Sermon Tone Analysis

*The Aftermath of the Golden Calf:  Response and Consequence to Sin*

/Exodus 32.7-35/

Pastor Oesterwind

 

*Overview:*

Response to Sin (7-29)

                God (7-14)

                Moses (15-20)

                Aaron (21-24)

                Levites (25-29)

Consequence to Sin (30-35)

 

*The Broader Context:  *

1.       Response – the Lord and Moses respond to Israel’s sin (32.7-33.17)

2.       Revelation – the Lord reveals Himself again on Mount Sinai (33.18-34.9)

3.       Renewal – the Lord renews His covenant with Israel (34.10-28)

4.       Reestablishment – the Lord reestablishes Moses’ authority and leadership (34.29-35)

 

*Response to Sin (7-29)*

 

/God (7-14)/

* *

*Exodus 32:7–10 (NKJV) — 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.”

*Exodus 32:11–14 (NKJV) — 11* Then Moses pleaded with the Lord his God, and said: “Lord, why does Your wrath burn hot against Your people whom You have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?

*12* Why should the Egyptians speak, and say, ‘He brought them out to harm them, to kill them in the mountains, and to consume them from the face of the earth’?

Turn from Your fierce wrath, and relent from this harm to Your people.

*13* Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, Your servants, to whom You swore by Your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your descendants as the stars of heaven; and all this land that I have spoken of I give to your descendants, and they shall inherit it forever.’

” *14* So the Lord relented from the harm which He said He would do to His people.

The Lord answered Moses’ prayer by relenting from the harm He said He would do to His people.

God’s response was altered by the prayer of Moses.

Judgment would still come, but not to the extent that it would have come had Moses’ not prayed.

That God would judge the people is seen in the context: 

*Exodus 32:34–35 (NKJV) — 34* Now therefore, go, lead the people to the place of which I have spoken to you.

Behold, My Angel shall go before you.

Nevertheless, in the day when I visit for punishment, I will visit punishment upon them for their sin.”

*35* So the Lord plagued the people because of what they did with the calf which Aaron made.

*Exodus 34:6–7 (NKJV) — 6* And the Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, *7* keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.”

God’s response to the golden calf sin is a test of Moses’ leadership over the people.

Moses was dealing with a stiff-necked people (9).

Wouldn’t it be better to start over?

Of course, God knows the answer to that question all along.

When God basically tells Moses to not interfere so that His wrath might burn hot and consume Israel, it is not unlike what a parent may do with a child.

I’ve told my son that if he leaves his Legos on the floor, I will simply throw them away.

I haven’t thrown them out yet.

My son doesn’t want to find out if I’m serious.

I want him to be responsible; I don’t want to throw his toys away.

His responsibility would save his Legos.

God did the same thing in His exchange with Moses so that Moses would fulfill his responsibility to intercede and save Israel.

God’s response provoked prayer from a righteous man.

This pray has effective components that we may place in our own prayer lives.

P.

G. Ryken mentions five of these that I have adapted:

·         Appealed to God’s fatherly affection.

God had called them Moses’ people; Moses was saying, “God, they are Your people.”

They were God’s children and nothing could change that fact.

As for us, this promise also holds true.

Once we become children of God, nothing can change that fact:  “No man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand” (John 10.29).

·         Appealed to God’s past investment.

God had done great and mighty things on the behalf of Israel.

How could He destroy a people He had redeemed?

God has revealed to some of us our sin.

He has sent people to us with the Gospel.

He redeemed us through the blood of His precious Son.

How could He give up on us now? 

·         Appealed to God on the basis of His public reputation.

It was not for Israel but rather for the name and reputation of God that God should extend mercy.

What would the Egyptians say?

The glory of God motivated the intercession of Moses.

When we pray for the deliverance of the needy souls around us, we must form the same basis in our prayer to God.

We want God to get glory for saving sinners.

·         Appealed to God on the basis of His merciful compassion.

The people of Israel deserved the full measure of God’s wrath.

Moses asked that He turn away from leveling this full measure.

When God turned aside, He was showing mercy.

He’s not obligated to do so.

We all would do well to remember that.

But it is part of His character.

So, we cry out for mercy in the lives of those around us.

·         Appealed to God on the basis of His promise (covenant) to~/with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

This is the strongest part of Moses’ prayer.

It is so because God will not break His promise.

We must pray with the promises of God firmly in mind.

God always remains faithful to His Word.

/Moses (15-20)/

*Exodus 32:15–16 (NKJV) — 15* And Moses turned and went down from the mountain, and the two tablets of the Testimony were in his hand.

The tablets were written on both sides; on the one side and on the other they were written.

*16* Now the tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God engraved on the tablets.

Moses turned and began to move down the mountain with the Ten Commandments in hand.

The stone tablets were written on both sides (not a common perspective).

It is said that they are the work of God.

That the writing itself was the writing of God.

God is the source of the Law; therefore, He has the authority to carry it out.

*Exodus 32:17 (NKJV) — 17* And when Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.”

Moses rejoined Joshua who had attended him.

Joshua heard the celebration and misconstrued it as the noise of war.

*Exodus 32:18 (NKJV) — 18* But he said: “It is not the noise of the shout of victory, Nor the noise of the cry of defeat, But the sound of singing I hear.”

Moses corrects Joshua.

It is not the shout of victory or the cry of defeat (prevailing or failing) in battle, but rather it is the sound of singing.

The singing was something akin to corporate worship (responsive singing; antiphonal singing).

*Exodus 32:19–20 (NKJV) — 19* So it was, as soon as he came near the camp, that he saw the calf and the dancing.