In an era where we have "American Idol" we should have a show called "Christian Idol". This would be a show where willing contestants would have their idols pointed out to them by a group of loving believers around them. In today's church environment I believe that many people would sign their friends and family up for this, but would not sign themselves up.In our culture today we have made idols out of almost every conceivable thing. No need to look at Aaron and the Israelites and their golden calf to say "at least I'm not that bad". Well let's take a look at a few things and take the Idol Challenge.....
Television - Do you have a favorite TV show? What do you do if you are going to miss it? Do you own a DVR or some type of recording device that allows you to record your favorite shows? Now I'm not saying that if you have one show you watch and you have one of the afore mentioned recording devices you are an idolater. What I am challenging you to do though is to see how you react when you can't record that show and something else comes up. I know Christians that I call dear friends that will purposely not schedule things on days that their TV shows come on. I know others that just go into fits of anger because something has come up on their shows day. Now that's idolatry.
Movies - How many movies do you watch in a month? A week? a day? Are you driven by entertainment? Do you have to be entertained every waking moment? If so then you idolize entertainment. In today's society we really do make idols out of characters in movies, the actors that play them and epic movie series themselves. We can enjoy movies as believers, but we must not make them the end all be all. We must not get caught up in the fictitious worlds that is portrayed on the screen.
Cars - Do you value your car more than life? How do you react when your car is dented? How do you react when it is scratched? Do you look at cars and see what your next car will be? Do you look at the luxury cars and see it as a benefit of you wealth? Now there is nothing wrong with having a nice car for safety or for having a car that will bring you no worries when you drive it. As believers though we should be looking at the best way to use our money. How can we use our money to advance the Kingdom? Is it by owning a $60,000 plus car?
Home - Is your house bigger than what you need? Is it a status symbol for you? Do you live in one area town instead of another area of town because of the status it brings? How about the inside of your house, is it a museum or a house?
Academia - This is the one that can be an idol in my life. Here in the SCV where we have The Master's College, The Master's Seminary and Grace Community Church are we can be quite academic in our faith. We get more caught up in the memorization of scripture than the application of the scripture we memorize. We also get caught up in the academic labels of differing theological circles. So, ask yourself are you caught up in the academic aspect of Christianity or do you live your faith? Do you look for the outward appearances of your faith or do you truly serve your fellow believers?
There are so many others. One of the ones I am going to look at in my next blog is the idol of Family. This is something my pastor brought up a week ago and something I have thinking through this week.
For now remember this....Lev. 19:4 " 'Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves molten gods; I am the LORD your God."
We all have idols, what's yours? Take some time today and think about it.
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