The temptation to tangible

“And all the people brake off the golden earrings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron.” –Exodus 32:3

Humanity is not incapable of trust and belief; in fact we are extremely capable of it.  One would even venture to say that we find it easy, with certain stipulations attached of course.  One of those stipulations is, whatever we are placing our trust and belief in, must be seen.  We will trust in the tangible to the point of madness; going to ridiculous lengths to put our faith in something that is seen.

In the 32nd chapter of Exodus we find the children of Israel doing just that.  Moses, their leader and spiritual adviser, was up on a mountain talking with God.  Now, mind you, this Moses (by the helping hand of God) had bested the Pharaoh that had enslaved them for 400 years.  This Moses, by the helping hand of God, parted the Red sea before their eyes.  They witness and experienced marvelous miracles wrought at the hand of Moses, and for the most part, followed him, but now God was calling them to wait.  He was calling them to wait at the bottom of the mountain for Moses to return with instructions. They did none of the sort, but quite the opposite.  They petition Aaron (he was 2nd in command) to make a golden calf; something tangible for them to worship.  So, he told them to brake off their golden earrings and bring them to him; he then used the gold to fashion an object for them to worship.  Notice that they used something on their person to provide the materials to create their idol.  It was something close by, within their reach that they used to worship.  When Moses had gone, and they were expected to wait in faith, they turned to the natural.

The devil would have us fall after the same “example of unbelief.”  Sometimes in our spiritual walk with Christ we find ourselves in a spiritual desert.  This is not the same as being lost in sin.  It’s “knowing” you are right with God, but not “hearing” from him in a while.  You pray daily, read often, go to church, but yet…..you haven’t felt the move of the Holy Ghost; you haven’t had a fresh blessing, true worship, undoubted communion.  What do you do?  Don’t begin to panic and fashion yourself gods of tangible nature.  The devil would have us think that God has forsaken us; he is gone, never to return, and he would have us search for something, anything, within our means to fashion a god out of.  It may be your: job, husband, wife, girlfriend, boyfriend, hobby, ANYTHING; and perhaps it is not just one thing, but multiple little things melted together to create no space for Christ.  You go from one “I got to” another “I need to” and then all that’s left for God is your spare time.  This is how gods are created in our day and age, not by gold and silver melted and beaten into an image; but by giving too much of your time, money, and energy to something temporal.  The temptation to trust in the tangible is never more potent then when you cannot “feel” Jesus there.  So what then?  What do we do when God doesn’t answer?

We do the only thing that we know to do……..continue; continue reading, continue praying, continue believing, continue praising.  Thank God for his goodness and trust him for tomorrow.  There is a reason for the desert and a purpose for the suffering.  Continue, then one day, one glorious day, the Spirit will come down from heaven and pour out a wonderful, overwhelming blessing on your soul, and you will be glad that you didn’t break off the golden earrings!  You will be glad that you waited on the Lord to come down from the mountain.