Love, Worship and Idolatry

Posted by anointedplace on December 8, 2009 · 1 Comment 

When we are in love with a person, place or thing; in most cases it becomes our center. We spend a lot of time with it or working for it or in it. Lets take a job for instance. When we really love a certain job, we will spend a lot of our time there and will not mind at all working long hours. We want to be apart of the activities related to that job. We not only desire to be associated with the job; we desire to be identified with the job and we usually call those people “company man”. All these people talk about is their jobs. Then there are those who just replace their jobs with something else like their children. Their lives become centered around their kids. So would say what’s wrong with that right? Well sometimes when we center ourselves around our kids be begin to put pressures on them and we tend to make them carry our failures. We place all of our insecurities, anxieties, hopes, dreams, goals, future and other burdens at their feet. We look to their abilities and their successes as our calling card. We use our kids works and achievements as a way to glorify us. Plus we use them to make us feel better about our sins. Especially parents of student athletes; those kids become the savior of the entire family. We repeat this type of behavior with our spouses, homes, cars, money, social status and anything else that we can hold on to. This has become so normal to the point that we do not recognize them as idolatry. Plus the fact that our community churches don’t see it as idolatry either. As a matter of fact some churches parade the kids, members’ vocations and the like before the church. We have been lead out of Egypt and instead of waiting on the Lord we have created the golden calf.

It wouldn’t be that bad if we did not act the way we do towards church being so long and our lack of commitment to bible study, Sunday school and reading the bible on our own time. Anything that requires more than Sunday worship; we don’t have time for. We truly lack a thirst for God and a yearning to know Him. We constantly ask what is God’s will for our lives or why certain things happen in our lives; yet we never attempt to seek Him in His Word (the bible). Only what you do for Christ will survive.

Matthew 6
19″Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. 20But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

22″The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light. 23But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

24″No one can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.

25″Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life[b]?

28″And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

What is Idolatry?
We value and rely on idols in ways that keep us from properly loving and trusting our Creator. In this regard, idols are all deadly. Often, however, we hold onto an idol in virtue of its seemingly positive or pleasant effects in our lives. We may call this a bright idol, as it appears to be good. Money, for instance, appears to be good, but it becomes an idol when we rely on it in ways that detract from God’s preeminent role in providing our security, power, and contentment. We attribute powers to money that detract from God, including the power to bring us lasting contentment. While financial resources are often good and even necessary for material well-being, they are not themselves the ultimate source of our well-being and security. They are a gift, even when earned through employment, because the ultimate circumstances of and capacities for our employment come to us by divine gift. You did not earn, for instance, your capacity to think. Indeed, all good things come to us by divine gift and are fitting for our thanks to God (see 1 Cor. 4:7; James 1:17; John 3:27).

I know we have read this scripture many times, yet its the least carried out one. But we would say that we do serve God but how do you serve Him when your focus is not Him? Jesus tells us to not be like the pagans and they are for sure idol worshipers. Remember when I mention how we act out our true love and if it doesn’t include seeking to know God, can God truly be in our heart? If we don’t act like we love God are we really in love with Him? Do you delight to hear the name Jesus? When you hear the Word being preached does it have an effect on you? When you hear about the goodness of God or when you think about the cross does it do anything to you? If not then what is in your heart? What is your center? Who is your foundation? Jesus says that the eye is the lamp of the body… What do you give off? When people see you do they first think of how God has worked in your life or do they first think of your job, your kids, your house and etc? Do they know you as a child of God first?

John 10
1″I tell you the truth, the man who does not enter the sheep pen by the gate, but climbs in by some other way, is a thief and a robber. 2The man who enters by the gate is the shepherd of his sheep. 3The watchman opens the gate for him, and the sheep listen to his voice. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out. 4When he has brought out all his own, he goes on ahead of them, and his sheep follow him because they know his voice. 5But they will never follow a stranger; in fact, they will run away from him because they do not recognize a stranger’s voice.” 6Jesus used this figure of speech, but they did not understand what he was telling them.

7Therefore Jesus said again, “I tell you the truth, I am the gate for the sheep. 8All who ever came before me were thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. 9I am the gate; whoever enters through me will be saved.[a] He will come in and go out, and find pasture. 10The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

11″I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand is not the shepherd who owns the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

14″I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me— 15just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. 17The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life—only to take it up again. 18No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father.”

1 John 4

4You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. 5They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit[a] of truth and the spirit of falsehood.

19We love because he first loved us. 20If anyone says, “I love God,” yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. 21And he has given us this command: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

But we will listen to those that are not Christians and they tell us that its ok and we can have it all. We listen to those in the pulpit that twist God’s words. We don’t respond to the word of God and we act as if we don’t feel the Spirit of truth. We reject God’s discipline and say God is love and would not want us to neglect those things. God works from the heart, all things work from the inside out. How we treat each other, how we behave on the job and how we speak to each other is a reflection on the relationship with God. Everything we do reflect our true relationship in Christ. If your heart is centered on Christ, Jesus said that we would have love for one another and that is how they would know that we are His disciples. Don’t let the world, no matter who they are tell you that you can find God another way; Christ called them a thief!

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