The most classic example of idolatry in the bible can be found in Exodus 32. It is the story of when the Israelites were waiting for Moses as he went up the mountain to receive the ten commandments from God. In their impatience for Moses’ return, they decided to create an idol.
Idolatry In The Bible
Idolatry examples in the bible are not uncommon. Throughout their history, the children of Israel were led astray into idolatry time after time. The story of Exodus 32 is a classic example of worshipping idols in the bible.
Another interesting example is Jeroboam
Exodus 32 – The Golden Calf
When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us a god who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.”
Things were not going according to the children of Israel’s timeline. When they felt God was taking too long for their liking, they decided to make and worship a god, made from their own hands. They made up their own god according to the characteristics they wanted him to have; a god with more suitable timelines.
2 Aaron answered them, “Take off the gold earrings that your wives, your sons and your daughters are wearing, and bring them to me.” 3 So all the people took off their earrings and brought them to Aaron. 4 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, “This is your god,[b] O’ Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”
What is Idolatry Today In The Church?
Idolatry is when you change the characteristics of God to what you want and worship it. This is a god that you have fashioned with your own hands to suit yourself. You have essentially fashioned a god using your own imagination.
5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar in front of the calf and announced, “Tomorrow there will be a festival to the Lord.”
Aaron actively participated in this very serious case of idol worshipping when he fashioned the idol, built an altar and announced a celebration.
It’s important to note that when Aaron earnestly repents, God forgives him and still allows him to be His first priest. This is significant because it shows us that God will also forgive us of idolatry when we admit to it and repent from it.
6 So the next day the people rose early and sacrificed burnt offerings and presented fellowship offerings.
The people aligned their own version of right and wrong with this false god and then asked it for forgiveness with sacrifices and burnt offerings.
7 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go down, because your people, whom you brought up out of Egypt, have become corrupt. 8 They have been quick to turn away from what I commanded them and have made themselves an idol cast in the shape of a calf. They have bowed down to it and sacrificed to it and have said, ‘This is your god, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.’
Idol worshipping is when you turn away from God’s commandments through adding exceptions; compromising His word and believing that you are still honoring God. This is delusional thinking and is exactly what the children of Israel did when they believed that a statue of a golden calf can be representative of the living God. Attributing the things that God has done in your life so far, to a god with characteristics made up by yourself is idolatry,
Idolatry In The Church Exists Today
Some people are attracted to Christianity through their original desire to change and follow Jesus. However, they then twist the characteristics and attributes of God (the teachings of Jesus) into something else that suits them better. This allows them to not have to change. This is how idol worshipping occurs in the church. They attribute all the things that God has done to bring them to the truth so far (which is the teachings of Jesus) to this new god that they invented to suit themselves.
9 “I have seen these people,” the Lord said to Moses, “and they are a stiff-necked people. 10 Now leave me alone so that my anger may burn against them and that I may destroy them. Then I will make you into a great nation.”
God will destroy us in the same way if we are guilty of idolatry. Destruction is the penalty for idol worshipping.
Do not change God’s characteristics by compromising and twisting his word. When we change God’s definitions and meanings and we don’t view His Word in the spirit He intended, we are idol worshipping.
God’s word should be viewed with repentance and a constant willingness to change. This willingness must never die in our lives.
Matthew 3:8 – Bear fruit in keeping with repentance.
Luke 3:8 – Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.
Acts 26:20 – but declared first to those in Damascus, then in Jerusalem and throughout all the region of Judea, and also to the Gentiles, that they should repent and turn to God, performing deeds in keeping with their repentance.
Exodus 32 continued… 11 But Moses sought the favor of the Lord his God. “Lord,” he said, “why should your anger burn against your people, whom you brought out of Egypt with great power and a mighty hand? 12 Why should the Egyptians say, ‘It was with evil intent that he brought them out, to kill them in the mountains and to wipe them off the face of the earth’? Turn from your fierce anger; relent and do not bring disaster on your people.
13 Remember your servants Abraham, Isaac and Israel, to whom you swore by your own self: ‘I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and I will give your descendants all this land I promised them, and it will be their inheritance forever.’” 14 Then the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.
15 Moses turned and went down the mountain with the two tablets of the covenant law in his hands. They were inscribed on both sides, front and back. 16 The tablets were the work of God; the writing was the writing of God, engraved on the tablets.
17 When Joshua heard the noise of the people shouting, he said to Moses, “There is the sound of war in the camp.” 18 Moses replied: “It is not the sound of victory, it is not the sound of defeat; it is the sound of singing that I hear.”
Ridding Ourselves Of Idolatry In The Church
19 When Moses approached the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, his anger burned and he threw the tablets out of his hands, breaking them to pieces at the foot of the mountain. 20 And he took the calf the people had made and burned it in the fire; then he ground it to powder, scattered it on the water and made the Israelites drink it.
To rid ourselves of idol worshipping, we must do as Moses did. We must repent and completely destroy the god we, ourselves, have created. Worshipping a completely different god, while applying the great things the true God has done to this god, is a grave sin.
We must keep and practice God’s commandments, statutes and precepts without compromise (no twisting). By distorting God’s truth, we create and worship a false god, fashioned by our own imagination and desires. This is idolatry and worshipping another god.
Ridding ourselves of idol worshipping is a long process of sincere self examination. It involves grinding to a pulp, the false characteristics we have applied to God. Then aligning ourselves with the God of the bible, as He is and not as we want Him to be.
‘Grinding it down’ means to acknowledge that we have been idol worshipping. Acknowledge that it is a great sin and ask God for forgiveness. In addition, we are to read the word of God with a repentant heart so that we can discover His true attributes, and not what we want Him to be.
2 Corinthians 13:5 – Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test!
2 Peter 1:10-11 – Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. 11 For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Psalm 119:59 – I have considered my ways and have turned my steps to your statutes.
Lamentations 3:40 – Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord.
Haggaii 1:5-7 – Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. 6 You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.”
7 This is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways.”
1 Corinthians 11:27-31 – So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. 29 For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves. 30 That is why many among you are weak and sick, and a number of you have fallen asleep. 31 But if we were more discerning with regard to ourselves, we would not come under such judgment.
Galatians 6:4 – Each one should test their own actions. Then they can take pride in themselves alone, without comparing themselves to someone else,
Exodus 32 continued… 21 He said to Aaron, “What did these people do to you, that you led them into such great sin?”
22 “Do not be angry, my lord,” Aaron answered. “You know how prone these people are to evil. 23 They said to me, ‘Make us gods who will go before us. As for this fellow Moses who brought us up out of Egypt, we don’t know what has happened to him.’ 24 So I told them, ‘Whoever has any gold jewelry, take it off.’ Then they gave me the gold, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf!”
Aaron lied to Moses. He said he threw the gold jewelry into the fire and a calf came out. But verse 4 says that Aaron fashioned the calf with a tool.
25 Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies. 26 So he stood at the entrance to the camp and said, “Whoever is for the Lord, come to me.” And all the Levites rallied to him.
27 Then he said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbor.’
Rejecting Idolatry And Choosing God Above All Else
The sword strapped to our side today is the word of God. As a Christian today, are you willing to arm yourself with God’s word and choose Jesus over your brother, friend and neighbor?
By speaking the truth, the people around you may have a different idea of God. As a result, they may hate, persecute, revile and isolate you because of it. But will you love the praise of man more than the praise of God?
This is part of the repentance process. Once we have discovered the true characteristics about God and have identified exactly what we have compromised about Him to suit ourselves, we must then tell others how to avoid this trap which is so easy to fall into.
Ezekiel 33:8 – If I say to the wicked, O wicked one, you shall surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from his way, that wicked person shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand.
Exodus 32 continued…28 The Levites did as Moses commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people died. 29 Then Moses said, “You have been set apart to the Lord today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day.”
If we can stand strong in our faith against those around us (even our own kin, friends and neighbors), who choose to worship a god that has been created, we will be set apart for God. Just like the Levites, we will be blessed with the Holy Spirit and eternal life.
30 The next day Moses said to the people, “You have committed a great sin. But now I will go up to the Lord; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin.”
Moses was speaking to the people not including the Levites and Aaron since they had already repented and been forgiven.
Each Levite had to kill only the people close to him, so not everyone died. About three thousand out of one million people died. This is what the Levites had to do to atone for their sin.
31 So Moses went back to the Lord and said, “Oh, what a great sin these people have committed! They have made themselves gods of gold. 32 But now, please forgive their sin—but if not, then blot me out of the book you have written.”
33 The Lord replied to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book. 34 Now go, lead the people to the place I spoke of, and my angel will go before you. However, when the time comes for me to punish, I will punish them for their sin.”
35 And the Lord struck the people with a plague because of what they did with the calf Aaron had made.
The Israelites were not genuinely repentant, only the Levites had repented. It was Moses who made atonement on behalf of the people. The people were just going through the motions as per Moses’ instruction without having a sincere repentance. God did not forgive them due to their insincerity and struck them with a plague as punishment for their sin.
We must ensure that we repent earnestly and genuinely from the sin of changing God’s characteristics. Compromising the teachings of Jesus to suit ourselves and worshipping and sacrificing to this self made god is idolatry. It is a sin to live our lives according to a self-fashioned god and obey its compromised commandments and statutes.
As children of God, we must choose a side. Are we going to continue to change God’s characteristics and worship this changed, false god/idol which has been fashioned with our own hands through our imagination and desires?
Or are we going to repent, align ourselves with the way God truly is (like the Levites), tell others this truth and not what suits us?
For Examples Of Idolatry, Check Out The Following Case Study And Bible Study:
Jeroboam: A Case Study On Idol Worshipping
Idol Worshipping In The Church Today (Bible Study)
