Exodus (Lesson 59)

Welcome to the Preaching the Cross Radio Podcast, featuring the radio ministry of Pastor James W.

Knox of the Bible Baptist Church of Delaney, Florida.

Our prayer is that these half-hour Bible study programs will bring the lost to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and enable the saved to grow in the grace and knowledge of the Savior.

Now here's your host, Pastor James W.

Knox.

I'm Brother James.

I greet you once again in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.

This is the Preaching of the Cross radio broadcast.

Before us today is an ominous chapter.

It's so weighty, it's so troubling, it's so practical, it's so up to date that I really truly, sincerely hope that every one of you can stay with us for the full half an hour.

We have been studying together the Bible book of Exodus.

We have made our way all the way to chapter number 32.

In Exodus chapter 32, we have the tragic golden calf affair.

Exodus 32 · chapter mention

This chapter stands as a great warning, as it tells the tale of a people who, well, as we read in verse 1, when Moses, I'm sorry, 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 want not what is become of him.

This chapter pictures the apostasy of the church in the last days.

These people were tested by the prolonged absence of Moses, just as the church is tested by the prolonged absence of Jesus Christ.

As we look at verse number one, it is filled with spiritual import.

First of all, and and that word makes the account of making an idol to dance around if it could be any worse.

That word and makes it far worse.

We have just come out of a portion of Scripture where God has been speaking of meeting with man in a most holy place, of receiving sacrificial offerings from men in a holy place.

We have just read of consecration, of sanctification, of a high priestly ministry, of intercession, of sacred ceremonies and feasts, of lighted candlesticks, and mercy seats, and arks of the the Ark of the Covenant, and the tables of stone, and Aaron's rod that butted, and for all of that, chapter 32, verse 1 links what happened down in the valley with what God was instructing up on the mountain, and what a horrible thing.

What a horrible thing.

To see a people so blessed, so privileged, to see a people who had enjoyed the miraculous, like only one other generation of people in human history would ever enjoy it.

To see them so quickly turn aside must break the heart of everyone who honestly considers the words of this chapter.

And when the people saw, we walk by faith, not by sight.

So many times I hear people say, if I could just see the Lord, if I could just see a miracle, if if if some great thing were to happen in my life, like the things that happened back in Old Testament times or the times when Jesus walked the earth, then it would be easier for me to believe.

That seems as though it would be right.

That sounds as though it has some logic to it, but it's completely wrong.

Consider the two groups of people who were privileged to see the greatest number of miracles since Adam left the garden.

This race or generation of Hebrew people, they saw the ten plagues fall upon Egypt, and they saw as those ten plagues did not touch them, their property, their houses, their families.

They saw the waters of the Red Sea part, and they walked across that body of water on dry land, right through the middle of it.

Then they saw those waters crash down upon Pharaoh and his host.

They saw that with their eyes.

Every single day they saw manna fall from heaven.

They were guided and directed by a pillar of fire by uh by night and a pillar of cloud by day.

These people saw water gush forth from a rock.

They saw a tree make bitter water sweet.

And for all that, for all that, they could in just over one month forget all about the true and living God who had wrought all those miracles before them.

The other generation.

For three and one half years the Lord Jesus Christ went about, not just doing good, but doing supernatural good, restoring withered arms, healing men of palsies, giving sight to blind eyes, opening deaf ears, casting out devils, raising the dead, and after three and one half years of watching Jesus Christ perform so many miracles that John wrote the world could not contain all the things that Jesus did.

After seeing all that with their eyes, they cried out away with this man, crucify him, crucify him, and they nailed Jesus Christ to a cross.

It is of no proven advantage to walk by sight rather than by faith.

If your heart is not right with God, all that God could show you would make no difference.

You know the Bible says the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork.

Did you know the Bible says that day after day, the rising and setting of the sun, the forthcoming, and the vanishing away of the stars, day after day as a man looks into the heavens, he sees ample proof and splendid evidence of the mighty power, hand and working of God.

And yet, and yet, for all of that glorious show, millions and millions and millions of men close their eyes tightly and say there is no God.

Each and every time the miracle of life, be it the birth of a beautiful baby, some little bird or beast of the field, the springing forth of the plant life, after a cold and barren winter, men behold the life-giving power and the awesome majesty of Almighty God.

And yet millions and millions and millions of people shut their eyes tightly and say it's chance, it's accident, it's circumstance, it's science, it's nature.

And so seeing is not believing, believing is believing.

And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount.

Now, who said he delayed to come down out of the mount?

Did Moses say, I'm going up on the mountain and I'll be back in four days?

Did he say I'm going up on the mountain and I'll be back in a couple of weeks?

Did he say I'm going up on the mountain and in no time at all I'll be right back down?

No, you see, the people acted upon what they supposed was a reasonable time period.

They acted upon what they, in their minds, deemed to be a sufficient length of time for Moses to meet with God on the top of Mount Sinai.

And when Moses did not return, in a time suited to their expectations, they began to imagine that he either wasn't coming or that he wasn't coming soon enough for his return to have any effect upon their present actions and activities.

And so I say to you today that Jesus Christ promised when he went away that he would come again.

Some foolishly set dates for his return.

Some imagined that his return would be within a certain period of time.

Others, others just reasoned within themselves or applied their own uh flawed brand of logic to the situation and said, well, surely if Jesus was coming, he would have been back by now.

So he must not be coming at all, or perhaps he is coming, but not soon enough or quickly enough to have any effect upon our actions today.

Now, let's suppose that were true, which it isn't, because he didn't tell you when he was coming or how soon he was coming or on what day he was coming or uh how you could predict the time of his coming.

None of that's in the Bible.

But let's suppose that Jesus didn't come when you thought he was going to come.

Let's suppose he didn't come when anybody thought he was going to come.

What difference could that possibly make to the way you live, the way I live, if our hearts are right with God?

Now, now stay with me.

The verse goes on to say, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us.

If Moses had died on that mountain and was never coming again, how does that justify turning aside to other gods?

If Moses decided to stay up there for three, four, five years instead of forty days, how would that make it right for the people to turn aside after other gods?

If if there was no Moses, how would that justify the people turning aside after other gods?

Now let me ask you something.

If a thousand men set dates for the coming of the Lord, and none of those dates were correct, how does that justify you or me turning away from the worship of the true and living God?

If the New Testament writers all lived in the anticipation of the soon return of the Lord, and two thousand years have now gone by without that return, how would that justify turning aside after other gods?

You see, the the crime here is not that they got impatient, the crime here is not that they acted in haste.

The crime here is not that they misunderstood the uh the duration of the or the nature of the absence of Moses.

The crime here is that they had any willingness at all to abandon the God who had redeemed them and to turn away from the Lord who had brought them out of Egypt?

How could they do such a thing?

Now think with me, please, please.

I I want to know something.

How do you ask a man to make you a god?

How do you ask a human being to form and fashion for you a god?

I honestly don't understand that.

I before I got saved, I didn't get saved out of a tribal religion where we worshiped rocks or trees or statues or totem poles or carvings.

So I can't grasp it.

I was never in a church that had statues of blonde-haired women with crowns on their head and the earth under their feet and a baby in their arms.

I I was never, I was never part of an idolatrous paganism.

Oh, I was lost.

I was a sinner, I was on my way to hell, but I don't think there was ever a time in my life you could have convinced me that something made by men's hands was a God, or that something made by men's hands had any spiritual power, could impart any spiritual power, was something to be prayed to or bowed before.

I don't understand it.

There's nothing in my mind, there's nothing in my heart that can grasp the stupidity of worshiping something you know a man made with his hands and calling that a god.

Honestly, I don't get it.

I just don't get it.

Now, if I was, if I was living in Portugal and had never seen miracles, if I was a Spaniard or an Italian and never seen miracles, if if I was living in a large city in South America, if I was a cab driver in Quebec, or a school teacher in in uh Sweden, I could, I could, listen, I can understand people who have never seen the miraculous hand of God at work, I can understand how they might be more inclined to miss the true God.

Even with the testimony of creation, look look, here's what I'm saying: creation testifies, it does.

The handiwork of God testifies it does.

But we're talking about a people here who who saw ten supernatural plagues, who saw who lived through Pass overnight, who walked on dry land and saw Red Sea waters piled on either side of them, who watched food fall out of the sky six days a week.

I don't get it.

I don't understand.

How can you think Aaron is going to make you a god?

Where does that come from?

How deluded must you be?

How blind must you be?

They said, they said, Aaron, up, make us gods, which shall go before us.

How could they?

They have no life.

For as for this, Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, and there it is again, they never gave God the credit in their hearts.

They never gave God the glory in their hearts.

You know why we got all this apostasy in our churches today?

You know why we have all this turning from the Word of God?

Do you know why?

Because the majority of our church people never see beyond the preacher.

They never see beyond the priest, they never see beyond the Pope.

Their trust is in a religious figure.

Their trust is in a human leader.

God to them is not real, the preacher's real.

And some of you preachers have gone a great way to contribute to that ridiculous, false confidence.

When these popes stand up and pretend they're the vicar of Christ and pretend that the only way for you to get to heaven is through their blessing.

In their church.

They are encouraging people to trust in man, not in God.

When these little egomaniacs stand in their church and get up before their congregation and strut around and pound their chest and talk about how I'm the man of God and you can't make a move without me, and you can't get truth without me.

And so listen, all you're doing is teaching people to trust you, not God.

Look, if you find out the Pope's corrupt, that doesn't affect my faith.

If ten more pastors take a nosedive today, that doesn't affect my faith.

Jesus Christ saved me, not a preacher.

Jesus Christ gave me eternal life, not a pope.

Jesus Christ washed my sins away in his blood, not some priest somewhere.

But these people, they always, in their heart and mind, they always gave Moses the glory.

And if Moses gets the glory, he also takes the heat.

In their mind, they just couldn't get beyond attributing their deliverance to human and consequential activity.

They just couldn't give God the honor he deserved.

And it cost them dearly over and over and over again.

As for this Moses which brought us up out of Egypt, really?

Moses did that?

Are you kidding?

How did Moses pull off that Passover miracle?

How did Moses pull off that Red Sea crossing?

Really?

Moses?

How did Moses bring that manna down from heaven?

Oh, I'm telling you.

The human heart, it's so deceitful.

The human heart, it's so corrupt.

Let me ask you something, my friend.

What's more important to you?

Your relationship to God?

Or your friendships at church?

Hear me now.

Hear me.

I've been doing this for a long, long time.

The preacher doesn't change, the preaching doesn't change.

The music doesn't change, the doctrine doesn't change.

And people say, well, this church just isn't what it used to be.

You're wrong.

It's exactly what it always was.

In your heart, you want another God.

That's what's happened in America.

In this generation, we have watched the ministers and the church members in America decide that that old God wasn't good enough.

That old God couldn't keep up with the times.

That old God wouldn't bring in in the money.

That old God didn't make them feel good about themselves.

And so they turned to apostate ministers.

They turned to carnal compromisers who were more willing to do the will of ungodly people than they were to do the will of God.

And they turned to those men and asked those men to make them a new God.

Now that's what's happened in our land.

In the United States of America right now, people are gathering on Sunday mornings by the tens of thousands, and they don't have a God who demands repentance.

They don't have a God who puts lost sinners in hell.

They don't have a God who's concerned with the salvation of their soul through the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.

They don't have a God who sets forth his son as the only way to heaven, and they don't have a God who calls upon his people to deny themselves for the good of saving other sinners.

They have found worldly infidel ministers who have made them a brand new God.

Their new God doesn't ask anyone to repent, he tells everyone they're wonderful.

Their new God doesn't judge, doesn't condemn, and doesn't find fault.

He doesn't wait for men to praise him.

He heaps praises upon men.

The new God is not concerned with the condition of their soul.

He's concerned with healing their bodies and patting their bank accounts.

Their new God doesn't demand that they serve him.

Their new God meets their demands for entertainment.

It's a different God.

It's a man-made God.

It's a God invented by carnal ministers for carnal people.

It's a testimony to the heart condition of the people attending our churches and claiming the name of Christ.

That's where we are.

You say, Well, Jesus has been gone a long time, preacher.

You think he's coming again?

I don't think he's coming again.

I know he's coming again.

He's not a liar.

He said he was coming again.

He said, Well, he said he was coming soon, and it's been 2,000 years.

He never said he was coming soon.

He said he was coming quickly.

That's the nature, the speed with which he'll come when he gets ready to come.

See, here's your problem.

Your problem is you will love and serve God if you think you have to, because he might catch you if he shows up and you're not serving him.

But if you think he's going to be gone a while, you just go ahead and live in the old way you want to.

That's the problem.

Why do you want to live contrary to God's will and word and ways and holiness?

Why?

Why?

Okay, so Moses has been gone 40 days.

Why don't you want to live for God?

Moses has been on the mountain too long to suit you.

Why would that change your conduct and your behavior?

And that therein lies therein lies the problem.

You see, these people, they resented having to be holy because their God was holy.

They didn't like having to be righteous because their God demanded righteousness.

And just as soon as they thought they had the right opportunity, they get rid of that God in a minute.

You know what people want today?

They want a Jesus who will save them and then keep his nose out of their business.

They want to be delivered from the bondage and the fear of knowing that they're not going to heaven when they die, but then they want that God that got them out of the consequence and penalty of sin to leave them be.

Now that that's what we have before us in this chapter, and that's what we have before us in our nation today.

And so we're going to talk about it.

But not today.

We've only got one minute left.

And then we're done.

Look, if we're not done, we're done.

If I don't quit talking, you won't hear anything else I've got to say.

When our time's up, man, they cut us off.

So if you want more, you want to hear more, you'll have to write to us.

Our mailing address, 872 Glenwood Road, 32720.

872 Glenwood Road, D Land, Florida, 32720.

You know, if you just put the preaching of the cross 32720, we'll get it.

All right, online.

You can visit us at JamesNox.com.

Jamesenox.com.

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Until then, I'm Brother James.

May the Lord richly bless you and good day.

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Until next time and throughout eternity, may Jesus Christ be praised.