When we do not wait on God, sin has a way of bamboozling. Waiting on God on-the-other hand is a time of testing, of increasing faith, and of hoping. The Bible has numerous examples of waiting on God. One such event is the Exodus.
The Passover is a watershed event for the Hebrews and Christians alike. It was a monumental event with good and catastrophic consequences. It was good that Pharaoh set the Hebrews free and made them rich, but freedom and riches can lead to stupid choices.
Thinking about the event, the Hebrews under Moses’ leadership did as the Lord instructed and made the Exodus at the right moment. They had faith to get out, but did not have faith to enter the promise land. They experienced “rags to riches” overnight and had the wrong idea what to with riches.
While Moses was spending time with God, the Hebrews figured that Moses must have gotten lost or God killed him because it looked as though he was not returning. Having too much time and too much money, they approached Aaron, Moses brother, and instructed him to make them a god to worship since the great I AM and Moses were not around to help them.
To put in perspective the Hebrews’ wealth, Aaron said, “Break off the golden earrings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me.” Aaron gathered enough gold to hammer. Pure gold is very malleable. I am sure that none of the Hebrews carried a furnace to melt and pour the gold, so the tool that Aaron used was to shape the gold as he hammered it. Egyptians taught this technique to the slaves.
The idol was of a calf, which the word “calf” denotes a three-year bull. Idols of bulls were the popular trend. Bulls represented power and fertility. This was no small idol. If the estimated 1.5 Hebrews and mixed multitude each gave one earring, that is a chunk of gold.
When Moses did return, he made Aaron burn the idol, sprinkled it on the water, and made them all drink it. No pun intended, but that is a lot of waste of gold that could have been used for good.
What can we learn from this? First, we need to wait on God. We do stupid stuff when we grow impatient. Second, be generous toward God’s work. They, as are we, were generous to give to creating an idol and rejecting God’s way. Third, walking with God is more important than money and things.
And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount . . . And all the people brake off the golden earrings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron. And he received them at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: (Exodus 32:14a KJV).
God is generous, always giving.
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