Exodus 32:1 When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.”
Today’s passage puts me in mind of Matthew 26:36-46, when Jesus asks the disciples to pray with him in the Garden of Gethsemane and they fall asleep. In today’s passage, Moses asks the Israelites to stay faithful while he goes up the mountain to talk to God. But in Matthew, the disciples fall asleep and in Exodus, the Israelites need something solid to hold on to, and both examples are eerily similar to what happens today when we have to wait.
Exodus 32:2 Aaron answered them, “Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me.”
Waiting is hard. It can be painful and challenging or just plain boring. And when we don’t feel like we have anything solid and real to hold on to, it can be so very tempting to grab on to something, anything that feels solid and real as we wait and wait and wait.
Exodus 32:3 So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron.
Precious Savior, In these seasons when You call me to wait, forgive me when I get impatient, when I get antsy, when I look around for something solid to hold on to. Help me to hold on to You. Always. Help me to draw closer to You in the waiting. Help me to be faithful to You. Help me to wait in joyful hope. Amen.
Exodus 32:4 He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”
Have a blessed day.