“You must not make any idols. Don’t make any statues or pictures of anything up in the sky or of anything on the earth or of anything down in the water.
He took the gold from the people and used it to make an idol. Using a special tool, he shaped the gold into a statue of a calf. Then the people said, “Israel, here are your gods! These are the gods that brought you out of the land of Egypt!”
They did throw the gods of those nations into the fire. But they were not real gods. They were only wood and stone—statues that people made. That is why the kings of Assyria could destroy them.
But look at what this man Paul is doing. Listen to what he is saying. He has convinced many people in Ephesus and all over Asia to change their religion. He says the gods that people make by hand are not real.