Psalms 78:17

¹⁰But they rebelled and grieved his Holy Spirit. Therefore he turned and became their enemy, and he himself fought against them.

¹⁶For who, when they heard, rebelled? Wasn’t it all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? ¹⁷With whom was he displeased forty years? Wasn’t it with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? ¹⁸To whom did he swear that they wouldn’t enter into his rest, but to those who were disobedient? ¹⁹We see that they weren’t able to enter in because of unbelief.

⁸Don’t harden your heart, as at Meribah, as in the day of Massah in the wilderness, ⁹when your fathers tempted me, tested me, and saw my work. ¹⁰Forty long years I was grieved with that generation, and said, “They are a people who err in their heart. They have not known my ways.”

¹²The LORD said to me, “Arise, get down quickly from here; for your people whom you have brought out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned away from the way which I commanded them. They have made a molten image for themselves!”

¹³Furthermore the LORD spoke to me, saying, “I have seen these people, and behold, they are a stiff-necked people. ¹⁴Leave me alone, that I may destroy them, and blot out their name from under the sky; and I will make of you a nation mightier and greater than they.”

¹⁵So I turned and came down from the mountain, and the mountain was burning with fire. The two tablets of the covenant were in my two hands. ¹⁶I looked, and behold, you had sinned against the LORD your God. You had made yourselves a molded calf. You had quickly turned away from the way which the LORD had commanded you. ¹⁷I took hold of the two tablets, and threw them out of my two hands, and broke them before your eyes. ¹⁸I fell down before the LORD, as at the first, forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water, because of all your sin which you sinned, in doing that which was evil in the LORD’s sight, to provoke him to anger. ¹⁹For I was afraid of the anger and hot displeasure with which the LORD was angry against you to destroy you. But the LORD listened to me that time also. ²⁰The LORD was angry enough with Aaron to destroy him. I prayed for Aaron also at the same time. ²¹I took your sin, the calf which you had made, and burned it with fire, and crushed it, grinding it very small, until it was as fine as dust. I threw its dust into the brook that descended out of the mountain. ²²At Taberah, at Massah, and at Kibroth Hattaavah you provoked the LORD to wrath.

⁸Also in Horeb you provoked the LORD to wrath, and the LORD was angry with you to destroy you.

¹³They soon forgot his works. They didn’t wait for his counsel, ¹⁴but gave in to craving in the desert, and tested God in the wasteland. ¹⁵He gave them their request, but sent leanness into their soul. ¹⁶They envied Moses also in the camp, and Aaron, the LORD’s saint. ¹⁷The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan, and covered the company of Abiram. ¹⁸A fire was kindled in their company. The flame burned up the wicked. ¹⁹They made a calf in Horeb, and worshiped a molten image. ²⁰Thus they exchanged their glory for an image of a bull that eats grass. ²¹They forgot God, their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt, ²²wondrous works in the land of Ham, and awesome things by the Red Sea. ²³Therefore he said that he would destroy them, had Moses, his chosen, not stood before him in the breach, to turn away his wrath, so that he wouldn’t destroy them. ²⁴Yes, they despised the pleasant land. They didn’t believe his word, ²⁵but murmured in their tents, and didn’t listen to the LORD’s voice. ²⁶Therefore he swore to them that he would overthrow them in the wilderness, ²⁷that he would overthrow their offspring among the nations, and scatter them in the lands. ²⁸They joined themselves also to Baal Peor, and ate the sacrifices of the dead. ²⁹Thus they provoked him to anger with their deeds. The plague broke in on them. ³⁰Then Phinehas stood up and executed judgment, so the plague was stopped. ³¹That was credited to him for righteousness, for all generations to come. ³²They angered him also at the waters of Meribah, so that Moses was troubled for their sakes;

³²For all this they still sinned, and didn’t believe in his wondrous works.