The Israelites built their own god
the moment Moses went up Mount Sinai to hear God's instructions.
They sent Moses to God, because they didn't want to hear what He
was saying themselves. They told Moses that God must speak to him
and then they will listen and do what he tells them. Now while
Moses was away hearing the Lord's instructions of behalf of the
Israelites, they turned their back on God and started to worship
their own golden calf made of their own jewelry.
Moses was furious when he saw what
they did. He couldn't believe it. They turned their back on God the
moment they were left alone. They were repeatedly warned not to
worship anyone but God, but they didn't listen. They deliberately
sinned. And it had grave consequences.
Moses stood at the entrance of the
camp and shouted that all who were on the side of the Lord should
come and join him. All the Levites came. And then Moses gave them
this shocking instruction:
"This is what the Lord, the God of
Israel, says: Strap on your swords! Go back and forth from one end
of the camp to the other, killing even your brothers, friends, and
neighbors." The Levites obeyed Moses, and about three thousand
people died that day." Exodus 32:27, 28
How awful that must have been! For
the Levites themselves, killing their own friends, family and
neighbors, and obviously for those being killed. It was
devastating. And not only that, God also punished them Himself:
"The Lord sent a great plague upon
the people because they had worshipped the calf Aaron had made."
Exodus 32:35
The Israelites quickly learned that
their sin had consequences. God hates sin and He cannot leave it
unpunished.
Luckily for us, Jesus died for our
sin and took the punishment on Himself. How wonderful that we do
not have to carry around the burden of our sins anymore! Jesus took
the penalty of sin, which is death, all on Himself. But we must
remember our sin still has consequences. For example, if you keep
on smoking, the smoking can damage your health, if you commit
adultery, people will gossip about you and your children might just
turn their backs on you, if you gossip and talk ill of others,
people might just not want to be your friend or gossip about
you behind your back, if you continue to enjoy your
alcoholic drinks in an excessive manner, your liver might just not
cope with it, if you have anger fits, people might just avoid you
or even worse you might get into serious trouble etc. I can go on,
but I think you get the point.
Our sin has consequences that we
have to live with. God didn't want it that way, but we chose to
continue in our sin anyway. Think carefully next time when you want
to light up a cigarette or when you quickly want to spread an ugly
rumor about someone else. It might just have unpleasant
consequences.
Please forgive us Lord for
continuing to sin. We know You still hate sin, but we also know
that You love us. Please give us the strength to leave our sin
behind and to rather focus on You and Your loving grace. Amen