Let me give you kind of the introduction
to that passage of scripture I asked Ron to read for us earlier. Moses and Joshua have been up
on the mount. Moses a little further up on
the mount than Joshua. They've been up there 40 days
and 40 nights. The scripture says in another
location that Moses had fasted, and he did not only without food,
but he did without water all that time. God's giving to him
all of his law. He's giving to him all the instructions
pertaining to the tabernacle, which we've studied, and the
priesthood. And the Lord has given him instructions
about the sacrifices that are to be offered to him. Now, Moses
being up there on the mountain 40 days and 40 nights, his presence
was missed down in the camp of Israel. He's up on Mount Sinai. And then the rest of the camp
of Israel, the rest of the nation of Israel, they're down in the
valley. And they're waiting. And they wait, and they wait,
and they become very impatient. And so they go to Aaron. They
say, Moses, we don't even know where he's at. We don't know
what has become of Moses. And so here's what we want you
to do, is make us gods. Now look at verse 1 in chapter
32. And when the people saw, Exodus 32, 1, and when the people
saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people
gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and they 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 has become of him. And Aaron, trying to get
along with the people, that's a big mistake when it comes to
religion. That man who is faithful unto
God, He's not interested in getting along with people. He's interested
in honoring God with God's true message. That one who would faithfully
honor God and serve the cause of Christ will boldly speak to
people about the things of the Lord. He believes God's word. He'll
set forth God in His holiness, in His sovereignty, in His justice. He'll tell people what they are
in themselves. All of us, we're sinful people.
God's servant will tell people not what they want to hear by
nature, but what God has revealed to them. And he'll speak to the people
about the necessity of having a mediator between them and God. And you're not your own mediator.
Neither is your mother or your father. Neither is the preacher. The only mediator between you
and God is that man, Christ Jesus. God will only deal with, He'll
only speak with us through that man, through that God-man, Christ
Jesus. That's what God's faithful servants
do. And Aaron, he really makes a
big mistake here. Because he seeks to please the
people. We read what Paul said, if I
seek to please the people, I'm not the servant of God. All right, Aaron, what are you
going to do? What are you going to do? They've said, up, make
us gods which will go before us. And he says to them in the
second verse, break off the golden earrings which are in the ears
of your wives, and of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring
them unto me." Now, many writers, I'll just give you this, many
writers believe that Aaron figured they wouldn't give up their gold.
That was too high a price to pay, or to get the gold in Egypt. As the Israelites left Egyptian
bondage, the Egyptian women, they said to him, take anything
you want. Well, we'll take your gold, we'll
take your silver. And like I say, most writers
believe that Aaron, he just kind of figured, well, they'll never
give up their gold. But don't be too quick to judge
people. He misjudged them because they
were indeed willing to give up their gold. Let me tell you something. There are great sacrifices that
people will make even in false religion. And so they gave up their gold.
They gave it to Aaron. They break off their earrings
and look at verse four, he received them at their hand. And he fashioned
it with a graving tool after he had made it a mold and calf.
And they said, these be thy gods. They said, these be thy gods,
O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. Now Moses has only been up in
the mountain 40 days. How long does it take for idolatry
to go through kind of like wildfire spread through a group of people? It doesn't take too long. And I remind you, these people
are just several weeks away from being redeemed by the blood of
the Passover Lamb. They knew that that price that
was paid for their redemption was the blood of an innocent
victim which pointed to God's Lamb. They knew that. The seed of the woman is coming.
They knew that. And yet here they are just several
weeks away from being redeemed out of Egyptian bondage, and
God made a way for them to go through the Red Sea. One path. Their preacher, he's been gone
up on the mountain just about six weeks. And already, idolatry
sets in. Oh, how wicked, how wicked is
the heart of man. Always ready to make a God that
he can see. Our God is Spirit, and they that
worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. And in
their minds, they're thinking about way back there in Egypt. In Egypt, the Egyptians, they
had a god, Apis. He was the calf. He was the bull
that they worshipped. They made this bull out of gold. And then right at the front of
it was a serpent's head that came out. a weird-looking creature. And here are the Israelites,
people who ought to know better. These are the people of God.
These are the people that God, by His mercy, chose as a nation
to be a separate people. And now they're saying, we want
to be like the rest of the nations. We want to have a God we can
see. And so, Aaron fashioned them
a God that they could get along with. You see, the natural man
is religious. Isn't that right? Everybody is
religious. You say, well, you know preacher,
churches all around us, they're doing so good. You look at what
a great crowd they've got. Well, there's a massive crowd
here. They had a bunch of people. That
doesn't mean God's with you. The evidence of the presence
of the Spirit of God is not a parking lot overflowing with vehicles
and a church building overflowing with people bringing out chairs.
That's not an indication of the presence of God. You see, where
God is present, there's worship, there's reverence, there's respect. This was a big religious festival,
is what this was. This is great excitement. And
that's not unlike what people want today. We want, people by
nature want religion that's exciting. Oh, it's exciting to go to church.
I feel so good going to church. The preacher makes us laugh.
He entertains us on our way to hell. He makes us feel good about
ourselves. And then we fellowship with one
another. They fellowship with one another.
It says that they sat down and they ate and drank and then rose
up and then they played some kind of games. Let's all play
bingo. That's man's religion. Let's
get a crowd together. Well, you can get a crowd together.
We'll just tape under these pews several $5 bills and just tell
people, come on in. When we start Sunday school again,
we'll start giving things away. Oh, we can fill up the building.
There's a way to fill up the building. I used to do it. I know what that's about. But
there's something about the very truth of God that it whittles
us down. It brings us to the end of ourselves
and we're made to know this is not about us, it's about God. That's the reason when Moses,
when he came down, started coming down from the mountain, and Ron
read to us, he threw the law down and broke it. That law written
with the very finger of God. His is a holy anger. The Scripture doesn't say, don't
be angry. It says, be ye angry and don't
sin. Oh, he had a holy anger. Moses
did when he came down. He's coming off that mountain
and Joshua said, boy, I hear the noise of battle. There's
a battle going on. And Moses said, no, that's not
it. This is a noise of a bunch of people getting together and
they're happy. Is that what church is supposed
to be? Let's everybody be happy. Be happy all the time. Let's
all clap and yell and wave our arms together and such stuff
as that. Is that what it's about? Then
all get together in fellowship. People who have attended larger
congregations than ours, they'll tell you tomorrow, We had such
a wonderful service. I tell you, people at our church
love one another. Everybody hugs one another. And
we just have a great time together. This is not about fun. It's not about having a good
time. It's about worship. What do we know about worship?
What do we know about honoring God? Solomon said, God's in heaven,
you're on earth, keep your mouth shut. Remember to reverence Him. The fear of the Lord, the reverence
of the Lord, the worship of the Lord, that's the beginning of
wisdom, that's the beginning of knowledge. And that's the
last thing that people do, so they don't have any knowledge.
Don't have any wisdom. Idolatry. And you know when Moses,
after he threw the law down and broke it, and he took that golden
calf that Aaron had made and he ground it to powder. First
of all, he melted it and then ground it to powder and then
strode it on the water and made the people drink of it. And I
would say that'd be the leaders of Israel to drink of it. Here's what Aaron said to Moses.
Well, Moses said to Aaron, look at verse 21. And Moses said unto
Aaron, Verse 21, Moses said unto Aaron,
what did this people unto thee that thou hast brought such a
great sin on them? What in the world did they do? And Aaron said, let not the anger
of my Lord wax hot. You know how people are. They're set on mischief. And
that is the truth. That's how people are. They're
set on mischief. Aaron blamed it on the people.
This is just the way people are. This is what they wanted, so
this is what I gave them. Well, Aaron, you're behaving
like all the false preachers in the world. They find out what
people want to hear, like to hear, love to hear. That's what
they give them. Aaron, make us a God. A God we
can see. So that's not made yet. When Aaron sought, he built an
altar and he made a proclamation that said, tomorrow is a feast
to the Lord. He's not leaving the name of
God out of it. You see, most people are wise
enough to know. They're smart enough to know.
Let's don't leave God out of it. Because we believe God. We believe
there's a God. That's good, isn't it? We believe
there's a God. Don't leave God out of it. We're
not atheists. We're not agnostics. We're God-fearing
people. That's what most all your friends
will say. And look at verse six. They rose
up early on the morrow, they offered burnt offerings and brought
peace offerings. Burnt offerings. That's what
God said for Abraham to do pertaining to Isaac. Offer him as a burnt
offering unto me. The burnt offering was a sacrifice
to God, to appease God. That pointed to the sacrifice
of our Lord Jesus, who died that God might be just and justify
the ungodly. So not only, not only burnt offerings,
but then peace offerings. Peace offering was the offering
made because the burnt offering had been offered to God. We're
at peace with God now. Everything's all right. We got
a no so salvation. We're as sure for heaven as if
it was already there. That's the kind of language people
use in religion today. And when Moses comes down off
that mountain, he's unhappy. In fact, I'll tell you this.
These folks fully deserve God's wrath. There's nobody here that
would disagree with that. They deserve God's wrath. And
actually, God was ready to kill them. He's going to wipe them
all out. Look what he says to Moses, verse
7. Moses up on the mount still.
The Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down. Watch the language. For thy people, which thou broughtest
out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They've
turned aside quickly out of the way. That's what men will do. They'll turn aside quickly out
of the gospel. Let me tell you something. If
our God doesn't keep us, we'll turn aside too. We'll turn aside
too. Something else will attract us.
Something else will draw us. Something else will have an appeal
to us. I tell you, it's God who must
do the work in the heart and keep that work going. Verse eight again, they've turned
aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They've
made them a molten calf. They've worshiped it. They've
sacrificed thereunto. They said, these be thy gods,
O Israel, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.
And the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people and behold,
it's a stiff necked people. This is one stubborn bunch here. Now therefore, this is what he
says to Moses, leave me alone. Leave me alone that my wrath
may wax hot against them that I may consume them. I'm gonna
wipe them all out, Moses. You better get away from them. And I'll make of you a great
nation. That's what he says. I'll make
of you a great nation. And Moses, he's a type of our
Lord Jesus. He's the intercessor. He's the
mediator. And Moses, he besought the Lord
his God and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy
people? Watch his language now. Against
thy people, the Lord had said back up here in verse eight, Or verse 7, the Lord said to
Moses, it's thy people. Now Moses said, no, Lord, it's
your people. It's your people. Why doth thy
wrath wax hot against thy people, which I didn't bring them forth? You did. You did. You brought them out of the land
of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand. Wherefore should
the Egyptians speak and say, for mischief he brought them
out. He just brought them out to kill them and to consume them. He says, Moses said to the Lord,
turn from thy fierce wrath and repent of this evil against thy
people. What is repentance? Just a change
of direction. Now, God did change the direction
of His providence, but He didn't change His purpose, because God
never changes His purpose. And here's what Moses said to
the Lord in verse 13, "'Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, thy
servants, unto whom you swore.'" By thine own self, you said,
I will multiply your seed as the stars of heaven, and all
this land that I have spoken of, will I give it unto your
seed, that they may inherit it forever. Moses said, Lord, remember
your covenant. Remember your covenant. And here's
what we call on our God to do. Lord, I know we're still a rebellious
people. And I know that really, to a
degree, we're still idolatrous. We're all idolatrous. You say,
oh no, I'm not. So often, every one of us, we
idolize self. You know we do. That's the way
we are. We're concerned with me, mine,
and mine. That's what we're concerned about.
When you pray before the Lord, do you pour out your heart? Do
you shed tears over people you don't even know? Say, Lord, bless
my family. Lord, save my family. That's
the way we are. Don't tell me you're not idolatrous.
We are. To a degree, we are. And we look forward to that day
when the Lord will rip all of that idolatry out of our hearts
when we get to glory. And we'll only honor Jesus Christ,
the King. But we're all idolaters. These people deserve the wrath
of God, but to have somebody praying for them. Yes, sir, they had somebody interceding
for them, Moses. And you and me, those of us who
love the gospel, we're still sinful people. Thank God we have
an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He
prays for us. What does he pray? Five bleeding
wounds I bear, received on Calvary. Forgive them, Father. Forgive
them. That's what those wounds cry
out. The blood of our Lord Jesus.
Well, Moses makes the people drink the water. These people... You look at religion
today, and as you see the excitement, if you watch any of the crazy
religious programs on television, you see that kind of religious
fervor and zeal, how excited people get. That's the way these
were. It's like they're wound up to
a religious frenzy. That's the reason you see people
on television doing this, you know, and just say, well, their
sincerity, I don't doubt that. But there's no truth to it. No
truth. So, well, they mention the name
of God. That preacher, he didn't preach a lot of good things,
but he did say a few things about God. Well, whoopee. The devil believes there's a
God and he even trembles. Did that preacher tell you who
God is? In His holiness? In His sovereignty? That that God says, I'll have
mercy on whom I'll have mercy and whom I will, I'll harden
them. Did he tell you what you are?
Did that preacher tell you what you are? Is it like that preacher
on television who says, I don't ever call anybody a sinner. That's
so offensive. We've all made mistakes. I sure don't want to be around
him because God's wrath waxes hot against that sort of stuff. We're sinful people. We need
a mighty Savior. Don't you see that? There's only
one who can help us. There's only one sacrifice that
fully put away sin. That's a sacrifice of our Lord
Jesus Christ. And Moses, boy, he gets to, he's
so fed up with these people, but he loves them. and he stands in the gate, he's
looking at all these people who are naked. Aaron made them naked. What religious nonsense and foolishness
is all of this? I'll tell you, you fall in with
false religion, there's no depth too deep, but what you can't
fall into it. You just get deeper and deeper.
And Moses stood in the gate to the camp, verse 26. And he said,
who's on the Lord's side? That's the message. That's the
issue right there. It's not who's religious. Everybody's
religious. It's not who's got a big crowd. Lots of churches got a big crowd.
It's not who's got the religious excitement. A lot of churches
got religious excitement. The issue is, who's on the Lord's
side? Who's on the Lord's side? And
all the sons of Levi had gathered themselves together to Him. He
said, put your sword on, every one of you. And you go out there
and you find somebody who's still committing idolatry. They're
so upset that their God has been squashed. Tell you what, you start killing
somebody's God, they're going to get upset. You got a God who loves everybody
and hates nobody? I wish I could squash that God.
Grind it to powder. You got a Jesus who died for
everybody but saved nobody unless he agrees with what they did,
unless the person believes him and adds faith to what he did. I want to grind at the powder. A spirit of God who's trying
to save everybody is knocking at your heart door. Won't you
let me in? What a pitiful, sissy Savior
you got. He can't help you. I want to
take that golden calf and grind it to powder, just drink it and
choke on it. That's what Moses did. Get your sword on. Why don't
you take the Word of God to your family? You got family members
that believe all this hogwash? Take the Word of God to them.
Take them this CD. Who's on the Lord's side? I'll
tell you what these Levites did, and they went around and they
killed 3,000, and I would take this to be 3,000 of the tribe
of Levi. 3,000 of the tribe of Levi. Who's on
the Lord's side? By the way, maybe a good question
there, what is the Lord's side? What does it mean to be on the
Lord's side? Well, it means, first of all,
to agree with Him. You can't be on somebody's side
and be in disagreement with them. Who's on the Lord's side? People
who agree with what His Word says. Amos 3 and verse 3 says,
Can two walk together except they be agreed? Don't tell me
you're on the Lord's side, but you don't believe what the Lord
says. Who's on the Lord's side? People
who worship God as He set forth in the Scriptures. That's who's
on God's side. Not this God who is like a Santa
Claus in the sky. He wants to give you all these
presents. Not just at Christmas, but all
year round. If only you would receive them.
Not that God. I'm talking about the God who
does His will in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants
of the earth, and nobody can stay His hand or say unto Him,
what doest thou? I'm talking about the God who
says, I will do all my pleasure. So I don't think God can act
unless I let Him act. He's going to roll right over
you and there won't be as much as just a smudge left of you. And His purpose will just keep
on going. You think He needs you? What is the Lord's side? It's
to agree with God. See, this is the issue. Who's
on the Lord's side? Not who's got the crowd, who's
got the excitement, who's got religion. The issue is who's
on the Lord's side. That's what I'm asking you. Who's on the Lord's side? What
does it mean to be on the Lord's side? It means to worship Him.
through the only appointed way, Christ Jesus, the smitten, crucified,
dead, buried, risen Savior. Worship Him that way. You can't
come to God any other way. And you know what Moses said?
I like the way it's worded here. He said, look at verse 26 again. He said, who's on the Lord's
side? Let him come to me. And that
reminds me of our Savior's words in Matthew chapter 11. Who's
on the Lord's side? Let him come into me. All you
that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. I'll give
you rest. Who's on the Lord's side? What
does that mean? It means you believe salvation altogether
by grace. Not free will, but free grace. You bow to God's way of saving
sinners. What are the marks of true worship? Of really being on the Lord's
side? Well, number one, confession. Moses said, who's on the Lord's
side? And all the sons of Levi stepped over. He said, who's
on the Lord's side? Come to me. And here's the sons
of Levi. And they said, we are. And they
just stepped over there. They said, we're with you. We're
on God's side. This is a big, this is a tragic
mistake. This is awful idolatry. We're
on the Lord's side. We confess and we identify with
God's servant. God's message. Don't tell me
you're on the Lord's side and you identify with some false
religion or false preacher out here. You're not on the Lord's
side. If you're on the Lord's side, you identify with those
who preach the Lord as He set forth in the Word of God. That's what we do. We identify with God's people. And we separate from those who
don't believe the Word of God. Moses said, come over here. Don't
you stay over there. How can you stay over there with
the idolaters? How can you go to church with
the idolaters? How can you associate with those
who deny the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace? Separate
yourself from them. And boldness. Take out that sword. The Word of God. And here's something else. What
happens to those who are not on the Lord's side? Well, look
at verses 27 and 28. Death. Death, destruction. The children of Levi did, verse
28, did according to the word of Moses. There fell that day
of the people 3,000 men. You gonna remain in idolatry?
Let me tell you something, you end for everlasting death. You
go ahead and have it. Enjoy your fun. Enjoy the big
crowds. Enjoy the excitement. Go ahead
and cast your lot with all these big charismatic churches. But one of these days, God's
going to get you. His judgment's going to find
you. And as judgment finds you, eternity keeps you. That's for
sure. Well, what about those who were
spared judgment? What was the reason for that?
Oh, I can tell you. Look at verse 30. It came to
pass the next day on the morrow, Moses said unto the people, you've
sinned a great sin. Now I will go up. I'm going up. as your representative, as your
mediator under the Lord, and I'm gonna make an atonement for
your sin. I'm gonna appease God's justice
with the sacrifice of an innocent animal in your stead. And this
atonement speaks of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. He
is the atonement. He is the great reconciler. He's
the one who made things right. He didn't try to make things
right. He didn't try to save His people. He didn't try to
put away sins. He did save His people from their
sins. He offered Himself to God. It's
just like Moses said, Lord, let these people live. If you don't
let them live, just kill me. Kill me. That's what our Lord
Jesus said, Father, let these people live. Take me. Take me
instead. And I want you to notice something.
Go down here to verse 34. Here's the result of this now.
The Lord said to Moses, whoever sinned against me, him will I
blot out of the book. Now verse 34, therefore now go. And he doesn't say, go and forsake
these people. He says, lead them. Lead them
to the place I've spoken to you of. This people, This religious
but lost bunch, this idolatrous bunch, you may lead them, lead
them. Because I made a promise and
I'm going to fulfill it. And then he said, look down chapter
33, verse one. The Lord said to Moses, he says,
depart and go up hence. Thou and the people which thou
has brought up out of the land of Egypt under the land that
I swear unto Abraham, to Isaac, to Jacob saying, unto thy seed
while I give it. And I'm going to send my angel
before thee. And he's going to take care of
the enemies. And children of God, let me tell you something. Our Lord has sent and continues
to send, in a sense, the Angel of the Covenant, the Lord Jesus
Christ. He goes before us. He's gone
before us on the glory. And He staked a claim to our
everlasting inheritance. And through Him, we shall enter
in. Because He made the atonement
for our sins. Well, let's sing one stanza,
42. All hail the power of Jesus'
name. You've got a lot to think about
this morning. When you go away from here, who is on the Lord's
side? Are you? Are you? And you know, there's
a sense in which you need to ask this question of yourself
every day. Am I on the Lord's side? I am by His grace. Let's sing,
first stanza, all hail the power, 42.