, depart from me, I never knew you. So many people don't know what they're saved from or who they're saved by. And this means that the mission field, in looking at this text, isn't just out there. The mission field is within the congregation as well, because it only took 40 days for somebody without the Word of God, this collection of people, and not being in the presence of God, with a faithful shepherd, for this congregation to be lost. And the worship that they come up with looks like an outdoor brothel. And God, in verse 8, makes clear their lack of faith to the true God is going to have consequences. And Moses in this moment, as he hears what's going on below, he's in utter shock. I actually believe the text seems to make clear he's speechless. That's why there is this, notice that 8 and 9, and yet it tells us God speaks again, starting in verse 9. Well, it's not explicitly said. If I have to guess why Moses put this in, it's because there was this moment where Moses doesn't know what to do with his people down the mountain. He can't process the full enormity of how these people have fallen away from God and have gotten everything so wrong and embrace the things of the world so quickly. And I have to kind of know what this looks like. You heard about the woman who woke up after a five year coma this week. I mean, poor woman. I wonder if they keep her away from the headlines for a little while and she recovers. But haven't you felt? That strain, that dumpstruck kind of reality, and you see the world go the way the world is going? How can this be? And how it could be is they forgot who their Savior was, and they forgot the heinous word. And unless we go the same way, we cannot fall into the same trap. The power of sin to deceive large numbers is staggering. And in verse 10, God now says, now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them, and that I might consume them, in order that I might make a great nation of you. And this is one of those moments people get twisted at times, starting to say, God isn't sovereign, or maybe he's changing a plan. I assure you by the end of this, you'll have a better understanding of what's being said, but bear with me a moment. Let's just consider immediate context. God is actually offering Moses something that's rather remarkable in verse 10. Moses is technically a descendant of Abraham, and God basically is telling Moses, Hey Moses, I can wipe off the slate again, and you'll kind of be a second Abraham. And one of the things that we get to learn in this moment is this is no longer the Moses of Exodus chapter three and Exodus chapter four. That Moses was selfish, that Moses was often petty, that Moses often put a variety of things up against God of why he didn't want to go help save his people. He has totally changed in the course of basically 29 chapters. Where the reason is that he didn't want to serve this people earlier, Moses' faith has now grown, and he is no longer an under-shepherd of the Lord who's putting his own interests first, but rather, his love is now set upon this people, and he wants to see them saved. And Moses, after 40 days in the midst of God, and was offered this great honor, and he hugs it down to this moment, so that sinners below God's mountain could be saved. Because the purpose of life is not to seek your own glory or for the greater advancement of your own household, nor the better portion is to seek above all else God's glory and the salvation of God's people. Then Moses in verses 11 through 13 gives three reasons to God he should save his people. And yet, before we consider these things, let's just be clear. Who inspires Moses to say these inscripturated words? The Holy Spirit. And so be careful not to think God is not at work in the argument that Moses gives as to why God should save sinners at the bottom of the mountain. The first point made by the mediator is that why would you save a people only to destroy them? Why would you save a people only to destroy them? You know, I come from a Roman Catholic family, and every once in a while, one of my Roman Catholic family members will come to me and try to make an appeal, you know, turn the Protestant pastor back around, get him back on the full, put him back on the Roman team, right? You know why I can't ever go back to Rome? Just look at Moses' first point in the argument. Rome teaches that you can lose your soulmate. Rome teaches that, yeah, God will save you, but the rest is up to you, and you can be damned. That's a false gospel. It's a false gospel, and it's always been a false gospel. And Moses, in his first point, articulates that's no gospel at all, basically. You can't allow that to happen. If you're working to be a God who saves, you have to fully save those people, is what he says. And really, if you want a quick definition of the Reformation, what the Reformation was, was Spirit-born believers recognizing that truth once again. The second reason, now in verse 12 given, is to prevent evil from celebrating the fact that God tried to save somebody, but now they're judged. You want to know another reason you can be assured that you can't lose your salvation, Christian? If you're one of His? If you're spirit-born? If God has truly removed the scales from your eyes, why the serpent never will capture you again? It's because God will not allow evil to have such a celebration. This is the story of Job, and it's actually true of all of us individually as believers. We learn this in the story of Job. The devil can try his best, but he can never steal the salvation of Job, or you, or I. The third thing Moses says, through the power of the Holy Spirit to God, as to why God can't destroy this people, is because God made a promise. God made a promise. I love that scene. I think it's my favorite scene in the movies of Lord of the Rings. And it's at the end of the first film, when Frodo's leaving on the boat, and he's going to the other side. He's leaving the Fellowship. He's leaving them all behind. And Samwise Gingy, who cannot swim, enters the water. And he's getting ready to drown. He's getting ready to die. And Frodo pulls him up on the boat. And Frodo kind of gets mad at him. Why would you risk your life for such a thing? Why would you put yourself in a third of death for such a thing? And Samwise looks to Frodo, and he says to Frodo, I made a promise, Mr. Frodo. A promise. Don't leave him, Samwise Gamgee. And I don't mean to. God made a promise, is what Moses says. And by the way, notice what finally happens in verse 13. That was a problem starting in verse 1. We saw the drift. We saw the drift into the car crash. First it began with salvation found in a Pope. Oh wait, I meant to say Moses, my bad. Then it shifted into a salvation found in super saints, like St. Francis, oh no, I'm sorry. My bad again. Idols and false gods. And this third and final point of Moses made through the power in the spirit. Finally, the redemptive purpose of the salvation of the people Hasn't been brought back. No longer is it found in a variety of gods. No longer is it found in Moses. But here, speaking through the power of the Spirit, the hope of salvation goes back to God. Because that is the only hope of salvation. It is the salvation found in the Lord our God. And when the words of this passage, when people start embracing a biblical faith once again, a faith that says, God has given a promise, a promise for redemption of slavery and his sin, that he would crush sin. And he doesn't mean to break it. Finally, Moses writes in verse 14, the Lord read the lens. And yet I assure you, I would explain the fact that this is not God changing his mind. And I only have to illustrate it with one story from the Bible we all know well. It's Jonah. Jonah. Here are the first two verses of the story of Jonah. Now the word of the Lord came to Jonah, son of Amittai, saying, Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach against it, because of its wickedness, because its wickedness has come up before me. Can you imagine that? Imagine if God woke me up this morning and said, Kevin, go to D.C. and preach instant, for its wickedness is offensive to me this morning. I'd be like, Lord, where do I start? Start with the letter agencies or the halls of power. What does Jonah do? He runs away, because he knows Exodus 32. He knows Exodus 32. He knows that God who pronounces judgment on a people, God who is being merciful to a people, and a God who will save people through that fear of death. and embrace the salvation he offers. And so, Jonah gets out of town, and it takes a great fish to swallow him up, and then by chapter three, he's preaching for three days in Nineveh, and about how in 40 days, it's all gonna be destroyed. And what happens by chapter four? We get Jonah saying the following, because Jonah wrote his own book. Basically, the story of Jonah is his own confession. Jonah, however, was greatly displeased, and he became angry, and this is because Nineveh repented. So he prayed to the Lord, saying, O Lord, is this not what I said while I was still in my own country? This is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew you were a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger, abounding in loving devotion, one who relents from sustaining disaster, And now, O Lord, please take my life for me, for it is better for me to die than live. And you know what? That is an unholy request by the prophet, and God will not honor that one as well. God forgives, God saves Jonah as well. Jonah knew the character of God in Genesis chapter 32, and he knew that God didn't promise Abraham to only bless one nation, but that he'd be the father of many nations, and so he ran. He ran because he knew the promises of God. And yet he hated them. Whereas this moment, this mediator, Moses, has successfully pointed us back in the right direction, not looking to save the fallen individuals for our salvation, not looking to false gods to save us, not making false religions or false doctrines. No. He teaches us to recenter upon God. And Moses picks up the two tablets. And he begins heading back down the mountain. He begins, even though those tablets, while they have not been physically broken yet, they have already been utterly broken by the people. In all sorts of sin and licentiousness and ugliness, we have a God who has made a promise. We have a God who offers a full and entire salvation for His people. And that salvation is called to change us and to draw us closer to Him. And we have a God who sends His people into communities that have struggled to love the Lord, into relationships, into a collection society that refuses him in order that we might be a ministry and we might minister and we might offer grace and share the love of the Lord with others. How far do we go to pursue those in love who we've been wronged by? How far do we go to overlook sin? These are difficult things to pursue at times. But what this passage shows our God to be is a God who continues to reach out to pursue those who refuse Him. Let us be changed by such a love. Amen? Amen. Let us pray. Father God, who ordained all things to come to pass, I pray that a good portion of this Word, that which was right and pleasing to you, will be remembered by us. Let us not forget the One who gives us salvation, a full salvation, a final salvation. And let us continue to abide by His Word. Let the pressures of the world not change the people that we are called to be in You. Let us not forsake You. Let us not give in to idols. Let us stand patiently and firm, faithfully, loving and serving the Lord our God. who went down the mountain in order to save people like us. I pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.