Mediation of Moses

Mediation of Moses

(No. 2398)

INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S DAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1895.

DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,

AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING,
FEBRUARY 17, 1887.

"And the LORD repented of the evil which He thought to do unto His
people." Exodus 32:14.

I SUPPOSE that I need not say that this verse speaks after the manner
of men. I do not know after what other manner we can speak. To speak of
God after the manner of God is reserved for God, Himself, and mortal
men could not comprehend such speech. In this sense, the Lord often
speaks, not according to literal fact, but according to the appearance
of things to us, in order that we may understand so far as the human
can comprehend the Divine. The Lord's purposes never really change. His
eternal will must forever be the same, for He cannot alter, since He
would either have to alter for the better or for the worse. He cannot
change for the better, for He is infinitely good–it were blasphemous
to suppose that He could change for the worse. He who sees all things
at once and perceives at one glance the beginning and the end of all
things, has no need to repent. "God is not a man, that He should lie;
neither the son of man, that He should repent," but, in the course of
His action, there appears to us to be, sometimes, a great change, and
as we say of the sun that it rises and sets, though it does not
actually do so, and we do not deceive when we speak after that fashion,
so we say concerning God, in the language of the text, "The Lord
repented of the evil which He thought to do unto His people." It
appears to us to be so and it is so in the act of God, yet this
statement casts no doubt upon the great and glorious Doctrine of the
Immutability of God.

Speaking after the manner of men, the mediation of Moses worked this
change in the mind of God. God in Moses seemed to overcome God out of
Moses. God in the Mediator, the Man Christ Jesus, appears to be
stronger for mercy than God apart from the Mediator. This saying of our
text is very amazing and it deserves our most earnest and careful
consideration.

Just think, for a minute, of Moses up there in the serene solitude with
God. He had left the tents of Israel down below and he had passed
within the mystic circle of fire where none may come but he who is
specially invited. And there, alone with God, Moses had a glorious
season of fellowship with the Most High. He lent his listening ear to
the instructions of the Almighty concerning the priesthood, the
tabernacle and the altar. And he was enjoying a profound peace of mind,
when, all of a sudden, he was startled. The whole tone of the speech of
the Lord seemed changed, and He said to Moses, "Go, get you down; for
your people, which you brought out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted
themselves." I can hardly imagine what thoughts passed through the
great leader's mind! How Moses must have trembled in the Presence of
God! All the joy that he had experienced seemed suddenly to vanish,
leaving behind, however, somewhat of the strength which always comes
out of fellowship with God. This Moses now needed, if ever he needed it
in all his life, for this was the crucial period in the history of
Moses! This was his severest trial, when, alone with God on the
mountain's brow, he was called to come out of the happy serenity of his
spirit and to hear the voice of an angry God, saying, "Let Me alone,
that My wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them."

The language of God was very stern, and well it might be after all that
He had done for that people! When the song of Miriam had scarcely
ceased. When you might almost hear the echoes of that jubilant note,
"Sing you to the Lord, for He has triumphed gloriously; the horse and
his rider has He thrown into the sea," you might quickly have heard a
very different cry, "Up, make us gods!" And, in the presence of the
calf that Aaron made, the same people blasphemously exclaimed, "These
are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of
Egypt." Such a prostitution of their tongues to horrid blasphemies
against Jehovah! Such a turning aside from the Truth of God to the most
gross of falsehoods, might well provoke the anger of a righteously
jealous God!

It is noteworthy that Moses did not lose himself in this moment of
trial. We read at once, "And Moses besought Jehovah, his God." He was
undoubtedly a man of prayer, but he must have been continually in the
spirit of prayer, or else I could conceive of him, at that moment,
falling on his face and lying there in silent horror! I could imagine
him flying down the mountain in a passionate haste to see what the
people had done–but it is delightful to find that he did neither of
these two things–rather he began to pray! Oh, Friends, if we
habitually pray, we shall know how to pray when praying times become
more pressing than usual! The man who is to wrestle with the angel must
have been familiar with angels beforehand! You cannot go into your
chamber, shut the door and begin a mighty intercessory prayer if you
have never been to the Mercy Seat before! No, Moses is "the man of
God." You remember that he left us a prayer, in the 90th Psalm, bearing
this title, "A prayer of Moses, the man of God." There is no man of God
if there is no prayer, for prayer makes the man into "the man of God."
So, instinctively, though startled and saddened to the last degree,
Moses is on his knees, beseeching the Lord, his God.

I. This, then, is the scene I have to bring before you, and my first
observation shall be that NOTHING CAN HINDER A TRULY LOVING SPIRIT FROM
PLEADING FOR THE OBJECTS OF ITS LOVE.

There were many things that might have hindered Moses from making
intercessory prayer and the first was, the startling greatness of the
people's sin. God Himself put it to Moses in strong language. He said,
"The people have corrupted themselves: they have turned aside quickly
out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten
calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said,
These are your gods, O Israel, which have brought you up out of the
land of Egypt."

This terrible accusation from the mouth of God, spoken as God would
speak it, must have impressed Moses greatly with the awful character of
Israel's sin, for, farther on, we find Moses saying to God, "Oh, this
people have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold." It
has happened to you, I suppose, as it has to me, that in the sight of a
great sin one has almost hesitated to pray about it. The person sinned
so wantonly, under circumstances so peculiarly grievous, transgressed
so willfully and so altogether without excuse that you felt thrust back
from the Mercy Seat and from pleading for such a sinner! But it was not
so with Moses. Idolatry is a horrible sin, yet Moses is not kept back
from pleading for its forgiveness. It astounds him–his own wrath waxes
hot against it–but still, there he is, pleading for the transgressors!

What else can he do but pray? And he does it after the best possible
fashion. Oh, let us never say, when we see great sin, "I am appalled by
it! I cannot pray about it. I am sickened by it, I loathe it." Sometime
ago we had revelations of the most infamous criminality in this great
city which we cannot, even now, quite forget, and I must confess that I
sometimes felt as if I could not pray for some of the wretches who
sinned so foully. But we must shake off that kind of feeling and, even
in the presence of the most atrocious iniquity, we must still say, "I
will even pray for these Jerusalem sinners, that God may deliver them
from the bondage of their sin."

A second thing that might have hindered Moses was not only the sin, but
the manifest obstinacy of those who had committed the sin. Moses had it
upon the evidence of the heart-searching God that these people were
exceedingly perverse. The Lord said, "I have seen this people, and,
behold, it is a stiff-necked people." Poor Moses had to learn, in later
years, how true that saying was, for though he poured out his very soul
for them and was tender towards them as a nurse with a child, yet they
often vexed and wearied his spirit so that he cried to the Lord, "Have
I conceived all this people? Have I begotten them, that You should say
unto me, Carry them in your bosom, as a nursing father bears the
sucking child, unto the land which You swore unto their fathers?" He
was crushed beneath the burden of Israel's perversity, yet, though God,
Himself, had told him that they were a stiff-necked people, Moses
besought the Lord concerning these obstinate sinners!

Then, thirdly, the prayer of Moses might have been hindered by the
greatness of God's wrath, yet he said, "Lord, why does Your wrath wax
hot against Your people?" Shall I pray for the man with whom God is
angry? Shall I dare to be an intercessor with God who is righteously
wrathful? Why, some of us scarcely pray to the merciful God in this
Gospel dispensation in which He is so full of goodness and
long-suffering! There are some who profess to be God's people who make
but very little intercession for the ungodly. I am afraid that if they
had seen God angry, they would have said, "It is of no use to pray for
those idolaters! God is not unjustly angry. He knows what He does and I
must leave the matter there." But mighty love dares to cast itself upon
its face before even an angry God! It dares to plead with Him and to
ask Him, "Why does Your wrath wax hot?" although it knows the reason
and lays no blame upon the Justice of God! Yes, love and faith together
bring such a holy daring into the hearts of men of God that they can go
into the Presence of the King of kings, and cast themselves down before
Him even when He is in His wrath, and say, "O God, spare Your people;
have mercy upon those with whom You are justly angry!"

Perhaps it is an even more remarkable thing that Moses was not hindered
from praying to God though, to a large degree at the time, and much
more afterwards, he sympathized with God in His wrath. We have read how
Moses' anger waxed hot when he saw the calf and the dancing–do you not
see the holy man dashing the precious tablets upon the earth, regarding
them as too sacred for the unholy eyes of idolaters to gaze upon? He
saves them, as it were, from the desecration of contact with such a
guilty people by breaking them to shivers upon the ground! Can you not
see how his eyes flash fire as he tears down their idol, burns it in
the fire, grinds it to powder, strews it upon the water and makes them
drink it? He is determined that it shall go into their very
bowels–they shall be made to know what kind of a thing it was that
they called a god!

He was exceedingly angry with Aaron, and when he bade the sons of Levi
draw the sword of vengeance and slay the audacious rebels, his wrath
was fiercely hot, and rightly so! Yet he prays for the guilty people.
Oh, never let your indignation against sin prevent your prayers for
sinners! If the tempest comes on and your eyes flash lightning, and
your lips speak thunderbolts, yet let the silver drops of pitying tears
fall down your cheeks–and pray the Lord that the blessed shower may be
acceptable to Himself–especially when you plead for Jesus' sake!
Nothing can stop the true lover of men's souls from pleading for them!
No, not even our burning indignation against infamous iniquity! We see
it and our blood boils at the sight, yet we betake ourselves to our
knees and cry, "God be merciful to these great sinners, and pardon
them, for Jesus' sake!"

A still greater hindrance to the prayer of Moses than those I have
mentioned was God's request for the pleading to cease. The Lord,
Himself, said to the intercessor, "Let Me alone." Oh, Friends, I fear
that you and I would have thought that it was time to leave off praying
when the Lord, with whom we were pleading, said, "Let Me alone: let Me
alone." But I believe that Moses prayed the more earnestly because of
that apparent rebuff. Under the cover of that expression, if you look
closely into it, you will see that Moses' prayer was really prevailing
with God. Even before he had uttered it, while it was only being formed
in his soul, Jehovah felt the force of it, otherwise He would not have
said, "Let Me alone."

And Moses appeared to gain courage from that which might have checked a
less earnest suppliant–he seemed to say to himself, "Evidently God
feels the force of my strong desires and I will, therefore, wrestle
with Him until I prevail" It was a real rebuff and was, doubtless,
intended by the Lord to be the test of the patience, the perseverance,
the confidence, the self-denying love of Moses. Jehovah says, "Let Me
alone, that My wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume
them." But Moses will not let Him alone! O, you who love the Lord, give
Him no rest until He saves men! And though He should seem to say to
you, "Let Me alone," do not let Him alone, for He wishes you to be
importunate with Him, like that widow was with the unjust judge! The
wicked man granted the poor woman's request because of her continual
coming–and God is testing and trying you to see whether you really
mean your prayers. He will keep you waiting a while, and even seem to
repulse you, that you may, with an undaunted courage, say, "I will
approach You! I will break through all obstacles to get to You. Even if
it is not according to the law, I will go in unto the King of kings and
if I perish, I perish! I will pray for sinners even if I perish in the
act."

And, dear Friends, there is one thing more that might have hindered the
prayer of Moses. I want to bring this all out, that you may see how
tender-hearted love will pray in spite of every difficulty. Moses
prayed against his own personal interests, for Jehovah said to him,
"Let Me alone, that I may consume them." And then, looking with a
glance of wondrous satisfaction upon His faithful servant, He said, "I
will make of you a great nation." What an opportunity for an ambitious
man! Moses may become the founder of a great nation if he wills! You
know how men and women, in those old days, panted to be the progenitors
of innumerable peoples and looked upon it as the highest honor of
mortal men that their seed should fill the earth. Here is the
opportunity for Moses to become the father of a nation that God will
bless! All the benedictions of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are to be met
in Moses and his seed! But no, he will not have it so. He turns to God
and cries to Him to bless the sinful people! It seems as if he passed
over the offer that God made, sub silentio, as we say. Leaving it in
utter silence, he cries, "Spare Your people and bless Your heritage."

II. Now I introduce to you a second thought, which is that NOTHING CAN
DEPRIVE A LOVING SPIRIT OF ITS ARGUMENTS IN PRAYER FOR OTHERS.

It is one thing to be willing to besiege the Throne of Grace, but it is
quite another thing to get the ammunition of prayer. Sometimes you
cannot pray, for prayer means the pleading of arguments, and there are
times when arguments fail you–when you cannot think of any reason why
you should pray. Now there was no argument in these people, nothing
that Moses could see in them that he could plead with God for them–so
he turned his eyes another way–he looked to God and pleaded what he
saw in Him!

His first argument was, that the Lord had made them His people. He
said, "Lord, why does Your wrath wax hot against Your people?" The Lord
had said to Moses, "Get you down, for your people have corrupted
themselves." "No," says Moses, "they are not my people–they are Your
people." It was a noble, "retort courteous," as it were, upon the
Ever-Blessed One. "In Your wrath You call them my people, but You know
that they are none of mine–they are Yours–You did choose their
fathers and You did enter into Covenant with them. And I remind You
that they are Your chosen ones, the objects of Your love and mercy and,
therefore, O Lord, because they are Yours, will You not bless them?"
Oh, use that argument in your supplications! If you cannot say of a
sinner that he is God's chosen, at least you can say that he is God's
creature and, therefore, use that plea, "O God, suffer not Your
creature to perish!"

Next, Moses pleads that the Lord had done great things for them, for he
says, "Why does Your wrath wax hot against Your people, which You have
brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a
mighty hand?" "I never brought Israel out of Egypt," says Moses, "how
could I have done it? I did not divide the Red Sea! I did not smite
Pharaoh! You have done it, O Lord! You, alone, have done it and if You
have done all this, will You not finish what You have begun?" This was
grand pleading on the part of Moses and I do not wonder that it
prevailed! Now, if you see any sign of Grace, any token of God's work
in the heart, plead it with the Lord. Say, "You have done so much, O
Lord. Be pleased to do the rest and let these people be saved with Your
everlasting salvation!"

Then Moses goes on to mention, in the next place, that the Lord's name
would be compromised if Israel should be destroyed. He says, "Why
should the Egyptians speak and say, For mischief did He bring them out,
to slay them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the
earth"? If God's people are not saved, if Christ does not see of the
travail of His soul, the majesty of God and the honor of the Redeemer
will be compromised. Shall Christ die to no purpose? Shall the Gospel
be preached in vain? Shall the Holy Spirit be poured out without avail?
Let us plead thus with God and we shall not be short of arguments that
we may urge with Him.

Moses goes on to mention that God was in Covenant with these people.
See how he puts it in the 13th verse– "Remember Abraham, Isaac and
Israel, Your servants, to whom You swore by Your own Self, and said
unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of Heaven, and all
this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed, and they
shall inherit it forever." There is no pleading with God like reminding
Him of His Covenant! Get a hold of a promise of God, and you may pray
with great boldness, for the Lord will not run back from His own
Word–but get a hold of the Covenant and you may plead with the
greatest possible confidence! If I may compare a single promise to one
great gun in the heavenly siege-train, then the Covenant may be likened
to a whole park of artillery–with that you may besiege Heaven and come
off a conqueror! Moses pleads thus with the Lord–"How can You destroy
these people, even though You are angry with them, and they deserve
Your wrath? You have promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob that their
seed shall inherit the land, and if they are destroyed, how can they
enter into Canaan and possess it?" This is grand pleading! But what
bravery it was when Moses dared to say to God, "Remember Your Covenant
and turn from Your fierce anger, and repent of Your thoughts of evil
against Your people"! O Lord, teach us, also, how to plead like this!

Nor was Moses without another argument, the most wonderful of all! If
you read in the next chapter, at the 16th verse, you will notice how
Moses says to God, in effect, "I cannot be parted from these people!
With them I will live. With them I will die. If you blot their name out
of Your Book, blot out my name, also. If Your Presence goes not with
me, carry us not up from here. For how will it be known, here, that I
and Your people have found Grace in Your sight? Is it not in that You
go with us?" See how he puts it–"I and Your people.. .You go with us."
"No," says Moses, "I will not be favored–I will sink or swim with
these people." And I think that this is how the Lord Jesus Christ
pleads for His

Church when He is interceding with God. "My Father," He says, "I must
have My people. My Church is My bride, and I, the Bridegroom, cannot
lose My spouse. I will die for her and if I live, she must also live.
And if I rise to Glory, she must be brought to Glory with Me."

You see, it is, "I and Your people." This is the glorious conjunction
of Christ with us as it was of Moses with the children of Israel! And,
Brothers and Sisters, we never prevail in prayer so much as when we
seem to link ourselves with the people for whom we pray. You cannot
stand up above them, as though you were their superior, and then pray
for them with any success–you must get down by the side of the sinner
and say, "Let us plead with God." Sometimes, when you are preaching to
people, or when you are praying for them, you must feel as if you could
die for them, if they might be saved, and if they were lost it would
seem as if you, too, had lost everything! Rutherford said that he would
have two heavens if but one soul from Anwoth met him at God's right
hand, and, doubtless, we shall have the same, and we have sometimes
felt as if we had a Hell at the thought of any of our Hearers being
cast into Hell! When you can pray like that, when you put yourself side
by side with the soul for which you are pleading, you will succeed! You
will be like Elisha, when he stretched himself upon the Shunammite's
son and put his mouth upon the child's mouth, his eyes upon the child's
eyes, his hands upon the child's hands and seemed to identify himself
with the dead child. Then was he made the means of quickening to the
lad! God help us to plead thus in our prayers for sinners!

There is one other thing which I think has hardly ever been noticed,
and that is the way in which Moses finished his prayer by pleading the
Sovereign Mercy of the Lord. When you are pleading with a man, it is
sometimes a very wise thing to stop your own pleading and let the man,
himself, speak, and then out of his own mouth get your argument. When
Moses pleaded with God for the people, he had, at first, only half an
answer. And he turned round to the Lord and said, "You have favored me,
and promised me great things. Now I ask something more of You. 'I
beseech You, show me Your Glory.'" I do not think that was idle
curiosity on the part of Moses, but that he meant to use it as the
great master-plea in prayer. When the Lord said to him, "I will make
all My goodness pass before you," I think I see the tears in the eyes
of Moses and I seem to hear him say, "He cannot smite the people. He
cannot destroy them! He is going to make all His goodness pass before
me and I know what that is–Infinite Love, Infinite Mercy–mercy that
endures forever."

And then, when the Lord said, "I will proclaim the name of the Lord
before you; and will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will
show mercy on whom I will show mercy," how the heart of Moses must have
leaped within him as he said, "There it is! That glorious Truth of
Divine Sovereignty! The Lord will show mercy on whom He will show
mercy. Why, then, He can have mercy on these wicked wretches who have
been making a god out of a calf and bowing before it!" I do delight,
sometimes, to fall back upon the Sovereignty of God and say, "Lord,
here is a wicked wretch. I cannot see any reason why you should save
him! I can see many reasons why you should damn him, but then You do as
You will. Oh, magnify Your Sovereign Grace by saving this great sinner!
Let men see what a mighty King You are and how royally You handle the
silver scepter of Your pardoning mercy."

That is a grand argument, for it gives God all the Glory! It puts Him
upon the Throne, it acknowledges that He is an absolute Sovereign who
is not to be dictated to, or held in with bonds and cords. Shall He not
do as He wills with His own? We need to often listen to the sublime
Truth that thunders out from the Throne of God, "I will have mercy on
whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have
compassion. So, then, it is not of him that wills, nor of him that
runs, but of God that shows mercy." Out of this Truth of God comes the
best plea that ever trembles on a pleader's lips. "Great King, Eternal,
Immortal, Invisible, have mercy upon us! Divine Sovereign, exercise
Your gracious dispensing power and let the guilty rebels live!"

III. Now, in the third place, let me say that NOTHING CAN HINDER A
PLEADING SPIRIT OF SUCCESS. The text says, "The Lord repented of the
evil which He thought to do unto His people."

If you and I know how to plead for sinners, there is no reason why we
should not succeed, for, first, there is no reason in the Character of
God. Try, if you can, to got some idea of what God is, and though you
tremble before His Sovereignty and adore His Holiness and magnify His
Justice, remember that He is still, first and foremost, Love. "God is
love," and that love shines in all the Divine attributes! It is
undiminished in its glory by any one of them. All the attributes of God
are harmonious with each other and Love seems to be the very center of
the circle. Let us never be afraid of pleading with God! He will never
take it ill on our part that we pray for sinners, for it is so much
after His own mind. "As I live, says the Lord God, I have no pleasure
in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way, and
live." The Character of God is infinitely gracious, even in its
Sovereignty. It is Grace that reigns, therefore let us never be afraid
of pleading with the Lord! We shall surely succeed, for there is
nothing in God's Character to hinder us.

And, next, there is nothing in God's thoughts to hinder the pleader's
success. Look at the text–"The Lord repented of the evil which He
thought to do unto His people." I will, therefore, never be hindered in
my pleading by any idea of the Divine purpose, whatever that purpose
may be! There are some who have dreaded what they call, "the horrible
Decrees of God." No Divine Decree is horrible to me! And it shall never
hinder me in pleading with the Lord for the salvation of men. He is God
and, therefore, let Him do what seems good to Him–absolute authority
is safe enough in His hands. But even if He had thought to do evil to
His people, there is no reason why we should cease from praying! We may
yet succeed, for so the text has it, "Jehovah repented of the evil,
which He thought to do unto His people."

I will go yet farther, and say that there is nothing, even, in God's
act to hinder us from pleading with success. If God has begun to smite
the sinner, as long as that sinner is in this world, I will still pray
for him. Remember, how, when the fiery rain was falling upon Sodom and
Gomorrah, and the vile cities of the plain were being covered with its
bituminous sleet, Zoar was preserved in answer to the prayers of Lot?
Look at David–he was a great sinner, and he had brought upon his
people a terrible plague, and the destroying angel stood with his drawn
sword stretched out over Jerusalem– but when David saw the angel, he
said to the Lord, "Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but
these sheep, what have they done?" So the Lord was entreated for the
land, and the plague was stayed from Israel. Why, if I saw you between
the very jaws of Hell, so long as they had not actually engulfed you, I
would pray for you! God forbid that we should sin against any guilty
ones by ceasing to pray for them, however desperate their case! My text
seems to me to put this matter with astonishing force and power–the
evil which God had thought to do was prevented by the intercession of
His servant, Moses.

IV. I had many more things to say to you, but I must leave them unsaid
and conclude by reminding you, in only a sentence or two, that NOTHING
IN THE MEDIATION OF MOSES CAN MATCH OUR GREATER INTERCESSOR, THE LORD
JESUS CHRIST.

Remember, Brothers and Sisters, that He not only prayed and willingly
offered Himself to die for us, but He actually died for us. His name
was blotted from the book of the living–He died that we might live. He
went not to God saying, "Perhaps I may make Atonement for the guilty,"
but He made the Atonement and His pleading for sinners is perpetually
prevalent. God is hearing Christ at this moment as He makes
intercession for the transgressors! And He is giving Him to see of the
travail of His soul. This being the case, nothing ought to prevent any
sinner from pleading for himself through Jesus Christ! If you think
that God means to destroy you, yet go and pray to Him, for "The Lord
repented of the evil which He thought to do unto His people." Thus may
He deal in mercy with you, for His dear Son's sake! Amen.

EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: EXODUS32.

Verse 1. And 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 know not
what is become of him. What a terrible speech to be made by the people
whom God had chosen to be His own! "Make us gods. Make our creator."
How could that be?

2. And Aaron said unto them, 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. Poor Aaron! He never had the backbone of his
brother, Moses. He was a better speaker, but oh, the poverty of his
heart! He yields to the will of these idolatrous people and bows to
their wicked behests at once!

3. And all the people broke off the golden earrings which were in their
ears, and brought them unto Aaron. Idolaters spare no expense–there is
many a worshipper of a god of wood or mud who gives more to that idol
than professing Christians give to the cause of the one living and true
God! It is sad that it should be so.

4. And he received them at their hands and fashioned it with an
engraving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: and they said,
These are your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of
Egypt. This was an Egyptian idolatry, the worship of God under the
fashion of an ox, the emblem of strength. But God is not to be
worshipped under emblems at all! What a poor representation of God any
emblem must be!

5. And when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made
proclamation, and said, Tomorrow is a feast to the LORD. They were
going to worship Jehovah under the emblem of an ox! This is what you
will hear idolaters say–they do not worship the image, they say, but
the true God under that image! Yet that is expressly forbidden under
the Second Commandment!

6. And they rose up early on the morrow and offered burnt offerings,
and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to
drink, and rose up to play. Lascivious games were sure to accompany
idolatrous worship, for idolatry always leads to filthiness in some
form or other, as if it were inevitable!

7. And the LORD said unto Moses, Go, get you down; for your people,
which you brought out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves.
How startled Moses must have been when Jehovah said this to him!

8. 9. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded
them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and
have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These are your gods, O Israel,
which have brought you up out of the land of Egypt. And the LORD said
unto Moses, I have seen this people, and, behold, it is a stiff-necked
people. Moses, perhaps, begins to lift his voice in prayer, and God
says–

10. Now therefore let Me alone, that My wrath may wax hot against them,
and that I may consume them: and I will make of you a great nation. "I
will keep My promise to Abraham by destroying these rebels, and taking
you, his true descendant, and fulfilling the Covenant in you."

11-13. And Moses besought the LORD his God, and said, LORD, why does
Your wrath wax hot against Your people, which You have brought forth
out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why
should the Egyptians speak, and say, For mischief did He bring them
out, to slay them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face
of the earth? Turn from Your fierce wrath, and repent of this evil
against Your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your
servants, to whom You swore by Your own Self, and said unto them, I
will multiply your seed as the stars of Heaven, and all this land that
I have spoken of will I give unto your seed, and you shall inherit it
forever. What a brave prayer this was! Here is a wrestling Moses–true
son of wrestling Israel–and he brings his arguments to bear upon
Jehovah when He is angry! And, by God's Grace, he succeeds in turning
aside the Lord's wrath!

14, 15. And the LORD repented of the evil which He thought to do unto
His people. And Moses turned, and went down from the mount. An unhappy,
broken-hearted man, going from the closest communion with God, down
into the midst of a wicked people!

15-17. And the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand: the
tablets were written on both their sides; on the one side and on the
other were they written. And the tablets were the Work of God, and the
writing was the Writing of God, engraved upon the tablets. And when
Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said unto
Moses, There is a noise of war in the camp. Joshua had probably waited
lower down and he met Moses in his descent. He heard with the quick
ears of a soldier and his thoughts went that way.

18, 19. And he said, It is not the voice of them that shout for
mastery, neither is it the voice of them that cry for being overcome:
but the noise of them that sing do I hear. And it came to pass, as soon
as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the dancing:
and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tablets out of his hands,
and broke them beneath the mount. This is he who had been praying to
God and saying, "Why does Your wrath wax hot against Your people?" Now
he is in deep sympathy with God and he is, himself, angry with the
idolaters. He cannot help it when he begins to see their sin. Before,
he had only thought of the people, but now he looks at their sin. When
you see sin, if you are a man of God, your wrath waxes hot and you get
into sympathy with that Holy God who cannot be otherwise than indignant
at iniquity wherever it may be.

20. And he took the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire,
and ground it to powder, and scattered it upon the water, and made the
children of Israel drink of it. See the power of this one man who has
God at his back and God in him! While the people are dancing around
their idol, he tears it down, grinds it to powder and says, "You shall
drink it, every one of you." Why, there are millions to one–but what
cares he about their millions? God is with him and he is God's servant
and, therefore, they all tremble before him!

21-24. And Moses said unto Aaron, What did this people unto you, that
you have brought so great a sin upon them? And Aaron said, Let not the
anger of my lord wax hot: you know the people, that they are set on
mischief. For they said unto me, 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 know not what is become of him. And I said unto them, Whoever
has any gold, let them break it off so they gave it me: then I cast it
into the fire, and there came out this calf. That was a lie, for he had
made the calf and shaped it himself. Aaron had not any backbone, nor
any principle–he could not be stout-hearted for God! What a poor
little man he seems by the side of his great brother! How he shrivels
up under the rebuke of Moses!

25. And when Moses saw that the people were naked, (for Aaron had made
them naked unto their shame among their enemies). Moses does not spare
Aaron. He lays at his door the guilt of the great sin he had
committed–"Aaron had made them naked unto their shame among their
enemies."

26, 27. Then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, Who is on
the LORD'S side? Let him come unto me. And all the sons of Levi
gathered themselves together unto him. And he said unto them, Thus says
the LORD God of Israel, Put every man his sword by his side, and go in
and out from gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man, his
brother, and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor. This
is the man who pleaded for them on the top of the mount! See how he
acts in the sight of their sin, by Divine Authority! He smites them
right and left. Possibly, those who were slain were the men who refused
to drink the water on which the powder had been sprinkled, or those who
continued in rebellion against the Lord.

28-30. And the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses: and
there fell of the people that day about three thousand men. For Moses
had said, Consecrate yourselves today to the LORD, even every man upon
his son, and upon his brother; that He may bestow upon you a blessing
this day. And it came to pass on the morrow, that Moses said unto the
people, You have sinned a great sin; and now I will go up unto the
LORD; perhaps I shall make an atonement for your sin. I will be bound
to say that this was said after a sleepless night. The people's sin is
now so vividly before him that he begins to feel that God will be just
if He punishes them and does not grant them any forgiveness. So he
goes, once more, up that steep climb to the top of Sinai with a
trembling heart–and with only a, "perhaps," on his lip.

31, 32. And Moses returned unto the LORD, and said, Oh, this people
have sinned a great sin, and have made them gods of gold. Yet now, if
You will forgive their sin– There he broke down, he could not finish
that sentence!

32. And if not, blot me, I pray You, out of Your Book which You have
written. "Let me die in their place!" But God could not accept one man
in the place of another! There is a great Substitute, ordained of old,
but He is more than man and, therefore, He can stand in the sinner's
place.

33-36. And the LORD said unto Moses, Whoever has sinned against Me, him
will I blot out of My Book. Therefore now go, lead the people unto the
place of which I have spoken unto you: behold, My Angel shall go before
you: nevertheless in the day when I visit I will visit their sin upon
them. And the LORD plagued the people, because they made the calf,
which Aaron made. Moses had only half success in pleading for the
people. They were not to die as yet, but God declared that He would
visit their sin upon them.