This afternoon's text comes from Exodus chapter 32. For the last several weeks, we have been with Moses up at the top of Mount Sinai, listening to the voice of God as he has conveyed the instructions for the tabernacle to Moses, the Lord's mouthpiece. This morning we are finally coming back down the mountain to see what Israel has been up to, and the descent that we are making, as you may be aware, can be understood in more than one sense. There's the physical descent down the mountain, and then there is the spiritual, moral descent, the spiritual decline that you find in chapter 32. This is one of Israel's darkest, most infamous episodes in their entire history. that we have under examination this morning, and it has so very much to teach us. So with God's help, let's turn our hearts to hear his word, and then we'll consider what the Lord would have to say. Exodus chapter 32, beginning in verse one. When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves 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. So Aaron said to them, take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me. So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, these are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, tomorrow shall be a feast to Yahweh. And he rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. And Yahweh said to Moses, go down for your people whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, these are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. And Yahweh said to Moses, I have seen this people. And behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore let me alone that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them in order that I may make a great nation of you. But Moses implored Yahweh his God and said, oh Yahweh, why does your wrath burn hot against your people whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, with evil intent did he bring them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth? "'Turn from your burning anger "'and relent from this disaster against your people. "'Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, "'to whom you swore by your own self, "'and said to them, "'I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, "'and all this land that I have promised, "'I will give to your offspring, "'and they shall inherit it forever.' "'And Yahweh relented from the disaster "'that he had spoken of bringing on his people. Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand. Tablets that were written on both sides, on the front and on the back they were written. The tablets were the work of God and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, there is a noise of war in the camp. But he said, it is not the sound of shouting for victory or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear. And as soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses's anger burned hot and he threw the tablets out of his hand and broke them at the foot of the mountain. He took the calf that they had made and burned it with fire and ground it to powder and scattered it on the water and made the people of Israel drink it. And Moses said to Aaron, what did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them? And Aaron said, Let not the anger of my Lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are set on evil. For they said to me, 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. So I said to them, let any who have gold take it off. So they gave it to me and I threw it into the fire and out came this calf. When Moses saw that the people had broken loose, for Aaron had let them break loose to the derision of their enemies, then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, who is on Yahweh's side? Come to me. And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. And he said to them, thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, put your sword on your side, each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor. And the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses. In that day about 3,000 men of the people fell. And Moses said, today you have been ordained for the service of Yahweh, each one at the cost of his son and at the cost of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day. The next day Moses said to the people, you have sinned a great sin, and now I will go up to Yahweh Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin. So Moses returned to Yahweh and said, alas, this people has sinned a great sin. They've made for themselves gods of gold, but now, if you will forgive their sin, but if not, please blot me out of your book that you have written. But Yahweh said to Moses, whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you. Behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them. Then Yahweh sent a plague on the people because they made the calf, the one that Aaron made. The last time we heard from Israel, it was in Exodus chapter 24 and verse 13. What do we find there? Well, it is their strong affirmation to the covenant that the Lord made with them. It says that Moses came down and told the people all the words of the Lord and all the rules and all the people answered with one voice and said, all the words that the Lord has spoken, we will do. Now we change scenes. And you can hardly find a stronger antithesis between their stated commitment and their actual practice. What went wrong? What happened? Before we attempt to answer that question, I want to ask you whether you can identify with that kind of observation yourself on a personal level. Can you recognize in your own life, on some level, a disconnect between your stated commitment to the Lord and your actual practice? Have you said on the one hand, I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back. And then on the other hand, you find that you do turn back. that your faithfulness to Christ does not rise to the level of your professed commitment. I raise that now at the beginning because we're inclined to look at a passage like this with a sense of spiritual superiority. That's just the way that we are in the pride of our flesh. We will be inclined to distance ourself from this kind of passage, something that looks so stunningly obvious to us and think, well, I could never stoop so low. This really has no application to me. But we all stumble in many ways, James says. So if we can concede that, if we will humble ourselves and recognize at the outset that we're actually not that all together different than Israel, God can do a work in us. God can change our hearts. He can transform us and sanctify us to the praise of his glory. In 40 days time, Israel has turned from all that they had come to know about the Lord, his gracious deliverance of them out of Egypt. Now just remember, these are the ones that had seen the Lord smite their oppressors with 10 plagues. Water turned to blood, frogs, gnats, flies, boils, the death of the firstborn, and so on. They'd watch the Lord deliver them across the Red Sea and apart from any involvement of their own, no less. You remember his words, fear not, stand firm, see the salvation of the Lord, which he will work for you. The Lord will fight for you. You have only to be silent. They'd partaken of his provision in the desert with the manna and the quail. So what went wrong? Look at verse one. First you see the people sizing up the predicament that they find themselves in. It says that the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain. Now the question that has to be asked at this point is according to whose schedule had Moses delayed? It wasn't God's. It wasn't Moses's. It was the people's. there was a presumption on the part of the people about the sort of timetable that the Lord should be working on. And the consequence was that they began to grow impatient. They stopped waiting on the Lord. They stopped putting their trust in the Lord, fearing Him, and they began to wring their hands. They began to fret over the circumstances that they found themselves in. And impatience is a big part of this puzzle, but there's something more here. There's something that's at the root of their impatience. Look at what the people say to Moses in verse one. They say, up, make us gods who shall go before us. That helps us get underneath the hood a little bit further. It's the very same expression. Make us gods who shall go before us. That idea of someone leading us that you find back in chapter 13 where it says that the Lord went before them in a pillar of cloud to lead them along the way. Well now we find Israel in this situation where they can't quite see the way forward. Things aren't working out the way they expected. Life isn't going the way that they had hoped for. And the thing that we have to emphasize throughout this whole episode is that Israel is surveying their circumstances with nothing but their natural eyes. Nothing but their natural eyes. They take their spiritual eyes, the eyes of faith, off the Lord, and they begin to use what they can see with their physical eyes. They look out at their circumstances, and it's on the basis of that that they move forward. What happens? They become stressed out, they're fearful, they're anxious about the future, and so what do they do? Where does this kind of mentality lead them? Well, desperation sets in, and they immediately begin running to other things. They immediately begin running to what they know, running to what they're familiar with, and this is key, running to what they can see. Israel is fearful. They're fearful that they are going to go unaccompanied into this new foreign land, and so they resort to their senses. They start looking for something tangible, something that they can lay hold of with their natural senses. Something that will give them the sort of comfort that they long for. Something that will give them the security that they're craving. Something that will deliver them from the fears that they're facing. They're looking for a savior. Now brothers and sisters, it's not as if Israel doesn't have a cause for concern, humanly speaking here. The land that they are going to is positively filled with enemies. It's filled with enemies that they don't have the power to deal with. They don't have the resources to contend with the enemies that they're going to face on their own. But the question they were facing is the same one we're actually facing today. And it's this, will we be ruled by our fears or will we put our trust in the Lord? Will we walk by sight or will we consciously, deliberately look to the only one who has the power to save us? The only one who has the power to calm our fears and grant peace and hope to the heart. It's the same problem at root. You see, it seems so far removed from the life that we live, but it's not at all. It's the very same thing at root. Israel chose unbelief. They chose faithlessness. And you can see the fruit of that in everything that follows in the rest of this passage. Their vision of God begins to dim and it leads to misery. It leads to ruin and to disaster. The people say, as for this Moses, we don't know what's become of him. And you can hear the derision in their voice, as for this Moses. That gives you an indication already, they're beginning to rationalize their course of action in their mind. They're thinking to themselves, well, our leaders failed us. We've got a good reason to think the way that we're thinking. Of course, so is Aaron. Aaron's failed them as well. The people asked for gods, and what do you get out of Aaron? Nary a word of protest, nothing that says, what are you thinking? We're here to trust in the name of the Lord. He just invites them to bring their jewelry forward. He melts it down and fashions it into a golden calf. And in just a blink of an eye, they revert back to what they know. They revert back to what they're familiar with. They revert back to the gods of Egypt. And you see how brazen Aaron's claim is here. He says, these are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Aaron lifts the very words of God. The words that the Lord himself uses to preface the Decalogue in chapter 20, where Yahweh says, I am the Lord your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. What does Aaron do? He tips the hat to the calf. He gives the credit to an idol. And in doing so, he gives them something they can see. He gives them something visible. And this is the attraction of idolatry. This is the attraction of so many false sources of salvation. It places the emphasis on what is not of faith. on what you can hold on to, again, with your natural senses. We have a saying in our day that seeing is believing. Well, brothers and sisters, that's a thoroughly unbiblical way of understanding the truth about God and man and the world and eternity as the Lord has revealed it to us. Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Hebrews 11 says that it was by faith Moses left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible. That's something you can appropriate today in your own life. Are you this day in the face of all of your fears and pressing concerns enduring as seeing him who is invisible? Putting your trust in an invisible God. Moses was governed by the eyes of faith. Israel now has a visible idol. And then if you look at verse five, you have Aaron building an altar and he makes this proclamation saying, tomorrow shall be a feast to Yahweh. He dares to suggest that the whole affair shall be a feast to the Lord. So which is it? Is this a case of rank idolatry? Or is this just a well-meaning priest to be that has somehow gone off the rails for a minute? To put it another way, is this a violation of the first commandment? You shall have no other gods before me? Or is it a violation of the second? You shall not make for yourself a carved image. In a real sense, it's both. It's both. That's part of the seduction and the allure of this whole situation. The golden calf serves whatever purpose you want it to serve. It's idolatrous in that Israel has exchanged the glory of the immortal God for creative things. Paul talks about this in Romans chapter one, how the natural man takes the truth about God and he exchanges it for a lie and he worships and serves the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. And at the same time, it's syncretistic in that it provides the people of Israel with an opportunity to try to worship the one true God by way of created things, by way of images. And so in that way, Israel has broken the first and second commandment before Moses ever gets off the mountaintop. You see the nature of the human heart. Now Aaron's assessment of this whole situation is instructive for us. When he brings out this calf and says, tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord, notice that Aaron has convinced himself that he can have his cake and eat it too. In other words, he has come to believe that he can hang on to the remnants of orthodoxy. He can hang on to the remnants of right worship, to sacrifices, and there's an altar and a sacred assembly. Those trappings of orthodoxy are there, but so is the idol. Both are there. But everyone remember, This is a feast unto Yahweh. So he's working himself over in his mind. He is justifying himself, saying, well, we haven't really turned from the Lord. Aaron doesn't believe for a moment that he's given himself over to full-blown apostasy. But can you see that seduction of sin? You see the degree to which we are capable of rationalizing our departures from the Lord. Church, do you recognize that propensity in your own heart? Can you see that tendency to work things over in your mind and to justify yourself? Now at this point, Moses is still up on the mountaintop. He is not able to see what God is able to see. Look at the terms the Lord describes things in, in verse seven and eight. He says, they have corrupted themselves. This is not a feast to the Lord. It's corruption. Beloved, God has called us to pure, unalloyed worship. Not Christ plus idols, not Christ plus self-reliance, single-minded devotion in all that we do. Israel has corrupted themselves. The Lord says that they've also turned aside quickly out of the way that I have commanded them. What way was that? We can look at the last words God spoke to Israel before Moses went up to meet the Lord. God said, you shall not make gods of silver to be with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold. The Lord couldn't have been any more clear about his instruction for his people, and yet, what do we find? They turn aside, and they do so quickly. Psalm 106 puts it bluntly. It says they forgot God, their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt, wondrous works in the land of Ham, and awesome deeds by the Red Sea. In 40 days time, they have moved from trembling at the base of the mountain in awe of the holiness of God, in awe of the threat of God's judgment. You remember that scene, if anyone touches the foot of the mountain, they will be stoned. Now they are breaking loose. Have you ever found yourself surprised at just how quickly your heart can turn aside? How quickly you can vacillate between trust and leaning on your own understanding? It's so easy to look at a passage like Exodus 32 and to our minds read it as this unbelievable, almost cartoonish depiction of idolatry, something we would never succumb to. We read it and we find ourselves laughing, thinking, you know, how could they be so foolish? What were they thinking? A golden calf, what good could that possibly have done for them? This is some crass, ancient expression of primitive instincts, isn't it? No, not so, brethren. What you have here is a people driven by the same kind of garden variety fears and anxieties that plague us today. And so what of us? You might not be crafting a golden calf in your backyard, but are there things that you find yourself going to that you know have no power to deliver you? Things that you know in your heart of hearts have no power to save, no power to deliver, no power to grant the kind of comfort that you so desperately long for. We look to other people, to other comforts, to other hopes, to other releases, to other escapes that together can only be relied upon for one thing, which is that they will utterly fail us. They will utterly fail us. In Jeremiah chapter two, the Lord says, has a nation changed its gods even though they are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit. And again, he goes on, for my people have committed two evils. They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed out cisterns for themselves, broken cisterns that can hold no water. Perhaps God in his mercy would be so kind to us today as to reveal those broken cisterns, those false saviors, those comfortless hopes that we run to, those things that we are tempted to run to instead of the Lord our God that we might confess them and forsake them and turn and be healed. Israel is described here as a stiff-necked people. It's the very first time that often used expression is used. They're a stiff-necked people. What is that getting at? Well, it describes the stubbornness and the spiritual obstinacy of a people who are bent on having their own way. Church, I would ask you, what's the alternative to being stiff-necked? Second Chronicles 30 in verse eight says, do not now be stiff-necked as your fathers were, but yield yourselves to the Lord, and come to his sanctuary, which he has consecrated forever, and serve the Lord your God, that his fierce anger may turn away from you. Beloved, yield yourself to the Lord. Come to Him, submit to Him, follow Him in Him alone, serve Him, delight yourself in Him. In 1 Corinthians chapter 10 and verse seven, Paul quotes from our passage today, and he says, do not be idolaters, as some of them were, as it is written, that people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. So the apostle Paul says, under inspiration of the Holy Spirit, do not look at this episode and think to yourself, what were they thinking? Rather, let anyone who thinks they stand take heed, lest they fall. Recognize that the same seedbed of idolatry exists within your own heart and run from it. Run to the Lord Jesus Christ, the fountain of living water. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry. Run to Jesus Christ. Israel is fully steeped in their idolatry. That being the case, the Lord tells Moses in verse 10, now therefore let me alone that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them in order that I may make a great nation of you. It's at this point that we see Moses come and stand between the people and the Lord as the mediator and the intercessor between God and man. Immediately he begins to pray. Immediately he begins to intercede on behalf of the people. Look at verse 11. Moses implored the Lord as God and said, oh Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people? Now church, Moses' question here is rhetorical. It is noteworthy that he never says, but God, I don't understand. Never once does he claim in this passage that Israel doesn't deserve God's wrath. He knows full well why God's anger burns hot against Israel, but he does have a rejoinder to offer. It's essentially a three-point prayer, and I want to look at it with you. He appeals to God first on the basis that Israel is God's people. They belong to him. And there's an interplay between verse 11 and verse seven. If you look at verse seven, the Lord says to Moses, go down for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. And in a sense, that's true. It's absolutely true. Moses is the representative of the Lord to the people and of the people to the Lord. But in a greater, more profound sense, these are God's people whom the Lord has brought up out of the land of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand. Those words at the end, with great power and a mighty hand, are not something that Moses can claim for himself. And that's what Moses says in verse 11. Moses knows his power has nothing to do with Israel's deliverance. He has no power to offer of his own. He is but an instrument, but he is so bold as to take this up with the Lord and turn the Lord's words back on him. These are your people, the people of your special possession. God, would you work on their behalf? Secondly, he argues on the basis of God's own glory and name. Verse 12, why should the Egyptians say, with evil intent did he bring them out to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people. Again, Lord, though you would be perfectly just in pouring out wrath upon your people, what would the Egyptians say? What would the nations all around say? In Deuteronomy chapter nine, he goes into even further detail. He says, and I prayed to the Lord, do not regard the stubbornness of this people, or their wickedness, or their sin, lest the land from which you brought us say, because the Lord was not able to bring them into the land that he promised them. And because he hated them, he has brought them out to put them to death in the wilderness. And so Moses perceives that although the Lord would be right in punishing his people, his actions might be open to wrongful interpretation on the part of other peoples, and we can't have that happening. There is no excusing the fact that Israel has sinned grievously against the Lord. There's no denying the fact that they are worthy of the judgment of God. But if there's one thing that cannot happen, it's that God cannot be made a laughing stock in the world. And you see how Moses' prayer rises beyond the plight of the people. It rises to the very glory and reputation and name of the Lord. He's going to get to their concern. He's going to get to their plight. But first comes the glory of the Lord. First comes the name of the Lord. Have we learned to pray like this? Have we learned to pray this way? Teach us to pray, Master. Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. That is the first petition. That this is of such urgent concern is very telling. It's very instructive when it comes to the heart of Moses. His great desire is to see the name of the Lord vindicated among the nations. His glory exalted, not just in Israel, but in all of the earth. His chief concern is for the name of the Lord, not just the preservation of the people. May the Lord work that kind of heart in the church today. Now thirdly, he does appeal for mercy on the basis of God's promise, verse 13. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self and said to them, I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring and they shall inherit it forever. Moses' prayer isn't an empty plea. He has a basis for his cry. He is looking to the covenant-keeping God, one who has gone on oath, one who has sworn by himself since he had nothing greater to swear by. Moses appeals to God on the basis of the Lord's own word. In verse 10, God looks at Moses and says that he is going to consume Israel and make a great nation out of Moses. The Lord could have used Moses and used him to raise up another generation, and he's not saying here that the Lord would renege on his promise. He could have used Moses to do that, but the line of the promise would not have been so clear. to the nations of the world. You might notice here that when Moses cites from Genesis 26 in verse four, whereas we are accustomed to remembering God's promises, one that is given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Moses strategically uses Israel. It's the nation of Israel that's at stake. It's their destiny that's at hand and it's for their sake, Moses appeals to God. Israel's mediator prays and the Lord relents. Again, this is from Psalm 106, verse 23. Therefore, he said he would destroy them Had not Moses, his chosen one, stood in the breach before him to turn away his wrath from destroying them? We have one who has stood in the breach. We have one who has stood in the gap and turned away the wrath of God on our behalf. We have one in whom mercy is found. Psalm 106 verse 45, for their sake he remembered his covenant and relented according to the abundance of his steadfast love. The Lord showed compassion and pity to his people. Was that not our hope today? to say, Lord, we are weak and sinful men. We have no right to come before you. We deserve judgment. We don't deserve your kindness, but according to your steadfast love, according to the word of the gospel, have mercy on us. Friends, I would remind you that God did not make his face to shine upon you because you were worthy of it in the first place. He will not show mercy on you because of your goodness if you have strayed and need to return to him today. It's not actually until verse 15 that Moses finally begins to make his descent down the mountain. He meets up with Joshua, who's been waiting on him. Joshua hears sound coming from the people. He says, well, there's a noise of war in the camp. Joshua knew what war sounded like. You can imagine something like war cries, shouts of commanders, victory cries, maybe the agony of defeat. Moses knows what Joshua doesn't. The sounds that they hear didn't belong to war, either to the sound of shouting for victory or the sound of the cry of defeat. It was the sound of singing. Probably a frenzied revelry, carousing, weeping, and wailing, the kind of ruckus pagans use to arouse the attention of the gods. As soon as Moses comes near the camp and he sees the calf and the dancing, his anger burns hot and he smashes the two tablets at the foot of the mountain. It's one thing to be told something. It's another thing to see it with your own eyes. We should be careful not to assume that Moses is in a fit of unbridled anger at this point. Moses is no doubt angry at what he sees, but if you read the text carefully, you'll see that his actions, though they are born out of righteous indignation were a careful, deliberate action. They were something that were intended to convey a very important lesson to the people. And you can see the way that the text belabors the point to say that the 10 commandments are of divine origin. They come from the Lord. Moses turned and went down the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand. tablets that were written on both sides, on the front and on the back they were written. The tablets were the work of God and the writing was the writing of God engraved on the tablets. This is all working to underscore the fact that Israel has this special covenant bond with their Lord God, the God of Israel. They are recipients of his special self-revelation. And so in a way that mirrors the fact that this covenant has been broken, Moses symbolically breaks the sign of the covenant before their eyes. It's emblematic of just how tragic this whole ordeal really is. Of course, that's not all that happens. There's another gesture Moses makes that vividly, graphically requires them to be confronted just with how bitter their deeds really are. Moses takes the calf, he burns it with fire, he grinds it into a powder, he scatters it on the water, and he makes the people drink it. It also functions as an illustration of how idols are to be dealt with. You heard the passage that was read earlier. They're to be cast down, they're to be pulverized, they're to be done away with entirely, not to be tucked away into some corner, not to be put into a drawer, not to be set aside temporarily, but utterly destroyed. Now how will Aaron receive the Lord's correction? Verse 21 has Aaron in the hot seat. Moses said to Aaron, what did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them? We could preach a whole passage, a whole other sermon on Aaron's dereliction of duty in this episode. But it's here that we discover the most pitiful and absurd explanation of sin you find in the whole counsel of God's word. And yet again, it's not one that's altogether unfamiliar to us if we'll consider it carefully. If we'll be honest with ourselves in the Lord. Notice how Aaron puts it, let not the anger of my Lord burn hot, you know the people. that they are set on evil. It starts with deflection and excuses. The very first words out of his mouth are, I'm not really the one responsible here. They said to me, make us gods who shall go before us. It was all their idea. I just took what they gave me, threw it into the fire, and out came this calf. Nevermind the graving tool that's mentioned from the Lord's mouth earlier that Aaron must have sat and worked with and labored over that calf for who knows how long. But this is the insanity of sin. This is the kind of self-deception and blindness that it brings. What can we learn from this, church? What can we take away from this? Proverbs 28 verse 13 says, whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy. Blessed is the one who fears the Lord always, but whoever hardens his heart will fall into calamity. I would exhort you here to resist the urge of thinking about your neighbor, your friend, or your spouse, or your parent, or your child, or whoever else it may be, what is the Lord calling you to confess and to forsake? There is mercy in the blood of Jesus Christ. Confess your sin, look to him, and he will be faithful to forgive you your sin and to cleanse you of all unrighteousness. Will you obtain mercy today or will you fall into calamity?" We can see both sides of that proverb in the section that follows here toward the end. Moses issues a call for separation to the people of God. He issues a call for holy, undefiled allegiance to Israel. He says, who is on Yahweh's side? Who is on the side of the Lord? And straight away, all the sons of Levi are gathered around them. There's some encouragement there. It suggests that while there was this licentiousness that permeated Israel at large, there was perhaps this remnant that kept their hearts fixed on the Lord. And it's with this tribe that the same Moses who earlier pleads for mercy now calls for the Levites to arm themselves and to go into the camp killing his brother and his companion and his neighbor. Now the idea there is not that they were to seek out those closest to them, but that they weren't to show special deference by sparing someone just because they were close to them. Christ later echoes the very same idea in Luke chapter 14 and verse 26 where he says, if anyone comes to me, and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple. You see, being on the Lord's side, separation unto the Lord requires that the Lord take precedence over all earthly bonds, over everything else in this life. The Levites are instructed to go back and forth throughout the camp. The unstated objective here being to determine who intended to return to the Lord. It was time to set the camp in order. The next day, the Lord, or Moses rather, returns to the Lord in prayer. He goes to pray in a second time of intercession. He says, you have, he tells the people, first you have sinned a great sin, and now I will go up to the Lord. Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin. Now Moses says, perhaps, carries the right tenor. It's the right spirit in this context. Israel has broken covenant with God and so it is humility, not presumption that must lace Moses' petition. He doesn't know what the Lord is going to do, but having witnessed the scene, having witnessed the severity of Israel's condition, Moses does something absolutely remarkable. He offers up his own life. He says, Lord, if you will forgive their sin, and he doesn't finish the thought, he says, but if not, please blot me out of your book. that you have written. He goes further than he did in his first prayer. Instead of just asking for mercy and forgiveness, he says, God, if you won't, take me in their place. Blot me out that they might be saved. You see, Moses is prepared to offer up his own life in exchange for the pardon of Israel. Now we must notice at this juncture that God does not grant Moses' petition at this point. Now why is that? Moses isn't fit to stand as a ransom for the people of God. Moses will not do as a substitute for Israel. Moses cannot make atonement for anyone. But there is one who can. There is one who can, beloved. And the scriptures say, you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, with Christ, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. And so we can pray today not with a perhaps, but with strong confidence. We can draw near to the throne of grace knowing that we will receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need because of the shed blood of Jesus Christ. We can come not with a perhaps, but with strong confidence. Would you bow your hearts? Can you come with me to the Lord? Our great God, our gracious Redeemer, our Savior. Lord, thank you for your steadfast love toward us. Thank you for the kindness that leads us to repentance. Lord, we thank you for the hope that we have in Christ, that we have a perfect mediator, one who has made atonement for all of our sins, for all who put their faith in you. God, help us now to identify those worries and fears that tempt us, that tempt us to run to other things. Lord, instead, let us flee to you, our rock and our refuge. In Jesus' name, amen.