Deuteronomy 9:13-21
“Then I took the sinful thing you had made, the calf, and burned it with fire and crushed it, grinding it thoroughly, until it was reduced to dust; and I threw the dust of it into the stream that runs down the mountain” (Deuteronomy 9:21)
Sometimes it’s the small differences in scripture that can be the most interesting, especially if we don’t get lost in the tension of two differing accounts of the same event. That is what we have here in our Deuteronomy selection today. The story of how Moses responds to the waywardness of Israel, when they made a golden calf and profaned God’s holy name in the process, differs between Exodus (probably the more popular account) and this reading. In the Exodus reading, Moses still burns the golden calf, crushes it, grinds it, but then he puts it in the water and forces Israel to drink it. He makes them consume their sin – like swallowing back a mouthful of vomit.
Our rendition of this story today, though, has the calf burned, crushed, and ground, but then Moses throws “the dust of it into the stream that runs down the mountain.” Ahhhhhhh…. That’s a much happier ending! Their sin has been demolished and removed entirely from them. Far from having swallow back into themselves the sin that had come out of themselves, now they get emptied of their sin altogether.
I suspect we gravitate more toward the conclusion of Deuteronomy’s account not only because it doesn’t involve some disgusting swallowing, but – more importantly – because it is more reminiscent of what God does with our sin through Jesus Christ. For in the Gospel, our sins are taken from us and placed on Him. They get buried with Him. But when He is raised, they remain in the tomb. From Death our sins came and to death they return, but we – well – we get to be raised with Jesus, far away from all sin and death.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
