Sermon of November 18, 2012

“The Ten Commandments and the Golden Calf”

 

A Sermon Preached by the

Rev. Jean Niven Lenk

Sunday, November 18, 2012

First Congregational Church of Stoughton, United Church of Christ

 

Text:  Selections from Exodus 20 and 32

 

The story that is told in Exodus is so important to our Judeo-Christian tradition that Biblical writers quote or refer to it more often than any other biblical book. 

 

It is from the book of the Exodus that we know, for instance, that God’s people matter to God.  Last week, as God spoke to Moses from the burning bush, we heard how God recognized the misery of the Hebrew slaves and heard their cries and called Moses to lead them out of Egyptian bondage and into the freedom of the Promised Land.

 

It is Exodus which gives us the story of the ten plagues that God visited upon the Egyptians, and it is the book of Exodus it carries the story of the Passover itself, when the Angel of Death passes over the houses of the Hebrew slaves, sparing the children within their homes.  It is Exodus that tells of the parting of the Red Sea and the miraculous rescue of the Hebrew people.  And it is from this book that we learn how God leads the people through the desert by night with a pillar of fire, and shelters them from the scorching heat by day with a pillar of cloud, and provides them with water to drink and manna to eat to sustain them on their journey.

 

You might be surprised to learn that the Exodus story is also important to our American heritage and our tradition of Thanksgiving.  It provided inspiration to the Pilgrims, who saw their flight to religious freedom in a new land as an echoing of the biblical story of the ancient Hebrews’ exodus from Egyptian bondage.  The pilgrims’ pastor, John Robinson, likened them to the chosen people, casting off the yoke of their pharaoh, King James.  And in escaping religious persecution in the old world for religious freedom in a new one, they too had to cross a tumultuous sea, arrive in an untested wilderness, and create a new “Promised Land.” 

 

The first of today’s lessons is another momentous story from Exodus: God gives Moses the Ten Commandments on Mt. Sinai, also known as Horeb – the same mountain where he had seen the burning bush.  When Moses goes up that mountain, he is still the liberator of the Hebrews, the long-time heirs of God’s covenantal promises: that after the Great Flood, God would never again destroy the earth, and that the descendants of their forefather Abraham would be as plentiful as the stars in the sky.

 

When Moses comes back down the mountain, he has become Moses the law giver, bearing on his arms the two tablets of an additional covenant.  But unlike the covenants with Noah and Abraham, which asked nothing in return, God’s covenant with the ancient Hebrews has conditions.  The Chosen People are expected to behave in chosen ways.  But there is no coercion, no strong-arming God forcing them.  “If you will obey my voice,” God says, “I will show you how a holy nation acts -- but it is your choice.”

The elements of this new covenant are short and to the point, and there are ten of them, one for each finger so that even a child can remember them:

1) No other gods.
2) No graven images.
3) Don't take my name in vain.
4) Keep the Sabbath.
5) Honor your father and mother.
6) Don't murder.
7) No adultery.
8) No stealing.
9) Don't give false witness.
10) No coveting.

 

So in the first of today’s scriptures, Moses goes up the mountain and receives the commandments that define how people are to live and relate faithfully to God and healthily to one another.  But that’s only half of this morning’s story. 

 

While Moses spends 40 days up on the mountain with God, the people at the foot of the mountain are turning away from God.  Despite having been rescued by God’s mighty hand over and over again, despite having been liberated and led by Moses through all kinds of danger and difficulty, the Hebrews let their impatience get the better of them, along with their forgetfulness and ingratitude.  They decide that God is not faithful; that Moses is not reliable; that there really is no point in continuing to wait any longer, and that their only choice is to fashion a god (small “g”) of their own hands; one that suits their own specifications; one that they can control; one that does their bidding; they  believe their only choice is to worship that god instead of the One who brought them out of the Land of Egypt.

 

And so they melt down their gold and create a god they can really trust, not understanding that something you make with your own human hands can never have divine power over you.  And then they hold a party for this new god and celebrate by eating and drinking and cavorting and doing things they shouldn’t do.  In other words, while Moses is receiving the Ten Commandments, the Hebrews are breaking three of them: no other gods, no idols, no adultery.

 

How ironic that as God is giving the law, the people are already breaking it.  And God gives the law not to handcuff the Hebrews but rather to keep them from wandering aimlessly in their relationships with God and each other.  God doesn’t give the law as a way of earning God’s love -- follow these Ten Commandments, and then I will love you.  Rather, God loves the Hebrews so much that God gives them the law to shape their life and identity as people of God; God gives them the law as a way of preserving them against every threat, saying in effect “these laws are meant to guard your life together and to guard your life with me.”

 

And we, too, are to guard our lives with each other and with God.  But, like the ancient Hebrews, we still forget all that God has done for us.  We still turn away from God.  We still worship things that cannot give life; we too dedicate our hearts and souls to things we have made with our own hands rather than the One who made us.  We too abandon our trust in God all too quickly and turn back to the things of the world, hoping they can save us, worshipping idols like wealth, success, beauty, any object of our devotion that leads us away from worshiping God.

 

Our God knows how easy it can be for us to lose our way -- we struggle with personal failure and disappointment and heartache.  Under the circumstances, we might feel a whole lot like we’ve been left at the bottom of the mountain waiting and waiting for a word from the Holy One that will speak to our lives.  But God does not leave us alone to wander aimlessly through life, but instead offers us a way through its difficulties and challenges.  As God did with the Hebrews, God forgives us and calls us back into a life-giving, life-transforming relationship. 

 

The covenant God made with Moses and the Hebrews is for all of us — ten teachings to guide us: to worship and love the Lord our God; to respect and honor God’s name; to keep holy the Lord’s Day; to honor our mothers and our fathers; to respect life; to be faithful; to respect all property; to respect and honor truth in our words and deeds; to keep our hearts pure; and – especially on this Thanksgiving Sunday -- to live humbly thanking God for all things.  May we put into practice these holy words to guard are life together, and to guard our life with God.  Amen.

 

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