Smashing the Idols of the Heart

Isaiah 2:8-9 (NLT)

The land is filled with idols.  The people bow down and worship these things they have made.  So now everyone will be humbled and brought low.  The Lord cannot simply ignore their sins!

Remember a few weeks ago, I told you, it would take courage to read a few of these posts?  Today is one of those days.

As discusseed since mid-August, the Lord is shaking not only our nation, but the world as well. 

• 2001  attack on America-
• 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami and earthquake
• 2005 Cat 5 Hurricane that took out an entire American city and much of the landscape
• 2008 Housing and real estate market crash - that affected the entire global economy and continues to affect the global economy
• 2010 Haiti earthquake 
• 2011 Japan earthquake/tsunami
• 2011 Tornado season - one of the worst on record. Taking out entire cities and towns
• 2011 Winter season - record setting year for blizzards
• 2011 Record setting famine for many generational farmers across the US
• 2011 Earthquake/hurricane affecting much of the East Coast

Often these "shakings" affect not only the landscape, but has a drastic affect on us and our families.   Sometimes ushering in storms and tsunami's of unprecedented proportion.

So why is God allowing the shaking?  I believe ONE of the reasons is found in our Scripture for the day.  (Read it if you have not already.)

The land is filled with idols.  I believe that God is smashing the idols of our heart.

Now what are idols?  Are they the little carved figurines made of wood or marble or gold or silver?  Yes possibly - but idols extend much further.  An idol is anything given sacred value and power in our lives.  It is anything we put before God.  An idol does not have to be a physcial object - it can be thoughts or desires.  Let me give you a few modern day examples:

• Money; our bank accounts; our portfolios - it's what we ultimately trust. 
• Our homes; our housing values; our credit ratings
• Our stuff!  Cars, boats, TV, iphones, our furniture; our antiques; our collections; obsession with decorating and staging.
• Newspaper and computers  (How much time do you spend reading the paper or on Facebook; Twitter etc... vs the time you spend reading your Bible?)  Ouch!
• People - sports figures; celebrity; experts in any given field
• Religious icons - (I got to meet Beth Moore last November at the LifeWay Women's forum.  Our collision course was totally accidental.   This was Women's Leadership forum - Christian leadership.  Yet you would have thought that God had come down in human form by the way she was received.  She would never want this kind of notariety.  She lives to point that notariety to One deserving of it - Jesus.  Yet women were fawning over her unlike I've ever seen.  I was quite shocked.
• Our desire for acceptance and approval from others.
• Our wardrobe and shoes
• Our calendar and daily list of things to do- (Sometimes my list of things to do becomes my god.  I can't see straight until every thing is checked off.)
• Self!  What we want; what we need; our time
• Self sufficiency - "I can do it myself.  I don't need anyone."
• Trinkets - such as cross necklaces or angel lapels that we describe as our protection or as good luck.
• Prestige; social position or prominence.
• Greed; lust for more; never enough
• Food; alcohol; drugs; sexual addiction; porn
• Our education or perhaps the "experts!"  (I live in an area of 3 major universities.  Oh, the experts!)
• Environmentalism - I've started calling it the 'green god.'   It's the new altar at which many are worshipping - Mother Earth.    There's nothing wrong with recycling - NOTHING - we should recycle.  But if you are counting on earth loving conservation to make you righteous and clean before God- it's an idol.
• Politics - This one is near and dear to my heart.  But if we aren't careful, we'll begin looking to a political figure or political party to fix all of our issues - never seeing Jesus as the ONE with the answer.

This is a hard message.  If it makes you feel any better, the reason I could list these off with such ease is because at one time or another - many of the above has unintentionally been the object of my affection or passion.  A.K.A.: my idol.

Scripture says, "people bow down and worship these things they have made.   So now everyone will be humbled and brought low.  (How drastically has your world changed in the last 5 years?  Have your circumstances humbled you?)  The LORD cannot simply ignore their sins."

God is smashing the idols of our heart.  All that we once held dear and built our lives upon - for many have come to ruin and to nothing. 

More tomorrow-

Can you name idols I've not mentioned? 
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