Word to the Wise
Thursday, March 31, 2022 - 4th Week of Lent - Thurs
[Exod 32:7-14 and John 5:31-47]"Do not think that I will accuse you before the Father: the one who will accuse you is Moses, in whom you have placed your hope. For if you had believed Moses, you would have believed me, because he wrote about me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words." [John]
The "discourse" following the healing of the crippled beggar features the tension between Jesus (and the early Christian community) and the Pharisees. Today's passage ends the discourse with a reference to Moses in which Jesus accuses his adversaries with being unfaithful to Moses and the Torah! This should direct our attention to the first scripture for today from the Book of Exodus which features a portion of the account of the golden calf.
Moses is put in the unenviable position of being between God who is angry about the golden calf ("Lemme at 'em!") and the "stiff-necked" Israelites who have created a god of their own designs because they lost patience with God and Moses. Moses persuades God to calm down. But then Moses grinds the idol into powder, makes a kind of kool-aid out of it and forces the Israelites to drink it!!! The whole incident has a kind of comic element to it but the matter is quite serious! Losing patience with God can have serious consequences!
What I would call the "Golden Calf syndrome" is a lot more common than we might think! God's self-revelation, whether through Moses or Jesus or the scriptures in general, may not meet our human cultural, social or political or even religious expectations. We can easily turn on our consumer appetites and create a "satisfactory god!" Lent offers us the opportunity to pay attention to whom we do worship and how our conduct reflects our belief. How does the so-called "gospel of prosperity" or other popular gospels contrast with the scriptures and Jesus' example? The answer may be quite sobering. AMEN