Please turn your Bibles over to Exodus chapter 32. And a famous passage in Exodus, we're there this morning because our youth group has been walking through the book of Exodus for the last year. And it's been an amazing journey through the scripture. It's been amazing because actually the content of the entire story is absolutely amazing.

The deliverance of the nation of Israel from Egypt by the powerful hand of God is an amazing, amazing story. It's an amazing truth. And I wish there were greater synonyms, more profound ways to say it. But I would like to do is actually go through how amazing it's been.

Even just from the very beginning, God had prepared for an amazing deliverance for the nation. It wasn't just from Moses. It wasn't even just his birth and how he survived the massacre of the Israelite baby boys. But actually from long before, God has been preparing to build up his people.

And here and now in terms of the deliverance of the nation, God too by his sovereign hand spared Moses, placed him in the hands of individuals who will raise him in the palace, and then also eventually prepare him to be a man that will deliver his people. What's more, the amazing promise of God was with him.

From the burning bush, God promised Moses, "I have seen the affliction of my people and I am coming down. I will deliver them with a mighty hand. You will see my judgments. I'm going to place you in a land flowing with milk and honey." What's more, upon the execution of that deliverance, it was an amazing thing.

I mean, we don't have the time to do it. I wish we did, but to rehearse, every single miracle of God affected the entire land. And people could see this God is more powerful than any idol, any presumed provision we have in the gods of Egypt. And what's more, even at the end of the story when the 10 plagues go through the land and the people finally are saying, "You may go," and then they start leaving, God leads them on a million man march.

And there are epic moments when people are walking, they come to the sea, their backs up against the wall, so to speak, and God provides for them. God ultimately splits the sea in half when they walk on dry land. And even as they walk, though, God's amazing protection is with them.

These passages I want to highlight for you, that even as they walk, God protects their feet. Scripture talks about how their feet and shoes did not wear and tatter. Why? Because God allowed them to have provision even in their walk. Who provided the cloud? Who provided the warmth of the pillar of fire?

Who provided the food that just shows up every single day? I mean, the provision and protection is amazing. Here's a verse I want to highlight to you, Exodus 14, verse 19. It says that the angel of God who has been going before the camp of Israel moved and went behind them.

The pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them. So it came about between the camp of Egypt and the camp of Israel, that there was a cloud along with darkness, yet it gave light at night. Thus, one did not come near the other all night. The reason why I highlight that for you is because when I say there was protection, I don't even mean just the small provisions of the cloud, or not the small provisions, but the provisions of the daily necessities.

There was an angel in their midst. Here's another passage, Exodus chapter 23, verse 20 through 23. "Behold, I'm going to send an angel before you to guard you along the way, bring you into the place which I have prepared. Be on your guard before him and obey his voice.

Do not be rebellious towards him, for he will not pardon your transgressions since my name is in him. But if you truly obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries, for my angel will go before you and bring you into the land." It's been amazing, okay?

That's the point I want to get across. And where they are now is another amazing moment in their journey. They have had an angel, supernatural being, guard them and protect them to this place where they are now at Mount Sinai. And in my last previous sermon a little while back, what I mentioned was that God had an amazing meeting with them where he came down with a covered glory.

He filled the mountain with smoke, thunder, and lightning and said, "I am here to meet you. I am here to be with you. I am here to give you my law, my good law, give you my presence. I desire to be your God and I desire for you to be my people." And in this moment, God gives them an amazing law and in that, God gives them an amazing covenant, a relationship that you and I are bound together.

And God in many ways also is giving them promise of his words. It is this moment that they are here in Exodus chapter 32. In Exodus chapter 32, a famous passage that we know of, they're still at the mountain seeing the glory of God covering this mountain that stands before him.

And so, with such an amazing journey, we wonder how things will go. Well, let's read how things are going. Chapter 32 verse 1, "Now when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people assembled around Aaron and said to him, 'Come, make us a God who go before us.

For this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.' Aaron said to them, 'Tear off the gold rings which are in the ears of your wives, your sons, your daughters, and bring them to me.' Then all the people tore off the gold rings which were in their ears and brought them to Aaron.

He took this from their hand, fashioned it with a graving tool and made it into molten calf. And they said, 'This is your God, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.' Now 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.' So the next day they arose early and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings.

People sat down to eat and to drink and rose up to play." Oh no. Amazing journey. Nothing short of supernatural, profoundly genuine, life-altering greatness of God delivering you. And bam. A miserable failure. The people, because Moses is not coming down, perhaps kind of like if there's a senior pastor who's been the founding pastor along their journey, he's gone.

They're like, 'Where is he? Did he abandon us?' And then they turn to Aaron who's kind of like an associate pastor. And I'm sitting here thinking, 'Come on, Aaron. Making a bad name for all us associate pastors.' They go to him and say, 'What shall we do?' And this is it.

In the midst where God's presence is seen on the mountain like a volcano, they turn to a gold piece that looks like a cow and they worship and say, 'Ta-da. Here's your God.' This is a miserable, miserable failure of the greatest kind. And what I'd like to do today is not simply gloss over the sins of Israel or even our sins but actually dissect, analyze, and examine everything so that we dare not do something like this.

Because God, upon seeing it, verse 7, if you look down at the passage, 'Then the Lord spoke to Moses, "Go down at once for your people whom you brought up from the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned aside from the way which I commanded them.

They have made for themselves a molten calf and have worshipped it and have sacrificed to it and said, 'This is your God, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.' The Lord said to Moses, 'I have seen this people and behold, they are an obstinate people.

Now then, let me alone that my anger may burn against them, that I may destroy them, and I will make of you a great nation.'" You understand what he's saying, right? I'm going to destroy everyone. Start over with you. We dare not take sin lightly because God is an absolutely holy God who has every prerogative to judge and it would have been just, it would have been proper and appropriate that God would actually annihilate all of these people.

Why? Because I have a case against Israel in this situation, in this narrative and story, that this was not just a, "Oh dear, the leader was gone." So you understand people were just trying to make a solution. No, this was first degree disobedience. I want to make a case to you and prove to you that this is first degree disobedience.

And what I mean by that is if you know much about law, there is first degree murder, there is secondary murder, there is involuntary manslaughter. I always had that stuff kind of mixed around. I always thought it leveled up so if you did second degree murder, it was like extra bad.

It was the other way around. There's secondary murder which is more like fits of rage. You're mad and you're angry and yes, you're getting violent, but your intention was not to kill somebody. Maybe you expected to harm somebody, but not to slaughter him. What I'm saying to you is this is not that.

This is first degree disobedience. Why do I say this? Because number one, this is first degree disobedience because they already knew the Ten Commandments. Upon careful examination of this narrative and story, I always presumed Moses was on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights, yes? What was he receiving?

The tablets. What was on the tablets? The Ten Commandments. So there was almost a sentiment in me that thought if God was just a little bit faster or like download it, cast it down, project it or something like that, you just missed it. And then I was upset at the people like, "Gosh, it's just a little bit longer and you would have had the Ten Commandments." Wrong.

They already had it. The narrative goes that Moses was actually upon this mountain longer in total because he met the Lord. God spoke to Moses and the elders, including who? Aaron and the leaders of the 12 tribes of Israel and gave them the Ten Commandments and then told them, "Go speak this to the nation." Moses did.

He said, "Upon your hearing, I give you the word and covenant of God." And the people all heard it. Why is this first degree murder? First degree disobedience, sorry. It's because the people responded, "Then we will obey it." They said they would obey. And for this, let's read the story.

Go over in your Bibles, please. It's a little bit long, so let's all read it together. Follow along with me as I read in chapter 24. Exodus chapter 24, starting from verse one, gives us this account of how Moses received the law and then gave it to them. The Ten Commandments happens in chapter 20.

Yes? After chapter 20 are many other laws that God gives. Here in chapter 24, then, is already having time pass that Moses was up at the mountain with God. Chapter 24 says, "Then he said to Moses, 'Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab and Behu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and you shall worship at a distance.'" You see who's all there?

"Moses alone, however, shall come near the Lord, but they shall not come near, nor shall the people come up with him." Verse three, "Then Moses came and recounted to the people all the words of the Lord and all the ordinances, and all the people answered with one voice and said, 'All the words which the Lord has spoken, we will do it.'" Everybody in the congregation got together, heard the words, and they responded.

So then what does Moses do? Moses writes down all the words of the Lord. "Then he arose early in the morning and built an altar at the foot of the mountain with twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of Israel." There was representation. There was recording. Moses actually had the words of God written on paper before God wrote it on stone.

Verse five, "He sent young men to the sons of Israel, and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as peace offerings to the Lord. Moses took half the blood and put it in the basins, and the other half of the blood he sprinkled on the altar. Then he took the book of the covenant and read it in the hearing of the people, and they said, 'All that the Lord has spoken, we will do, and we will be obedient.'" This is not repeating the same thing.

They did it twice. They said to God in the hearing of everyone, "Lord, we heard your word, and we will do it. And upon that the covenant is made." How do we know? Because in the next verse, verse eight, "So Moses took the blood and sprinkled it on the people and said, 'Behold the blood of the covenant.'" This was the binding commitment.

This was the dedication of the people. "God, we've heard your word. We know that your word is for our protection, for our holiness, for our representation with you to be your people. We will do it. Deliver us." And then Moses takes the blood and sprinkles everybody. Verse nine, "Then Moses went up with," guess who, there's our man, associate pastor Aaron, "Nadab and Abihu and seventy of the elders of Israel, and they saw the God of Israel under his feet.

There appeared to be a pavement of sapphire as clear as the sky itself." Did you know that? These details sometimes I don't remember, but when I read it, I'm like, "Oh my goodness. Aaron saw the glory of God as a sapphire crosses the sky." And then guess what? "Yet he did not stretch out his hand against the nobles of the sons of Israel.

They saw God, and they ate and drank." Where do you think Aaron got his ideas? They dined with the Lord and God did not kill him. Verse 12, "Now the Lord said to Moses, 'Come up to me on the mountain and remain here, and I'll give you the stone tablets with the law and the commandments which I have written for their instruction.' So Moses arose with Joshua his servant, and Moses went up to the mountain of God." So think about this.

People say, "I don't know what happened to Moses." Lies! They know exactly what happened to Moses. He went with Joshua to the mountain because God called him. Next, verse 14, "But to the elders he said, 'Wait here for us until we return to you. And behold, Aaron and Hur are with you.

Whoever has a legal matter, let him approach them.' So Aaron was given charge. You decide matters. You be in charge and take care of the people. I will return." Verse 15, "Moses went up to the mountain, and the cloud covered the mountain. The glory of the Lord rested on Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it for six days.

And on the seventh day he called to Moses from the midst of the cloud and to the eyes of the sons of Israel." To who? Just the 70? Just a few leaders? No, to everyone. "The appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the mountaintop.

Moses entered the midst of the cloud, and he went up to the mountain. Moses was on the mountain forty days and forty nights." Do you see my case? This is not happenstance mistake. Do you see my case that this is first degree disobedience? That this was not, 'I didn't mean to.

I'm sorry if you took it the wrong way.' This is not like that at all. What's more, it is high-handed rebellion. It is first degree disobedience because the people aggressively demanded their way of Aaron. Maybe they saw. Maybe there are a bunch of people who are already complaining. They're like, "Aaron, what are we going to do?" "I don't know, man." "Aaron, what are we going to do?" "I don't know, man." It's like, "Aaron, we got to plan something." "I don't know." "I don't know." And then they felt, "Fine, we're going to take over this guy." They massed together as a group, as a crowd, and what's really interesting is they say, "Come, make us a God." The Hebrew word for come actually is a command that means stand up.

They were commanding Aaron, "Do what we tell you." And Aaron, unfortunately, he should have been the one who knows better than them. He was amidst the group of select few God called to the mountain. He saw God's glory. He heard God's audible voice. He walked up farther than any of those.

He should have been the first one to say, "Well, that's a dumb idea. Do you see the mountain? It's on fire. And he said he's going to kill you." But instead, Aaron succumbed to his fear of the people and said, "Okay." He didn't even consult the other leaders. He didn't even pray.

He didn't even ask, "What other options do we have?" He just did what they asked him to do. There was an absolute failure in leadership. And when you see this, I make the case. When you see a fat, fat sinking hole in the ground, it did not just happen overnight.

There has probably been long decay farther than what we can see. And that is my next case. We dare not gloss over sin, especially when it's this heinous, especially when it's first degree, and say, "Well, you know, everybody's prone to make mistakes." You stop and ask, "How deep does this go?" And my case to you is, when there is such sinful disobedience, it goes deeper than the act itself.

There are deep-root sins of the heart that we must uproot. We have to ask, "What permission did they receive? Who gave them this right to make a calf?" My case to you is, there are deeper issues than meets the eye. Let me prove it to you. First, let me ask you this question.

Why did the Israelites worship a cow? Other people, and maybe if it was me, if I'm worshiping anything, I'm worshiping something awesome, tigers, lions, you know, like, I don't know, like, king cobras that look awesome. Why a cow? Important question, yes? What was in them is the question that when they had the idea, there's a vacuum of leadership, Moses is gone, my first idea is, "Mooo," like, why?

And what that reveals is the question, yes, why was that already there? And it's because back in Egypt, the cow was awesome. It's because in their lives previous, that's what they knew to be power. Let me tell you that there was gods of bulls that looked like bulls. There was a god of Hathor in the Egyptian culture that represented the blessings, the prosperity and fertility.

There was the god Isis, which probably you have heard before, the queen of the gods, who was represented as a cow with horns. There was a god named Menware, who was the sacred bull of Ra. You guys recognize that in there? Ra was the ultimate god, kind of like Zeus from the Greeks.

He was the ultimate god, and he was shaped in the shape of a falcon, and his cow was laden with gold. There was another god, Apis, who was a bull considered to be the manifestation of the creation of the world. The greatest gods in Egypt were cows. That's what I'm saying.

And what's really interesting is later on when he says, when Aaron and the peoples actually make a calf, do you know what they say? These are your gods. What's my point there? My point is this. At the first sign of trouble, the nation of Israel always kind of revealed what was in their heart.

When they were at the waterbeds of the Red Sea, when there were nations who were trying to attack them, what would they say? "What are we doing here? At least in Egypt we had something. What are we doing here? At least in Egypt we had food." What do you think that means?

When at the first sign of trouble, at the first sign of hardship, they start turning to what was familiar, comfortable, and good for them. What was in their mind and what was in their heart? And I have to commentator says this. What we see when these individuals turn to the Egyptian gods so quickly is that once again it is proving more difficult to get Egypt out of the hearts of the Israelites than it is to get Israelite bodies out of Egypt.

Do you hear that? I thought that was incredibly, incredibly insightful. It is more difficult to get Egypt out of the Israelite heart than it was to get Israelite bodies out of Egypt. Now more than what a commentator says, the Bible says this. If you turn in your Bibles to Acts chapter 7, starting from verse 39 to 41, this is when Stephen is giving a defense against the Jews who are persecuting him.

As Stephen gives his defense, he gives the most amazing, amazing recount of Jewish history. Why? His point is to say, "You are just like them." Well, how are they? Our fathers were unwilling to be obedient to him but repudiated him and in their hearts turned back to Egypt. Saying to Aaron, "Make for us gods who will go before us for this Moses who led us out of the land of Egypt.

We have no idea. We do not know what happened to him." At that time, they made a calf and brought a sacrifice to the idol and were rejoicing in the works of their hands. Verse 51, "You men who are stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears are always resisting the Holy Spirit.

You are doing just as your father did." Wow. Stephen gives an amazing rebuke to the leaders of the time, the religious individuals. You are stiff-necked like your fathers. What were they stiff-necked in? Well, Stephen actually starts to quote Old Testament prophecy. It comes from the book of Amos, so I'll actually read it directly from that passage.

Amos chapter 5, verse 25 to 26, just listen to this. God asked them, "Did you represent me or present me with sacrifices and grain offerings in the wilderness for 40 years? O house of Israel, you also carried along Sikith your king, Ki and your image, the stars of your gods which you made for yourself." For who?

For yourself. What is he saying? What I'm saying is there's a million man march out of Egypt, but I am willing to bet a huge portion of them, maybe not the majority, but at least a huge consistency of them, carried in their pocket and in their heart the gods of Egypt.

Out of Egypt, they probably brought along the gold figurines in their pockets, in their sacks, and in their wagons, and in their bags. Why? Because it was also always in their heart. They loved comfortably the things that gave them comfort before. They never actually left. A way of application to every single one of us when we deal with sin, if you just say, "I just need to stop idolatry.

I just need to do more of reading. I just need to do more of this." It does not sometimes then actually account for and diagnose and then actually apply a solution to what is wrong. Because what is wrong is in the heart. What I'm trying to prove to you is the absence of Moses was not a temptation.

It was only an opportunity for them to worship openly that which they already worshiped secretly in their heart. Let me repeat that. The absence of Moses was just an opportunity to put out in the open what was already in their soul. That's what I mean as a case for first-degree disobedience that has much more to do than just what meets the eye, but internally there is a struggle for what was already contained in their heart.

Look at the scenario. It is baffling. Who was running around tempting them? "Do you want to worship this?" There was nobody. In the vacuum, that was their volitional idea. Make us another God. Make us another God. Make us this calf and their wicked heart desired it. For us, we have to do a thorough job examining the heart.

Please understand that I'm not just trying to weigh heavy on sin. Neither am I trying to make this a soapbox I stand on. It is my conviction that if we do not analyze, dissect, and sin for what it is, we will never find an appropriate solution and our disobedience will continue.

Is it not? So what are the deeper issues of the heart? Let's begin actually in dissection. What are the deeper issues of the heart? First, the deeper issues of the heart start with personal selfish desires. Selfish desires. There are selfish desires that they are pursuing. God calls it out in Amos.

Who did you make that idol for? For me? Come on. You slapped my name on it, but you know it was for you. That's what God said. You did it for a while. Yes, maybe you thought you were persevering in it, but you made this for you. You did not make this for me.

The fact of the matter is you read the story and you ask the question, "Okay, they make the calf. What comes out of that? What comes out of that?" Hilarious story. You know what comes out of it? "Tomorrow we feast to the Lord." Okay. The next day they rose, they offered the offerings, they brought the priest's offerings, they sat down, they ate, they drank, and they rose up to play.

Do you know what happened? Is they played. There wasn't any fruit of holiness. There wasn't any greater worship or service. There wasn't any faithfulness. They played. And in the end, that's what they were seeking. They wanted to satisfy whatever desire or inclination was in their heart. I think about all the riots, all the complaints in this day, and in the end, what is it?

What do we want? When do we want it? Now. And actually, if you think about it, everything in terms of idolatry is just like that. Idolatry is for me. Write this down. Any idol is an idol because it's by me and for me. Let me repeat that. Any idol is an idol because it's by me and for me.

Stephen, who was making that accusation against the nation of Israel in the past, said, "You rejoice in the work of your hands." And then God said, "You made that for you." It's an idol because it's made by you, and it is unlike the real God who demands exclusive faithfulness.

It is unlike the real God who demands that we mimic him and follow after his holiness. It's different than the real God who desires true worship from our heart. That God is there for you. It's like that Buddha at an Asian restaurant where he's sitting up at the front door and it's just like, "Come, and I'll take whatever you got.

Pennies, nickels, watermelons, oranges." I always laugh every time I see one of those things. It takes whatever you have and implicitly, it doesn't speak to you, it's there for you. For your fortune, for your luck, and for your business. You know that's what it's about. That's an idol. By you and for you.

And our selfish desires that precede that is our pride and our arrogance constantly seeking not God's good pleasure, but our good pleasure. And when we do that, we will always disobey. That kind of selfishness always lies to us. It lies to us that this is for the better good.

If I'm doing well, then I can really serve the Lord. Don't slap on our agenda to God's business and say we're doing fine. That selfishness needs to die. And what's really interesting is anytime I've seen an individual who's very selfish, anytime that I've seen an individual who's very arrogant about that kind of boast of life, I find incredible fear, which brings us to our second point.

The heart issue that lies beneath this disobedience, this first-degree disobedience, one predominant one seen in the passage is fear. Why do selfish people, why do arrogant people, why do they fear? It's because they have much to lose. When you have much to lose, when you have agendas, when you have passions and ambitions, then you have so much you can lose, and therefore you are absolutely afraid.

I imagine I start thinking about the person who is sitting in the congregation of the Israelites out there. One of them probably asking like, "Hey guys, Moses is not coming back. I thought he'd come back at the end of the day." The next day goes by, it's like, "He's not back yet." And some of us are worry wards.

I'm actually a worry ward too. I worry a lot. "What are we going to do? What are we going to do?" By day three, someone probably asks like, "Dude, did you see Moses carry a lunch bag? He didn't have no food, man. Did you see Joshua carry a water canteen?

They don't even have water." So the worry ward in you says, "Oh my God, I think they're dead." And then other individuals are probably like, "Oh no, what if he abandoned us? Did you know fear also lies? Just like selfish desire lies, so does fear." Fear starts saying, "He's not coming back.

It's been one week." By the second week, "He's abandoned us. And has God abandoned us." And then by the fourth week, it's like, "We don't even know where he is." That's a lie. You know exactly where he is. You just don't see him, but he's right there at the mountain.

God called him up. You know where he is. And God told you to wait. But fear lies. You know what scripture says in the book of Proverbs, "The man who fears says, 'Lions and bears.'" They're out there, man. Lions or bears are everywhere. Fear lies all the time. Fear makes us do all kinds of silly stuff.

And by way of application, this is the thing that I'm talking about. If you fear, you will disobey. I take some opportunity sometimes when I'm on the pulpit to confess to you honestly. I struggle with fear quite a lot. And I share this with the elders, and I share it with you if you talk to me personally.

I as a pastor, I fear failure. I fear failing God, and I fear failing you, and I especially fear failing my own leaders. I do. I'm just being honest. What's more, I fear certain things that are more just subjective to me. I fear looking stupid in front of you.

When I don't know what to say, when I don't know what to do, and I just put up my hands, I fear looking dumb. Can I be honest with you? I fear that a lot. But if I allow that to rest in my mind and rest in my heart, I will always disobey God.

So if an individual is sitting there saying, "Well, I just have to stop doing this stuff. I just have to stop doing this stuff." But he doesn't deal with the fear, he will never obey. You see what I'm saying now, right? He will never obey. And fear is one of those things that makes us do all kinds of silly stuff.

It doesn't even make sense. We hide in trenches. We lie. Do you know what Aaron says? Moses comes down and says, "What did you do?" And Aaron's like, "You know these people, these people are wicked. They gave me their gold. I put it in the fire and boop, this calf came out." Read this story later.

For the sake of time, I read it in the first service and then I went really, really long. For the sake of time, read it on your own time. It's hilarious. Aaron's like, "Yeah, I just put it in there and then it just came out." I was like, "Wow, Aaron." But when you're afraid of the people, you're afraid of the people.

You're afraid of the people, you're afraid of Moses too. And so what do you do? You lie. You lie. Fear is at the heart of sin. He was flustered. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know who to consult and he just did whatever they told him. And his fear then is closely tied with the next thing.

You distrust God. Fear is closely tied with desire, but it's also closely tied with distrust. And all three of those things, desire, fear, and distrust, all feed each other. They just feed each other into this ginormous monster. And so typically when you find an individual who has great passions and lust, you find them pretty arrogant.

You find them not trusting God. And then that also feeds their continued desire because ultimately you're going to trust one or the other. You're going to either trust yourself or you're going to trust God. But when you're in a moment where you feel like you're in survival mode, like, "I just need to do something," you're not going to trust God.

So my third and final heart issue that we want to tackle today, this morning, is the distrust of God that the people have. The audacity for them to say, "Let's make a God who'll go before us." Like he didn't before? How dare you? From before you were even born, he was leading your path.

He was making you into a great nation. How dare you distrust God and say, "Let's make one who'll actually go before us." It's crazy what the people are thinking. The people are thinking, "I don't even know of this guy." The pastor says, "This man, Moses." They don't trust Moses anymore?

And I don't think they ever actually did. They don't. How could they? The Bible passages are sloaned with just, "Moses, who are you? Does God only speak to you? Why do we have to follow you? Who are you?" They're asking constantly. "You were just a shepherd guy who was out in the wilderness.

You killed people and you're not even leaving all of us. You're from that palace. What are you?" They doubt him and they doubt his God. They doubt the Lord. So an application right now for us, we have to deal with the hard issues of desire, fears, and distrust. If you live in any one of these hard issues, you will never obey.

Think about this. Imagine if I was an absolute stranger to you. You just walking down the street and I show up to you like this. I typically don't even wear these things. My son got it for me. But I'm all in a suit today. Now so you just automatically think, "What are you doing, man?" And I come to you and say, "Put out your hand.

I have something to give you. What are you going to do?" "No." You're just going to look at me and be like, "No." Because why? You don't trust me. You don't know me. I'm just a guy in a suit probably trying to sell you something. Right? When you do not trust, you are not going to open your hand.

When you do not trust, you're not going to do anything. We operate like this all the time. And the challenge for us today is to trust the Lord with everything we've got because he's absolutely trustworthy. I just started this sermon with, "Look at what God has been doing in amazing fashion and I wish there was even better terms." God was profoundly faithful, good, loving, kind.

He was an amazing Father giving them everything. But they don't trust him. And that's the challenge at heart today. Please turn your Bibles to Romans chapter 4. Contrary to example of distrust, Apostle Paul gives us an example of trust in the person of Abraham. Romans chapter 4 verses 18 through 22.

Elder Joe read it for us this morning before the worship set and it was a perfect one for us to think about trusting in God from the heart that we would not be led down the path of first degree disobedience. Romans chapter 4 says this, starting from verse 18, "In hope against hope." In hope against hope.

You see, I get it. When the people looked down, what did they see? They saw dirt. When they looked around, what did they see? Scared people everywhere. When they looked up, what did they see? Mountain on fire. I would be afraid too, genuinely. And I would wonder, "Oh my goodness, our founding father guy, our Moses, our leader is not even here." But in that moment, what they should have done is exercise spiritual hope in God when there was hopelessness on the earth that they stood.

But Abraham, it says, "In hope against hope, he believed so that he might become a father of many nations according to that which had been spoken. So shall your descendants be." God gave the promise of his word. I'm going to bless you and make you a great nation. So then, verse 19, "Without becoming weak in faith, he contemplated his own body." Abraham looked down.

He looked down and said, "Yup, about to die." And then it says that he looked now as good as death since he was about 100 years old and the deadness of Sarah's womb. He looked at his wife and she's always been barren. But hope against the hope, the hopelessness of this world.

It says, "Abraham, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God and being fully assured of what God had promised. He was able to also perform. Therefore, it was also credit to him as righteousness." The solution against every kind of idolatry, the solution of every kind of sin that we do is not just the action of, "Stop it.

Knock it off. I just need to stop." It's ingrained in your heart, do you trust God? And unless you come to a point where besides what you see, besides what you're convinced of, besides the lack, deficiency, whatever that you're experiencing, the hurt and the pains, you need to be able to say, "I trust God that he will deliver.

I trust his word. I trust his character. I trust his history, his past. I trust everything about him. So that in this moment when I stand at the foot of the mountain, I wish I was up at the top, but right now I'm at the foot. I trust you, God." That is to us our righteousness, amen?

That is to us God's expectation. That is to us actual spiritual success when we in faith hold true to the confession, "God is good," even now at the bottom of the mountain. This is absolutely necessary, you see? This is necessary for the solutions of our own faith where we are then guarded against pride, arrogance, where we're guarded against sin and all kinds of heinous before God.

But this last point I want to make really emphatically. It is absolutely important for us to dissect the sins, to look at the hard issues, to make sure we do an absolute thorough job. Why? Not just so that we can find a solution for our sins, but because if in any way we diminish what our sin is, we make God a liar.

Let me repeat. If we in any way do not see our sin for what it is, if we in any way diminish what we've done in our sin, we make God a liar. Scripture says, "If we say we have no sin, we lie. We lie against the truth and we make him a liar." How?

Because if we gloss over it and say, "I get it. Everyone would. In that scenario, I would too." And then we flip it. Truthfully speaking, yes, if I was in that scenario, I would probably be dismayed too. But if in any way we gloss over it without looking at the depth of sin, then now all of a sudden God's wrath doesn't make sense.

My anger burns. Leave me alone that I would destroy you. For what, God? You don't understand? I was scared. Do you know, we don't have time to go over it, but later on, read the whole chapter. God tells Moses, "Tell the people of my men who are on my side, everybody who is a Levite who is on my side, come.

They all come." He said, "Take your sword, put it on your side, now walk and kill your brother, your father, your friend." Thousands of men died that day for their sin. If we say all we did is make a mistake, circumstantial failure, then we make God unjust. You see that, right?

But let me make this case for you. The sins that were committed against God in this scenario is so much more than meets the eye. If any one of us was a ruler, if any one of us was an Aaron or Moses or even a superpower that we were ruling, we would have been so fed up with these people, we would have killed them all.

That's my personal conviction. Let me prove that to you a little bit, of the things that they did. For example, Scripture makes mention of how quickly God says, "Moses, go down, look at these people, I've seen them, how quickly do they turn?" Think about it in context. God was not forced to come and make any covenant with these people.

And this covenant was so severe, severe as in so strict, so weighty and solemn, there was blood. There was an actual counting of, "This is who I am, this is who you are, and let's repeat the covenant stipulations." What does that sound like to you? A marriage ceremony. What they did is apropos to a man looking at his bride and saying, "I love you, I'll always be there for you until death do us part, baby," walks down the aisle, turns the corner and kisses another woman.

That's this scenario. Does God not have the right to eradicate these people? What's more, think about what Aaron does when he says, "Listen guys, we're going to make this calf, here is your God, Elohim, majestic Lord. He's brought you out." To a credit to this figurine, what God Almighty has done, you don't think God would be offended?

A people He's given them His good law and His presence, where He said, "Make a tabernacle for me, make a sanctuary for me." Because why? Because we want to dwell with you. And then to have the audacity to mimic what God was doing with that, God desires to have peace with us, so He gives them sacrifice.

God wants us to remember Him, so He gives us feasts. And then to use that for their self-agenda, "Guess what guys, tomorrow we'll feast." Like wink. You know, think of something else. Do you know how a bunch of slaves in the wilderness had gold to make a calf? That was God's sovereign provision.

God commanded Moses, "When you leave, turn to the Egyptian neighbor and says, 'Give me your treasure, your gold and silver, that I might worship God.' And miraculously, all these Egyptians who hated these shepherds said, 'Oh yeah, please leave.'" That was God's sovereign provision for worship, to laden His tabernacle with gold.

And He ripped them off of the years of His women, His daughters, and said, "Let's make a calf." Think about this. Would you not be enraged? Now, to me then, when I read the Old Testament, God is not a God full of wrath. We are a people full of sin.

And what God is, is He is patient. If we are disobedient to the first degree, God is patient to the nth degree. Amen? I can't fathom the measure of His grace and His patience when we look at how sinful their actions have been. I just can't fathom that. It's wild and mind-blowing to think about the fact that God in this moment, He says, "Let me alone, that my anger would burn." And Moses said, "Please." And God says, "Then I relent." We are not going to get into a theological argument about God's sovereignty, what He knows, whether He bends His will.

We are going to say this, "God Almighty is a God who relents of His anger for your sake." That's amazing. Now let me ask you a question. We have to trust God, do you? This amazing God is so faithful, even in this moment at the end of the chapter, He looks at Moses and says, "Moses, now go.

Now go and go before these people and lead them into the land I promised." Why? "Because I am faithful and I will send my angel before you." That's crazy. Because we know through history, God not only sends His angel, He sends His servants, He sends His prophets, and then ultimately He sends His greatest prophet and servant, His very Son, Jesus Christ, to die for who?

These people, who at the core of their heart don't trust His goodness. That's why it might be understandable if I go to you and say, "Trust me. Put out your hand so I can give you something." But it is sin to not trust the holy God who's been this faithful.

If anything, our challenge today is not to simply look upon this sin, but once we look upon this sin, the challenge is clear. We need to work here. Wickedness is not out there. The temptation is not up there. It's not over there. It's not with him. It's not with her.

It's right here. And that wickedness is distrust of God. May we see God as the most trustworthy thing in the universe and have confidence in Him for everything. Amen? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we take a moment now to bow our hearts and say to you, "Thank you, thank you, thank you." Your love is unmeasurable.

Your patience with no bounds. Scripture says you're a steadfast God, steadfast in your loving kindness. And God, we see a glimpse of it today. In the face of such outright rebellion, you are a relenting, faithful God. Help us, Father God, to understand, Lord, what it means to trust you.

Help us, Father God, to understand that although sometimes maybe we've even thought and selfishly, sinfully thought that words like, "You just need to trust in the Lord," does not work. Help us, Father God, to repent of our disbelief and to trust you and hope in you against all hope.

We thank you, Lord. It's in Christ's name we pray. Amen. available at www.minerva.com.