Don’t Copy The World’s Worship - Exodus 17-20

Exodus 20:22-26 (ESV)

And the LORD said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the people of Israel: ‘You have seen for yourselves that I have talked with you from heaven. You shall not make gods of silver to be with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold. An altar of earth you shall make for me and sacrifice on it your burnt offerings and your peace offerings, your sheep and your oxen. In every place where I cause my name to be remembered I will come to you and bless you. If you make me an altar of stone, you shall not build it of hewn stones, for if you wield your tool on it you profane it. And you shall not go up by steps to my altar, that your nakedness be not exposed on it.’

Israel has now been at the foot of Mt. Sinai and heard the voice of God give them the Ten Commandments.  The Ten have not officially been written out, but they have verbally been delivered.  Moses will eventually return to the mountain and receive all the commandments and write them out.  Moses will receive all God’s commands, found in chapters 21-31.  (In chapter 32 we have the story of Aaron and the golden calf.)  The transition between all those chapters and the verbal instructions is found in the above passage.   God gives them a warning about how to worship.  Least they go out immediately and start to copy the world’s approach, God tells them two very important aspects about how to worship Him:

1.  Don’t make any gods or alter out of anything other than the natural components of the earth.  At the time, the world would cut out stones and make high alters for all to see.  They called their cut out stones gods and made worship on the high places.  

2. This worship on the high places would call for the priest of these gods to wear less clothing and expose themselves to their god and to the people.  As they walked up the steps they would expose more and more.  It was meant to be a show of the priests or priestess.    

God is forbidding all this.  He will, in the next ten chapters, outline all the laws.  But before that He warns them against copying the world’s approach and systems.  God is distinct and is not to be worshipped like false gods.    It is a great warning for our churches today in regard to our worship.  Perhaps the turning worshiping into media production is not always the best way to honor the God of the universe.   It might attract the world, but the church is not the attraction.  Christ is.