The Man of God Vs the People

In the Old Testament times after the parting of the red sea and after the great Exodus from Egypt, Moses then proceeded to lead the people of Jacob (Israel) toward the promised land on the other side of the Jordan. But what we will discuss in this devotional is Moses and the direct disobedience of the people of God. The Bible says in Exodus 32:1-8, "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!' Aaron saw how excited the people were, so he built an altar in front of the calf. Then he announced, 'Tomorrow will be a festival to the Lord!' The people got up early the next morning to sacrifice burnt offerings and peace offerings. After this, they celebrated with feasting and drinking, and they indulged in pagan revelry. The Lord told Moses, 'Quick! Go down the mountain! Your people whom you brought from the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. How quickly they have turned away from the way I commanded them to live! They have melted down gold and made a calf, and they have bowed down and sacrificed to it. They are saying, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt.'"

In this passage, we see the whole story between obedience and disobedience. We see Moses adhering to what God told him do and that he went up to the mountain top to receive what the Lord had for him. Meanwhile, the people of Israel were planning to disobey the Lord by building an idol out of gold and other metals, professing the idol as gods that brought them out of Egypt. Now this problem we can relate to a similar problem that we have in today's world: we replace God with man-made things like phones, jewelry, and other things. What we don't realize is that we are replacing God with earthly items. The situation here is clear when it came to Moses versus the People, the people lead themselves to destruction. The final thing here is that obedience and whole-hearted service to God is better than disobedience and pain. Justin Citro Real Talk with JNC Host