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Exodus
20:3
Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.
Other
gods? What gods? From the Christian perspective, how
do we deal with the notion of ???other gods???? To the
born again believer, God is the supreme reality; the
supernatural being worshipped as the creator and ruler
of the whole universe. HE IS:
1.
Omnipotent??¦having unlimited authority or influence;
almighty
2. Omniscient??¦having infinite awareness, understanding, and insight
3. Omnipresent??¦being present in all places at all times
Anything
less cannot/does not meet the qualifications for
godhood. Anything less is a FALSE god. Even the
angels who are indeed supernatural beings are not
gods. They are the servants and messengers of God.
Satan, who thought himself equal to God and who
attempted to become greater than God was defeated and
cast out. He was created as an underling and is still
an underling. Yes, Satan is called such things as a
prince (John
12:31) ???Now is
the judgment of this world; now shall the prince of
this world be cast out.??? but being a prince of evil
and darkness, he can do NO good and he is still under
subjection to the King of Kings who is the Lord Jesus
Christ. (I Timothy 6:15-16) ???Which in his times he
shall show, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the
King of kings, and Lord of Lords, who only hath
immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can
approach unto, who no man hath seen, nor can see; to
whom be honor and power everlasting, Amen.??? Looking
at (Deuteronomy 10:17) we are told, ???For the lord your
God is God of gods and Lord of lords.??? There is none
above Him! There is no presence or force on this
planet, in heaven, or in hell that can even compare to
HIM. There never has been. There never will be.
(Obviously,
as a Christian, my source of information is The Word
of God. I see no reason to use anything else. If we
all cannot accept The Holy Bible as being absolutely
correct and true, then we have no reference material
concerning the one, true, living Supreme Being, who is
our master.) (Jeremiah 10:12) ???But the Lord is the
true God, he is the living God, and an everlasting
king: at his wrath the earth shall tremble, and the
nations shall not be able to abide his indignation.???
(I
Chronicles 29:11)???Thine , O Lord is the greatness, and
the power, and the glory, and the victory, and the
majesty: for all things that is in the heaven and in
the earth is thine; thine is the kingdom, O LORD, and
thou art exalted as head above all.???
Continuing
to use the Bible as our answer guide, we find that
idol worship was as common in those days as drinking
coffee is to our society!
Israel was
blessed and chosen to worship and represent the one,
true God and thus they battled constantly with all the
heathen cultures around them. The Old Testament is a
bloody historical account of the effort to rid the
land of false gods. The scriptures bear record to the
specific details given by God??™s prophets to his chosen
nation, Israel. (Deuteronomy 7:25-26) ???The graven
images of their Gods shall ye burn with fire:
thou shalt not desire thee silver or gold that is on
them, nor take it unto thee, lest thou be snared
therein: for it is an abomination to the Lord
thy God. Neither shalt thou bring an abomination into
thine house, lest thou be a cursed thing like it: but
thou shalt utterly detest it, and thou shalt utterly
abhor it; for it is a cursed thing.??? (Note: an
abomination is something disgusting and loathsome. A
graven image is a statue carved from wood or stone;
the man made likeness of something or someone to be
worshipped as though it were a god.)
The account
progresses in (Jeremiah 10:3-5) ???For the customs of
the people are vain: for one cutteth a tree out of
the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with
the ax. They deck it with silver and gold; they fasten
it with nails and with hammers, that it moves not.
They are upright as the palm trees, but speak not:
they must needs be borne, because they cannot go. Be
not afraid of them; for they cannot do evil, neither
also is it in them to do good.??? In short, idol gods
are NOTHING!!! They can??™t see, hear, move or speak.
They are USELESS!!! What??™s more (Deuteronomy 4:24)
???the Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous
God.??? Read the 5th. Chapter of the Book of
Samuel. It??™s amazing and also a bit amusing how the
huge statue of a false, heathen god named Dagon
literally, physically fell apart in the presence of
the Ark of the Covenant. God, himself had commanded
the building of the ark, to house the law of God
written in tables of stone (the 10 commandments) and
it was to be handled only by the Levitical
priesthood. When the Philistines procured it in
battle and brought it home to the temple of their
stone deity??¦big mistake. Old Dagon lost his head.
Read it!
So now,
let??™s deal with the absurd idea that the idols are
energy bearing images of some real and powerful
being. Well, some cultures do worship animals, but
animals cannot save the soul and give one eternal life
in heaven. They can??™t even save themselves from dying
so what good is a statue of an animal? We??™ve all
heard of sun worshipers. In the past, sun worshipping
societies perished, and modern day sun worshipers get
skin cancer! Even men who were considered great
prophets of one sort of another are dead. Jesus
Christ is alive. That one and only empty tomb
belonged to Him!
Then, there
are the so-called gods of Roman, Greek, and Norse
mythology, and they are indeed a myth (a legendary
narrative that presents part of the beliefs of a
people or explains a practice or natural phenomenon).
Ancient peoples tried to explain the why and how of
every part of life insomuch that they invented a god
for each and every thing: good crops, prosperity,
health, fertility, etc. They were so adamant in their
worship, they even erected an alter to the ???unknown
god???, just in case they had left one out. After all,
they wouldn??™t want to ignore some god they hadn??™t met
yet, and maybe make the bugger mad! (Acts 17:23)
???For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I
found an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN
GOD, Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare
I unto you.??? These are the words of the apostle
Paul, and he began at that point and preached Jesus
Christ, the true God, to the population of Mars Hill
in the city of Athens, Greece.
These
so-called gods never existed. If there had ever been
some thing or being that could have in any way
competed with God, wouldn??™t there be a Biblical
record of it? Considering the ???war in heaven??? account
of (Revelation 12:7), surely Zeus or Odin or Jupiter
would have been mentioned, if indeed they ever existed
and ever attempted to seduce humans away from ???the
only wise God??? (I Timothy 1:17). So what if
multitudes used to believe Mercury, Aries, Athena, and
all the others were real!? Mankind also used to
believe that the world was flat!
But, what
about the idols people worship NOW? An idol is an
idol is an idol. A stature is forever a statue.
Today??™s idols are still false gods. Idol worshippers
can believe as long and fervently as they wish in
their graven images, but nothing will ever happen. No
prayers will be answered. No eternal life will be
gained. No matter how many beautiful shrines are
erected and no matter how large the statues are, it??™s
all in vain.
However,
there is one more form of idolatry that could possibly
be more dangerous than bowing down to a man made
image. It is the false worship of THINGS that takes
place in the hearts of those who believe in Jesus
Christ. It is the consuming adoration of LUST AND
COVETOUSNESS that can so easily come between a
man and God. Mankind desires, seeks after, and
tenaciously holds on to money, fame, sex, sports,
possessions, and so on. Sadly, sometimes even after
we become born again and start on the road to glory,
we still get caught up in the manifestations of our
own will. (The works of the flesh are listed in
Galatians 5:19-21.) We??™ve all seen or heard about the
parent who neglects their family while in pursuit of
the almighty dollar. The media produces stories
everyday about celebrities who forfeited the things
that really mattered for fame. Ever heard of a
football widow? Then there are so many who are
overwhelmed by sexual desire. They will never know
the joy and sanctity of lifelong companionship because
they sacrifice all for physical pleasure. How many
young people have lost all sense of direction because
of the idol worship they bestow on the stars of
Hollywood? Adoration for a new car or a beautiful
home can quickly escalate to the ranks of idolizing.
All of these folks need deliverance. As long as that
THING is the most important thing in their lives, God
stays on the backseat, therefore the THING becomes a
god, a false god??¦an idol! (Matthew 22:27) ???Jesus
said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with
all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy
mind,??? That means we must love God MORE THAN ANYTHING
ELSE!
God does
not play second fiddle. Things (possessions,
collections, hobbies, jobs, pastimes) that get more
time than God, more attention than God, more effort
than God, and more love than God can cut us off from
God. The world scoffs at such thoughts as these,
declaring they do not worship these things, so let??™s
define worship. The dictionary says worship is 1.
Reverence toward a divine being, but it is also 2.
Extravagant respect or admiration for, or devotion to
an object of esteem. BUSTED! Right now would
be a good time for the Christian believing world to
search their hearts and clean house. Brothers and
sisters, let??™s rearrange our priorities and give God
what He deserves. Let it be said of us as God??™s
chosen, (I Thessalonians 1:9-10) ???ye turned to God
from idols to serve the living and true God;
And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised
from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the
wrath to come.??? After all, (Isaiah 44:6) ???Thus saith
the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of
hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and
beside me there is no God.???
Rosalia
Hunt |
