Rainey Prays on Some Days

I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City yesterday with my wife and several of her colleagues from Hawthorne Christian Academy . One exhibit that stood out to me was the Ishtar Gate exhibit , a brick wall that dates to ca. 600 BC in the city of Babylon. The wall has glazed figures of lions and the prophet Daniel would have walked by the walls frequently while living in Babylon. The lions depicted on the walls were associated with the goddess Ishtar, and people could follow the lions on the walls to her temple. Daniel's escape from the lions' den seems to show the powerlessness of Babylonian gods vs. Yahweh, the god of Israel. Nice kitty!

After the lengthy cultic interruption in Exodus 25-31, the narrative resumes in Exodus 32 with the people anxious because Moses has not returned from the mountaintop. This is subtly hinted at in the text, as the Torah commentary notes the transition in Exodus from “the man, Moses” in 11:3 to “this man Moses” in 32:1. People will not wait indefinitely when there is a leadership vacuum. This is why leadership transitions are so critical. Show me a church without a pastor, and I will show you a church at risk. In the absence of viable leadership, people will go back to what they know—to old habits and notions—and in this case the polytheism of Egypt. Despite their grand experience of deliverance under Moses' leadership, his absence up on the mountain with God leaves them vulnerable. It becomes obvious in this episode too that Aaron is certainly not a suitable understudy. Despite making a golden calf, Aaron clings to the notion that the calf represents God's throne. This is the

Old Testament scholar Walter Kaiser lectured at Central Bible College --where I attended as an undergraduate-- around 1990. While there, he spoke on the Old Testament missions mandate and noted that there is no historical record of a spiritual revival in Egypt as predicted at the end of Isaiah 19 . This would be a good time to pray for it to happen.