The Golden Calf

     In the story of moses, the Israelites made themselves a golden calf.  Exodus 32:4 says, "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, 'These are your gods, O Israel who brought you up out of Egypt." 
     Were the Israelites worshiping the one true God?  If the were, they were not worshipping God in an acceptable way. 
     I've been going through some really hard times lately and wondering why?  I became a Christian at the age of 30.  Soon after, we jumped into going to a Church and doing everything we could think of to help that Church.  My husband Mark and I were tithing regularly.  We started a prayer line in our home and I prayed with anyone from the Church that would call.  We got on the board at the Church.  I worked in the nursery, Mark was on the worship team, and we volenteered for anything that came up.  But still things were more than bad.  After reading the story of the golden calf I thought instead of being blessed, maybe I was being cursed.
     Deuteronomy 28:15 says, "If you do not carefully follow all these commands and decrees I am giving you today all these curses will come upon you and over take you."  I read down the list of curses, "Confusion, deseases, being defeated before your enemies, at midday you will grope about like a blind man in the dark.  You will be unsuccessful in everything you do, day after day you will be unsuccessful in everything you do, day after day you will be opressed and robbed with no one to rescue you.  The sights you will see will drive you mad.  You will sow much seed in the field but will harvest little, because locusts will devour it.  The alien who lives among you will rise above you higher and higher but you will sink lower and lower.  He will lend to you but you will not lend to him.  He will be the head but you will be the tail.  The Lord will give you an anxious mind, eyes weary with longing and a despairing heart.  You will live in constant suspense filled with dread both night and day, never sure of your life.  This will be upon you because you did not serve the Lord your God joyfully and gladly in the time of prosperty."  These are just part of the curses listed.
     Was I serving God the way He wanted me to serve Him, or was I serving Him the way I thought I should serve Him?  I started to think that maybe I wasn't serving God at all.  Some how I had started to serve the Church instead of serving God, and I made a golden calf of my own.  I didn't even stop to ask, "God, what do you want me to do?"  Instead I just made up my mind and did what I thought I should be doing. 
     We were having financial trouble, I felt unstable, confused and I just wanted to give up trying.  My family had sickness, and I felt that everything that could go wrong, pretty much was.
     I kept thinking, "Where is God?"  I'm in so much trouble and where is God?  I was doing everything I could for the Church but I felt far from God. 
     I read more in Deuteronomy 30 "And when you and your children return to the Lord your God and obey Him with all your heart and with all your soul according to everything I command you today then the Lord your God will restore your fortunes and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where He scattered you.  Even if you have been banished to the most distant land under the heavens from there the Lord your God will gather you and bring you back."
     Deuteronomy 30:19 says, "This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses.  Now choose life so that you your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice and hold fast to Him for the Lord is your life, and He will give you many years in the land He swore to give your fathers, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
     I know that a lot of things have changed with the coming of Jesus.  I know that there is Grace, and I am righteous through Him, and not because of how good I am.  I had put myself back under the law.  I knew the truth, but somehow I started to think that by doing good things I could earn God's blessings, and I can't.  The only way to be blessed by God is to totally submit to Him.  Pray and listen for his vioce, then follow.  Only then, Jesus in me will help me to please God, Jesus through me will produce good fruit and I will be blessed.