There is perhaps no more well-known idol in the Bible than the golden calf. The story is from the book of Exodus. While Moses was up on Mount Sinai receiving the Ten Commandments directly from God, the Israelites grew impatient and demanded that Aaron make them "gods" to go before them (Exodus 32:1). Aaron complied, melting down their gold jewelry to fashion a golden calf idol. When Moses returned and saw the people worshiping the idol, he was enraged, throwing down the stone tablets and calling the people to repentance.
This was not intended to be a new deity to replace Jehovah, the one true God who had miraculously delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt. Rather, Aaron claimed that this golden calf was a representation of the same God, the God who had brought them out of bondage (Exodus 32:4-5). But this counterfeit god allowed the Hebrews to indulge in debauchery and licentiousness, throwing off the moral constraints of the law they had so recently received.
This is not the only appearance of the golden calf in Hebrew history, however. We see similar incidents later on, when Jeroboam, the first king of the northern kingdom of Israel, set up golden calves in Dan and Bethel, claiming they represented the God who had delivered Israel (1 Kings 12:25-33). Each time, the golden calf idol was followed by a throwing off of morality and a departure from the worship of the one true God.
The golden calf has become synonymous with anything that the people of God, in the Old or New Testament eras, create to be a substitute for the Lord in order to live as they please. For most Christians, these idols are usually easy to spot - the love of money, sexual immorality, materialism, and the like. But there is another kind of idol that isn't as easily detected.
The Pharisees are infamous in the Scriptures for being especially targeted by Jesus during His earthly ministry, as He called them out for their idolatry and self-righteous hypocrisy. The Pharisees were deeply concerned about the moral decay of their time, and they were zealous to keep the law and maintain their own purity. You would never find a Pharisee being civil with a tax collector, ministering to the ceremoniously unclean, witnessing to the heretical Samaritans, or showing mercy to prostitutes - all of which Jesus did in plain sight. The Pharisees were scandalized by Jesus' grace and compassion for those they avoided at all cost lest their own holiness be besmirched.
The golden calf of the Pharisees also claimed to be Jehovah, the God of Israel. But instead of promising the freedom to live sinfully without consequence, like the original golden calf, it promised something perhaps even more enticing - the ability to take credit for their own right standing before God. What could be more appealing to fallen human nature than to climb up before God's throne and stand proudly, knowing that you did this all yourself? That was the sweet deception the Pharisees fell to, as illustrated in Jesus' parable of the tax collector and the Pharisee:
Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself: 'God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.' But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, the sinner!' I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted (Luke 18:10-14).
In our day and age, many of us stand aghast at the shocking lies and immorality that have taken root in many churches. It seems at times that there have never been more golden calves than there are now. But in our preaching against and tearing down of these idols erected within the church walls, we do not need to forget that perhaps the most dangerous idols are the ones that are right there with us, fighting against open sinfulness, patting us on the back when we do good, or standing in the pulpits preaching hellfire and brimstone but not the cross.
The church fathers were vigilant against this golden calf of legalism. We see the apostle Paul calling out Peter for withdrawing from eating with the Gentile believers and instead dining only with the more respectable Jewish Christians (Galatians 2:11-14). Paul warned the early church against the "Judaizers" who were attempting to bind Gentile Christians to the Mosaic law (Galatians 5:1-6). And he spoke forcefully against any notion of works-based righteousness, declaring, "By the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight" (Romans 3:20).
There is only one Hero in the story of our salvation, and that is Jesus Christ. Anything that attempts to take that glory from Him and give it to us is an idol, whether it's the freedom to live as we please or the ability to earn our own right standing before God. The way of the gospel is the way of grace - unmerited, unearned, freely given. As the Apostle Paul wrote, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9).
So let us be vigilant, not only against the golden calves of overt sin and ungodliness, but also against the more subtle idol of self-righteousness. Let us humble ourselves before the Lord, acknowledging our utter dependence on His mercy and grace. For in doing so, we will find the freedom to truly love, serve, and obey Him - not out of a desire to earn His favor, but out of gratitude for the salvation He has freely provided in Christ.
