Spiritual Idolatry # 3

Spiritual Idolatry # 3

4. There are idols of the WORLD - idols which the children of this world worship, and in whose worship the children of light sometimes unite. What crowds are continually assembled in the 'temple of fashion' - that bright but graceful deity of taste and elegance. What costly sacrifices of modesty, sobriety, time, money, usefulness, are offered on this altar! The study, the solicitude, the happiness, of many are considerably made up of matters of fashion. A recognized defect of taste would more distress them, than a breach of truth or justice! A perceived lack of elegance be a far more serious matter, than a lack of piety or mercy! And to be behind some of their mirthful neighbors in some new mode of dress, furniture, or style of living - is far worse than to be lacking in honor, generosity or gratitude! Fashion is, in short, the God of their idolatry; before which, however frequently they go to church or chapel, or with whatever fervor they repeat their prayers, their hearts bow down, and pay their homage!

And is there no undue devotion paid to this idol by professors of religion? Is there not a turning aside, at any rate, from God, to visit the shrine of this delusive goddess? How concerned are some good people about gentility, elegance, and fashion. See them in their dress, in their furniture, in their entertainments, in their late hours. Hear them in their conversation about what is new, tasty, splendid. Behold them even in their religion, choosing fashionable beliefs, churches, preachers, and regulating even their worship to God, by taste! And could you search their hearts as God does, and observe the solicitude, the contrivance, the plans and purposes - which are cherished in their bosom - to shine, to excel, to be admired, to be thought elegant and of good taste, to be admitted to be the first of their circle for what is fashionable - you would recognize, at once, the idol at whose altar they often bow with the multitude!

How much more concerned are they about these matters than about spirituality of mind, mortification of sin, the cultivation of the fruits of the Spirit, and fitness for heaven. The simplicity that is in Christ is gone from such minds. God is, perhaps, their God; but they linger so much, and so often, and so long, about the temple of fashion, that it is a doubtful matter whether their hearts are true to Him or not. They are so anxious to get as near as possible to the people of the world in their general habits, as to leave it a question whether they do not belong more to them than to the people of God! Or, if they cannot give up the Lord, it is evident they want to serve Him in the priestly dress, and with the rights of an idol.

Literature and science are among the idols of the world; and far more dignified are they than the one I have just mentioned; and yet they may be, and they are, with many, the supreme good, and thus are the gods of the mind and the heart. How many almost worship knowledge, and the means of obtaining it; not indeed the knowledge of the true God, and Jesus Christ whom He has sent; but the knowledge of nature. Nature is their deity, and this globe the temple in which they adore her. Even some good men who have a thirst for information, a love for books, a taste for science, carry this too far, and are in danger of being more enamored by what is intellectual than by what is moral; and of deriving  their happiness too much from the seen and temporal things - amidst  which they are led by the senses; than from unseen and eternal things - which can be apprehended by faith alone.

5. There are the idols of the SANCTUARY. Even in God's house, as in the temple of old, there are other objects set up for worship beside Himself - and above Himself. There, where God should be supreme and alone - are to be found altars raised, and offerings presented to His rivals! What subtle homage is paid to human names, and human theological systems; and how much do we hear from some about the Fathers, and from others about Luther and Calvin, Wesley and Whitefield. What a cry is raised by multitudes in this day about the church. We hear more from some about "the church", which is but the body, than about Christ, who is the Divine Head. The church is with them Christ visible; and the visible Christ seems to be more thought of, and spoken of, than the invisible Christ. The influence and authority of the latter is by these people delegated to, if not supplanted by, the former. The church is the great object of their faith and confidence, and hides from their view, or goes far towards hiding, the Redeemer of the world Himself. The sacraments are more talked of than the gospel, more relied upon, more inculcated, more exalted - than justification by faith. A human priesthood, though in their view designed to reflect, eclipses the luster of - that which is divine. Human standards of opinion and faith are raised to all but an equality with the only perfect, infallible, and authoritative one. In short, on arriving at the house of God, instead of finding God alone presented to their attention in the simplicity of his own truth and worship; instead of making Him the Alpha and Omega, before which the mind and heart are to lie prostrate, they bow before various other objects, all pretending to lead to Him, but which in fact interpose between Him and the soul, to turn away the attention of the worshiper from Jehovah Jesus, and share the throne with Him!!

Others again convert the preacher into an idol. Ardently attached to some favorite minister, they can relish the truth only as dispensed by him; and all others are neglected, if not despised. No prayers excite their devotion but his; no sermons instruct, please, or edify but his. When he is not in the pulpit, they will listen to no other. Their religion and their religious comfort depend all on him. The clearest elucidation of truth, the grandest views of the Divine character, the fullest exhibitions of Christ, the most consoling manifestations of heavenly glory, are nothing except from his lips; in this case the preacher is converted into an idol, and it is he that is worshiped, and not God.

Alas, alas, in how many ways does the heart of man go astray from God! And out of what materials does it construct its idols! It aggravated the sinfulness of the idolatry of the ancients, that they paid their worship to such low objects, and changed the glory of God into creeping things. And how does it increase our folly and guilt that we do the same?

My dear friends, let me admonish you to worship God alone. Give your heart, your whole heart to Him. Is it not your sin, and ought it not to be your shame and your sorrow - that you bestow so much of your affection upon other objects, and so little upon Him - that you treat Him so little as  such a God deserves, and claims to be treated? Recollect He is God, God in Christ; God reconciled, your Father, your portion; all glorious and all gracious. Think how you ought to love Him, with what entire, ardent, constant, devoted affection. It would seem, when we consider His glory, as if it would be the easiest thing in the world to love and serve Him, and the hardest thing in the world to love any other objects; as if it would be impossible so to get out of the sight, and beyond the attraction of His glory, as to have time, inclination, or ability to take an interest in anything else than in his favor, which is life, and His loving-kindness which is better than life; as if with the hope of His favor through Christ as our portion, we should really no more desire any other object or source of delight, than the condemned criminal does besides the royal pardon, or the starving man the supply of food. Amazing baseness, that with an infinite God to love, we should be so taken up with the finite, and many of them the really minute objects of this world; and that with His love to us as our river of pleasure, we should be so dependent for bliss upon the "drops of earthly enjoyment", which ooze and trickle out from created good!

~John Angell James~

(continued with # 4)