His Story: A journey through the greatest story of all time
The Bible isn’t just an old book—it’s God’s story, and it’s still alive today. His Story takes you chapter by chapter through Scripture, combining simple readings of God’s Word with prayer for every listener and occasional reflections on what the passage means for our lives right now.
Whether you’re brand new to the Bible or have been reading it for years, this podcast is a space to slow down, hear God’s Word spoken, and be reminded that His story is also our story.
His Story: A journey through the greatest story of all time
From Idolatry To Intercession: What Exodus 32 Teaches About Our Hearts
Waiting can turn even grateful hearts into idol makers. At the foot of Sinai, Israel melts its earrings into a golden calf while Moses meets with God on the mountain. We walk through Exodus 32 step by step—impatience, the lure of a visible god, the failure of leadership, and the blowback that follows—so we can see our own patterns with honest eyes and renewed hope. This is a hard chapter, but it shines with a fierce kind of grace.
We explore how Aaron caves to the crowd, how worship shifts from God-centered to man-centered, and why Moses shattering the tablets is more than anger—it’s a sign that the covenant has already been broken. From there we lean into the mystery of intercession: Moses appeals to God’s character, his promises, and his name among the nations, and the Lord relents. The story doesn’t dodge justice—three thousand fall and a plague strikes—yet it refuses despair by pointing forward to a greater Mediator who would bear the full weight of sin.
Along the way, we talk about modern idols that look nothing like calves but demand the same devotion: productivity, pleasure, image, and control. We ask what it means to repent without excuse, to lead with conviction when popularity whispers, and to pray with a boldness that believes mercy is mighty. If your heart feels like a factory of substitutes, you’re not alone—this passage aims your worship back to the God who is worthy. Listen, share with a friend who needs courage to turn from counterfeits, and if the conversation helps you, subscribe and leave a review so others can find it too.
The Bible isn’t just an old book—it’s God’s story, and it’s still alive today. His Story takes you chapter by chapter through Scripture, combining simple readings of God’s Word with prayer for every listener and occasional reflections on what the passage means for our lives right now.
Whether you’re brand new to the Bible or have been reading it for years, this podcast is a space to slow down, hear God’s Word spoken, and be reminded that His story is also our story.
Welcome back to His Story, a journey through the greatest story of all time. Today we begin at the foot of Sinai in Exodus 32, where impatience turns to idolatry and intercession changes everything. Exodus 32 unfolds while Moses is on the mountain receiving the law. Human hearts are perpetual idol factories. You know it, and I know it. We're impatient and our unbelief combined to fashion false gods. In Exodus 32, this golden calf incident is the prototype of all idolatry, where worship becomes man-centered instead of God-centered. Chuck Swindal highlights Aaron's failure of leadership, choosing popularity over principle. Moses' intercession foreshadows Christ's role as mediator between a holy God and a sinful people. In Hebrew, the word for corruption means to ruin or decay, and it describes moral rotten that spreads quickly. Let's get started. May we rejoice and be glad in it. We worship sports teams, we worship objects, cars, houses, sceneries, all kinds of things. God, may we, through this passage today, be reminded that you are the only true object worthy of our worship. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him. So Aaron said to them, Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me. So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in their ears and brought them to Aaron, and he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, These are our gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. When Aaron saw this he built an altar before it, and Aaron made a proclamation and said, Tomorrow shall be a feast to the Lord. And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings, and the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose up to play. And the Lord said to Moses, Go down, for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way that I commanded them. They have made for themselves a golden calf, and have worshipped it, and sacrificed it, and said, These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. And the Lord said to Moses, I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore, let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them, and I may consume them, in order that I may make a great nation of you. But Moses implored the Lord his God and said, O Lord, why does your wrath burn hot against your people, whom you have brought out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand? Why should the Egyptians say, With evil intent did he bring them out, to kill them in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from your burning anger, and relent from this disaster against your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, your servants, to whom you swore by your own self, and said to them, I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and all this land that I have promised I will give to your offspring, and they shall inherit it forever. And the Lord relented from the disaster that he had spoken of, bringing on his people. Then Moses turned and went down from the mountain, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand, tablets that were written on both sides, on the front and on the back they were written. The tablets were the work of God, and the writing was the writing of God engraved on the tablets. When Joshua heard the noise of the people as they shouted, he said to Moses, There is a noise of war in the camp. But he said, It is not the sound of shouting for victory, or the sound of the cry of defeat, but the sound of singing that I hear. And as soon as he came near the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, Moses' anger burned hot, and he threw the tablets out of his hand and broke them at the foot of the mountain. He took the calf that they had made and burned it with fire, and ground it to powder, and scattered it on the water, and made the people of Israel drink it. And Moses said to Aaron, What did this people do to you that you have brought such a great sin upon them? And Aaron said, Let not the anger of my Lord burn hot. You know the people that they are set on evil, for they said to me, Make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him. So I said to them, Let any who have gold take it off. So they gave it to me, and I threw it into the fire, and out came this calf. And when Moses saw that the people had broken loose, for Aaron had let them break loose to the derision of their enemies, then Moses stood in the gate of the camp and said, Who is on the Lord's side? Come to me. And all the sons of Levi gathered around him. And he said to them, Thus says the Lord God of Israel, put your sword on your side, each of you, and go to and fro from gate to gate throughout the camp, and each of you kill his brother and his companion and his neighbor. And the sons of Levi did according to the word of Moses, and that day about three thousand men of the people fell. And Moses said, Today you have been ordained for the service of the Lord, each one at the cost of his son and of his brother, so that he might bestow a blessing upon you this day. The next day Moses said to the people, You have sinned a great sin, and now I will go up to the Lord. Perhaps I can make atonement for your sin. So Moses returned to the Lord and said, Alas, this people has sinned a great sin. They have made for themselves gods of gold. But now, if you will forgive their sin, but if not, please blot me out of your book that you have written. But the Lord said to Moses, Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out of my book. But now go, lead the people to the place about which I have spoken to you. Behold, my angel shall go before you. Nevertheless, in the day when I visit, I will visit their sin upon them. Then the Lord sent a plague on the people because they made the calf, the one that Aaron made. The word of the Lord. This is a tough chapter. I'm not gonna lie. This chapter is a sobering picture of what happens when we lose sight of God's presence. While Moses communes with God, the people below craft a God they can see and touch in exchange for one that they can't. They trade revelation for imagination. The Hebrew word for play in verse 6 hints at a revelry. It's the same root as Isaac's name, but here it's twisted into mockery. Aaron gives in to pressure and declares a feast to the Lord. He gives in to the crowd and what they want, blending truth and lies into spiritual poison. When Moses descends with the tablets and shatters them, it's not a temper tantrum, it's a symbol of the covenant broken. And Moses now understands why God was burning with anger as he burns with anger himself. But grace slips through the cracks. Moses pleads, blot me out instead. That's the heartbeat of substitution. Moses anticipates the one who would bear our curse completely. The Lord relents. Not because sin is small, but because intercession is mighty. This chapter points straight to Christ, the greater Moses, who ascended the true hill, bore our sin, and reconciled us to God. One thing that's really difficult about this chapter is the fact that Moses commands the Levites to kill, to slaughter those who are opposed to God. That's a tough thing to read. Until we understand the fact that every one of us deserves the same punishment for our sin. God made it clear to Adam in the garden that the day that you eat of the fruit of the tree, of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall die. And when they did, that was the beginning of a physical death that we all will experience, and an instantaneous spiritual death, a spiritual separation from God in that moment. Every one of us deserves death, as Paul says in Romans. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life. Every day that God gives us on this planet is a gift because it's not what we deserve. He is preserving us for his glory and for those whom he has called for them to turn and repent and receive salvation. Again, it's a tough story to read. There's no doubt about it. But what God is doing is he is cleansing for himself a people who earnestly will follow after him. And that's what he wants for us as a people who will earnestly follow after him, who will repent of our sins as Moses did for the people and ask God for forgiveness. And the Bible is clear that if we confess our sins, that God is willing and just and able to forgive our sins. God, thank you for this tough passage. God, I thank you that the Bible is not just roses and daisies, but it's truth. And sometimes the truth is tough to read. We all deserve death because of our sin. And yet you provide for us, you sustain us, you give us your grace. God, I pray that this passage passage would remind us that we are created to worship. We want to worship. And so that when we do that, that we should know that that is who we were created to be. The question is, who or what are we worshiping? And the answer needs to be the God of the universe who created all things, including every one of us. God, may we worship you and not substitute you for something we can see and touch. God, thank you for providing for all of our needs. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Next time we'll join Moses again in Psalm 90 as he reflects on the brevity of life and the eternity of God. Until next time, remember, Jesus wrote the greatest story ever told, and that includes loving you and me completely. See you next time.
