The Lord spoke to Moses, ‘Go down now, because your people whom you brought out of Egypt have apostatised. They have been quick to leave the way I marked out for them; they have made themselves a calf of molten metal and have worshipped it and offered it sacrifice. “Here is your God, Israel,” they have cried “who brought you up from the land of Egypt!”’ the Lord said to Moses, ‘I can see how headstrong these people are! Leave me, now, my wrath shall blaze out against them and devour them; of you, however, I will make a great nation.’

But Moses pleaded with the Lord his God. ‘Lord,’ he said ‘why should your wrath blaze out against this people of yours whom you brought out of the land of Egypt with arm outstretched and mighty hand? Why let the Egyptians say, “Ah, it was in treachery that he brought them out, to do them to death in the mountains and wipe them off the face of the earth”? Leave your burning wrath; relent and do not bring this disaster on your people. Remember Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, your servants to whom by your own self you swore and made this promise: I will make your offspring as many as the stars of heaven, and all this land which I promised I will give to your descendants, and it shall be their heritage for ever.’

So the Lord relented and did not bring on his people the disaster he had threatened.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

They fashioned a calf at Horeb
  and worshipped an image of metal,
exchanging the God who was their glory
  for the image of a bull that eats grass.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

They forgot the God who was their saviour,
  who had done such great things in Egypt,
such portents in the land of Ham,
  such marvels at the Red Sea.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

For this he said he would destroy them,
  but Moses, the man he had chosen,
stood in the breach before him,
  to turn back his anger from destruction.

O Lord, remember me out of the love you have for your people.

Glory to you, O Christ, you are the Word of God!
Your words are spirit, Lord, and they are life;
you have the message of eternal life.
Glory to you, O Christ, you are the Word of God!