The Blame Game

Exodus 32:1–34:10 ESV

When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, “Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” So Aaron said to them, “Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.” So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord.” And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play. And the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ ” And the Lord said to Moses, “I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you.” But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, “O 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? Why should the Egyptians say, ‘With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth’? Turn from your burning anger and relent from this disaster against your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, ‘I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever.’ ” And the Lord relented from the disaster that he had spoken of bringing on his people. Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand, tablets that were written on both sides; on the front and on the back they were written. The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, “There is a noise of war in the camp.” But he said, “It is not the sound of shouting for victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear.” And as soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses’ anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hands and broke them at the foot of the mountain. He took the calf that they had made and burned it with fire and ground it to powder and scattered it on the water and made the people of Israel drink it. And Moses said to Aaron, “What did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them?” And Aaron said, “Let not the anger of my lord burn hot. You know the people, that they are set on evil. For they said to me, ‘Make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ So I said to them, ‘Let any who have gold take it off.’ So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.” And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose (for Aaron had let them break loose, to the derision of their enemies), then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, “Who is on the Lord’s side? Come to me.” And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. And he said to them, “Thus says the Lord God of Israel, ‘Put your sword on your side each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor.’ ” And the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses. And that day about three thousand men of the people fell. And Moses said, “Today you have been ordained for the service of the Lord, each one at the cost of his son and of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day.” The next day Moses said to the people, “You have sinned a great sin. And now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.” So Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Alas, this people has sinned a great sin. They have made for themselves gods of gold. But now, if you will forgive their sin—but if not, please blot me out of your book that you have written.” But the Lord said to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you; behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them.” Then the Lord sent a plague on the people, because they made the calf, the one that Aaron made. The Lord said to Moses, “Depart; go up from here, you and the people whom you have brought up out of the land of Egypt, to the land of which I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, saying, ‘To your offspring I will give it.’ I will send an angel before you, and I will drive out the Canaanites, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.” When the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned, and no one put on his ornaments. For the Lord had said to Moses, “Say to the people of Israel, ‘You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.’ ” Therefore the people of Israel stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward. Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp. Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise up, and each would stand at his tent door, and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent. When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the Lord would speak with Moses. And when all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise up and worship, each at his tent door. Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses turned again into the camp, his assistant Joshua the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent. Moses said to the Lord, “See, you say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but you have not let me know whom you will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in my sight.’ Now therefore, if I have found favor in your sight, please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight. Consider too that this nation is your people.” And he said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” And he said to him, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in your sight, I and your people? Is it not in your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?” And the Lord said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in my sight, and I know you by name.” Moses said, “Please show me your glory.” And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by. Then I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back, but my face shall not be seen.” The Lord said to Moses, “Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. Be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to me on the top of the mountain. No one shall come up with you, and let no one be seen throughout all the mountain. Let no flocks or herds graze opposite that mountain.” So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the first. And he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand two tablets of stone. The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. And he said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.” And he said, “Behold, I am making a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels, such as have not been created in all the earth or in any nation. And all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the Lord, for it is an awesome thing that I will do with you.

Scripture: Exodus 32:1-34:10

Sermon Title: The Blame Game

Congregation, I invite to close your eyes for a few seconds and picture this, I’m sure for most of you it’s a common experience. It’s 1994, I’m 5 years old and my brother 3. We’ve been in the house together, my dad working in the garage out back, my mom out grocery shopping. Playing catch in the house is always a good idea, especially when there’s lots of fragile plates and delft around. Unfortunately I’m pretty sure it was one of my throws hits a plate and down it falls to shatter. Me and my brother both know someone’s in trouble, but we know to get away from the scene of the crime. Mom comes home, sees the broken pieces, and yells for us. We both run up the stairs, put on innocent faces, “Yes mom?” She’s pretty mad, “who did this?” she asks. Instantly we both blame the other, denying we did it, and after a few minutes I’m pretty sure I won and successfully pinned the blame on my brother…at least that’s how I remember it.

Brothers and sisters, It’s been in our human nature since the fall to play the blame game. The blame game means when we do something wrong, we know it, yet are so quick to get away from the scene of the crime, and when found guilty we deny fault, that is to make truth a lie, becoming enemy to what is right. Adam denied his fault to Eve and Eve to the serpent in the garden. Cain denied being his brother, Abel’s, keeper after killing him. Now we come here and find 3 attempts by different parties to change the blame. 

In chapter 32 7-14, interestingly enough God tries to shift the blame. Wait a second, God tries to shift the blame, that doesn’t fit quite right with most of us I’m guessing. Yes indeed God, it appears is shifting the blame. God’s anger is raging as he meets with Moses on day 40, he denies for a few moments that these are his people that he led from Egypt. The words spoken 6-7 weeks after leaving Egypt and almost 6 weeks before this when God came down upon Mt. Sinai in all majesty to claim these people, addressing all of them, saying I am your only God and you shall not attempt to put form to me or to make anything beside me…now these promises seem like chaff that so easily is caught in the wind, not like a binding covenant made by the only true God. God wants nothing to do with these people, save Moses, who he offers the re-up, the Abraham covenant 2.0. Strange as it may seem, God is testing Moses, checking his leadership, checking to see where his priorities are, are they for his own greatness or does he trust God and truly believe this covenant to be for real, to be forever. Moses we can see almost falling prostrate, crying out, reclaiming the promises that were made when he stood among his fellow Israelites. He says “No God, these are your people, only you could have done what has been done. Plus if you destroy them now, they will be even more of a joke. This covenant is not with me today, this covenant has been since the Patriarchs.” So God’s shifting blame is a test.

Our second contestant for the blame game comes with Aaron. Moses’ right hand man since he had been called to lead these people. Let me propose Calvin’s defense, that is that Aaron asked for gold hoping it would be too much, that the people would not come through and realize their foolishness, but when they did he had no choice.  Moses confronts his mate in chapter 32:21-34, it’s a rerun of the garden, of Cain and Abel, as well as the pilot episode for all the times when we make mistakes that we are unwilling to take responsibility for as children, parents, employees, and bosses. Don’t be mad at me, it just happened, this calf came out of no where, not my fault! Responsibility is what we are called to brothers and sisters. Because we are fallen, it is a guarantee that we will mess up, that we will fault the covenant.  While Moses “convinced” God to maintain the covenant, upon seeing the calf himself, he broke the covenant , God would not live at that point with his people. The betrayal of Aaron as Israel’s leader while Moses was gone, proved to be fatal because God is a jealous God. While he is supremely merciful, he is just and thus, there was punishment demanded by God and so the game played with blame brings death, it brings not sacrifice but throwing one under the bus, in the way of the sword.

The third account of the blame game offers a different type. A typology that sets the tone of the core of Scripture, the core of history as set in motion by God. Verse 30 sets this off, “The next day Moses said to the people, “You have committed a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.” Atonement, that which is propitiation, appeasing, cancelling. Perhaps I, Moses, can do something to cover you. Perhaps I can sacrifice to cover you. And so he goes up to God pleading forgiveness, and if not, may his name be taken from the book. This is God’s turn to say “no” he tells Moses that he cannot pardon the people, that his punishment will be carried out as he has decided. The atonement that will be made for humankind, cannot be made through this man, it is not time, the act of Moses’ self-denial will not be the greatest glory to God. But as God has plans still, he tells Moses to continue, though he will not go as he has gone with them from Egypt. There is a gap so much that while Moses had been given plans for the tabernacle, the tent of meeting by which God speaks to his people is outside the camp. The dwelling is too great, but God remains faithful to their leader, calling him a friend, there is intimacy between God and those who are faithful to him. 

“Now show me your glory.” There’s no please, this is not a question, it’s a request that seems like a command. The relationship between God and Moses is striking. God and Moses meet alone at the mountain, they meet alone in the tent of meeting, Joshua was nearby during both encounters but surely he was not of the same privilege as Moses. Moses knows his place, he is the vassal in the treaty that God has made with this people, His people. Moses is a vassal but he has been appointed to lead, one appointed and successful, as we are told he has found favor and his name is known to God. He begs the question though “You have not let me know whom you will send with me.” Now is when we say wait a minute, he has Aaron given by God, he has Joshua who trusted in God, what does he mean whom will you send with me? God knows Moses but Moses is wondering if God knows his people, does he know them by name, does he seek for them to find favor. This is Moses concern for he knows that the inheritance promised to this people will be received, but what does it matter if the One who delivers is not present. And so God relents again, My Presence, not just my angel will go with you, and the people. Moses pushes back though, saying God if you’re prone to find anger or if you’re presence is passive what’s the point, we’re no different than any other conquering nation. God says indeed, I will do the very thing you have asked, because of your faithfulness. Then Moses says those five words, or however ever many it takes in Hebrew.

Does he do this with boldness, with arrogance or with confidence, in humility, shaking in his boots as it were? It appears that their relationship is indeed intimate, for Moses knew that which God re-iterates in verse, no one may see me and live. Surely Moses is asking to sign the treaty, to sign with a viewing of his faithfulness. God says yes, I will do this and I will proclaim my name. 

Moses goes and prepares as he is told, chiseling the tablets himself this time, coming alone, he enters and In God’s time, God prsents and proclaims himself. Borthers and sisters I want to offer something to think about, something that I feel has been put on my heart this week by the Spirit. Moses may have gotten a preview of Christ, a preview of faithfulness as well as a preview of redemption. Looking ahead to the first chapter of the gospel of John we read about the Word becoming flesh. The flesh, the presence of God is seen in human form as it appears, Moses sees the back of God, and his face is covered by the hand of God. The Word, the pronouncement of God is spoken, The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion, and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punished the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning…The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. This encounter was full of grace and truth. This encounter was a presentation of a God who acts amidst the faith of his people. This encounter was reminder of the truth that God dwells with his people. The 2 tablets of the covenant normally taken separate by the king and by the captured, dwell together, in one place not far off. Jehovah Jehovah is his name, worthy alone of worship and praise, he brings us to our knees because we are a stiff-necked people, in need of forgiveness, in need of someone else to claim us because we cannot claim ourselves. Finally borthers and sisters, the Lord pronounces a coveantn, to do wonders never before done, people will see the awesome work… our hope as believers rest in the awesomeness that came about in the lineage of this people Israel, that awesomeness that is the one who can provide atonement.