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.” – Exodus 32:4

Today’s Scripture Reading (August 6, 2013): Exodus 32

Baltimore set a grim record last month. Forty-three murders in July tops the list for homicides in any single month for the past forty-three years (the last time the city exceeded that number was the forty-five who were killed in August 1972.) The murders are simply a symptom of a people who have surrendered to despair. A lack of jobs, an increasing discrepancy between the rich and poor, elevated drug related violence and violence that is racially motivated has been at the core of the murders. And it is not just Baltimore that is in trouble. Violence is up in several major cities in the U.S. We have a problem. And we have yet to prove that we are willing to anything about it – that is other than to insist that someone else is the cause of what is wrong.

There is an obvious answer to the problem. As a culture we seem to have devoted everything that we have to the gods our culture has chosen to worship. Oh, I know, we would never admit that we even have gods, but we do. Drugs, both legal and illegal, have become a widespread god of our choosing, one that demands much from us. But maybe the bigger god is our own bigotry. We have come to hate everything that is not like us. Our hate exists on an economic level, a racial level and a sexual preference level (or whatever else we may find that separates us.) The hate has burned and consumed us until we barely even realize that it exists. We hate because we believe it is right to hate. Even within Christian circles, we have surrendered everything that we have to this false god. We have even convinced ourselves that this god of hate is the one God of the Christian church. We are wrong, and one of the symptoms is the violence of which our culture has found itself in the midst. And the fuel of this violence emanates from the fact that we have devoted everything that we have to our new god.

Moses has been too long on the mountain. The people have grown impatient of waiting for Moses and this God of Israel. So Aaron and the leaders of the people make a decision. They will create new gods. They ask the people to devote everything that they have to these new gods, and the people respond. They fashion a calf from the materials that they have at their disposal and then they unveil their creation – Israel, here is your god, the god to which you have devoted all that you are.

The decision impacted Israel for generations. In this one act we find the seeds of disobedience that would continually plague Israel as a nation for the rest of its existence. And generations from now these words will be spoken again – almost to the word. This time the words would be spoken by the king on the advent of the northern tribes breaking away from the Kingdom of Judah. After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt” (1 Kings 12:28). Bad ideas seem to reappear, especially when we are willing to give to them all that we have.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Exodus 33

Note: We remember the bombing of Hiroshima on this day 70 years ago, and we weep for all those who were lost on every side during that terrible war. This was the first time a Weapon of Mass Destruction was used in war.