God's Boundaries for Abundant Living - No Worship But True Worship, Part 2

You know, I've been in countries where there's thousands of idols from huge statues to rodents that people actually worship.

And I'm tempted to think that, oh, that's not a problem in my life. Today, let's look at the idols that we have because God wants to help us remove them so we get the highest and best from Him. Stay with me. Thanks for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Living on the Edge is an international discipleship ministry focused on helping Christians live like Christians. Well, we're in the middle of our series, God's Boundaries for Abundant Living. Today, Chip continues talking about the dangers of idolatry and why we need to recognize the idols in us. But before he gets going, if you've missed any part of this series so far, catch up through the Chip Ingram app.

It's an easy way to listen to Living on the Edge anytime. Well, if you're ready, let's join Chip now as he dives right back into Exodus chapter 20 for his talk, No Worship But True Worship. Second part of the analysis here is coming out of verse second half of 4b. It says, No man made not just an icon or a statue, but no man made likenesses, images that are real or imagined, pictorial representatives of God, are to be used as a means of worshiping the living God.

It's just what it says. Not only an idol, but no likenesses. The likenesses is a resemblance. The point is exactly the same as with the idols, but it broadens the scope from statues only to any real perceived or imagined pictorial representation of God. Don't use even false mental pictures to worship God. Don't make an idol and don't make a likeness.

He just expands it even farther. I brought a quote by A.W. Tozer, and Tozer writes that idols fashioned with hands or idols fashioned in the human mind are no less idols. To think thoughts that are unworthy of God, to think thoughts that lowly represent Him, are just as much as idols as those that are made by human hands. And it's interesting where, you know, this isn't a prohibition against Christian art. This is a prohibition against using things in the act of worshiping God to help you draw close to Him by some visible representation. Why? Because it reduces Him.

Can I take a sensitive subject and then I'll bring some close to home? You know, for the first 400 years of the church, the cross was never a symbol of the body of Christ. It was introduced to the church in about the fourth century. The crucifix, the cross with Jesus hanging on the cross, you know, limp and in His pain, was not introduced in the church until the seventh century. There are many, many people, and I say this sincerely and lovingly and kindly, many people who use the crucifix as a means or an object of promoting their worship. And the problem is is that it tells only part of the story. It vividly tells what part of the story? The humanity of Christ, the compassion of Christ, the love of Christ, the payment of Christ, the suffering of Christ.

And that is something we need very much to understand. But what about the power of Christ, the empty tomb, the risen Christ, the controlling God who is sovereign over all the world? And so if over time you use a crucifix, what happens? It reduces God. It begins to shrink Him.

You view Him as a God who's in pain, a God who has suffered, but it begins to send only part of the message. And that's the whole point behind using symbols. You know, in the evangelical community, we've done the same thing. Remember in the 1950s?

Some of you do. Remember when people would put all the pictures? And I'm not saying that people were using the pictures to worship God.

There's been great debate whether we should use pictures at all. But in the 1950s, the average picture of Jesus was what? Jesus meek and mild. I mean, the guy always looked like he needed to get out in the sun and get a tan or something.

And if you blew on him, he would fall over. And he had kind of the long hair and the really white skin and was always kind of like this. What does that tell your five-year-old about Jesus? And then, you know, in the 60s, you know, in the early 70s, you know, Jesus became kind of like the campus radical. You know, he'd have a little scruffy beard and look like he was starting a revolution. You know, by the 80s, the pictures of Jesus, he looked like a model.

He looks like he, you know, he's, you know, doing Bowflex commercials. You know? Have you ever talked with people from other nationalities and other cultures and other backgrounds and they see our pictures of Jesus? In fact, if you go to Japan, guess what culture Jesus looks like there? That's soul. He's Japanese. I have it on rather good authority. He was Jewish.

And that he looked Jewish. Do you understand the point? We reduce him. The second command is all about even sincere people like you and like me taking God and unconsciously. Most of us don't have a little idol that we're lighting candles to and have a little thing on the mantle.

But the same principle, we keep reducing Jesus, reducing God, trying to tame him. And basically, you know what we're doing? We're like the little boy. What we really want is a bike. Except we don't want a bike, we want a great marriage.

Oh, Jesus, Jesus, be this, you know, I'll do these things. Give me a great marriage. Or we want our kids to turn out right. Or we want financial prosperity. Or we want to be healthy all the time.

Or we just want to be happy. Oh, Jesus, will you please make me fulfilled? And we shrink a God and then we package him.

And if you don't believe it, I mean if you can stand it, with some great exceptions, go turn on your cable TV and watch about 10 hours straight of Christian programming. Who is the Jesus of cable evangelical Christian TV? He's the Jesus that will make you wealthy. He's the Jesus that will take away your problems. He's the Jesus that is strong and powerful. He's the one who's going to make you upwardly movable. He's the Jesus that if you will call in at this number at this time, he can solve all your problems in 20 minutes.

And by the way, if you give $10, he'll give you $100 back. We've created a God and shrunk a God and made images of Jesus to do what? Control him, tame him, and get him to fulfill our personal agendas. And the second command prohibits it. The first one says that God demands that we worship him in the spirit. The second aspect is that we must worship him. He demands that we worship him in truth. Notice as we continue the analysis, no man-made idols or images, real or imagined, are not only to be made, but they're not to be worshiped or served.

Look at the next aspect of this command because I want you to understand God knows our hearts. Once we make them, it's only a matter of time before we worship them. Anybody remember what happened to the bronze snake that Moses held up? Eventually they worshiped it, so they had to destroy it.

Anybody remember what happened to the calves, the golden calves that Rehoboam made as he was trying to call the people to worship? They begin to worship it. The statues of Christ, of the saints, the icons of church history.

Anybody know what's happened to most all of them? Somewhere, sometime, people are bowing down, kissing, and worshiping them. We make idols that selectively take the parts of God that we like, and then we make a man-made realignment of them to fulfill our own lusts.

Jot down Romans chapter 1, verses 18 through about 32. Although they knew God, they didn't glorify him as God, neither did they give thanks, but they exchanged what? Their worship of the creator for creatures, and they begin to make what? Idols or statues or icons of things in the sea, things in the air, multiple animals, and then the progression is God gave them over. The worshiping of idols and the reduction of God, whether intellectual or whether in physical statues or likenesses, always reduces God and always ends up in immorality.

You can just take it to the bank. And Romans 1, 18 to 32, shows the slide and progression when you don't glorify God as God. And then the shift is you don't give thanks, and then we begin worshiping the creation instead of the creator. The application here is we must remove the idols from our lives. Could I, since there's got to be at least someone in the crowd going, you know what, that guy was pretty good, but when he said this thing about the crucifix, I am really ticked off. I mean, I don't really worship it, and I think he's pushing it a little bit, and that's kind of picky, picky, picky.

Well, I'll tell you what, I want to give equal time for those from different traditions. Some of us, could I talk about maybe some potential idols among just regular, ordinary Bible-believing Christians in America and around the world? One, wonder how many of us have made our churches idols and the church size.

I wonder how many people are really excited. I've been one of those mega church pastors, okay? I started out with 35 people in a little town in Texas and then went and we had several hundred and then went to thousands of people and we did the multi-buildings and five services and video overflow for each one, and I can tell you something. There's something so exciting and intoxicating about watching God multiply ministry and building buildings and 20 pastors and 30 pastors and all these things that happen all over a community. You know what can happen to a church? Guess what becomes the idol? The success of the ministry. And it's your part of a happening thing instead of being in submission to Jesus, the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. You know another one?

And we had to cut this one at the knees early on. I wonder how many churches have made their pastor an idol. You ever heard anyone talk about, I go to Andy Stanley's church, I go to Charles Stanley's church, I go to Chuck Swindoll's church, I go to, you fill in the name of your area. I have it on equally good authority that Andy Stanley doesn't have a church and Chuck Swindoll doesn't have a church. And whoever your pastoral hero is, they don't have a church. They are a pastor, they are a saint. They've been called by God to teach the word of God and they are an equal footing with you right there at the cross and they sin and struggle just like you and they've been given a role to teach God's word.

And you know what we do? We've got this thing going in evangelical Christianity called celebrityism. And I mean it's idolatry. And you know we buy this guy's books or this girl's books and you know we go to her Bible studies because she puts this stuff and then you know we have our stickers on our Bibles of where we've been and what we've been to and you know we got our multi-colored notebooks depending on where we've been and it's just, I don't think God's real happy about it. We had a little rule in Santa Cruz, I was pastor there for 12 years and cause see I didn't grow up as a believer so I'm real sensitive to this stuff. And you know what it's like when you were the guy growing up as a kid and I thought, I mean you know this is heretical, I'm sorry but I grew up as a pagan. And the only experience I had around kind of born again people was not good. And so I thought everyone on the radio and everyone on TV were, I thought they were all crooks including some of the really good ones. And you know what it's like to go on the radio when you thought all those people were crooks, you know that was a real you know God how do you work that out.

And then I realized God really uses it and that not all the people were crooks. But I remember when that started to happen people started to talk to me differently and start to treat me differently and talk about my church. And I just made some private rules. One, I would never call it my church, it's Christ's church. Number two, in my presence I never let anyone talk about I go to your church. I would interrupt them politely and say oh do you go to Santa Cruz Bible Church? They said yeah I do too. And then at times you know my wife said Chip you're kind of rude. I said you know, I know. Because this really bugs me.

But we're gonna remember that Christ is the head of this church. And what I understand is people when you're an up front person people want to make you bigger and smarter and holier than you really are. And it's for two reasons.

Number one it sets you up in a place that's not good for you. But number two then all the stuff you're preaching is for people like you. The exceptions, right? Missionaries, pastors, the superstars.

I got news, I don't think there are any superstars. I don't think they exist in the body of Christ. I think there's people that live the normal Christian life. You know they obey scripture, they discover what their gifts are, they do what God wants them to do and God chooses to prosper it. And then we all put them in stained glass. Or we want their autograph on a book or something like that.

What's that all about? Could it be that the second command has a lot more to say to us evangelical born again Bible believing believers than we ever dreamed? Could it be that our connection with God is coming through this personality or the success of our church?

Or how about this one? Is there any chance that legalism has crept in as an idol? Aren't there some groups you know and if we're one of them then you know he who has ears to hear let him hear? You know I've been around people that their idol is we don't do these things.

We don't do this, we don't do that, we don't do this, we don't do this, we don't do that, we don't do this, we don't do that and we don't do this, this, this, this and this. Aren't we holy? And you know as Howard Hendricks said there's a whole group of people in any cemetery that don't do any of those things either. And I'm not sure that makes you holy at all.

But we can take pride you know. Have you been down that road? I've been around people that think God is only at work in their denomination. Could it be that's an idol? Could it be that unless it has a label on the outside and looks in this denomination or has just this precise theology even though boy the Bible's clear about all these majors and some really smart godly people might differ on some of the minors? See there's a lot of different ways that people and things and success and what about our view of God? What about Tozer's thoughts about, what about these kind of images?

Not the ones crafted by hands. What about the kind that you have a God who's harsh and he's a judge and he's down on you and you're perfectionistic and driven and you feel guilty all the time not because it's the Holy Spirit because you have a false view of God that's an idol and he's a harsh judge and his arms are crossed and his fingers pointed and he's always down on you. It's an idol and you know what that does? It destroys the work of Christ because God is a faithful loving judge but he's made atonement for you through what Christ has done. And when we live with this picture in our mind of a harsh judge or how about some of us who grow up and think that God is a benign you know grandfatherly that he has this white beard flowing over his rocking chair and he just winks at sin. You know they just quote the verse all the time. He's gracious and compassionate slow to anger.

You know he just winks at sin and I know you're living together but don't worry about it because I understand down deep in your heart somewhere somehow some way you really love me and I know your finances are completely out of order and you know you haven't given me the first portion in the last five or ten years but you know I know your heart and you're just so sincere when you sing those songs and you're reading your Bible and read that little devotional and you know just warms my heart. It's not the God of the Bible. That may have been your grandfather. That may be a God that you've created.

Here's the deal. We always create a God in our own image to fulfill our agenda and at the end of the day it's so we're in control. God is in a box. He's been tamed and we call the shots and the second command says no idols.

The kind you can set on the mantle or the kind you make in your mind. No likenesses. No pictures.

No things. Not about art but in your worship. Get rid of them and by the way don't serve them and the progression is if you make them in your mind or you make them with your hands the day will come because of the human heart you will serve them. And he says I have a boundary.

Don't go there. I have a boundary. I love you too much because I want you to know me as I am. I want you to worship me in spirit and in truth. I want you to grapple with the mystery of my holiness and my compassion. I want you to grapple with the infinitude of my love.

I want you to struggle with the sense of all and mystery and majesty where you fall down and you don't have words to say. And the spirit of God brings utterance and you worship and you pray and you love me and you get your image of me from the icon. The exact representation of the Godhead.

Who is it? It's Jesus. You want to know exactly what God is like? You want to have a picture in your mind that is exactly if you've seen me you've seen the Father.

You want to get the right picture? Jesus, Hebrews 1, literally the word is icon. The Greek word is a picture in the ancient world where they would take a coin and you would take it on putty and you could press down the coin and when you took off the coin all of the exact representation of the coin would be in the putty. That's the same word for this invisible God. We can't see, we can't touch.

What's he like? You take the invisible God and you put him in the putty of human flesh and here's what you get? It's Jesus.

You want to know how it feels about people that have blown it and sinned and done terrible things that they're ashamed of? It's Jesus with the woman at the well. You want to know what God is really like?

This invisible God when people are religious and self-righteous and think they've got it all together? It's Jesus with the Pharisees. If you want to get the right picture without images or statues, it's Jesus and his word. It's Jesus in the life of authentic community, not just in big groups but in small groups where you peel back the layers of hypocrisy that we all wear and you unzip your heart and you get vulnerable and the spirit of God living in you through your personality expresses the love, the compassion, the reproof and the correction to other believers because Jesus lives in you. It's hearing God's word and responding. It's worshiping in spirit and truth. It's saying my picture of God will not be anything I will make, create, bow down or serve to and he gives two reasons.

One, he's a jealous God. I mean I don't know about you but Teresa and I have this agreement. She's never really been crazy about and I've never been crazy about her being like first in my life. Any ladies here, would you be satisfied if your husband said, you know honey I want you to know you're first in my life and Judy is second and Mary is third and Barbara is fourth. And you know what? I don't want to be first in her life.

I want exclusive rights to Teresa Ingram. You know what that's called? Jealousy. That's a zeal that comes out of love. That's a protective.

I want a unique exclusive relationship with her that a spouse has rightfully for a spouse. That a parent has rightfully for the protection of your children. Don't you have a jealous zeal for your children when they are running out toward traffic and you say hey, not there.

When they reach for the stove that is not there. There is a jealousy or a zeal, not a selfish jealousy. This is a picture of God's deep commitment and love for you that says no images, no likenesses, no bowing down because I jealously love you to the point that I will not allow you to settle for second best or some reduction of who I really am. And the second reason is that whatever you do your children will follow. Ezekiel 18 is clear that God doesn't punish kids for the sins of the fathers but there are patterns about how you worship. There are patterns of lifestyle and if you have images or false views of God it just gets passed on just like osmosis in the air and the culture of your home to the second, third and fourth generation. Question.

Second command. A boundary. It's not about do you worship the right God. It's about are you worshiping the right God in the right way. Do you have any idols in your life? Are you worshiping in spirit and in truth? Could you unconsciously, unconsciously develop little idols about church size or pastors or your group that might have tainted or reduced the purity of who Jesus is and what he wants to be to you?

So how about you? Are there any idols in your life? If you're like me the answer you intuitively know is yes.

There really are and the question is what do you do about it? This could be one of the most important days in your life. You know many, many, many people, I meet thousands literally of Christians who honestly have prayed a prayer. They've asked Jesus to come into their life.

Their sins are forgiven and they are a part of God's family and that's a wonderful thing. But this command brings us to a second and most important prayer you need to pray and that's where you say you want him to be the Lord of your life. This is a Romans 12.1 issue where God says what he really wants from you he doesn't want to be first in your life. He wants to be the exclusive love of your life. He wants to be the master, the CEO, call the shots.

He's a jealous God in that good way that we talked about. Have you ever offered your body as a living sacrifice? I mean all that you are, all that you have in a moment of time and said Lord you're Lord you call the shots. Whatever your word says about the future I'll do it.

Whatever your word says about relationships I know I'll mess up but I'm purposing to do it that way. Whatever your word says about time, about money, about dreams, about ministry, I commit in this moment to turn all of my life over to you and you be the CEO, the master, the Lord of my life. My question is have you ever done that? And as God is speaking to you right now I'm going to challenge you to do it.

I don't mean flippantly. I don't mean just emotionally. I mean where you realize that if you haven't done this and then you live it out day by day that there's something that's first. It's called an idol and God's a jealous God. Would you like to pray with me right now? Would you like to get this resolved and start a new kind of graduate level journey with the Lord Jesus? Pray dear Jesus I confess to you today that I've always thought of you as first in my life but the fact is it's not exclusive. You're first among family and job and work and my dreams and money and Lord I ask you to forgive me for the idols in my heart and my life. I give you permission to show me clearly what they are and right now in this moment I offer myself afresh as a living sacrifice holy and acceptable to you and you've told me this is what you really want. And Lord I now know that I need to get an accurate view of you and so I ask for the grace to get into your word like never before. I ask for the grace to find other believers who are serious about you so they can inspire and encourage me and Lord I ask for your grace to swim upstream in a Christian world where you're really maybe number one but not exclusive in most Christians lives. Oh Lord God I don't want any idols.

I want you to be the king of my heart. In Jesus name I pray. Amen. If you have prayed with me I would be very encouraged if you would take a moment and quickly email me and say Chip I prayed with you he's the Lord of my life and then let me tell you find a pastor or a strong Christian and let him know what you did and get some help to continue on your journey. God bless you have a great day. Great word Chip and if you'd like to tell us about your decision to recenter your life on Jesus email chip at Living on the Edge dot org that's chip at Living on the Edge dot org we're really looking forward to hearing from you and by the way here at Living on the Edge we'd love to support you in your pursuit to recommit your life to Jesus that's why I want to quickly tell you about a great resource that will help deepen your faith it's chips book true spirituality becoming a Romans 12 Christian through this resource he'll reveal a clear blueprint to becoming a genuine follower of Christ to get your copy of true spirituality or order one for you and an additional one so you and a friend can go through it together go to special offers at Living on the Edge dot org or on the chip Ingram app will chip still here in studio with me to share one last thing with all of you I want to pause before we continue and I want to thank just for the last few weeks we've talked about this match we've talked about the ministry we've talked about what God is doing and the response and the generosity has been overwhelming thank you very very much and I also want to say that tomorrow is the last day where your dollar will be matched dollar for dollar and so as God has been speaking to you would you please move your good intention to an action the Lord is much at work during these very challenging times in our world we can make a difference and we can do it together thank you for whatever God leads you to do and let me add when you partner with Living on the Edge you're helping us fulfill the mission God's put on our hearts we're encouraging and equipping countless pastors around the world with helpful tools and training we're continuing to create new discipleship resources that will help Christians deepen their faith and we're standing with other ministries to take the truth of the gospel to this lost generation all of this work is made possible by your financial support and right now every dollar we receive until midnight tomorrow will be matched dollar for dollar partner with us today by going to Living on the Edge dot org or by calling triple eight three three three six zero zero three that's Living on the Edge dot o-r-g or call triple eight three three three six zero zero three app listeners tap donate regular mail needs to be postmarked by tomorrow thanks for your generosity and being a part of making a difference in today's world well before we go I want you to know about an easy way to listen to our extended teaching podcast here chip anytime on amazon's alexa echo and echo dot just say alexa open Living on the Edge and you'll hear that day's extended teaching anytime you want well for chip and everyone here this is dave drewey saying thanks for joining us for this Edition of Living on the Edge