Lessons From The Golden Calf Series

Text: Exodus Chapter 32

Title: Lessons from the Golden Calf

Introduction

Exodus chapter 32 tells us about one of the darkest moments in the entire history of Israel.

The people of God changed who they would worship

Read text…

“When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him” (v1)

“Aaron…took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your god’s, O Israel, who brought you out of Egypt.” (v4)

God’s people exchange the worship of God for… the worship of an idol in the form of a golden calf?

Question: How does something like this happen?

How could people walk away from the worship of God in order to worship - a piece of metal?

Or closer to home…

Why are there days when I find time to do other things - but no time to spend with God?

Today is Superbowl Sunday!

All week we’ve been pumping ourselves up for the big game

All week we’ve been talking about the game even with- total strangers…

We’re going to get to the Superbowl party as early as possible…

We’re going to really get into the game. We’re going to shout at the tv,

We’re going to cheer for our favorite team

We can’t wait for the game to start!

Are we ever that excited about God?

Maybe you find yourself today wishing you were more excited about God

Again why are there days when I find myself not spending time with God?

What went wrong?

How did we get to that place…Jesus calls it …being lukewarm

What would we say in our defense?

When ever we find ourselves lukewarm what do we say in our defense?

I find I like to use the same defense Aaron gave to Moses.…

I just didn’t know Aaron used it first.

Here is what Aaron told Moses

I told the people…”whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off. Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.” (v24)

What was Aaron’s defense?

It was all an accident

It accidentally happened

It was a surprise to me too Moses

But isn’t that just like our human nature?

When even we are caught putting something before God

Our first response is usually – but it was an accident

I didn’t mean for it to happen…

I can’t tell you how it happened….

Was Aaron really telling the truth to Moses?

Was the worship of the golden calf all because of an accident?

“So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool.” (v4)

So it did not just accidentally happen.

Aaron took the earrings from the people and deliberately cast and fashioned them into an idol.

Application:

You don’t exchange the worship of God for the worship of something else by accident

You don’t accidentally forget to pray

You don’t accidentally forget to read your bible

We don’t accidentally walk away from God in order to worship something else

If we’re honest with ourselves –

If we’ve walked away from God – it’s always because we have replaced Him with something else

Through the choices that we made….

What are those choices and how do we correct them?

Mistake #1: We exchange the truth about God for a lie.

Notice this was the very same mistake the people of God made in Exodus 32

As I read verses 1 and 4 see if you can identify what piece of truth changed

Clue: It’s about who gets the credit for bringing the people up out of Egypt

“When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him” (v1)

Who gets the credit for bringing the people up out of Egypt….? Moses!

Now listen to how the truth got changed for a lie in verse 4?

“Aaron…took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your god’s, O Israel, who brought you out of Egypt.” (v4)

Now who gets the credit for bringing the people up out of Egypt?