Exodus 32:1-35 - Leadership Challenges And Failures

We are jumping back into Exodus, so we want to recap a little bit. Exodus is the story of the people of Israel being delivered from captivity by God Himself, using Moses as His leader. Today, we're going to be in Chapter 32, where we'll study two lessons in leadership with Moses and Aaron. We'll see what bad leadership looks like, and what great leadership looks like in today's passage. But before we do that, we've got to lay a little foundation. I'm going to ask you to go to Exodus Chapter 20 with me, and we're going to look at two verses in Chapter 20 because we need this foundation for everything to really make sense in Chapter 32. Exodus Chapter 20, verses 3 and 4, these are the first two commandments of the Ten Commandments: "You shall have no other gods before Me." Pretty straightforward. The second commandment: "You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth." Pretty clear, pretty straightforward.

Now let's fast forward to Exodus Chapter 24, because we need to make sure the people got that. Exodus Chapter 24, Verse 3: Moses came 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." So that brings us to Exodus Chapter 32. And I want us to see ourselves, as much as we hate to admit it at times, being like the people of Israel. We come to church, we hear a message, God stirs our heart, and we say, "God, I am going to do what it is you are leading me to do, and I'm going to be faithful to do that. I'm not deviating." But then life comes along, things get a little ambiguous, things are uncertain, and we start to develop some uncertainty in our lives.

This is what happens with the people of Israel in Chapter 32 of Exodus, beginning at verse 1. When the people saw that Moses 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." So here's what's happening: Moses has given them the law, and now he's gone up on the mountain of God, and he's been gone for 40 days. Nobody's seen him, nobody's heard from him, and the people are now wondering, "Well, if he's not around to lead us, what should we be doing?"

And here's why I want us to really lock into this: I'm speaking for myself, I would imagine some of you can relate. There are times when I am seeking God's direction in my life, and everything is quiet, meaning I'm not hearing from God, I'm not getting the answer I'm looking for, I'm not hearing clear instruction on what to do next. And so what begins to happen is this temptation comes along to create my own solution. Now, I don't know if you can relate to this, but my biggest problems generally come from my best thinking. So, some of you can relate. So generally, my solution to deal with the problems that come from my best thinking is, what? Do some more thinking. And it never ends well.

And that's what's happening here. The people of Israel are saying, "Okay, this Moses guy who led us out, obviously he's died or something's happened to him. He's not coming back. Let's take matters into our own hands." The temptation for us is we do the same thing: "God, I need your solution to whatever my problem is, and I'm not hearing from God, so I go create a solution of my own." And what begins to happen is I begin to put my confidence in that person, that job, that situation, that relationship, instead of putting my confidence in God. I am looking for satisfaction in something other than Him.

So, Moses delays to come down from the mountain, and the people go to Aaron. Now, Aaron is number two in charge. He's Moses's kin; they should be of the same heart and same mind. He was called when Moses was called; he's seen all the cool stuff. "Aaron, this Moses guy's disappeared, we want you to make us an idol." Aaron had a choice in the moment. He could have said no, that's not what God's led us to do, but what we find about Aaron is, like a lot of leaders today, he leads by popularity. "That's what the people want, I guess. I don't want to make any waves. I don't want people not to like me. I don't want these people to kill me, so I guess I'll do what they're asking of me, even though I know it's not the right thing." Here's the reality of leadership: you can't lead from a place of compromise; you have to lead from conviction. And what we're finding with Aaron is, Aaron lacks conviction; he leads from compromise.