Sermon: Idolatrous Suppressors of the Truth

#1732
Martin G. Collins
Given 28-Oct-23; 58 minutes 2023-10-28

description: (hide)

"Little children, keep yourselves from idols." You are very familiar with that phrase. These are the apostle John's words of advice and warning to the people he fondly called little children and genuinely loved.

When he wrote this, he was an elderly man who was concerned about the life and the future of Christians, including you and I, to whom he was writing it to at the time as well. The words of an old man are always worthy of respect and consideration, especially if they are biblical and they are words that are based on a long lifetime of experience. And more importantly, they are some of the last written words, in this case of an apostle of our God and Father and of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Please turn with me to I John 5. John is looking back on a long life here, having had many different and unique experiences himself. He saw and heard the teachings and miracles of Jesus Christ. Jesus personally asked him to care for his natural mother and he witnessed the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, the growth of the church in the first century, the destruction of Jerusalem, the martyrs of all the other apostles, and the persecution of the saints. Also, the infiltration of false teachers in the church and the falling away of many; and some even went back to their former ways. Now that is some experience. I do not think anyone in the entire history of the church in the last 2,000 years has ever had that much experience.

Over that period of time, this elderly man knew his time was short and as he saw his fellow Christians in a hostile world, he wanted them to live a life of spiritual success. He wanted them to have a joy that is full. And so the last thing he wrote in his letter was,

I John 5:21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen.

In ending on this note, John is doing something that is very characteristic of himself. He uses contrast. He enjoys comparing things. For example, light and darkness, love and hate, that which is true and that which is false. He sees our spiritual battle as between two contrasts, two opposites. And he ends on that.

Now, the previous verse tells us,

I John 5:20 We know that the Son of God has come and has given us an understanding, that we may know Him who is true; and we are in Him who is true, in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. [And then he adds, "Little children, keep yourself from idols."]

So we have the contrast between the true and the false in verses 20 and 21. In other words, John found the negatives useful and he did not see the positive as the complete story. He tried to balance his teaching and his practical applications and so he generally puts his positive first and then his negative, and this is what he has done here. So we are not only told that we must keep the commandments and be perfect, we are also told that we must not sin. Here, we see the negative in relation to the one and only true and living God and that is the avoidance of idols.

John always warns us, and because of his years of experience, he knew how important warnings were because he was constantly in his writings, and I am sure in person, warning the church of the dangers that they were facing. He warns us not to put on a false act in worship. John had many warnings of that kind because he was a very practical minister. It is very dangerous to have only a theoretical interest in the truth. You need much more than that, you need the practical as well.

So in a sense, John did not write this letter merely to give a knowledge of the truth. His goal from the beginning was essentially practical and he wanted to help us in our daily lives and our battle against the forces that are set against us in the world. Now, John wants us to know the only true and living God and that we may know Jesus Christ. That is the one thing that we must hold on to, despite all that may happen to us. The one thing that matters in this life and world is to know God and all that that involves. And you know that involves submission, obedience. It involves love and all of the fruit of the Spirit. It involves a whole way of life (as we heard in the sermonette today by Craig).

John 17:3 says, "And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent." So John says, if we do not have that knowledge, if we do not have the understanding, then we are not aware of the spiritual problems either that we are up against and we are going to be defeated if we are not aware of them. This knowledge of God is only available through Jesus Christ, who Himself is at God's right hand. And if we know Him, we have eternal life, as John repeatedly reminds us.

This is a positive aspect of the truth. But if we want to make sure that we will be in that condition, we must keep ourselves from idols. There are constantly things in this life and world that threaten to become between us and that knowledge of God. In other words, whether we like it or not, it is a warfare and it is a fight of faith; there is a fierce enemy against us and he is aggressively active.

The primary goal of that evil one that John speaks of towards the end of his letter is to come between us and this knowledge of God. And the way he does that, of course, is to try to get us to fix our mind, our attention, and our heart on something else. So it is to warn us against the terrible danger that John ends on this note.

In a sense, the greatest threat that confronts us in our spiritual life is the devotion to and worshipping of idols—idolatry. Most people tend to think that above all we need to be warned not to do certain things. There are many warnings like that in Scripture, but never forget that before we are told what not to do, we are always told what we are to do. Take the Ten Commandments for example. They are positive and then negative. They follow the same pattern of procedure that John does.

Please turn over to Exodus 20. Idolatry stems from self-centeredness and rebelliousness and people refuse to surrender themselves to worship the true and living God as He commands. The world does not know how to worship God because they lack His Spirit. And without God's help, human nature tries to limit God to the confines of physical objects that it understands. People fabricate images and representations to aid them in worshipping a god that they themselves have concocted. These images may be idols or icons or symbols or objects of devotion. Anything can become an idol. Exodus 20:3 gives us the commandment, "You shall have no other gods before Me."

Now, the first commandment expresses that it is a sin to place a higher value on anything other than the importance we place on God. And building upon the foundation of the first commandment, the second commandment forbids the use of physical aids in worshipping the invisible, eternal God.

Exodus 20:4-6 [the second commandment] "You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments."

Living in such a visual age, we see obvious religious aids, including statues, paintings of Jesus, of Mary, nativity scenes, crucifixes, graphic symbols, steeples and stained glass, pictures of God and Christ, and many other objects of a devotion in this world, not only in Christianity, but throughout the entire world and all of the many beliefs.

But breaking the second commandment is not only the use of physical aids. God does not condemn every picture or image, but as the command states in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, "You shall not bow down to them nor serve them."

Solomon had God's blessing to build a Temple. He erected golden forms of two cherubim inside the Holy of Holies. On the walls of the sanctuary were carved figures of angels, trees, and flowers, none of which Israel worshipped under Solomon. Of course, there was no image representation made of God Himself. It is not wrong to have pictures and have certain statues and things like that. The key is not to bow down to them nor serve them.

Now, the first and second commandments are inseparable, as all the Ten Commandments are, all the way to the tenth, the one of coveting. And when we combine the two together, it becomes clear that an idol can also be something of which we make the Sovereign God a second God. Some people overlook the "nor serve them."

Our deeds and actions are always the outcome of our attitudes and thoughts. Proverbs 27:19 says, "As in water face reflects face, so a man's heart reveals the man." Actions are always the expression of a point of view. That is why actions always proclaim the individual. Matthew 7:16 says, "Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore, by their fruits [or actions] you will know them." So the thing to concentrate on is the outlook, the belief, the philosophy. And that is emphasized everywhere in the Bible. It was the fundamental error of the Pharisees; that they were so interested in details of the hundreds of points of the law on which they were so expert, that they constantly forgot the great principles of the law, what we might call the spirit of the law.

Please turn over to Mark chapter 12. The Pharisees showed that when they went to Jesus and asked Him the question, "Which is the first commandment of all?" They had been having a dispute amongst themselves regarding this matter, just as people still like to argue whether one sin is greater than another. Jesus' reply to the Pharisees is found here,

Mark 12:30-31 "And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment. And the second, like it, is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."

So that is the principle, because if that comes first, then our actions, and our conduct, and our behavior are likely to look after themselves, in one sense. The Scriptures always start with this. That is why the greatest danger in our spiritual life, if not one of the greatest dangers, is idolatry because not loving God and others is the result of idolizing oneself.

Like the first commandment: an idol is anything in our lives that occupies the place that should be occupied by God alone and anything that holds my life and my devotion, anything that is central to my life, anything that seems vital, anything that is essential to me can become an idol. It is anything by which I live and on which I depend rather than God. Anything that in an obsessive way moves, attracts, and stimulates us is an idol. An idol is anything that we worship other than God, anything to which we give all our time and attention, our energy and our money, anything that controls us is an idol. When God is not the supreme figure, anything that controls us is an idol.

Now, when we look at it that way, we see how practical the apostle John's advice is in I John 5, especially I John 5:21 there where it says, "Little children, keep yourselves from idols."

John was writing to people who had been pagan and who were still set in a pagan society where idols had literally been made of silver and gold and wood and stone and other material things. They had not gone back to them. And that is what answers the reason why. Why did John say to a converted congregation and to a converted people, "Keep yourself from idols"? Would that not be obvious not to have an idol to bow down to or look after? Obviously, John is talking about the spirit of the law there. He is talking about the spiritual principle and it is broad, in a sense.

Please turn with me to I Thessalonians 1, verse 8. So they had been called out, these people, of that and they were keeping the letter of the law by not having literal idols. That was not the danger confronting these church members. The danger was the teaching of the anti-Christ and the dangers that have always confronted God's church wherever it is located. There was no suggestion in the New Testament that any of the saints were liable to go back to literal idolatry in that sense. The apostle Paul earlier wrote to the Gentile Thessalonians, acknowledging that the reason they turned from idols was to serve God.

I Thessalonians 1:8-9 For from you the word of the Lord has sounded forth, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place. Your faith toward God has gone out, so that we do not need to say anything. For they themselves declare concerning us what manner of entry we had to you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and the true God.

God is called the living God here to contrast idols which are represented as deaf, dumb, dead, and blind. Everyone in God's church knows that idolatry with carved and shaped material idols is a sin; they did back then and we do now. This shows that John's primary goal was not just to talk about the literal idols, but the spirit of that the second commandment. However, what both Paul and John warned against were things contrary to the spirit of the law: obsessions, fanaticism, misdirected passions, and false ideas.

In the Old Testament, idolatry is seen as religious unfaithfulness. One of the most common biblical metaphors refers to idolatry as sexual impurity. But this also has an origin in idolatry that is built on many forms of sexual excess. Just as sexual purity was all important under the law and prophets, idolatry made the opposite claim. Fertility cults encouraged the flaunting of human sexuality as a way of ensuring the productiveness of the earth through magic and sorcery (which is being done today in these New Age religions).

For millennia, idols have represented nature gods, fertility gods and goddesses (as with the Baals and the Asherahs). Idols have had long associations with fertility cults and their practices. And those pagan practices were believed to be necessary to ensure successful grain and livestock production among the pagans. So they demanded rites like ritualized female and male prostitution, incestuous relations, and the sharing of one woman with several generations of men. The stone idol or the wooden pillar with its phallic symbolism seems to have been viewed as the mystical sire of the resulting offspring or even of the people.

So, in this type of religious climate, the prophet saw the image of an unfaithful wife as an obvious analogy with that for a nation abandoning its own God for that of other people. Shameless and rebellious, she breaks the marriage covenant, defiles herself with idols, and commits adultery with stone and wooden objects. Jeremiah and Ezekiel even characterized the nation of Judah as a religious nymphomaniac, which is not a very good label to have.

Please turn over to Ezekiel 14. You can see why God is such a jealous God and refuses to share His praise with idols. When we view idolatry from His perspective, it is downright disgusting, perverted, and debasing. God warns Israel through Ezekiel that idolatry will be punished and exposes the central source of idolatry.

Ezekiel 14:1-8 Now some of the elders of Israel came to me [that is, Ezekiel] and sat before me. And the word of the Lord came to me, saying, "Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their hearts [notice that, these men have set up their idols in their hearts], and put before them that which causes them to stumble into iniquity. Should I let Myself be inquired of at all by them? Therefore speak to them, and say to them, 'Thus says the Lord God: "Everyone of the house of Israel who sets up his idols in his heart, and puts before him what causes him to stumble into iniquity, and then comes to the prophet, I the Lord will answer him who comes, according to the multitude of his idols, that I may seize the house of Israel by their heart, because they are all estranged from Me by their idols."' "Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'Thus says the Lord God: "Repent, turn away from your idols, and turn your faces away from all your abominations. For anyone of the house of Israel, or of the strangers who dwell in Israel, who separates himself from Me and sets up his idols in his heart and puts before him what causes him to stumble into iniquity, then comes a prophet to inquire of him concerning Me, I the Lord will answer him by Myself. I will set My face against that man and make him a sign and a proverb, and I will cut him off from the midst of My people. Then you shall know that I am the Lord."

That is the theme of the entire book of Ezekiel: "Then you shall know that I am the Lord."

So the central source of idolatry is in the heart and mind. They even knew that back in the Old Testament. They knew that that commandment had both a letter of the law and a spirit of the law. This idolatry being spoken of includes having false ideas of God. If we are worshipping our own idea of God and not the true living God, that is an abomination. That is idolatry.

Now, the apostle John was very concerned about idolatry sweeping into the church. The anti-Christ had been denying the teaching that Jesus Christ had come in the flesh. They had been denying that Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God. So John's reply to this is, if you claim that, and if your idea of God is not the true idea based on the Holy Scriptures, and if you have a false conception of Him and are worshipping false ideas and beliefs, that is simply idolatry. So it is possible for us to worship our religion instead of worshipping God.

The manifestation of idolatry is very subtle and we may think we are worshipping God correctly when we worship our own religious observances and devotions, but we may not be if the self is involved. (I am talking about generally speaking, people in general, not specifically in the church.) It is possible that we might worship our religion, our church, our leader, or our point of view. Theology has often become an idol to people worshipping ideas and not God. An idol may indeed be a literal idol, but it does not stop at that. We can make an idol of another individual or group.

Dictionaries define an idol as an object of ardent or excessive devotion or admiration. Obeying the dictates of a person, church, or some other group contrary to the direct commands of God is idolatry. The individual group becomes the idol, superseding and replacing God and His truth. Some people get so enthralled with ideas that they forget that God first loved us. People seem to stop at the ideas and the theories and neglect the practice and imitation of His way of life.

We can clearly see that our own human nature is totally incapable of righteousness on its own. We must have the mind of God and we must have His Holy Spirit to empower us to live without idolatry.

There are people who worship their own experiences. They do not talk about God, they talk about themselves and what has happened to them; always self in the foreground rather than God. Probably the greatest idol of all is the self and we can trace all the others back to self. All the saints throughout the centuries have recognized itself is at the center of the problem of idolatry and the ultimate idol about which we must be so careful is this concern about myself, putting myself where God should be.

Certainly the world is all about self-preservation, a powerful motivator. Add to that fear of the unknown, a powerful destabilizer, and people can be convinced of almost anything. The world has created a destructive idol based on fear that will be part of what will enslave and completely destroy humanity, if God does not stop humanity's self-destructive plans.

Possibly the greatest act of idolatry affecting the whole world is that of the medical sphere, including medical officials, doctors, nurses, hospitals, and Big Pharma. Can they ever be trusted? The answer is found in how they handled the recent pandemic. They were worse than liars. They are guilty of crimes against humanity. And they continue to lie about the safety of their treatments, cures, and concoctions. It is sorcery at its worst.

Public officials lied, claiming that they had vaccines, which were really experimental gene modification treatments that had no traditional vaccine-like effects; and that they prevented infection. They lied. They claimed that the vaccine stopped the spread of the disease. They lied. Two years of data show that the vaccines did not work at all. They lied. Public health officials covered up deadly side effects of the vaccines that are just now coming to light as healthy 24 year old athletes who were vaxxed are dropping dead by myocardia and pericarditis on the playing fields. They claim that masks prevented infection from the virus. They lied. Why? Will the lying and fraud by public health officials get any worse? Yes, it will. Can they ever be trusted? No, they cannot.

The massive number of drugs the pharmaceutical companies are advertising on television and online and that the hospitals and doctors aggressively prescribe gives the impression that Big Pharma companies are nothing more than legalized drug cartels and that the medical doctors are their drug pushers. Nothing less. The present opioid epidemic in this nation is proof positive of that. Both Big Pharma and medical professionals are guilty of addicting hundreds of thousands of suffering people.

Have you ever listened to or read the side effects of these drugs listed in the commercials? This is sorcery at its worst. How in the world can anyone put their faith in that? But millions of people in this country and around the world idolize the medical profession. Who or what does the average worldly person turn to first when they or a family member is sick? Is it God? Do they immediately pray to God for wisdom and intervention before they seek the medical profession? Why not? Why do they not? Because they immediately turn to their idol when grip fears them. In their effort of self-preservation, they immediately scramble to their god and their idol. Some people later remember to get God involved—better late than never, I suppose. But by that time, they have already established who their god is and what their idol is.

Now, I am going to be very clear here and I would like you to listen to every word. I am not saying do not go to doctors or hospitals. Of course, you should go in an emergency room, maybe to find out what is wrong with you. That is not my point. My point is, who do you turn to first? What is the first thing or being that pops into your mind? Is it, "Oh, I gotta go to the doctor." or "Oh, I better go to the hospital." or is it, "God, please help me with this. Give me wisdom and understanding so I can make the right decision at this point." That is where we go wrong quite often and that is where the world goes wrong. They immediately turn to their idol.

Now, I am not saying that is our idol. It is not. But I am saying that we can easily slip into the influence of the world, which is what the apostle John was warning about, not allowing the world to cause you to slip into idolatry. Every member of God's church slips into sin at some point, in or out. We repent, but it is not our way of life. And so that is my point. Is God our God and the first one we think of for help? Or have we made a god and an idol of the world health system, which is entirely based on lies. The answers to those questions are strictly personal between each of us and our God. We cannot judge each other for whether a person is going to the doctor or hospital or using the medical profession. That is between each person and God. There may be a good reason for it. Break your arm? Please hurry up and go with it, you know, and many other things. The answers to those questions are strictly personal between each of us and our God.

Psalm 73:26 says, "My flesh and my heart fail; but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."

Please turn with me to Isaiah 19, verse 3. Notice God's judgment against Egypt for the same type of idolatry.

Isaiah 19:3-4 "The spirit of Egypt will fail in its midst; I will destroy their counsel, and they will consult the idols and the charmers, the mediums and the sorcerers. [Notice there the idols and the sorcerers.] And the Egyptians I will give into the hand of a cruel master, and a fierce king will rule over them," says the Lord of hosts.

According to the online Bible, Thayer's Greek Lexicon and Brown, Driver, and Briggs Hebrew Lexicon, the word idols in verse 3 is from a Hebrew word meaning, of naught, good for nothing, worthless. And it refers to two things or two categories. It says here, "This word idols is used of physicians, a shepherd, a divination." And the second category is, "It's used of false gods." And the word sorcerers there in verse 3, or wizards in some translations of the Bible, is from a Hebrew word meaning, a knower, one who has a familiar spirit, a familiar spirit, a soothsayer, a necromancer. And we know a familiar spirit is a demon.

Please turn over to Revelation 21, verse 8. In Scripture, sorcerers, idolaters, and liars are linked as being of the same evil spirit and slated for death in the Lake of Fire.

Revelation 21:8 But the cowardly, unbelieving, abominable, murderers, sexually immoral, sorcerers [that word sorcerers is, of course, pharmakon, where we get the word pharmaceutical, pharmacy, and the rest], idolaters, and all liars shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

According to the Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament, pharmakon here means poison magic charm.

Please turn over just across the page in my Bible to Revelation 22.

Revelation 22:14-15 Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the tree of life, and may enter through the gates into the city. [of course, the city there is a code word for God's Kingdom] But outside [let us say, outside the kingdom] are dogs and sorcerers [that word sorcerers again, pharmakon] and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.

Everyone who loves to deceive and act falsely is shut out.

The psalmist echoes this decree.

Psalm 101:7 He who works deceit shall not dwell within my house; he who tells lies shall not continue in my presence.

So as we saw elsewhere, it means the death penalty.

Please turn over to Exodus 32. It was all quite shameful and foolish. God does not tolerate idolatry for long. He considered destroying the Israelites for their idolatry. Here in Exodus 32 I am going to cherry pick the verses here.

Exodus 32:2 And Aaron said to them, "Break off the golden earrings which are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me."

Exodus 32:4 And he received the gold from their hand, and he fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made a molded calf. Then they said, "This is your God, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!"

Exodus 32:6-8 Then they rose early on the next day, offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and drink, and rose to play. And the Lord said to Moses, "Go, get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molded calf, and worshiped it and sacrificed it, and said, 'This is your God, O Israel, that brought you out of the land of Egypt!'"

Exodus 32:10 "Now therefore, let Me alone, that My wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them. And I will make of you [speaking of Moses] a great nation."

It was so serious that God was at the point of destroying Israel and starting all over again with Moses. God considered starting over beginning with Moses' family line. Jacob's descendants were not cooperating with God. Now, we know the story and we know that God did not go that route. He continued with Israel. The Israelites lack of faith while Moses was on Mount Sinai made them feel insecure. Moses was gone 40 days when the Israelites fashioned a calf of molded gold to substitute for the invisible Creator God. How shameful and how foolish! It is amazing what people will do when they become fearful of the unknown and when they do not have God's Holy Spirit.

Please turn over to over to Isaiah 44, verse 9. Now, in their minds, they had reduced God to something they could control and call upon when convenient. Those who repented were ashamed at what they had done. So here, Isaiah talks about how foolish idolatry is.

Isaiah 44:9-11 Those who make an image, all of them are useless, and their precious things shall not profit; they are all their own witnesses; they neither see nor know, that they may be ashamed. Who would form a god or mold an image that profits him nothing? Surely all his companions would be ashamed; and the workmen, they are mere men. Let them all be gathered together, let them stand up; yet they shall fear, they shall be ashamed together.

So God is going to bring idol worshippers to shame.

This whole world worships the medical profession, the WHO and all that it entails, and they are all going to be ashamed that they did follow that or listen to it. It recalls the manufacturing of automobiles today, which so many people fanatically love and care for when they have no power in and of themselves. It is foolish and absurd. But many people in the world do obsess over even their trucks, which is the number one seller in the nation. From what I understand, the apostle Paul got right to the point when he wrote,

Romans 1:22-23 Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man—and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things.

So ultimately, any violation of God's law is idolatry, and idols serve as an image and label for all that is anti-Christian.

Please turn over just a few chapters to Isaiah 40. A manmade image can never represent the Eternal Sovereign God. When Isaiah attempted to give comfort to God's people, he pointed out the greatness of God's might and the strength of His power compared with humanly manufactured molded or carved things.

Isaiah 40:18-26 To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare to Him? The workman molds an image, the goldsmith overspreads it with gold, and the silversmith casts silver chains. Whoever is too impoverished for such a contribution chooses a tree that will not rot; he seeks for himself a skilled workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter. Have you not known? Have you not heard? Has it not been told to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He brings the princes to nothing; He makes the judges of the earth useless. Scarcely shall they be planted, scarcely shall they be sown, scarcely shall their stock take root in the earth, when He will also blow on them, and they will wither, and the whirlwind will take them away like stubble. "To whom then will you liken Me, or to whom shall I be equal?" says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high, and see who has created these things, who brings out their host by number; He calls them all by name, by the greatness of His might and the strength of His power; not one is missing.

Later in Isaiah 46 Isaiah mockingly commiserates with the poor weary beasts forced to transport the worthless cargo of idols as they traveled to and from ceremonies.

Worshipping idols is irrational since placing a higher value on some material thing defies all wisdom. Often the world looks at material objects superstitiously. For example, charms and religious crosses and symbols and rosary beads or icons hanging around their neck. People find them appealing at first, but then foolishly rely on them.

To combat such foolishness, Isaiah sets forth the majesty and glory of God. In verse 25 he asks rhetorically, "What could be an adequate and appropriate and accurate representation of such a God?" Well, obviously, nothing can. And if God is such an awesome being, how great is the folly of idolatry and how vain was all their confidence in their gods which their own hands had made? Idolatry is condemned as a work of the flesh for which there is a horrible fate.

Every one of the sins in the list of the works of the flesh in Galatians 5:19-21 has some form of idolatry as its motivator. Every one has some form of idolatry as its motivator. The works of the flesh in Galatians 5:20 include the specific act of idolatry as well as other specifics. In verse 21, Paul was inspired to write concerning those who practice the works of the flesh, "of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in the past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God."

These human traits begin with enmity and rebellion against God. Samuel rebuked King Saul with these pointed words.

I Samuel 15:23 "For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king."

Here, stubbornness is equated to idolatry and sin. We are all somewhat stubborn. We should be steadfast in the truth, not stubborn in the self.

Idolatry committed now has an impact on later generations.

Deuteronomy 5:9 ". . . you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me."

God says those who commit idolatry hate Him! That is very strong language and it brings the death penalty if it is not repented of. Remember, there is both the letter of the law and the spirit of the law. The letter deals with the action and the spirit deals with the attitude. Children learn by example and if their parents set the example that physical objects have excessive importance, then their children will absorb and pass down the same selfish values.

Please turn over to Colossians 3, verse 5. As I said before, if you break one of the commandments, you break them all. And covetousness, of course, is the last commandment, not to be covetous. Covetousness is idolatry. Covetousness is a strong desire for and a seeking after material things that become objects of our worship if we hold them as more than important than God. Someone else's house or car can be an idol if we covet them. This attitude is identified with idolatry because it replaces God with self-interest and visible things. Any earthly desires, sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires, and greed become idolatry.

Colossians 3:5-6 Therefore put to death your members which are on the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Because of these things the wrath of God is coming upon the sons of disobedience.

So because we have died with Christ we can get rid of sinful practices. "Put to death your members" indicates that we must take severe measures to conquer sin. Vigilance and persistent prayer against it are the first steps, with self-discipline following.

Fornication is also (in most new Bibles) translated "sexual immorality," and it refers to every kind of sexual activity outside of marriage. Five of the items that Paul lists have to do with sexual purity, stressing the importance of bringing this area of life under the control and authority of Christ.

The covetous person makes money and possessions his God. But it is God's prerogative how He gives happiness and wealth to each individual.

Please turn over to Ephesians 5, verse 5. Every righteous person seeks his happiness in God, but the covetous person seeks his in wealth. It may be that his idol is of gold and silver, but his idolatrous attitude gives rise to the action. And since an idol is an object of adoration, one who is covetous becomes an idolater.

Ephesians 5:5-6 For this you know, that no fornicator [or sexually immoral], unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.

So some of the strongest statements in the Bible are used for idolatry: abhor, detest, provoke, rebellion, stubbornness, disobedience, abomination, sin. The prophets characterized idolatry as stubborn and willful disobedience of God's laws and natural laws. It is the kind of disobedience that would not even be committed by dumb animals, implying that idol worshipping humans are cruder than animals.

Sometimes people give in to syncretistic thinking and to the seductive power of idolatry. God views idolatry as an abomination and a sin and because idols are not really gods, only the deceived worship them, and when they do, they worship Satan, the deceiver.

Now please turn over to I Corinthians 10, verse 12. Before God calls us to live His way of life, we are completely immersed in idolatry and then conversion begins the long process of coming out of idolatry. At first, we leap out of the world and any association we may have had with literal material images. But the thoughts and mental idols of the heart take much longer to overcome. Paul urges the Corinthians—and us—to escape from everything that would lead us into idolatry.

I Corinthians 10:12-14 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you except as such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it. Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

Fleeing from idolatry indicates that you are often forewarned, that you can see it coming. So Paul had reminded them that God is faithful, but he did not expect God to keep them from the sin without any effort on their own. We have an obligation. We have a responsibility to do the works part of faith and to work at overcoming. Paul had reminded them that God is faithful so Paul urges them to flee from all avenues leading to it and from all secular customs and traditions encouraging it.

Turn over the I Peter 4. To fight these tendencies, we must reflect on the sure God-given promises we have received. And when we realize and understand the amazing blessing of knowing God, everything else pales into insignificance. So I guess the question is, do we really know God? Idolatry designates lawless living in general.

I Peter 4:1-5 Therefore, since Christ suffered for us in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same mind, for he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin, that he no longer should live the rest of his time in the flesh for the lusts of men, but for the will of God. For we have spent enough of our past lifetime in doing the will of the Gentiles [that is, the world]—when we walked in lewdness, lusts, drunkenness, revelries, drinking parties, and abominable idolatry. [mainly it is describing the way of the world, the way the world lives in general] In regard to these, they [that is, people of the world] think it strange that you [saints] do not run with them in the same flood of dissipation, speaking evil of you. They will give account to Him who is ready to judge the living and the dead.

So when we suffer in humility, endure all that persecution can do to us rather than join in abominable idolatry, we can be trusted to do right. Temptation has no power over us because we have overcome it through suffering and trial. And if we have survived persecution and not denied the name of Christ, we come out the other side with a character so tested and a faith so strengthened that temptation cannot touch us anymore in that area.

Every trial and every temptation is meant to make us stronger and better. Every temptation resisted makes the next easier to resist. Every temptation conquered makes it makes us better able to overcome the next attack. We must be aware that we do not place ourselves in the place of God. Idolatry is one of the greatest dangers in our spiritual life and it affects all our activities, our viewpoint, and our worldview.

Keeping ourselves from idols really means that we must guard ourselves as if we were in a defense force against idolatry. And this is something that we must do. It is not done for us. God does not do our resisting for us. He helps us by giving us the power of the Holy Spirit to resist, but we do the resisting. The apostle Paul tells us,

Philippians 2:12-13 Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.

So we are always to be on guard, we watch and pray. We realize that there is this terrible danger and we work to do something about it. It is the same thing we find Isaiah saying in the Old Testament.

Isaiah 26:3 You [God] will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You, because he trusts in you.

God will do this for us only if our mind is locked on Him. The word translated mind is derived from a root word that means to form, to create, to devise; it represents something that is formed or made as well as anything that is formed by the mind—its thoughts, plans, and strategies. In this context, it indicates the thoughts themselves or the mind that forms the thoughts. The mind is capable of thought and will, so here it represents the whole attitude and habit of a person. It is the mind that forms an idol or not.

God will support us if we are working to keep ourselves from idols and so we must keep ourselves in the right relationship with God. We must be aware of any enemy that walks the earth seeking whom he may devour and throwing evil darts against our spiritual armor, against our spiritual faith.

The principles involved are quite simple. We must remember that we are God's people and that we are those whom Christ purchased at the price and cost of His own precious blood. We must remember our purpose and potential and the kind of life we must walk in. If we are of God and belong to God, then we must live for God and we cannot live for those other things. It does not matter what they are, we must not live for them. We can use them but not abuse them. The way to avoid that is to realize and remember what we are; we are to remember that we are not of this world and therefore we must not live for or worship anything that belongs to it.

In addition, we must remember the true nature of idols. They are useless and they are worthless.

Now, look at the things we tend to give our attention and our respect. Even if we highly value them, are they really worthy of it? There is nothing in this world that lasts, everything is temporary, everything is moving to an end. There is nothing material that is lasting and eternal; therefore they are unworthy of our devotion.

Worship is extravagant respect or admiration for or devotion to an object of esteem. The gifts and blessings given to us by God must be appropriately used and not become objects of our devotion, such as our house or even our children. Remember the opportunity and potential God has given us by His grace and truth. And remember that the privilege offered to us is to worship Him in sincerity and truth, to walk with Him in His way of life, to know Him through obedience and experience, and to fellowship with Him and His Son Jesus Christ.

God wants us to worship Him directly rather than through an idol. And He wants us to worship Him humbly. Idol worship is degrading to the worshipper and an abomination to God. But when God calls us into His own spiritual presence, He wants us to worship Him directly. God looks to those who worship Him in humility, respectful fear, sincerity, and truth.

MGC/aws/drm