We are a land and a people of idols....personal idols. I am a man of idols. This is not a small thing. The idols are different than those that we read of in God's Word....but are nonetheless god's that we have crafted. They could be sports or entertainments of any kind....or money or vanity. They kill discernment and set up enmity to God. They are hard to detect....and harder to decide to deal with if detected. The pulpits should be warning us all the time of idols....but that is a habit of a day that is long gone in American pulpits.
This very second....as I typed....in the last paragraph....the period after the word...."pulpits"....my iPhone....sitting right here on the table....blared an annual test....repeating itself...."TEST ONLY"....for the local nuclear power station....and right now...as I type this....I can hear the siren....an odd siren....different from the regular fire alarms that we often hear. And now it is over....until next year....nothing to worry about.
This that I'm putting forth in this post....is not a test....THIS IS NOT A TEST! We in the church are no longer a "peculiar people".....and hardly a "holy nation." The only thing that sets us apart from anyone else in America is our conservative politics....social issues primarily.
I could list my own idols....and maybe I will do that....but I have wanted to broach this topic for quite a while. At my age....76....and with a strong background in books....from working my way through college at the library....to meeting my future wife in that library....and her becoming a librarian....to our owning a bookstore for a while thirty years ago....to haunting Barnes & Noble almost every Tuesday to scan the new arrivals....I witness women....most of them older women....reading their books.....and loving their reading....to a passionate degree that rivals any sport that a man might be attached to.
They are passing books to one another all the time....and recommending books....and talking about their book clubs...seemingly every time that I am around them. Now as I mentioned....I read all the time....more than half of them Christian books....and the rest done for research....on the culture....or on history as it relates to day that we live in. Rarely do I read a book simply for enjoyment....for I have my own idols
From what I have witnessed....and this going back decades....the books that these....wonderful ladies....devour literally all the time....are books that take them directly away from the faith that they will so joyfully tell you that they have. They do not know what is happening here. No one warns them....their pulpits do not warn them....and life passes ever so quickly....as the nation crumbles....and the church languishes!
My idols are many and varied. I spent an hour the other day researching the extraordinary music and personal relationships of possibly the best rock n' roll band of the late 60s....CCR....Credence Clearwater Revival. Oh yes I subjected much of what I read to God's Word....as I lamented the fact that these men had the whole world....so to speak....but missed the greatest thing in that whole world....Jesus Christ. I can try to excuse my research....but I know that something like this extends into my own fascination....if not memory of love....to the 60s generation.
It is a daily struggle....against a fierce and powerful opponent. I may lose as often as I win. I am at times but a wandering lamb....straying over to an intriguing thicket that hides predators....but there is hope even in all of this....for we are about to lose many if not all of those idols. God's winds are blowing right now....sifting and threshing and winnowing....and His angels are waiting....mounted....swords not yet unsheathed....but as though waiting with baited-breath for the command of the Lord of the armies....the LORD of Hosts!
"....A lamp is not brought to be put under a basket, or under a bed, is it? Is it not brought to be put on the lampstand?" Mark 4:21 NASB
" (Jesus)....Take care what you listen to. By your standard of measure it will be measured to you; and more will be given you besides. For whoever has, to him will more be given; and whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him." Mark 4:24,25 NASB
Folks....this is telling you to be careful where you have all your attention. If you show little interest in the things of eternity....(reading and playing all the time)....then the little discernment you have will be taken away....(and that is much of this political church today)....but the more you pay attention to God's Word....the more discernment you will be given!
