God gives up?

How can God give up on people? How can God say - I don’t care anymore? This week’s lectionary reading really challenged me because this is precisely the picture that we see in Exodus 32.

“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.”” (Exodus 32:9–10 ESV)

In this story, we see God deciding to give up on the people He had loved and delivered out of Egypt. He had enough and he was all ready to start a new people with Moses. Destroy everything and restart. We have all felt this way before. There are times in our lives when we just want to forget everything and start all over. Often times, starting new is so much easier and often more effective than trying to work with the old. There comes a time when we have to say - enough is enough. I’m not going to waste my time and effort anymore with this.

We have all been through experiences like this. But can we imagine God saying this? It’s ok for flawed human beings to just ‘give up’ on our projects. But God? The Scriptures testify exactly the opposite that God does NOT give up…

“God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?” (Numbers 23:19 ESV)

“The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself.” (2 Timothy 2:11–13 ESV)

The steadfast love of the LORD truly never ceases. Why? Because He is not just loving, but Love Himself. Love is not an attribute or virtue or property of God. He Himself is the source and substance of everything we know Love to be, and more (1 John 4:8).

So how can Love give up? Isn’t Love supposed to bear all things, believe all things, hopes all things and endure all things? (1 Cor 13:7)

I want to submit this thought for our consideration that here in Exodus 32, we are witnessing the nature of True Love. In this moment of God giving up, we see a Love so profound, we would miss it if we did not stop to meditate upon it. 

Tune in next week, as we consider the answer to this puzzle that Exodus 32 presents to us.