Idols and Idolatry https://youtube.com/watch?v=5YQ4Dte3-_Q&si=SGJPwGnTTPnEcIna
Reading: Eph 4:7-1 6 “7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. 8 Therefore it says, “When he ascended on high he led a host of captives, and he gave gifts to men.”9 (In saying, “He ascended”, what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? 10 He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) 11 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.” (Eph 4:7-16)
Introduction
Superficially, today’s reading has little to do with the subject I have been asked to preach on, idolatry, but idolatry (Rev 16:13ff.) is a [demonic] substitute for God’s [vast eternal] plan for humanity in Christ. Idols are as insidious as they are all-pervasive, idols are a projection of the genius of evil, “the serpent”, who slid into Eden, “was more crafty than any other beast [of the field] that the Lord God had made” (Gen 3:1). Today, we are increasingly surrounded by evidences of the seeming triumph (2 Cor 4:18) of the plan of the powers of evil (Eph 6:12) to distract and divert us from the worship of the true God revealed in Jesus (John 17:3). One does not have to go to global “hot spots”, [like India, Bali, or Lakemba, or Southern River (with its temples) etc.] to see evidences of the power of idols. The famine of listening to the pure Word of the Lord in Church (Am 8:11) testifies that not only is our fallen “secular” culture infested with demonically inspired false objects of adoration, but so are most of our assemblies (1 Cor 11:17ff.)! Since anything truly original can only come from the Creator of all (Isa 40:28) an idol is necessarily a poor God-substitute. Idolatry is misdirected worship where the worshipper is placed above the god because the initiative to name and fashion the object of worship is taken into human hands, literally or metaphorically (1 Sam 4-5; Isa 44:14-15). Idolatry is a sign of madness (Deut 28:28-34; Jer 50:38; Hos 4:17), “Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.” (Ps 115:8), “who say to a tree, ‘You are my father,’ and to a stone, ‘You gave me birth.’” (Jer 2:27). This is no trivial matter, John, that great apostle of the love of God, warns the Church “If anyone loves = agape the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” (1 John 2:15) [Cf. “covetousness, which is idolatry.” (Col 3:5)] . The crisis of discipleship across the Australian Church testifies to our rampant idolatries, for human beings orient their lives around that which we most love. (Family, work, houses, comfort, health, fitness, church, ministry, money etc.) Conservative Christians think our moral problems need political solutions, but the deeper truth is moral breakdown flows from false worship (Rom 1:24. 26, 28). [A famed theologian (Philip Melanchthon) said, “to know God is to know his benefits”, but] the disease of seeking God’s benefits before his kingdom and righteousness (Matt 6:33) has led to Western culture being inundated with numerous lords and gods (1 Cor 8:5-6); with the principal object of veneration being the self. [In the form of race, gender, sexuality etc.]. There can be no spiritual transformation until we repent from being devoted to what God can do for us. Such a massive turn around (i.e. repentance Acts 3:19) demands a great transformation in our thinking and so our worship (John 4:24; Rom 12:1-2).
Creation and Covenant
One of the keys to comprehending the Bible is covenant. [It has been precisely stated (Barth) “creation is the external basis of the covenant” and “the covenant is the internal basis of
creation.” In other words,] God made the cosmos as the site [temple] where he could enter into a dynamic intimate relationship with those uniquely made in his image; humans. Covenant is possible because both in nature (Ps 19; Rom 1:18-32) and Word God reveals Himself. [Divine revelation is self-revelation.] Adam and Eve were structured to be praying people in dependence upon their Maker (Isa 51:13; 54:5) as a total way of life. The lure to idolatry was a brilliant satanic attack on their total dependence on God as Father (Luke 3:38). Our dependence on God is first of all revealed in prayer!
The Substance of Idolatry
Martin Luther brilliantly said, “Anything your heart clings to (Ezek 14:3ff) is your god/idol” for you have fashioned it in your heart to possess godlike absolutes. All idols are projections of a lie, for Paul testifies, “they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.” (Rom 1:25 cf. Ps 24:4; Isa 44:20; Am 2:4). From the beginning (John 8:44) Satan’s strategy was to undo the plan of God for his “very good” creation (Gen 1:31) by opening up demonic experiences of false intimacy through communion with things other than God (Deut 32:17; Ps 95:5 (LXX); 106:36-37; 1 Cor 10:20). Idols are always “dearly beloved (beautiful) darlings” (https://www.newcreationlibrary.org.au/books/covers/045.html). Whereas Adam and Eve were called to lead the created order into communing with, “the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God…to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph 3:18-19; 4:13) the devil led them to turn away from God into the inner darkness of their own selves (Matt 8:12; 22:13; 25:30).
Idols and the Deconstruction of Humanity
Idols are ruinous of everything God designed because they are agents of de-creation and division (in Israel and Church). [denominationalism is an obvious idol, as is independence]. Idolatry distorts our thinking, feeling, willing and perpetually induces guilt, fear and anxiety. The power of many of Jesus’ parables was to expose idolatry (Matt 6:25-34). The Old Testament bluntly outlines the destructive effect of idolatry in robbing God of his glory in humanity. Idols induce blindness and deafness to the Word of God.
“8 Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.” (Ps 115:5-8; cf. 135:15-18). Human beings become conformed to the image of the ugly entities they worship. This is why the prohibition against manufacturing “graven images” [made in the “idol factories” of our hearts Calvin] is near the beginning of the Ten Commandments (Ex 20:3-6). Israel, and so the Church, never needed images of gods because the Lord was actually present amongst his people (Ex 29:4 etc.). Many of our problems today are dure to an absence in the Church of the manifest presence of God.
What you revere you come to resemble, for ruin or restoration. Israel became as spiritually inanimate/dead, blind and deaf as the calf they worshipped (Deut 29:4; Isaiah 6:9–10; Isaiah 63:17; Hos 4:16-17; John 8:43; Acts 28:26–27; Romans 11:8,10). Paul is not ashamed to say of certain heretics, “Brothers, join in imitating me (cf. 1 Cor 4:16; 10:1 see below on “Church”), and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us. 18 For many, of whom I have often told you and now tell you even with tears, walk as enemies of the cross of Christ. 19 Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.” (Phil 3:17-19). Because idols were never a part of God’s original good creation the end of all idolatry is total destruction (Rev 6:15-17; Isa 2:6-22). Revelation summarises the lostness of idolaters by simply categorising them as “the ones dwelling upon the earth” (3:10; 6:10; 8:13; 11:10; 13:8, 14 (14:7); 17:2, 8), that is,), earthly minded/worldly people (Rom 8:5; Phil 3:19; Col 3:2) whose portion is the lack of fire (Rev 19:20; 20:10, 14, 15).
Those who worship material things, such as financial security, become as hard as the coin that they worship (cf. Matt 22:21). To the degree that you commit yourself to a thing that is not spiritual, to that degree you lose the presence and power of the Holy Spirit (Isa 63:8-10). Which is why Paul, familiar with the destructive power of idols, exhorts his Corinthian converts, “take every thought captive to obey Christ” (2 Cor 10:5).
[All natural, non-revelatory, understandings of God, whether, classical theism, monotheism, pantheism, polytheism, panentheism, deism are human inventions and absolutized images of man endowed with pre-eminent qualities can be traced back to the Fall.]
Fall
When Eve began to misquote God’s Word in Eden, e.g. when she said God said “not touch” the fruit (Gen 3:2-3; 2:16-17) she and her companion Adam (Gen 3:6) took on likeness to the murderous character of the devil (John 8:44). To add and take away from the Word of God in its power to create, preserve and sanctify/make holy (Deut 4:2; 13:32; Josh 1:7; Rev 22:18-19) is a recipe for certain disaster for it involves an unstitching of the created order. No wonder the world is as a bad as it is! (Apart from preserving grace we would all be already in hell (Acts 14:17; 17:24 ff.) Ideology as idolatry is the foundation of the destruction of civilization as God intended it to be. [Not to be equated to “Christendom” but the eternal City of God (Augustine etc.)] To turn and twist the Word of God is a reframing from divine truth and conforming to the image to the word of a creature/ serpent; in doing this Adam and Eve left behind the mastery of “all things” and sought to refashion creation in the image of their fallen humanity. As Satan desired to ground good-and-evil in himself (Isa 14:13-14; Ezek 28:1ff), when humans make themselves as God (Gen 3:5), natural phenomena, like hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions become terrifying agents of God’s wrath to humiliate us towards repentance (Luke 21:25-26; Rom 2:4). Jesus meanwhile slept through the terrors of a fierce storm threatening the live of his disciples (Matt 8:24).
Jesus
The coming of the Word made flesh (John 1:14) is the final public contradiction of all idolatry because Jesus images the glory of humanity originally intended by our Creator. Whilst there are many stories about the gods, Jesus IS the one final saving story given “from heaven” (John 6:51). Without the revelation of human nature, begotten, humiliated and exalted, in Jesus, God would have remained forever utterly unknown and unknowable. [The old covenant communicates Christ in a figure/shadow typologically e.g. 1 Cor 10:6. 11; Heb 1:1ff.] As the one true image of God in humanity (2 Cor 4:4; Col 1:15), Jesus refused to bow to ungraced God-likeness. In the wilderness he resisted Satan’s temptation by conforming only to the Word of God, ““‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’”” (Matt 4); he told the rich young ruler, ““Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” (Luke 18:19), and pointed to the Father as, “greater than all” (John 10:29; 14:28). No one could accuse him of loving anyone except his Father (John 8:46). The utter genius of the enfleshed Word is that he came not to reveal himself but the Father in the power of the Spirit (John 14:9). In Jesus the full and final revelation of God as Trinity is eminently worshipful but totally inimitable, no one can make an idol of the Trinity.
Whereas the Fall fractured the unity between heaven and earth, in the love of Christ the visible created and the invisible heavenly are reconciled (Eph 1:9-10; Col 1:21). The Fall was a movement contrary to created nature, so what was made below Adam moved above him on a path to perishing. In Christ as the last Adam (1 Cor 15:4) order is returned because all things are placed under the feet of a glorified human being (1 Cor 15:27; Eph 1:22; Heb 2:8). God’s original purpose for the first couple was lost, but the Father has restored/recapitulated all things in heaven and earth in Christ in whom they were also created (Matt 19:28; Luke 9:56; 15:4; Acts 3:17-21; Eph 1:9-10; Col 1:16). In his own victorious mediatorial humanity (1 Tim 2:5) Jesus has lifted the crushing burden of sin from our shoulders (Isa 9:6). The rule of Christ’s glorified humanity resets the whole created order to its God-intended unity and integrity in the summing up of the scope of salvation. Paul confidently announces to the immature Corinthian Church, “all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, 23 and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” (1 Cor 3:21-23). What a godly Christian Prime Minister said a century ago remains true today, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!” (A. Kuyper). [Since by the grace of adoption we can be called “gods” (Ps 82:6; John 10:34) all of God entirely fills the Body of Christ leaving no part empty of his presence linking heaven and earth, earthly men to heavenly angels.] The cosmic Christ is about transforming everything through his life, death, resurrection, ascension and glorious Return!
Church
The people of God have always been central to these purposes, as Paul says, “all things are yours, 22 whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, 23 and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.” (1 Cor 3:21-23). The ancient prophets were signs of humanity’s final elevation to greatness for as ordinary weak men they were filled with Spirit and Word (e.g. Ezek 3:14ff, cf. Rev 19:20), the so-called “two hands of God” (Irenaeus). To communicate with the lost rebellious house of Israel the embodiment of divine truth the prophet became a sort of a “living idol” totally dedicated to the message he must proclaim. Such prophetic calls came to Isaiah (ch.6); Peter (Luke 5:8-9); Saul/Paul (Acts 9:) and John in Revelation (1:17). The call to image God in Christ as a sort of a “living/real not substitutionary idol” is always traumatic carrying as it does the message of life and death (Isa 6:9-10; Acts 28:26-27 cf. Ps 115:5-; 135:1-17; Isa 40-55; 2 Cor 4:7-12). This is the message of a way of divine destruction on idolaters and a way to life in the revelation of God alone in Christ (2 Cor 2:14-17). Being the Church means being the image and likeness of God (Eph 5:25-26) in uniting heaven and earth. We move here into a realm of power and authority rarely appreciated in the West today. These are utterly profound divine and humanly unapproachable mysteries (c Cor 12:1ff; Eph 5:32; Rev 17:5).
We read in Revelation how John, the great apostle, seer (33x in the book “I saw”) and exposer of the compromise of the cult of Babylon/Caesar himself falls down to worship the angel sent from heaven to bring him this final message. The angelic response was an immediate and stern rebuke (Rev 19:10; 22:8). This is a warning for anyone who “thinks they are spiritual” (1 Cor 14:37) to beware temptation (Rev 22:18-19). Praise the Lord he always has a remedy for our prevailing arrogances.
Persecution
The violent responses to the gospel throughout Acts [in Jerusalem, Lystra, Phillipi, Athens, Ephesus] towards those who were “turning the world upside down” (Acts 17:6) were signs of an idol-riddled culture intuitively threatened with imminent collapse. As one of the end-times signs of a true move of God, only the Judaeo-Christian tradition (with Islam) condemns “lawless/licentious idolatries” (1 Pet 4:3) which leads to offense and persecution of the Church/people of God [e.g. JY to Muslim “Islam as idolatrous.”]. The testimony of Jesus is so threateningly pervasive because its message that humanity was made to be “the workshop of all things” (Maximus Confessor Ambiguum 41) means in Christ we are made to contain all of creation and to unite ‘created nature with the uncreated through love’ [ ‘It is this mediation wrought by the incarnate Word that renders possible for man, by union to him, his own deification and by his own deification that of all creatures. Insofar, then, as the deification of all things is included in the deification of man, Maximus can truly say that the deification of man actualises God's incarnation ‘in all things’.]
Cleansing
In God’s severe wisdom (Rom 11:22) idols come to the surface in times of extreme emotional turmoil, in the way of Christ you will find at the bottom of your most painful emotions the exposing discipline of a Holy Father (Heb 12:5-11). He will never allow his chosen people to enjoy the useless happiness of empty idolatry. The only assured way of permanently cleansing the Church from the pervasive power of idols is what some have called the “expulsive power of a new affection” (Thomas Chalmers). The only way to dispossess the heart of an old useless affection is by the expulsive power of a new one. E.g. Jesus replaced money in Zacchaeus’s heart (Luke 19:1-10). Revival always begins with the conviction and removal of idols so that our lives may be filled with the Holy Spirit of God (Acts 2:38 ff; 15:9). Such a transformation purifies us (Tit 2:14; Heb 9:24; 1 Pet 2:22; 1 John 3:3) so that our life-goal moves from self-actualisation/self-fulfilment/[apocalyptic romance (Becker)] to manifesting the life and glory of God in Christ. Paul testifies of the Thessalonian Church, “you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.” (1 Thess 1:9-10). Christ must reshape everything, “We know that we are from God, and the whole world lies in the power of the evil one. And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know shim who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. 21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols. (1 John 5:19-21).
Fear of Idolatry
A final word of warning as I wrap things up. A common ungodly fear is itself an idol imparting self-centred confidence in our human ability to be godly (cf. 2 Cor 7:10). The true fear of the Lord (Prov 9:10) is the awesome holy reverent fear (Isa 11:3; 1 John 5:17) that led Jesus through the Gethsemane to the cross and beyond. This is a gift of fear of not “growing up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ,” (Eph 4:15) and it alone assures us we will not be ensnared by idols .
Conclusion
We live deceived by political powers into believing that something besides sin is the main problem in world, hence our failure to pray, and something other than God the main remedy, hence our failure to practice repentance as a way of life. Many new idols are being constructed in our time. With the assistance of AI, big tech is working hard to make new images of humanity in the likeness of the Adamic programme, we are indeed arrogant “glory thieves” (Neil Stewart) preoccupied with our own lives, gifts, careers ministries etc. [We are slow to accept that most psychological problems are simply signs of idolatry.] Praise God for his absolute intolerance (Hab 1:13) of our sinful constructions and inventions. Expect in coming days to see many young people become increasingly disenchanted with worldliness and turning away from the popular facile/impotent “moralistic therapeutic deism” of the churches and seeking Jesus alone as the true Way of salvation.
In God’s limitless wisdom (Mark 14:36) we have been taken back to the days of the Roman Empire where the Christian faith was viewed with suspicion and a danger to social cohesion so that we might be taught by God (John 6:45) that the Church rules in the power of the kingdom of God only by pointing to the cross as the finished work of Christ, the ascension to reign and the soon return of the Lamb. Christian martyrdom testifies of the single power which will make all things new (Rev 21:5). In the wise counsel of God the worship of the one true God will revisit us once again (John 17:3).