Acts 7:38-45

38Moses was with our ancestors, the assembly of God’s people in the wilderness, when the angel spoke to him at Mount Sinai. And there Moses received life-giving words to pass on to us.

39“But our ancestors refused to listen to Moses. They rejected him and wanted to return to Egypt.

40They told Aaron, ‘Make us some gods who can lead us, for we don’t know what has become of this Moses, who brought us out of Egypt.’

41So they made an idol shaped like a calf, and they sacrificed to it and celebrated over this thing they had made.

42Then God turned away from them and abandoned them to serve the stars of heaven as their gods! In the book of the prophets it is written, ‘Was it to me you were bringing sacrifices and offerings during those forty years in the wilderness, Israel?

43No, you carried your pagan gods— the shrine of Molech, the star of your god Rephan, and the images you made to worship them. So I will send you into exile as far away as Babylon.’

44“Our ancestors carried the Tabernacle with them through the wilderness. It was constructed according to the plan God had shown to Moses.

45Years later, when Joshua led our ancestors in battle against the nations that God drove out of this land, the Tabernacle was taken with them into their new territory. And it stayed there until the time of King David.