(Read part 1 here.)
Galatians 5:1
“[1] Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.”
This is the second part of our article expounding Galatians 5:1. In the first part we learned about what God’s grace is, and what it isn’t. We saw how false teachers, mentioned in 2 Peter 2, would teach excessively about grace (or liberty), and ignore the teaching about true repentance from sin.
In this article, we will see how Aaron, out of fear of the people (i.e. peer pressure), compromised his standards and built an idol for the people. And, we will see how false teachers are building golden calves of false doctrines, which are destructive to those deceived by them.
The Golden Calf
Deuteronomy 9:9-12
“[9] When I was gone up into the mount to receive the tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant which the LORD made with you, then I abode in the mount forty days and forty nights, I neither did eat bread nor drink water:
[10] And the LORD delivered unto me two tables of stone written with the finger of God; and on them was written according to all the words, which the LORD spake with you in the mount out of the midst of the fire in the day of the assembly.
[11] And it came to pass at the end of forty days and forty nights, that the LORD gave me the two tables of stone, even the tables of the covenant. [12] And the LORD said unto me, Arise, get thee down quickly from hence; for thy people which thou hast brought forth out of Egypt have corrupted themselves; they are quickly turned aside out of the way which I commanded them; they have made them a molten image.”
After Moses went up to the mount, the people began to remember the idols of Egypt. Many of them did not desire God. The reason many came up with Moses was to escape the bondage of slavery in Egypt, but not really to serve God. Their hearts were not really toward God. When their spiritual leader left to get the Ten Commandments, and had been gone for over a month, they began to speak of building and worshiping a golden idol.
Exodus 32:1 ― “[1] And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together unto Aaron, and said unto him, Up, make us gods, which shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him.”
Aaron Built the Golden Calf (but Later Repented)
