Last week, we looked at three common idols that can creep in and take hold of our lives as Believers, often without our even being aware of them.
Today, I'd like to look at 4 more of these dangers that can steal away our focus from the Father ...
4. Put your hands up if you are currently in either a fitness programme or a diet plan, or both? Hands up if you support Kattitude or your local SPCA? Hands up if you’re into composting and off-grid living?
Now, again, it’s good to do what we can to improve our health, to care for creation, and to have interests and concerns for local and global issues. We’re better able to fulfil the Lord’s purposes for our lives when we’re physically healthy, and Believers are called to be stewards of God’s Creation.
The problem arises when our passion for good causes shifts from being a tool to an object of our worship. To know when we’ve crossed the line into idolatry, we can ask ourselves some key questions:
Which do I think of first each morning – my meal prep for the day or getting into God’s Word before my day starts? Am I more likely to clear my schedule for a charity event or Bible study meeting? Am I torn between buying an air fryer or assisting someone to go on the QwaQwa trip? Can I quote more facts about the merits of veganism than I can Bible verses?
It’s deceptively easy to elevate good causes above our relationship with the Lord, and to strive for respect and image and popularity and self-righteousness through good works for local charities and intermittent fasting diets.
But none of these things should come at the expense of a deeper relationship with the Saviour, and a commitment to the work of His Kingdom.
5. “What do you do for a living?” Often, upon meeting someone, that’s the first question we ask.
Our culture tells us we need to “be something” – right from the day our children start school we’re obsessed with asking them “what they want to be one day”, as if that’s the end goal of becoming a mature human being. In fact, people look at me like I’ve grown a third arm when I tell them that I genuinely don’t care if my son goes to university, or what career he chooses, as long as he grows up knowing and living his identity in the Lord, and being a useful member of society and the Kingdom of God.
The question of what we do for a living triggers one of two reactions: pride or insecurity. How often do people answer with “I’m just a ...”, like being a mom, a wife, a cleaner, a cashier make them “less than” other people?
Or how often do people list all of their awards and titles and positions?
When we’re enslaved by the idol of success, this simple question can trigger us to listing all our accomplishments in an effort to prove our worth or gain respect.
But God measures success based on obedience, not results. In all things, our role is to obey; He’s responsible for, and sovereign over, the outcome.
Our identity is and must be found in Christ alone. He wants us to know who and Whose we are, and Scripture says, in Christ, we’re cherished, chosen, and empowered men and women of God handcrafted for an eternal purpose, irrelevant of our address or job title.
Our value doesn’t increase when we reach our goals or get promoted. Nor does it decrease when we’re laid off or encounter rejections. Knowing this, and anchoring our hearts in grace, frees us from the idol of success and enables us to become all we were meant to be in Christ.
6. The past is an idol when it plays a key role in determining our identity, both negatively and positively:
· Firstly, In the field of success and achievements. If this is your past idol, for you the past serves as a place of worship of your past successes and victories – and these have become the source of your identity, sufficiency, recognition, significance, and value. Of course we all have good memories, and it’s wonderful to look back on these, and for them to inspire us – but when you act like things will never be good in the country or in your life again, because of how perfect they were in your memory, the past has become your idol.
Our successes and achievements belong to God because they are based on talents, gifts, inspiration, and the unique design which each of us has been created with. He is the basis of our successes because He has blessed and multiplied our efforts and labor. All good things and gifts come from God and He is the Author (acknowledged or not) of all the good in our lives. James 1: 17 tells us: “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.”
· And secondly, in the sphere of failures and losses. While we’ve all had our fair share of bad things happen to us in the past, these are not meant to become our identity or our final destination. Past traumatic experiences can form established patterns of thinking, perception, and action that simply do not correspond to the present reality and are not relevant. And yet, many people are stuck there – still blaming everything in their lives on that thing that happened, or that person who did that thing to you, and unable to move on with their lives.
God was there in those things too. To show us mercy, to save our lives, to send us comfort and help, to bear our burden, ready and determined to redeem every tear and suffering. Psalm 68: 19 says: “Praise be to the Lord, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens.”
Part of processing the past is the process of giving and receiving forgiveness. We aren’t responsible for the painful events and people in our lives, but we are responsible our own thoughts, words, and decisions, as well as for our actions.
To overthrow the idol of the past we need to consciously and deliberately leave the past in the past and choose to move on and look ahead.
The idol falls when we choose to humble ourselves, forgive the other person, and put God into the picture. Then we understand that He is in our past and He owns it, but that He also wants so much more for our present and our future.
Let’s begin to look at our past through the prism of God’s presence, mercy, and love, “For in Him we live and move and have our being.”
7. There’s one idol in particular that the modern person is most infatuated with, though, and that is the idol of self.
In former days, men and women looked outside of themselves for answers, to the gods of wood, stone, and metal. Today, our ultimate authority and object of worship lies within: It’s the human heart. In the last several hundred years there has been a significant shift inward when it comes to how people think about identity and authority. Historian Carl Trueman writes, “’It just feels right’; or ‘I know in my heart it’s a good thing’, and other similar stock phrases are familiar to us all, and all point to the subjective, emotional foundation of so much ethical discussion today. So many people today worship the changeable god of their own feelings, placing us at the center of worship.”
We are a self-obsessed people, or at least, I am. Throughout the day, I filter everything through the lens of how it affects me.
Though I know I exist to glorify Christ and reveal His love to a hurting world, I can so easily slip into self-elevation mode.
Our culture even tries to convince us this is beneficial. After all, if we don’t look out for ourselves, who will?
According to Scripture, Christ will. We belong to an all-knowing, all-loving, all-powerful Saviour who gave His everything so that we might live. In return, He asks that we willingly give ourselves to Him.
Ryan French has a list of 10 Signs You Might Be Guilty of Self-Idolatry:
1. You search your heart before you search the Bible (Jeremiah 17: 9, Psalm 18:30).
2. Your feelings matter more to you than your faithfulness (Proverbs 28: 26, Luke 12:42).
3. You are overly obsessed with outward appearance and image (Jeremiah 4: 30).
4. You routinely reject Apostolic pastoral authority (Hebrews 13: 7, Hebrews 13: 17).
5. You crave flattery but recoil at conviction (Proverbs 27: 6).
6. You lack compassion for those less fortunate than you (Colossians 3: 12).
7. You maintain a double standard; you consider some things acceptable for you but not for others (Proverbs 20: 10, Romans 2: 11).
8. You use and manipulate people while simultaneously wanting their admiration (Luke 11: 42).
9. Your prayers are primarily focused on your own wants and needs; you rarely pray selflessly for others (Philippians 2: 3 - 4).
10. You view church as being all about your blessing; your opinions, wants, and needs are always the main focus (Philippians 2: 3 - 4).
Please join me on Friday, as I wrap up this blog series with some final thoughts, some ideas for dealing with them, and some guidelines and for avoiding them.