Imagine loving someone and giving them everything they needed and wanted and then they gave all those gifts to someone else who opposes you. How would you feel? Well, that is essentially what the Israelites did to God. All that He gave them, they gave to idols. And not only that. They took some of the gifts God gave them to make idols, which made Him angry.
You have also taken your beautiful jewelry from My gold and My silver, which I had given you, and made for yourself male images and played the harlot with them. You took your embroidered garments and covered them, and you set My oil and My incense before them. Also My food which I gave you—the pastry of fine flour, oil, and honey which I fed you—you set it before them as sweet incense; and so it was,” says the Lord God. “Moreover you took your sons and your daughters, whom you bore to Me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your acts of harlotry a small matter, that you have slain My children and offered them up to them by causing them to pass through the fire? Ezekiel 16:15-21
I keep on thinking about what gifts God has given me that I may have made into idols, or I have given to idols. Many people have made spouses, children, jobs, fame, beauty and wealth idols. Others have given away the gifts God have given them to idols. Some have used their God-given talents and have used them to glorify Satan. Skillful musicians and filmmakers make demonic films that give the devil the glory. But it doesn’t have to be that blatant, many times the way we misuse the gifts God has given us is more subtle. At times people give to the poor not to glorify God, but instead it is for people to glorify them. They crave the applause of people rather than hearing God say, “Well done good and faithful servant.” They don’t want to serve, but they want to be served, so they use the knowledge and abilities God has given them to gain influence and power so that people will bow to them as they make themselves into their own idol. Their flesh opposes God, and they are not willing to give up everything to fully surrender to Him.
Jesus said to him, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions. Matthew 19:21-22
Whatever we are not willing to give up so that we can fully follow Jesus, is an idol. This rich young ruler could not give up his earthly possessions to gain treasures in heaven. He made temporary riches on earth an idol in place of following the Lord of lords and the King of kings. He made his possessions greater than Jesus which resulted in him being sorrowful rather than experiencing the joy of the Lord by giving up all for Jesus. This rich man thought that keeping the commandments was all he had to do, but his heart was in the wrong place. His heart was with his wealth, but not the wealth Giver. How does God feel when we hold on to all that He has given us, and we are not willing to let them go to be totally surrendered to Him?
Why then did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you swoop down on the spoil, and do evil in the sight of the Lord?” And Saul said to Samuel, “But I have obeyed the voice of the Lord, and gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me, and brought back Agag king of Amalek; I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took of the plunder, sheep and oxen, the best of the things which should have been utterly destroyed, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal.” So Samuel said: “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He also has rejected you from being king.” 1 Samuel 15:19-23
Stubbornness is like worshipping idols. How many times have we wanted to do things our way and not God’s way? Then we try to give Him what He has not asked us to give. Saul did not do as God instructed. He was supposed to kill everything in Amalek, but instead when God gave him victory, he and the people took the best of the animals and then he set up a monument to himself. God regretted making Saul king and rejected him. Saul told Samuel that the people spared the animals to make a sacrifice for God. But God didn’t want their sacrifice, He wanted their obedience. Have we made sacrifices for God that He didn’t want? But in our stubbornness, we are offering God what we want, when He wants our complete obedience. We may be so busy doing the work we think God wants, when He is calling us to be in His presence because He wants to spend time with us. We have to be careful that we are not doing self-promotion when we should be glorifying God. Sometimes our very desire to do what we want for God becomes an idol. This is why it is important to be in His presence so we can know Him more and then we will understand that He gives us everything we need. And all we need are things that help us to live a godly life.
Grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord, as His divine power has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him who called us by glory and virtue, by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust. 2 Peter 1:2-4
Let us not misuse what God has given us. Instead, let us live godly lives pleasing to Him and give Him the glory in all that we do. We should also never forget that whatever God has given us should be used as He wishes and not as we please.
Comments