Homethis morning I read Psalm 106. I just had to point out the ridiculousness of this and then point it to ourselves.
verse 20:
They exchanged the glory of God
for the image of an ox that eats grass.
they had the very glory of God around them, had seen his miracles and His power, and yet, when Moses went up the mountain to meet with God of whom they were terrified to meet themselves, they quickly turned and had an image of a calf, an ox, something that eats grass. Other than an occasional goring by a bull, cows are generally gentle creatures that have some power, but not the might and power that had been displayed by God, but they were happy to exchange that glory for such a thing.
And so do we. We are distracted by all manner of things that we often exchange for the glory of God. We pursue our desires and sometimes our desires are not Godly and not of God. We justify it away in all sorts of ways. At the foot of the mountain, they declared that they did not know what had happened with that Moses. We declare similar things. Let it not be so.
Let us treasure and hunger and thirst for the Living God above all other things, not just so that it appears so externally, but that there is no questioning what we glory in. May we glory in God and desire Him only. The things of this world are not bad, but when they distract us from Him, they become sin. Let us crush and destroy our idols and turn back to God.