American Idol

Reading in the Old Testament, I’ve always found the Israelites dumb. I mean really stupid. They have just seen God do HUGE miracles right in front of their face, even seeing God speak. Exodus 20:18-19 When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do now have God speak to us or we will die” These people saw God! They were afraid of Him! But what do they do? They go and make an idol out of their old jewelry.


So many times I’ve wondered what was going on in their brains. One day they have the necklace around their neck and then the next they decide they need to worship it. Let’s get all the jewelry together and make a cow and that can save us! Doesn’t make any sence to me. No sence whatsoever.

What’s worse, is later on, the Israelites get so engrossed in worshiping their idols, they sacrifice their own bodies, their own CHILDREN to these things. King Ahaz (2 Chronicles 28: 1-4), one of the most respected in the country was sacrificing his sons to idols. Killing them. For what?

So I thought this was dumb. So glad we are civilized and don’t do that today. I would never worship an idol, how dumb is that. Why, that’s a no duh, even for people who don’t believe in God. Right?

I’m currently doing the Breaking Free study by Beth Moore. Week 3 she states, “Anything we try to put in a place where God belongs is an idol.” Since God wants us to be complete in him, to find satisfaction only in him, anything else we use to find that satisfaction, to fill that hole, is an idol. Woah.

Isaiah makes fun of the idol makers in Is. 44:9-20. Vs. 12 says …(the idol maker) gets hungry and loses his strength; he drinks no water and grows faint while he is making the idol. How many times do we put aside the good, healthy things for us do in search of the dream? I just finished reading a book in which a man was starting his own buisness. He got so obsessed with the business that he put aside his wife, his children, everything that he was starting the buisness for. Did he kill them in fire over a stone? No… but he sacrificed them to the idol.

How many times do you hear of people losing their children because they are alcholics. How many times do you see people spending all of their time at work, and not focusing on their relationships, and divorse occurs? Sacrificing loved ones to idols.

But, ANYTHING we put in a place where God belongs, anything we use to find that satisfaction only God can give us. Could worry be an idol? Yes, when I spend waking nights tossing and turning going over in my mind what should be done, what I can’t even change. I should be lifting that to God. Could chocolate be an idol? For me, yes, when I am so frusterated and should be lifting my frusterations to God, I go and eat 6 hershey kisses. Could reading a Christian novel be an idol? Yes, when I use the reading as an escape for reading the word of God. Could being on the internet be an idol? Could watching tv? Could anything?

Psalm 63: 3-7 Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. I will praise you as long as I live and in your name I will lift up my hand.My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods (Chocolate), with singing lips my mouth will praise you. On my bed I remember you,(not worry) I think of you through the watches of the night. Because you are my help, I will sing in the shadow of your wings. My soul clings to you, your right hand upholds me.

This is something I’m thinking about. So maybe I’m just as dumb as those Israelites, huh?