Hosea 11: 2,3,4; Luke 12: 21 

The idols of our time

What’s the deal with idols?  Do we really have an issue with that?  In the Old Testament that was a huge problem.  Hosea tells us about the relationship between God and the people of Israel. It is a story of disappointment and betrayal. The people of the Northern Kingdom known as Israel or Ephraim go are worshipping the idols known as the Baals.  It all seems of another time to us.  We don’t worship other gods. We try to respect the religion of others, but tend not to worship their God. The people then were very practical in their own way. They picked the “god” that offered the greatest pay-off for them.  If their neighbors had other gods and they seem to be pretty prosperous, why not give them a try? So we get this problem of clear idolatry. This causes God enormous heartache. God had “bent over and fed” Ephraim. In other words God had nursed and nurtured the child. Now Ephraim wants to try out other parents.  So the story is born about Hosea who must marry a prostitute to show that God thinks of Israel as a prostitute.  Going after the Baals is akin to prostitution, you see. Underneath the harshness of this story, however, is the tender beauty of God’s love for the people as the love for a child that can never be extinguished.  Still we see it as remote from us. It all seems of another time to us.

Jesus really takes idolatry in a different direction. It is a direction we are more able to understand. Essentially he says that trusting the material is a kind of idolatry.  Appreciating the material may be okay, but worshipping it is idolatry.  Okay, that we can get.

What’s the deal with idols, friends?  What’s the deal with idols in our lives?  Our issue isn’t having too many gods, our issue is having one at all.  I also believe that most of us do not idolize people so much anymore.  Too much information is available on the internet and cable tv to put anybody on a pedestal.  In countries where information is tightly controlled leaders can still turn into idols, but in a free and open society this is not the case. The moment someone raises a famous person to the level of idol, another person posts a video presenting that person as the devil.  But we do have our idols. They’re just not gods or people.  Jesus has already mentioned one:  Wealth or possessions. The moment the accumulation of wealth becomes an end itself, a greater value, that is where it is at danger of becoming an idol.  As Gordon Gecko played by Michael Douglas in “Wall Street” said:”Greed is good.”  Of course it isn’t. Another idol can be power.  If we idolize the power that well known people hold and hunger to be close to it, when power no longer exists for the common good, then there is a danger of idolatry.  Then there is status of position. If our place within groups and society starts taking on a life of its own, there is the danger of idolatry.  Beauty is another tricky thing.  We all need beauty to behold and to create, but if the beauty of ourselves and the people who want to be near becomes too important, then there is a danger of idolatry. Pleasure and enjoyment are fine in itself but if they become an escape through drugs or alcohol or an overconsumption of the wrong foods, it can become not only an addiction but an idol we worship. Knowledge is crucial for us to understand and manage our world, but if knowledge and education and always thinking we are right take us away from humility and compassion, there is a danger of idolatry.  Then there is admiration.  We all want to be admired.  Sometimes we will do almost anything o be accepted and admire. But if we worship the thought of being worshipped, then there is true danger of idolatry.  There may be a few people in the world who have all seven of these above, but I wonder how happy they are. Appreciating the things I just mentioned are in themselves not bad, unless they become worship.

Friends, idolatry is the worship of things other than God.  This always drives us away from God. God does not like this. It hurts God. That is the message of Hosea. But what takes us there, you think?

In the books of Moses the people build a golden calf to worship because they feel afraid or a vacuum with Moses away. There are people in this country who are on the edge of worshipping their weapons. It comes out of a kind of fear that gets whipped up into paranoia by those who wish to manipulate them for their own financial or political gain.   So emptiness and fear are risk factors of idolatry. Perhaps there is another. Perhaps when we are out of balance, when we focus on only one thing in our lives like our security or insecurity or our financial strength or weakness, or the attractiveness of our bodies or lack thereof, or our popularity or lack of popularity, when we lose perspective, there is a danger of idolatry.  It is then that we must remember Hosea and think not of God’s disappointment, but of God’s love. God is the One Who has been with us since before time, God is the One Who bent over to love us. There is no need for the worship of anything else. Only God should be worshipped. Thanks be to God.