This Is Taking Too Long
“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.” So Aaron said, “Take the gold rings from the ears of your wives and sons and daughters, and bring them to me.” All the people took the gold rings from their ears and brought them to Aaron. 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!”” Exodus 32:1-4 NLT
When you read about the Israelites in the Bible, you can see that they didn’t always make the brightest choices. After experiencing all the miracles back-to-back in escaping Egypt—from being completely unharmed plague after plague to walking across the miraculously parted Red Sea—these people still got impatient so quickly in a moment of waiting. When they grew bored with waiting on Moses, they decided to take matters into their own hands. They melted all their gold down, making a “god” out of their own wealth and resources, and claimed that this was actually what got them out of Egypt the whole time.
Wait a minute… didn’t they just see how that was made? Surely they knew that had nothing to do with how they got out of Egypt. And now they’re worshipping this thing?
It sounds like a pretty dumb decision—and it was, and it cost them dearly later on. As strange as the concept of someone worshipping a statue is to us today, it’s really more about what it represented. This statue was symbolic of impatience—the idea that “this is taking too long… I’m just going to do it myself.”
There have been many times in my life when I’ve had to guard my heart against this same thing. I’ve never been tempted to carve a cow out of items lying around my house. But I have been tempted to put my trust and hope in myself when the waiting gets long and it feels like God isn’t coming through.
This comes in many forms. It could be chasing financial security above putting our trust in Jesus. It could be refusing to rest, pushing ourselves to strive and achieve beyond what God is asking us to do. It could be settling in a relationship that we know isn’t quite right for us out of fear that God won’t ever bring the right person into our lives. It could be leaning more on medicine or self-help books and podcasts for healing than surrendering our brokenness over to Jesus.
Notice that all these things are good things that come from God. Financial provision, a balance of work and rest, relationships, modern medicine, and wisdom are all things that He brings into each of our lives. And the gold the Israelites had was no different. Where did it come from? It was a precious gift from God. They were slaves, yet God gave the Israelites favor with the very people they were trying to escape, and they were given whatever they wanted on their way out the door. This is something they would have never accomplished without God.
“The Lord caused the Egyptians to look favorably on the Israelites, and they gave the Israelites whatever they asked for. So they stripped the Egyptians of their wealth!” Exodus 12:36 NLT
May we never be so arrogant as to think that anything in our lives is something we accomplished without our loving God. May we always trust Him above everything, remembering that every good thing in our lives comes from Him.
“Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” James 1:16-17 NIV
