Idols Everywhere!

Exodus 32:1 When the people saw how long it was taking Moses to come back down the mountain, they gathered around Aaron. “Come on,” they said, “make us some gods who can lead us. We don’t know what happened to this fellow Moses, who brought us here from the land of Egypt.” 2 So Aaron said, “Take the gold rings from the ears of your wives and sons and daughters, and bring them to me.” 3 All the people took the gold rings from their ears and brought them to Aaron. 4 Then Aaron took the gold, melted it down, and molded it into the shape of a calf. When the people saw it, they exclaimed, “O Israel, these are the gods who brought you out of the land of Egypt!”

How soon do we forget the love and redemption God has given us through Jesus Christ? Very quickly the children of Israel drifted into worshipping idols they had made with their own hands and made from the gold rings they had in their ears and in their children's ears. Aaron melted them down to make a golden calf that they worshipped by saying “O Israel, these are the gods who brought you out of the land of Egypt!” Moses was spending time with God to lead them to greater things, In the time he was gone they lost their faith and even drifted so far from the truth to even say that their gods had brought them out of Egypt! HOW STUPID CAN YOU GET? Pretty stupid.

Aaron liked how the people were getting happy and in a state of celebration so he bowed to their stupid reasoning and set a day of celebration. Not a good move by him, because he knew better. Verse 5 Aaron saw how excited the people were, so he built an altar in front of the calf. Then he announced, “Tomorrow will be a festival to the Lord!” Idols usually get a strong standing in our lives when we see people like them, so we respond to what "people" like instead of what God wants and that is a dangerous misstep. What do we do when the lure of the world seems so good, so powerful, so godly? We turn away from the lure of the world and worship God and Him only, no matter what!

We can easily see that in the world we live in there are many temptations to "partake" and satan dresses them up to look real good and worth celebration. But God is not impressed, especially when it takes worship away from Him and gives it to the golden calf idol. We are humans and we have a natural tendency to see the world as humans do, but that is not what we are supposed to do. SHOCKER! The first commandment of ten says Exodus 20:3 “You must not have any other god but me. YOU MUST NOT!! In the Hebrew language that means DON'T DO IT! But they did it, didn't they? The second verse in Exodus 20 refutes the way the people looked at their deliverance when God says 2 “I am the Lord your God, who rescued you from the land of Egypt, the place of your slavery.

It can happen to us at any time when we feel God is near or far away. (By the way, God is always near). Psalm 139:1 O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. 2 You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away. We begin to see God moving so we want to qualify it, explain it, and process it through our human way of reasoning. Our sinful nature draws us into thinking some thought that causes us to think we made it happen. Idols are so deceptive and satan uses them to draw us away from that first commandment, which Jesus also speaks to in Matthew 4:10 when satan was tempting Him while in the wilderness. Unlike the children of Israel, Jesus denied satan elevating an idol and rejected the lure of his temptation.

We are so lured by idols because satan has elevated idols in our present-day world so much and even made them look like God, but they are God, but false gods. So don't follow those idols and stay true to your love for God alone. In Exodus 20 God said the following 7 The Lord told Moses, “Quick! Go down the mountain! Your people whom you brought from the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. 8 How quickly they have turned away from the way I commanded them to live! They have melted down gold and made a calf, and they have bowed down and sacrificed to it. They are saying, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt.’” 9 Then the Lord said, “I have seen how stubborn and rebellious these people are. 10 Now leave me alone so my fierce anger can blaze against them, and I will destroy them. Then I will make you, Moses, into a great nation.”

Moses talked God out of destroying them for that time, but Jesus' death on the cross stopped God from judging us by His blood, for all time. We should be very conscious of the need to stay away from any idol because of all that God has done to bring us out of the captivity of sin and give us a place in heaven for eternity. For me, it is a no-brainer. Follow God and Him only and as Jesus said in Luke 4:8 Jesus replied, “The Scriptures say,

‘You must worship the Lord your God and serve only him.’ Nothing has changed throughout time, do not worship Idols!! Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. We must keep this our priority because there are Idols Everywhere!

Vesselogical Out,

David Warren