God's Hatred of Idolatry
Exodus 32:1-10
SS Lesson for 09/19/2010
Devotional Scripture: 1 Cor 10:1-13
The concept of the outline of the lesson came from Bible Expositor and Illuminator. This week's lesson teaches about God's Hatred of Idolatry and how easy is for us as Christians to commit idolatry. The study's aim is to declare that God hates idolatry in all its forms. The study's application is to develop ways to stem the tide of empty worship of idols while encouraging the wholehearted worship of the true and living God.
Getting Egypt out of Israel
“You can take the boy out of the country, but you can’t take the country out of the boy” is a familiar saying. It means that when a person has been brought up in rural surroundings, the learned habits, attitudes, and expressions of that environment are not easily forgotten. This writer readily agrees with the statement; I often find myself longing for the simpler, slower-paced country life that I knew growing up in south central Indiana. The exodus was the event that brought the nation of Israel out of Egypt. But getting Egypt out of Israel was quite another matter. It involved the removal of all ties to that previous way of life. The practices of Egyptian culture were no longer appropriate (if they ever were) for the Israelites, given their covenant with God (Exodus 19:5, 6). Getting Israel out of Egypt was a geographical step; getting Egypt out of Israel was a spiritual issue. In a way, the latter transition was far more challenging. The Israelites had to be willing to sever ties with their past. God’s power had delivered them from physical bondage. Did the Israelites have the willpower and resolve to avoid spiritual bondage? The incident recorded in today’s printed text reveals that getting Egypt out of Israel was not going to happen overnight. A high price would be paid in the process of learning that lesson.
Lesson Background
Israel's deliverance from Egypt ranks as one of the most significant miraculous events in the history of this nation. In it God clearly demonstrated the impotence of all of Egypt's false gods and His own infinite might. The ten plagues showed Israel and Egypt that God was alive and active toward His chosen people. The crossing of the Red Sea on dry ground was evidence of His purpose of freeing them from slavery. The provision of water from solid rock and manna from heaven was further evidence of His greatness and care. Surely with all these events being done so recently for the Israelites, their faith would be strong and their confidence in God unshakable. Surely they were ready to trust and obey even if unexpected circumstances arose to test that faith. Surely they would not forget for a long time how God had worked on their behalf in their times of need and how He had actively controlled various situations in order to accomplish good for them. Surely they fully understood the folly of the Egyptian religious system. How quickly they forgot about trusting God. How brief was their comprehension of the foolishness of Egypt's religious system. How soon they turned to trusting in their own ways. To those who are not fully committed to God, faith can lose its luster and become stale very quickly. The people of God in our lesson this week faced such a situation when their leader, Moses, went up the mountain and showed no sign of returning. Soon they got weary of waiting. They needed some excitement and, as sometimes happens in our day, they expected their religious leaders to provide it. In our lesson this week, God shows us Himself in His hatred for idolatry. When we think of idolatry, we usually think of pagan cultures like Hinduism in which idols are an active part of their ritual worship. Then we react and say that that is not something we would do. But we may change our opinion when we realize that idols can be anything that displaces God from His supreme position in our lives. Now that is something we all are guilty of. We unconsciously commit idolatry over and over again, and the sad part is that we feel no guilt at all about it. Our lesson this week shows us that God hates idolatry in any form. It displaces Him from our lives, telling Him that we do not need Him. Idols are not always concrete images of stone. They can be something that we set up in our hearts.
(Scriptural Text from the New King James Version; cross-references from the NIV)
1 Now when the people saw that Moses delayed coming down from the mountain, the people gathered together to Aaron, and said to him, "Come, make us gods that shall go before us; for 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."
2 And Aaron said to them, "Break off the golden earrings which are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me."
3 So all the people broke off the golden earrings which were in their ears, and brought them to Aaron.
4 And he received the gold from their hand, and he fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made a molded calf. Then they said, "This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!"
5 So when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, "Tomorrow is a feast to the Lord."
6 Then they rose early on the next day, offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play.
16 Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; 2 so she said to Abram, "The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her." Abram agreed to what Sarai said. 3 So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian maidservant Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. 4 He slept with Hagar, and she conceived.
11 Jesus continued: "There was a man who had two sons. 12 The younger one said to his father, 'Father, give me my share of the estate.' So he divided his property between them. 13 "Not long after that, the younger son got together all he had, set off for a distant country and there squandered his wealth in wild living. 14 After he had spent everything, there was a severe famine in that whole country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to a citizen of that country, who sent him to his fields to feed pigs. 16 He longed to fill his stomach with the pods that the pigs were eating, but no one gave him anything.
6 When the men of Israel saw that their situation was critical and that their army was hard pressed, they hid in caves and thickets, among the rocks, and in pits and cisterns. 7 Some Hebrews even crossed the Jordan to the land of Gad and Gilead. Saul remained at Gilgal, and all the troops with him were quaking with fear. 8 He waited seven days, the time set by Samuel; but Samuel did not come to Gilgal, and Saul's men began to scatter. 9 So he said, "Bring me the burnt offering and the fellowship offerings." And Saul offered up the burnt offering. 10 Just as he finished making the offering, Samuel arrived, and Saul went out to greet him. 11 "What have you done?" asked Samuel. Saul replied, "When I saw that the men were scattering, and that you did not come at the set time, and that the Philistines were assembling at Micmash, 12 I thought, 'Now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not sought the Lord's favor.' So I felt compelled to offer the burnt offering." 13 "You acted foolishly," Samuel said. "You have not kept the command the Lord your God gave you; if you had, he would have established your kingdom over Israel for all time. 14 But now your kingdom will not endure; the Lord has sought out a man after his own heart and appointed him leader of his people, because you have not kept the Lord's command."
9 So Moses took the staff from the Lord's presence, just as he commanded him. 10 He and Aaron gathered the assembly together in front of the rock and Moses said to them, "Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?" 11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank. 12 But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, "Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them."
Although Scripture acknowledges the value of patience, this trait is often lacking. Christians are not immune to this problem. However, at times God’s people have shown great patience (and its companion virtue, perseverance). The great cathedrals of Europe are a testimony to this fact. Generation after generation took part in erecting these striking houses of worship. Many who helped had no hope that they would ever see the finished results of their efforts. Construction of the cathedral in Cologne, Germany, began in 1248. One of the church’s towers had reached only one-third of its ultimate height 200 years later. After 300 years, the roof still had only a board covering. The building was completed in 1880, over 600 years after the foundation was laid! The people Moses was leading had no such patience. Moses had been on the mountain six weeks when they began clamoring for a different god who would satisfy their longings immediately. So, which are we more like: the Israelites or the cathedral builders? When change in the church, society, or even our personal lives is not moving at the pace we think it should, we need to remember what Israel’s impatience led to!
23 "Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture!" declares the Lord.
12 Eli's sons were wicked men; they had no regard for the Lord. 13 Now it was the practice of the priests with the people that whenever anyone offered a sacrifice and while the meat was being boiled, the servant of the priest would come with a three-pronged fork in his hand. 14 He would plunge it into the pan or kettle or caldron or pot, and the priest would take for himself whatever the fork brought up. This is how they treated all the Israelites who came to Shiloh.
26 Her priests do violence to my law and profane my holy things; they do not distinguish between the holy and the common; they teach that there is no difference between the unclean and the clean; and they shut their eyes to the keeping of my Sabbaths, so that I am profaned among them.
5 You stumble day and night, and the prophets stumble with you. So I will destroy your mother— 6 my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. "Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children. 7 The more the priests increased, the more they sinned against me; they exchanged their Glory for something disgraceful. 8 They feed on the sins of my people and relish their wickedness.
7 "For the lips of a priest ought to preserve knowledge, and from his mouth men should seek instruction — because he is the messenger of the Lord Almighty. 8 But you have turned from the way and by your teaching have caused many to stumble; you have violated the covenant with Levi," says the Lord Almighty.
28 Her prophets whitewash these deeds for them by false visions and lying divinations. They say, 'This is what the Sovereign Lord says'-when the Lord has not spoken.
42 But God turned away and gave them over to the worship of the heavenly bodies. This agrees with what is written in the book of the prophets: "'Did you bring me sacrifices and offerings forty years in the desert, O house of Israel?
43 You have lifted up the shrine of Molech and the star of your god Rephan, the idols you made to worship. Therefore I will send you into exile' beyond Babylon.
18 Do not let anyone who delights in false humility and the worship of angels disqualify you for the prize. Such a person goes into great detail about what he has seen, and his unspiritual mind puffs him up with idle notions.
29 "Therefore since we are God's offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone — an image made by man's design and skill. 30 In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent. 31 For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead."
7 And the Lord said to Moses, "Go, get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves.
8 They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molded calf, and worshiped it and sacrificed to it, and said, 'This is your god, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!'"
9 And the Lord said to Moses, "I have seen this people, and indeed it is a stiff-necked people!
10 Now therefore, let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them. And I will make of you a great nation."
3 But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent's cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. 4 For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough.
6 I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel— 7 which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ.
3 If anyone teaches false doctrines and does not agree to the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teaching, 4 he is conceited and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy interest in controversies and quarrels about words that result in envy, strife, malicious talk, evil suspicions 5 and constant friction between men of corrupt mind, who have been robbed of the truth and who think that godliness is a means to financial gain.
18 Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour. 19 They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us.
5 This is what the Lord says: "Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord.
8 But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger.
26 If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, 27 but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.
31 It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness,
8 He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. 9 They will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord and from the majesty of his power
4 For every living soul belongs to me, the father as well as the son — both alike belong to me. The soul who sins is the one who will die.
41 The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil.
An idol has been defined as “anything that comes between a person and God.” That simple description is hard to improve on. An idol does not have to be a carved idol such as the golden calf. In Colossians 3:5, Paul defines covetousness as idolatry. Thus idolatry can include violation of not only the Second Commandment (as in the case of the Israelites) but also of the Tenth. Looked at from this perspective, idolatry becomes an issue not only for primitive tribes in a remote jungle but also for highly educated people. Modern advertising constantly bombards us with messages about all the “stuff” we need to make our lives more rewarding. Such messages distract us from God’s perspective. Any act of idolatry, whether it involves a carved or computer-generated image, ultimately begins in the human heart. Idolatry was King Solomon’s ruin, but it began when the king’s heart “had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel” (1 Kings 11:9). The king failed to heed his own advice found in Proverbs 4:23: “Guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life.” In staying with the focus of this study, perhaps the verse could be paraphrased as follows: “Guard your heart, for out of it spring the idols of life.”
The Scriptural text this week marks a sad time in Israel's history. God had delivered the Israelites from Egypt through incredible miracles. The Exodus would be remembered for centuries in Israel's history. They were on their way to the Promised Land, and God had outlined what He wanted for the tabernacle. Things were looking up for the Israelites. God had been talking to Moses on Mount Sinai. It was on that mountain that He gave him the Ten Commandments and other instructions as to how the Israelites should live. Apparently, however, Moses was away too long for the Israelites' liking. The beginning of Exodus 32 tells us that "when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him" (vs. 1). The people were itching for something to happen. And what better to have happen than for them to make their own worship? Moses had no idea of what was going on. Exodus 32:7 tells us that God told him what the Israelites were up to. Exodus 32:8 tells the specifics: "They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them." This points back to the second of the Ten Commandments. That commandment forbade not only idolatry but also making any visible representation of Yahweh. God is not limited to a form, and He would not have His people think He was. God further told Moses that they were worshiping a golden calf. That took their focus off God and put it on a physical representation that they had made. In fact, when Aaron had finished this golden calf, he told the people, "These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt" (Exod. 32:4). The word "gods" could also be translated "God." He was telling the Israelites that this was Yahweh (cf. vs. 5). But it most certainly was not! In our day, we do not have to worry about such things, right? Hardly. Idolatry is just as much a part of life now as it ever has been. This is especially true in America. The problem is that we do not often consider it idolatry. At the end of his first epistle, the Apostle John told the believers, "Little children, keep yourselves from idols" (5:21). This was written at the end of the first century A.D. Idolatry such as we find in Exodus 32 was not common among the Jews in John's time or among Christians. It was common among the Greeks and Romans, but it is clear that John was talking about a different type of idolatry, an idolatry more like what we deal with today. Today we see idolatry in the form of Christians not putting God first. That can take many different forms, but the common thread among all these types of idolatry is that they all take the place of God. And that is why the Lord hates all idolatry so much.
1. Weak faith is not persevering faith (Exod. 32:1)
2. We cannot justify sin by the support it receives, for there are always those willing to accommodate it (vs. 2-3)
3. One temptation we face is not to replace God but to make Him something He is not (vs. 4-5)
4. The way we worship reflects the God we worship (vs. 6-7)
5. Even the witnessing of miracles does not guarantee genuine and lasting faith (vs. 8-9)
6. Perhaps the greatest challenge to our faith is the desire for personal glory and comfort (vs. 10)
Our Scripture text this week shows how quickly and how easily we can be turned aside from worshiping God alone. We say we are free to worship God after the dictates of our conscience, but we actually are only free to worship God as He wants to be worshiped. To worship in any other way or place ultimate trust in another force or object is sin and enslaves us to sin. It incurs God's wrath until we abandon it and turn to simple faith.
You will quite naturally attribute pivotal events in your life to some cause. The Israelites knew that they had been brought out of Egypt by supernatural forces. They could no longer see Moses, their intermediary with God, since he was on the mountain to receive the law. They would not wait for Moses to return and lead them. They wanted some tangible representation or figurehead to go before them and lead them. This desire soon degenerated into carnal indulgence and false worship. When you start thinking that a great pastor, fate, luck, the universe, or your wisdom or efforts are responsible for getting you through life, you are involved in idolatry. You are going wrong, and there will certainly be consequences. You may soon wander off into self-indulgence and worldliness, far away from the blessing of the Lord and true worship.
God had observed the activities and even the thoughts of the people. He did not mention to Moses the part that Aaron had played in leading them into idolatry instead of remaining faithful to the Lord. Leaders are important in your life, but when they lead you to do that which is contrary to the Lord's clear Word, you must not follow them. You can always find an excuse or a winsome person who agrees with you. God's Word is your only sure guide for life and thought. You must wait in faith and obedience for Him to intervene when there seems to be delay or no clear way to proceed. He may well be preparing someone to pray for you, to speak to you, or to intervene in some way to bring you back to Him. Your part is to remember His Word and return to Him.
God expressed His anger with the people of Israel, implying that He was about to destroy them. He told Moses not to bother Him while He did it. He proposed to make a great nation from Moses' descendants to fulfill His purposes. The consequences of the sin of the people were to be severe. God said He intended to consume them. This is how strongly God hates the sin of idolatry. His people are to remain faithful to Him and His Word. When you and I decline from simple faith in God and turn instead to luck, fate, "the universe," or meditation in a way not prescribed in Scripture, we are committing the sin of idolatry. God hates it, and there will be consequences. Wherever you are in your journey of learning, serving, and worshiping the Lord, you can abandon your worship of and reliance upon things that are not God. God will restore you and begin again to lead you in paths of righteousness for His name's sake. Refuse to listen to excuses and false notions as other forces or people seek to influence your thinking. Obey God and worship Him, and see if He does not lead you into a place of spiritual victory and blessing. The things of this world cannot possibly add to your spiritual life.