Exo 32:1 | KingComments | STEP | In the previous chapters we have seen Who God is. Here we see who man, His people, is. By that we learn to admire God more, because despite the sin of the people the tabernacle is built from Exodus 35 onward. God comes to dwell with a people who have misbehaved themselves like this. The people are getting impatient. Moses stays away for so long. They do not realize that Moses is on the mountain for their benefit. They speak of him as “this Moses”. There is a scornful sound in it. There is no trust in him nor in the LORD because they “do not know what has become of him”. And all this while they saw him enter the cloud of God’s presence. Moses is here a picture of the Lord Jesus Who went to heaven. Because the Lord Jesus stays away for so long, in professing Christianity the thought of His return has been lost. The hope is gone. The fact that He is in heaven to commit Himself there for His people has no meaning whatsoever. The result is that Christians abuse each other and connect with the world, as the Lord Jesus suggests in a parable ( ). Through the people’s proposal to Aaron to make a god, the people reject Moses. This is because now that they no longer have Moses in their midst, they have turned back to Egypt in their hearts. They reject Moses and his words. Has he not recently reminded them that they will not have any other gods besides the LORD, neither of silver nor of gold ( )? But they don’t want to obey him. In the same way, professing Christianity acts in relation to Christ. The voices to introduce tangible things into the experience of religion are becoming stronger and stronger. It is because one does not want to listen to Christ and His Word. Then people come up with such proposals.

‏ Exodus 32:1

The People Ask for an Idol

In the previous chapters we have seen Who God is. Here we see who man, His people, is. By that we learn to admire God more, because despite the sin of the people the tabernacle is built from Exodus 35 onward. God comes to dwell with a people who have misbehaved themselves like this.

The people are getting impatient. Moses stays away for so long. They do not realize that Moses is on the mountain for their benefit. They speak of him as “this Moses”. There is a scornful sound in it. There is no trust in him nor in the LORD because they “do not know what has become of him”. And all this while they saw him enter the cloud of God’s presence.

Moses is here a picture of the Lord Jesus Who went to heaven. Because the Lord Jesus stays away for so long, in professing Christianity the thought of His return has been lost. The hope is gone. The fact that He is in heaven to commit Himself there for His people has no meaning whatsoever. The result is that Christians abuse each other and connect with the world, as the Lord Jesus suggests in a parable (Mt 24:48-49).

Through the people’s proposal to Aaron to make a god, the people reject Moses. This is because now that they no longer have Moses in their midst, they have turned back to Egypt in their hearts. They reject Moses and his words. Has he not recently reminded them that they will not have any other gods besides the LORD, neither of silver nor of gold (Exo 20:23)? But they don’t want to obey him.

In the same way, professing Christianity acts in relation to Christ. The voices to introduce tangible things into the experience of religion are becoming stronger and stronger. It is because one does not want to listen to Christ and His Word. Then people come up with such proposals.