No Other Gods

So the question remains who or what is your God? You'll recall last week we took
a look at seven modern-day idols outlined for us in the book by Dan
Ellender and Trimper Longwind III breaking the idols of your heart. It's
a commentary really in the book of Ecclesiastes and the seven idols that
they referenced are not exhaustive. There are many more that you and I can think
of but it makes a good beginning and I've taken the liberty to ask the office
to print them up for you on the back of the welcome sheet just so that we can
run through them very quickly once again to set the stage as we continue with No
Other Gods Part 2. Here are the seven gods which they identify based on the
teaching of the book of Ecclesiastes. Chasing after power, I can control my
world. Chasing after relationship, relationships bring me fulfillment.
Chasing after work and money, money brings me freedom. Chasing after pleasure,
pleasure will satisfy me. Chasing after wisdom, knowledge will put me on top.
Chasing after spirituality, my spiritual life will save me. Chasing after
immortality, I will have a long life if I take care of my body. So here's the
question for each of us this morning as we look at this list, how many of us here
would be honest enough to say we see ourselves reflected in at least one maybe
more of these idols? I wonder, can I ask a show of hands, how many of us can see
ourselves in that list somewhere along the line? Keep your hands up for just a
moment, good and high, and look around you because in all honesty there probably
isn't a one of us who doesn't have a God besides the true God, who doesn't
confuse the bucket with a fountain, who doesn't look to some aspect of creation
rather than the true and the living God to meet the needs and the desires of our
hearts. And you can imagine that if we who are in Christ struggle with
idolatry then how much more the people around us who don't know God, who don't
know Christ, who don't know the favor of God's Holy Spirit. And that cuts to the
very heart of who God is because it not only dethrones his centrality, which is
serious enough business, but it also sets the stage for our own disappointments
because as we've seen in the past these idols are worthless. Paul in Acts chapter
14 talks about these worthless things and I didn't catch it when we
were going through Acts chapter 14 but if you search for idols and for worthless
in the Old Testament you find that joining of those two words at least 15
times. Repeatedly the Old Testament says that idols are worthless. Doesn't mean
they don't have spiritual power, doesn't mean they don't offer you the whole
world like Satan did to Jesus, but it means that at the end of time they will
take you, use you, throw you on the pile because it's all about them and it's not
about God. And so here's what Psalm 97 says about the worship of idols. It says
all who worship images are put to shame those who boast in idols. Worship him all
you gods. So we're back to the question what do we do about the idolatry that
is so prevalent not only in the world but probably also in our own lives. Well
we've seen you try to identify what those idols are, we've done that. That
leads then to stage number two which is to repent of and renounce all idols.
Listen to these words from Ezekiel chapter 14 verse 6. Therefore say to the
house of Israel this is what the sovereign Lord says repent, turn from
your idols, and renounce all your detestable practices. Notice there are
three action verbs in that verse. There is repent, there is turn from your idols,
and there is renounce all your detestable practices. Let's take just a
moment or two and look at each of these words. First of all the word repent means
to change one's mind. To change one's mind is to come to the realization that I
used to look to these false idols, thought they had life, but now I've come
to realize that I have confused the bucket with a fountain and they do not
in fact give me life. And so here are the idols of my life. I used to think if
only I had power, if only I had that special relationship, if maybe I won the
lottery, or if I gave myself to pleasure, or if I experienced more knowledge, or
developed some level of spiritual experiences, or maybe knew how to look
after my body better, then I would be able to offset the consequences of the
fall and I will experience paradise regained. Repentance means I now know
that was a dead-end road, wasn't gonna lead me anywhere. Repentance means I now
have come to understand that these are all cisterns, as Jeremiah says, that
people have hewn which hold no permanent water, but that God alone is the fountain
of life. Everything short of that is vanity of vanities, which is why this
verse is such a dominant verse in the book of Ecclesiastes. Meaningless,
meaningless, says the teacher, utterly meaningless. Everything is meaningless.
Very depressing book if you read it from a worldly point of view, but it ends with
the emphasis that there's only one thing that matters and that is you put God
first. So to repent is to change one's mind, but it's not enough just to repent.
We also have to turn from your idols, says Ezekiel. Repentance has to lead to
action as the proverb goes, the road to hell is paved with what? Good intentions.
There's lots of people that have half a mind to change their life, but it wears
off really quickly. And to turn away from your idols is to disengage from them. It
is to turn your back on them to no longer allow them to have power or
authority in my life. But it doesn't stop there because the verse in fact goes on
to say we must renounce all our detestable practices and that includes
the idols themselves. Listen to what Joshua said years earlier to the people
of Israel. They're on the edge of the promised land.
Well, they're in the promised land. Joshua is about to die and he is
calling them to covenant faithfulness and he says throw away the foreign gods
that are among you. There you have it again, that mixture. Yes, we believe in
Yahweh. We believe in the God who made covenant with us at Mount Sinai, but just
to be on the safe side we'll keep our little gods along the side because when
we're really sick or when we're really out of money or we're facing an unhappy
experience in life then these are more dependable than the true and the living
God because he's holy and scary and he makes all kinds of demands. Get rid of
them says Joshua and yield your hearts to the Lord the God of Israel. Notice the
two components there. Throw away the foreign gods. Throw away the desire for
all of these as an end in themselves. Get rid of them. Throw them out of your
house and he says turn, yield your hearts to the Lord God of Israel. The heart as I
said is the seat of who we are. It's where we do our dreaming. It's where our
passions lie. It's a combination of the will and the intellect and our emotions
and God says I want you to love me with all of your heart, soul, strength and mind.
Your whole being ought to be focused primarily on who I am because it is in
relationship with me that everything else that you need I will give to you.
And so whenever we find an idol of the heart, a place where we look to the
bucket rather than the fountain, to the gift rather than to the giver, God says
I want you to do three things. I want you to repent. Learn to think differently. I
want you to turn your back, disengage and he says I want you to get rid of it.
Don't coddle it. Don't baby it. Don't pretend you can leave it in a room off to
the side just so when you need it you can go back to it. No, get rid of it
because I want, he says, an undivided heart of loyalty. I think we underestimate
how intensely jealous God is and Exodus 34 14 really brings it home. Do not
worship any other God for the Lord whose name is Jealous is a jealous God and we
read that earlier too in the second of the Ten Commandments when it talks
about God being a jealous God and we think of jealousy is a bad thing right? I
mean he's jealous of my friends. She's jealous of my work and and typically
jealousy is viewed as a bad characteristic but it says God's jealous.
So what does that mean? It means God is so focused on his relationship with you
and me that he doesn't want to share that relationship with anybody else. Those
of you who were here last week we played that little wedding video remember that
one? Where the girl says one day a week or one day a year I want to hang out
with my old boyfriend and do whatever I wanted to do. Remember that one? I thought
it was choice. Choice because as I said what self-respecting husband wants to
share his wife with any other man let alone an old boyfriend? That's what
jealousy is. Jealousy isn't a negative emotion a jealousy says I so value our
relationship that I don't want you to be unfaithful to that relationship. I don't
want to have to compete with you for an other idol in your life. That's what God
says and that's why throughout the Old Testament his anger burns to the people
of Israel when they commit spiritual adultery by running after the bales and
trying to mix bail worship in with the worship of the true God and likewise
he's jealous over you and me and he wants us to get rid of the idols of our
hearts so that he can be gone and he alone. I love that old hymn oh for a
closer walk with God a calm and heavenly frame a light to shine upon the road
that leads me to the lamb. Where is the blessedness I knew when first I saw the
Lord where is that soul refreshing view of Jesus and his word and then this verse
many of you will remember it the dearest idol I have known whatever that idol be
help me to tear it from my throne and worship only thee so shall my walk be
close with God calm and serene my frame so purer light shall mark the road that
leads me to the lamb. So how do we practically go about repenting and
turning away from and then renouncing the idols and all the practices
associated therewith. So I thought about that a little bit this past week and the
week before it occurs to me that there were at least three things that you and
I can and need to do in being obedient to this command of Scripture and the
first is this every sin every sin and bad habit has to go every sin every bad
habit has to simply go listen to Hebrews 12 the first verse since we are
surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses picture and athletic
competition just like in the Olympics all the people in the stands we run the
race says the Bible in full view of all heaven and all hell the Saints and the
angels and everybody is watching you and me as we run the journey of life do you
realize that you're never you think you got privacy you ain't got it somebody's
got a disconcerting somebody's watching you since we are surrounded by such a
great cloud of witnesses let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin
that so easily entangles and let us run with perseverance the race marked out
for us we've just come through the Olympics the Paralympics I don't know if
they're finished now or not they followed on the heels of the Olympic
Games we've seen many of us the exploits of the athletes and we have held our
breath who's going to win the game or who's gonna survive the aerial flips I
mean you gotta don't you ever wonder how in the world they learn these things
without breaking their neck first that's an astonishing thing to me but we know
that when we talk to athletes the amount of training that goes in to that
competitive edge is astonishing it is astonishing because when you're dealing
with hundreds of seconds everything matters including the fabric that your
clothes are made of and the material that your skates are made of and how
they're sharpened and and all your equipment has to be in top condition and
they do it says the Apostle Paul for an earthly crown but we do it for an
eternal crown listen to how he puts it one Corinthians chapter 9 verses 24 and
25 do you not know that in a race all the runners run but only one gets the
prize run in such a way as to get the prize everyone who competes in the games
goes into strict training they do it to get a crown that will not last but we do
it to get a crown that will last forever if athletes so apply themselves for that
chance of momentary glory how much more should we apply ourselves to run the
race before the face of God don't know how many of you were here some months
back when we played that series of videos with with Billy Graham but he
tells the story at one point of a survey that had been taken among I think five
thousand athletes asking them the question if there was a pill that we
could give you that would guarantee you gold but you know for sure that it would
kill you in five years time how many of you would take the pill and the answer
as I recall was that around fifty percent of the athletes questioned would
go for the pill and face certain death for that momentary glory and I look at
that and sometimes I'm ashamed of myself do I have that kind of dedication to run
the race to win the crown to please my father and my God who was in heaven put
away every sin every weight that clings so closely not just the bad things but
the things that entangle the things that take the focus off the Lord and that
make me a liability in the race that I'm running secondly and it gets worse just
for the record so bear with me here it means putting on the altar every
legitimate gift that God has given us see it's not hard to see that sin has to
go bad habits have to go because yeah well obviously they interfere in our
relationship with God but sometimes the biggest idols in our lives are not the
bad things we do or we want to do they're the good things that God has
given us that we want to do and if you were here last week you will recall
Roberta sharing the idol that music had become in her life because you see when
you're good at something that very quickly begins to shape your identity
you get your praise and you get your strokes from being successful and being
accomplished in a certain thing and before you know it that becomes the
focal point of your life and the very gift that God has given you gets in the
way of knowing God and the classic example in the Old Testament is who
Abraham you'll recall that he received Isaac as the son of promise it took a
long time for that child to be born and when that child was born he embraced
him with all his heart but what was the danger the danger was that the gift
would become more important than the giver and you'll recall that whole
episode where God says Abraham take your son your only son and place him on the
altar and I will never know what went through Abraham's mind when he
considered that challenge of God except scripture says in the New Testament he
knew the promises of God that even if he had to slay his son God would have to
raise him from the dead because the promise was focused on Isaac but I tell
you that's a walk of faith is it not and he had no idea when he laid his son on
the altar and lifted that knife to accomplish that awful deed that the
angel of God would step in and stop him and point to the ram in the thicket as
an example of the substitutionary atonement that one day the lamb of God
would accomplish on the cross but what an incredible test of faith that Abraham
withstood because he knew the giver was more important than the gift and so God
through his angel says to him these words Genesis 22 verse 12 now I know
that you fear God because you have not withheld for me your son your only son
see it's not only our sins that we have to surrender it's also the good gifts
that God gives us and that includes and here's the third thing to lay on the
altar every relationship that he has given us needs to be surrendered as we
seen before what are the most wonderful gifts that God gives us and one of the
most common vehicles of God's blessing is the significant people that he raises
up in our lives children have parents husbands and wives of spouses we have
friends we have co-workers we're part of community both within a big place like
this and out there in the world so to speak and how much of our life do we
draw from the people that God brings into our lives and remember I said that
is a perfectly legitimate reality we ought never to try to be more spiritual
than God the issue is not our relationships the issue is do our
relationships become more important than our relationship with God and so
whatever there is the danger of that then the relationships have to be put on
the altar because only God can be God in our lives listen again to how Jesus
puts it Luke chapter 14 verse 26 tough words people tough words if anyone comes
to me and does not hate his father and mother his wife and children his
brothers and sisters yes even his own life he cannot be he cannot be my
disciple and as I trust you know Jesus isn't really saying that the only way
that we can be a Christian is to actually hate all the significant people
in our lives it's hyperbole it's a strong statement to say that our lives
ought not to be governed by the most significant relationships in our lives
they ought to be governed by God and by God alone and so if my spouse wants me
to do something that God doesn't want me to do then I must obey God rather than
men if my friends want me to participate in an activity that is not sanctioned by
God himself then I need to say to my friends listen you guys I respect you I
love you I want to be part of your lives but I cannot participate with you in this
activity because I will not deny the true and the living God means if your
boss wants you to do something that is not in keeping with God's will for your
life you place God above the risk of being fired or losing his favor let me
ask you again do you still want to be a Christian it's not a cakewalk because
the claims of Jesus are exclusive and he wants us to be serious about putting to
death not only all those relationships but even the desires and the passions of
our own lives that get in the way of God's priority because you'll notice that
not only do we have to hate father and mother and brothers and sisters and so
on but even our own lives without that he says we cannot be his disciple and
what that means is that whenever we crave something our body craves something
that is not in keeping with the will of God that is illegitimate from God's
point of view then I must say no even at the cost of my own comfort and security
and again look at how Jesus puts it in the Sermon on the Mount Matthew 5 29 and
30 this is in the context of lusting after your neighbor if your right eye
causes you to sin and gouge it out and throw it away it's better for you to
lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell and
then as if we didn't get it the first time around he repeats it if your right
hand causes you to sin cut it off throw it away it is better for you to lose one
part of your body than your whole body to go into hell that's Jesus meek and
mild just for the record the Jesus that everybody says loves everything and
everybody well I don't know where you find that one but I don't find him in
the Gospels because he is totally sold out to God the Father and he wants us
to be sold out see to repent and to turn your back and to renounce means in
practical terms we take up our cross and we follow Jesus in all of the ways that
we've just been talking about and I can imagine what you're thinking because I
think of myself who in the world who in the world is sufficient for this I mean
isn't that the question isn't that the question the disciples asked what in the
context of the rich young ruler who turned his back on Jesus because he
couldn't surrender his riches they asked the question and Jesus made the
observation you will recall it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of an
eagle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of that's about as tough as it
gets I think you know whatever the eye of the needle was and there's different
theories about all of that it was sufficiently difficult for the for the
disciples to figure this just can't be done who remembers Jesus's response the
disciples here's the question the disciples asked they were greatly
astonished not just a little bit astonished who then can be saved and
then here's Jesus's response with man this is impossible but with God all
things are possible God can get a camel through the eye of the needle he can get
a rich man into his kingdom and he can get you and me to a place where we can
say no to our sins and our besetting bad habits we can say no to the worship of
the gifts that God gives us and we can say no we can say no to our relationships
even as we say yes to God and to God alone you say how in the world is that
possible well it's possible of course because of the finished work of the Lord
Jesus Christ because Jesus came into the world to bear our sin died on the cross
we died with him and we got raised with him into new resurrection life he now
lives in us by the power of the Holy Spirit if anyone is in Christ he is a
new creation the old has gone the new has come I wonder sometimes if we really
understand the incredible transaction that took place when Christ absorbed
all our crud into himself and he made all his benefits available to us and if
this morning you are in Christ if this morning you are in Christ as I trust you
are then you are already over here you have already made a commitment you said
yes to Jesus you have said yes to God you have said no to all the other things
that we have talked about may not be part of your experience or my experience
at the moment but positionally you're over there God accepts you in Christ as
righteous and holy has given you his Holy Spirit and through his Holy Spirit
as you walk out this journey he will come along and he will help you to
identify the idols of your life he will know how to put his finger on that scene
that keeps you blinded from seeing the glory of God in the face of Christ he
will put his finger on that aspect of creation on that relationship that has
become more important than God himself he will grant you a glimpse of his glory
so that in the light of his glory everything else fades away and then as
you battle to bend the knee before his authority his spirit in you will win you
over the glad and joyful obedience before God I love Philippians chapter 2
the verses 12 and 13 very applicable in this context therefore my beloved or my
dear friends work out your own salvation with fear and trembling for God is at
work in you both to will and to work for his good pleasure notice a couple of
things there work out your own salvation sounds the opposite of everything that
we've ever learned isn't it but it's not because positionally you are in Christ
you're living over here you have said that's where I belong that's where I
want to live and now God helped me to get rid of everything that interferes
with that it's the difference between justification and sanctification in
Christ we are justified sanctification is the outworking of that as I learned
to put off the old and to put on the new and what happens now is that I discover
that it's God who is at work in me and what does he do first he helps me to
will have you ever noticed how the biggest part of our battle is the fact
that we don't want what he wants am I the only one that ever feels that way I
don't want to give up certain sins or habits I don't want to lay down certain
things that I have received in life that I happen to like very much thank you and
I don't want to have to surrender relationships it's not even not having
an ability to do it I don't even want to begin with it but it's God who was at
work in me both to will and to work so what do you do when the Holy Spirit comes
along and he begins to nod to knock on the door of your heart and he begins to
say what about your finances or what about your relationships or what about
that scene will you stop doing it and you discover no I don't want to I love
you and all that but honestly I don't want it well you can pray God make me
willing what I like about that is you can go as back as far as you want to go
back because you may not even want to be willing but maybe you want to be willing
to be made willing and if that's not good enough how about willing to be
willing to be willing to be willing you back as far as you want just know that
God will take you at face value and he will stir in your heart the gift of faith
see all it takes is a glimpse of God's glory just for the record in Scripture
when the people in the Old Testament like Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all
those dudes when they make offerings to God they lay it on the altar it's always
after God has revealed himself and when God reveals himself surrender is a cinch
once you know the value of the pearl of great price selling everything that you
have to own the pearl is peanuts the point is getting to the point where you
see because of course God's out there and the things that were attached to a very
physical and they're here so God works to wheel and then when he wears us down
to the point where we can surrender our will to him then we discover that he
begins to strengthen us he helps us to start making those very practical
decisions I got to change my mind about who I am and about what I do and I got
to surrender this one thing that that clings to me so closely that the sin and
whatever it is that entangles me on the race of life I gotta put it on the altar
then eventually we discover ourselves coming to a place where God is so
hamdasein where all we can do is lay it on the altar and trust that he will take
care of us in the places where we now no longer have control and many of you've
heard me tell the story of how this worked out in my relationship with
Michelle many years ago as many of you know we we met on a summer assignment
the first year after my first year of seminary training and she was the first
woman I had ever fallen in love with and we
fell hard and after that summer she came to the school where I was going and we
began developing a relationship and as we were developing a relationship I
sensed the Holy Spirit coming along saying I want you to lay this
relationship on the altar don't know if you've ever been there but I can tell
you it was how I'd love to be able to say that I threw up my hands and glory
hallelujah Lord I'll obey you immediately like Abraham of old and I'll
do everything that you want no it was considerably more difficult it took a
few problems not in their relationship but it took it took the discipline of
God in my life to bring me to the point where eventually I had a layer on the
altar and say I don't believe the Lord wants us to get together and we broke up
and as far as I was concerned that was permanent because a test is never a test
if you know you're gonna get her back and as far as I was concerned this was
that she always has told me that she knew better but that was because the
test was mine and not hers but you know here's what I remember tough as it was
and it was tough tough as it was the joy of knowing that God was bigger than I
that he could wrestle me to the ground and bring me over to embracing his will
at great pain and great cost boosted my confidence in God and my love for God
because I knew that I could trust him with my life and I don't know where
you're at this morning I don't know if there are idols that you're holding on
to I suspect for all of us there are and I don't know what the Lord is doing in
terms of addressing those idols but I can tell you this that he is a jealous
God doesn't want to share us with anything that is not of him and if you
want to pursue a life with God and know the reality of the blessing of God in
his kingdom then sooner or later that idol has to be put on the altar it has
to be surrendered whether that's a sin we're prepared to give up a bad habit
we're ready to surrender if that is a gift that we find our security in if
that is a relationship that is overtaken God in the loyalty of our hearts God
will find it God will find it and you will face a choice and when that choice
confronts you that is the time to say Lord I need your grace I can't even
begin to consider this but you're the one who is at work within me make me
willing make me able to obey then I want to leave you with this incredible
promise of Scripture because you see God's desire is never to take it's not
that he can't do without you or me God's desire is so that he can bless us with
the fullness of his blessings without having to worry about idolatry in our
hearts so let me end with these two verses from Mark's Gospel this is Jesus
speaking to his disciples no one who was left home or brothers or sisters or
mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel what we've been
talking about right will fail to receive now listen to this a hundred times as
much in this present age homes brothers sisters mothers children in fields and
with them just to keep it in perspective persecutions and in the age to come
eternal life you will never out give God God will never owe you anything he just
wants your heart so he can open the windows of heaven and give you
everything and more that you need in this life and in the life to come and I
don't know about you tough as these choices are that's pretty good
mathematics and I think as individuals and as a community that's what we want
to buy into amen