The golden calf

“So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewellery, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf.’” Exodus 32:24
Most of us are familiar with the incident concerning the golden calf. Moses had last been seen climbing Mount Sinai and entering the thick darkness on top of it. While he was there, receiving the commandments from God and instructions about the tabernacle, the people grew impatient and wrote him off as dead. They turned to Aaron, Moses’ brother and spokesman, and asked him, “Make us gods who will go before us” (Ex. 32:1). Aaron asks for their jewellery, and from it he makes a calf. At that point, Moses comes back down the mountain to find them worshipping it.
It’s interesting to note here that Aaron makes the calf sound like an accident: “I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!” The reality was, he had fashioned it into the shape of a calf using tools (Ex. 32:4). Why didn’t he just tell the truth?... probably because human nature always tries to shift the blame to something or someone else – in this case, the fire.
Another interesting point is that they were trying to worship the God who brought them out of Egypt (Ex. 32:4). Why they thought God was shaped like a calf, I don’t know. They were probably just following the examples they had seen in Egypt, where there were many gods in the shapes of all kinds of animals, birds, and insects. They hadn’t yet been given the law, which expressly forbade the fashioning of idols or images to worship.
There is a lesson here for us. God did forgive the people. We shouldn’t be like Aaron and try to make excuses for our sin. Instead, we should be quick to confess our sin to God and repent of it (1 John 1:9).