“I will repay them double for their wickedness and their sin, because they have defiled my land with the lifeless forms of their vile images and have filled my inheritance with their detestable idols.”
How would we react if our spouses paraded extramarital partners through our homes, and constantly pursued adulterous affairs? What if they said they loved us, but chased others daily and only occasionally and ceremonially acknowledged us?
This verse, about how God responds to the Israelites idolatry, seems harsh. However, as the Bride of Christ we belong to God… God expects a much higher level of commitment from me than is due me by my wife. The difference is that my wife does it out of grace as I don’t deserve it. But God merits and has earned my undivided devotion.
This passage clearly illustrates that God sees my entertaining idols as defiling, vile, and detestable… When you stir those kinds of emotions in the creator of the universe you had better run to the cross and cling to it with all of your might… As John Edwards preached it is a fearsome thing to be a sinner in the hands of an Angry God.
Nothing Angers God more than idols. And they don’t have to be carved images. They can be money, reputation, houses, cars, Job titles, etc. Anything that you run to when you’re anxious. Anything you depend on for security. Anything you allow to define your worth… all are idols and all are adulterous and vile to a Holy God that created you and redeemed you at an unimaginable cost.
Examine your life today. Consider your expectation of loyalty and trust from your spouse… Magnify that ten thousand times and you will begin to scratch the surface of what we owe our Creator. The patriarchs of the Old Testament were sinful men. Murders and adulterous, polygamous, drunkards… But the men that were said to chase Gods heart, the ones chosen by God to do great things… all had the same thing in common… They refused to pursue other gods. The first commandment is first for a reason. The Lord is a jealous God, He will not share His glory with powerless idols …so, clean house today and get rid of your adulterous substitute gods…the first one, may be in the mirror.
“The human heart is a factory of idols.” - John Calvin
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