There are so many temples here in Taiwan filled with different idols. Every first and the 15th of each month, they would have these things set up to offer idols some food and burn money. Some idols are huge!! They cover the entire side of a mountain. Some are portable sizes for the people to bring with them. In the Old Testament, prophets were sent to confront the people of their idol worship. In the New Testament, Jesus confronted the people on a different level: the idols of their hearts.
Physical idols are easy to see and if you use your logical mind to think it through, you can figure out how powerless the idols really are. Isaiah 44: 9-20 points out the absurdity of a craftsman cutting down a tree using half of the wood to build a fire and cook his food or stay warm, and using the remaining half of the same piece of wood to carve a god to bow down and worship. When I watched the movie "Around the world in 80 days" a long time ago with my kids, I pointed out the absurdity of Jackie Chan risking his life to protect a jade Buddha. If that idol was a true god, who would it need protection? Who is truly powerful here?
Last year I went to a small town in Korea vacationing, and they sell these "good luck" bells. They were cute little bells that were made with brass. I am a sucker for metal shiny stuff....so I bought one. The little note said that it will make your wish come true if you ring it, and it will bring you good luck. I thought about it....., really? Then the store that sells the bell would be the luckiest of all by logic because they had shelves of the "lucky" bells. Why then would someone want to sell it? Obviously, I didn't buy it expecting good luck but there are so many good luck charm being sold here, all sizes and shapes. Why would people buy them? they obviously don't work, or else the store owner would have kept as many as possible.
The idol of Money
The other day I was reading about the story of the Rich Young Ruler and his encounter with Jesus. Here is a young man, I imagined probably dressed up in a fancy suit, financially blessed. He is not only wealthy, he is morally upright; probably a good son, good neighbor, good employee or a good husband/father. Here is the amazing thing, he feels like something is missing and he comes to Jesus because he is spiritually thirsty. This type of person is someone probably all churches are looking for, morally upright, rich, and successful! He asked Jesus what must he do to enter the kingdom of heaven? Jesus, unlike the church, saw through his wrong thinking, which is this: He thinks that he must ADD or DO something in order to be saved. So Jesus gave him a strange challenge, "sell all your stuff and give away your money to the poor and come follow Me. " For years I didn't understand why Jesus would say that. He never required for us to live in poverty by giving all to the poor. Even Zacheous only gave away half of his money. What Jesus saw was his idol, Money, has a tight grip in his life. In money lies his security, his happiness, his all in all. Jesus is pointing out the first commandment which he said he followed since his childhood, to love the Lord thy God above all other gods. Money was this young man's idol. Jesus loved this young man. He saw that if this man lets go of this one idol, he would gain treasure in heaven and abundant life and so much more. When God will have the rightful place in our lives, and in that, we gain back our entire life and freedom to follow Him. The interesting thing is that Christians who love money above all else almost never admit to it. It seemed like other people can have that problem but not us.
When I was younger, I didn't have a whole lot to worry about. I had a high paying job as my first job fresh out of college, and I lived with my parents at the time, so I spent money like water. I remember taking the entire youth group out to eat and paying for everyone. I was not irresponsible with money but I never worry that it would run out. Then when I got married and had a mortgage, and then the kids came one by one. We went through some financial challenges for many years. Thankfully, God brought us through it all. Stressful? Yes. At times I didn't think we would make it. But God is faithful even when we doubted. Once I saw how God could do that, my fear about not having enough had subsided a lot. I wish I could say that now I don't struggle anymore, but that's not the case. With our early retirement, I still sometimes wonder if the money will run out and we would have to live on the street, though unlikely.
The idol of Family
In Abraham's life, God came to him and ask him the hardest thing, to give up his only son Isaac. I didn't understand why in the world would God do that? Because Isaac is an idol in Abraham's life! God saw that. Since God is in the business of tearing down idols, He decided to deal with it in Abraham's life. In other places in the New Testament, Jesus said something strange, "I came not to make peace but to cause division among your family members." There is a guy who came to Jesus and said, let me bury my father first, and Jesus said, "let the dead bury his dead, you follow me." Again, what Jesus is doing is confronting the idol of family. Many good things that God gave us, such as our family, can become our idols if we love them so much that we elevate their positions above our love for God. We can love the gift so much and forget about the Giver. That's what Jesus is confronting.
Boy, God dealt with on that one. One of the main reasons for God wanting me to move to Taiwan was to loosen the hold on the idol of my kids. I didn't know this but the kids are everything to me because they are so important to me. When they were born, I felt that the purpose of my life was to take care of them and bring them to adulthood by homeschooling them and teaching them about God. I honestly thought that once my youngest reaches 18, I would have fulfilled my calling and then I am ready to go to God. I thought I was done. But surprisingly and thankfully, I am still here because God isn't done with me. And I still have a life outside of caring for my kids. God wants me to know, my kids are important but they should not be EVERYTHING in my life.
The idol of His blessings
In the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, they disobeyed the king's orders and proudly proclaimed, "Even if our God doesn't save us, we will not bow down to your idol." They were ready if God had not given them what they wanted. They would still obey God and love God regardless. In the above story of Abraham giving up Issac and many other places, God also wanted to know if we love Him or do we love what He can do for us? Do we love His blessing and gifts more than God himself? We pray and we believe He can change things for us, and that God answers our prayers. But does He? Not all the time. We pray for blessing and good things, but what do we do when God denies our request? Do we doubt His existence or His love then?
My most heart wrenching experience is praying and crying out so hard for God to heal my parents of cancer, but day after day, I watched their health decline and eventually died. I didn't know why God healed others of cancer, but didn't heal Mom and Dad. I struggled so much, but yet I brought all my bitterness, disappointments, and doubts to Him. That was ok to do, God accepts that. In the book of Psalms and book of Job, there were recording of many complaints to God, and God accepted it because these writing came to Him with all their struggles instead of going else where. When what we desperately wanted was denied from us, do we still want a relationship with God?
A picture comes to mind of a child having a fit because she was denied something that she really really wanted. The parent gently accompanied and stays by her side and hears and validates all of her feelings.....assuring her it will be ok. I think that's what God does with us. It's ok to want something. But sometimes we have to recognize that we cannot tell God what to do. God is still God and He can deny our requests, and He can decide what's best for us even when we do not think so or we do not understand. As I grow older, I long for friends, not Deal friends but Real friends who still love me even when I don't do what she wanted or I don't give her something she expected me to give. That's real love and real relationship. God longs for that unconditional relationship with us too.
These are hard things, and I don't know if there is someone, other than Jesus, who can say that they do not struggle with these modern day idols. But since God confronted these in scripture, He does want us to realize and be self-aware when we fall into it, and come to our Abba Father again and again rather than saying that we don't have those problems. The beautiful thing is that over and over again, God accepts us in our sin and many struggles and still loves us anyway. Like Moses said to the Israelite (I recently read in Deuteronomy) "It's not because of your goodness and righteousness that He has chosen you as His own, it's because of His love for you." That's the God we serve!!
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