Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, IDOLATRY, SORCERY, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like; of which I tell you beforehand, just as I also told you in time past, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:19-21, NKJV).
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I Have Seen the Enemy and He is Us - Part 3
The Lord takes us at our worst and redeems us, and begins to painstakingly conform us into His image. Of all the divine miracles this is the greatest. It entails the transformation of the most complex creation in the Universe, a human being, from a creature with a stone heart to an heir of God with a heart of flesh. I suspect that creation of everything out of nothing was a snap in comparison. This miracle could not have been possible without first something even more incomprehensibly magnificent and unthinkable taking place: the death of God the Son on the Cross.
I lived most of my life as a non-Christian. By even the loose, squishy morally relativistic standards of today, I was a horror. It's not that I was depraved as I could be, for there was always room to spiral downward. But it is that I was so far from anything remotely godly that in retrospect I wouldn't have given myself the time of day. Whatever I did that had even the semblance of good was for my own selfish reasons, and whatever I did that even I would admit was bad, I wrapped in all kinds of self-serving excuses. A career as the quintessential self-serving jerk has very little to commend itself to posterity or as a legacy for my beloved daughters. Yet the God-wrought transformation in me, while saying nothing of worth about myself, says amazing things about a loving, forgiving, and gracious God and Father.
So we come then to two more vile characteristics of the Fallen, both of which I have practiced personally to the point of a certain shameful expertise. Idolatry which is the worship of anything besides the living God of the Universe, and sorcery, which is an Old English translation of the Greek word from which we get our modern word, pharmacy, and which connotes occultic practices involving drug use. Mis-directed worship and drug-induced magical thinking, two dance partners on the long and slippery road descending into Hell.
Human beings are designed to worship. The older I get in the Lord, the clearer that becomes. The evidence in this information-saturated age is overwhelming. And depressing. There are countless examples of ferociously worshipping crowds fawning hysterically over a media or sports celebrity. Some incidents even involve human sacrifice, with one or more sycophants actually killed in the crushing fervor. As in everything, the original divinely-instilled impulse to worship is a gracious gift from God, but it has been twisted by sin and by our naturally sinful nature. And even in those quieter and more austere examples of mis-worship, those activities that can be mistaken for mere mild enthusiasm, there is that sin-driven desperation just under the surface. Scratch an unregenerate hobbyist and you will find a pagan lust. Harsh, you say? Indeed, but I speak from long experience and study.
Plus, one of the most subtle and pervasive forms of idolatry is self-worship. Oh this is a tricky one. Think about it. Hardly a moment goes by when I am not thinking about myself in some way, shape or form. If I could only think of the things of God, or of God Himself, even a minuscule portion of that time I am certain my life and Christian impact would be utterly amazing. And unless I school myself to wrench my eyes and attention away from myself to God, I can quickly become self obsessed. Again. And that wrenching must entail immersion in Scripture or I am lost once more in the sea of me.
Magical thinking, drug-induced or otherwise, is that line of thought that flies in the face of revealed truth. It is that which enables a human being to live like Alice in Wonderland, blithely thinking mutually exclusive thoughts all the day long. It is what enables the seemingly sincere description of something evil as good, or good evil. That too has rampant exemplars in our modern society. Normally, these are couched in deceptively innocuous or noble terms, serving to disguise all the dank and smelly darkness of fetid black magic spells.
It is a clear pattern in Scripture that God does not reveal the disease without prescribing the cure. What then is the cure for idolatry? Finding God. He promises to be found if you sincerely seek Him. What is the cure for magical drug-like thinking? Absolute truth. Fortunately, both remedies are readily available: the Bible.
God lovingly, graciously reveals Himself to us in His word out of love and a divine desire to have us return to Him.
*
I Have Seen the Enemy and He is Us - Part 3
The Lord takes us at our worst and redeems us, and begins to painstakingly conform us into His image. Of all the divine miracles this is the greatest. It entails the transformation of the most complex creation in the Universe, a human being, from a creature with a stone heart to an heir of God with a heart of flesh. I suspect that creation of everything out of nothing was a snap in comparison. This miracle could not have been possible without first something even more incomprehensibly magnificent and unthinkable taking place: the death of God the Son on the Cross.
I lived most of my life as a non-Christian. By even the loose, squishy morally relativistic standards of today, I was a horror. It's not that I was depraved as I could be, for there was always room to spiral downward. But it is that I was so far from anything remotely godly that in retrospect I wouldn't have given myself the time of day. Whatever I did that had even the semblance of good was for my own selfish reasons, and whatever I did that even I would admit was bad, I wrapped in all kinds of self-serving excuses. A career as the quintessential self-serving jerk has very little to commend itself to posterity or as a legacy for my beloved daughters. Yet the God-wrought transformation in me, while saying nothing of worth about myself, says amazing things about a loving, forgiving, and gracious God and Father.
So we come then to two more vile characteristics of the Fallen, both of which I have practiced personally to the point of a certain shameful expertise. Idolatry which is the worship of anything besides the living God of the Universe, and sorcery, which is an Old English translation of the Greek word from which we get our modern word, pharmacy, and which connotes occultic practices involving drug use. Mis-directed worship and drug-induced magical thinking, two dance partners on the long and slippery road descending into Hell.
Human beings are designed to worship. The older I get in the Lord, the clearer that becomes. The evidence in this information-saturated age is overwhelming. And depressing. There are countless examples of ferociously worshipping crowds fawning hysterically over a media or sports celebrity. Some incidents even involve human sacrifice, with one or more sycophants actually killed in the crushing fervor. As in everything, the original divinely-instilled impulse to worship is a gracious gift from God, but it has been twisted by sin and by our naturally sinful nature. And even in those quieter and more austere examples of mis-worship, those activities that can be mistaken for mere mild enthusiasm, there is that sin-driven desperation just under the surface. Scratch an unregenerate hobbyist and you will find a pagan lust. Harsh, you say? Indeed, but I speak from long experience and study.
Plus, one of the most subtle and pervasive forms of idolatry is self-worship. Oh this is a tricky one. Think about it. Hardly a moment goes by when I am not thinking about myself in some way, shape or form. If I could only think of the things of God, or of God Himself, even a minuscule portion of that time I am certain my life and Christian impact would be utterly amazing. And unless I school myself to wrench my eyes and attention away from myself to God, I can quickly become self obsessed. Again. And that wrenching must entail immersion in Scripture or I am lost once more in the sea of me.
Magical thinking, drug-induced or otherwise, is that line of thought that flies in the face of revealed truth. It is that which enables a human being to live like Alice in Wonderland, blithely thinking mutually exclusive thoughts all the day long. It is what enables the seemingly sincere description of something evil as good, or good evil. That too has rampant exemplars in our modern society. Normally, these are couched in deceptively innocuous or noble terms, serving to disguise all the dank and smelly darkness of fetid black magic spells.
It is a clear pattern in Scripture that God does not reveal the disease without prescribing the cure. What then is the cure for idolatry? Finding God. He promises to be found if you sincerely seek Him. What is the cure for magical drug-like thinking? Absolute truth. Fortunately, both remedies are readily available: the Bible.
God lovingly, graciously reveals Himself to us in His word out of love and a divine desire to have us return to Him.
