Idol – Pleasure

Many of God's children have gotten so used to the favor of God that we will have fun without the Father. Dr. Tony Evans says it's easy and risky to forget where our blessings and happiness come from. If you're having fun and God isn't, that becomes an act of idolatry. This is The Alternative with Dr. Tony Evans, author, speaker, senior pastor of Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas, Texas, and president of The Urban Alternative. The United States Declaration of Independence states life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are three rights given to all humans by their Creator. But Dr. Evans warns it's easy to obsess over happiness, and that can come at a great price.

Let's join him as he explains. Of all the sins in the Bible, idolatry is the greatest one named because it becomes the foundation for everything else that is anti-God. Again, an idol is any noun, person, place, thing, or thought, that you look to as your source, that you either place alongside of God as an equal or over God. That becomes an idol. In Western civilizations, we don't have, by and large, the primitive idols of stones, rocks, trees, water. No, we have American idols.

We have the sophisticated ones, the ones that are easily justifiable in our own minds. Today, I want to look at the idol of pleasure. And make no mistake about it, God does put pleasure in that category. Paul wrote Timothy and said in 2 Timothy 3, 4, he says, men become lovers of pleasure more than the lovers of God. They place pleasure over me, making it pleasure and idol. The idol of pleasure is anything that you enjoy in the creation that leaves out the Creator. If you're having fun and God isn't, that becomes an act of idolatry.

Solomon, who wrote the book of Ecclesiastes, has talked about this. He said he sought pleasure and he could afford it. He's a billionaire if we would use today's dollars. He didn't go to the party, he was the party. He operated on the pleasure principle and yet he says here and throughout the book, it was all vanity, that is, emptiness.

Why? Because of chapter 2 verse 25, for who can eat and who can have enjoyment without him? Who can eat and who can have enjoyment without him referring to God? So we're talking about the world of pleasure, the world, that system headed by Satan that leaves God out.

It wants to draw you in while keeping God out. And one of its primary tools is the tool of fun, enjoyment, desirability, pleasure. Now the Bible has a whole litany of things that could fit in this category. In Ephesians chapter 5 verses 3 to 8, he gives a list of things that would fit in the category of pleasure that would also be equally anti-God. So let me just categorize some of them so that we're on the same page. Let's talk about entertainment pleasure.

All of us love our televisions, we love our movies. They are designed to entertain us. But I'm sure you would agree that a lot of it leaves God out. And I don't mean just overtly leaving God out, it becomes anti-God in what it is promoting. And while we are laughing, sometimes God is crying. Because we are finding pleasure in that which excludes Him, in the creation, not consistent with the Creator. So you'll have people who will always find time for their favorite show who never find time to get in God's Word.

And even if they miss it, they're going to record it because they got to get it because they don't want to lose the flow of what's been happening in the series while they don't mind losing the flow of what's happening with their relationship with God. Sports, a form of entertainment, can be an idol. By the way, the Bible is full of sports. You've got racing in the Bible, boxing in the Bible, wrestling in the Bible. You know, the Bible has a lot to say, positively even, about sports.

But it can become an idol. You've got Christians who can quote the stats of players who can't quote Bible verses. Because they've studied it, they've followed it, they know yards gained, home runs hit. They are fully engaged in the world of sports.

They wouldn't miss the game. They would rather miss time and worship with God than miss the game. Because they've switched and they've turned what could be legitimate into an idol so God takes the back seat because they don't want to miss their entertainment. The Bible talks about, in Ephesians 5, sexuality or immorality, which has become today as common as shaking hands. People will disregard God in order to pleasure themselves.

It's gone one step further. It has now gone to endorsing the immorality. They want you to buy into it. They want you to accept it, and it's amazing how Christians who used to say, well, that was sin, who now say, well, that'd be sin for me.

They dumb it down. They changed the standard because they bought into the idolatry. The Bible says food. Uh-oh. The Bible says food can be an idol. Philippians 4, 19 says, and their belly is their God. Where their love for food is so dominant that we become gluttonous, which is an ungodly use of His provision of food.

Oh, that's quiet in here. So an idol then is anything in the creation. It is pleasure where God is not welcome to participate, and that makes it an idol. The world is set up.

It is set up. It is built to call you and me, us, because all of us, except for the few spiritual people here, all of us have to wrestle with idols, and the world is set up to draw us to an idol by making it fancy, desirable, pleasurable, by making us want it bad enough, by making it new and improved. We gravitate to it because the world is set up to draw us from God, for God will not be intimate when we are intimate with an idol. And since the system is set up to draw us to idols, the system is set up to draw us from God. So if you and me, if we are in league with an idol, the Bible is clear that you won't be in league with God.

This explains a lot. This explains why we don't hear more from God, experience more power from God, experience more victory in our lives, experience more answers to prayer, because while we may be doing the spiritual thing, we're doing it hanging out with an old boyfriend, hanging out with an idol, and God says, you can't have an idol over here and call on me over there and expect me to respond. Every good and perfect gift cometh from above from the Father of lights. So God is not against pleasure. He's against idolatrous pleasure. He's not against pleasure. The joy of the Lord is my strength. Rejoice in the Lord always and again I say rejoice. God is not against pleasure. Let me go a little deeper. He says in Luke chapter 12 verse 32, He says, it is my pleasure to give you the kingdom, to give you what the king rules over.

It's my pleasure. So God not only exists for His own pleasure, He exists for our pleasure. So He wants you to enjoy legitimately the pleasures that He Himself enjoys. What Satan does is Satan comes along to that which God offers legitimate pleasure and he illegitimizes it and turns it into an idol. Certain pleasures are wrong on their face.

They're wrong on their face. In other words, they come out of the box sin. It's sin. So you know, that's an illegitimate pleasure. You start off and it's illegitimate. If you smoke and crack, that's an illegitimate pleasure because it alters the mind illegitimately.

Oh, and by the way, let me explain something. The Bible talks about drugs. It uses the word pharmacia. Pharmacia is a Greek word that we get our English word pharmacy from. Pharmacy is the dispenser of drugs. So Satan has a pharmacy and he dispenses drugs. So when a person takes crack or heroin and yeah, reefer too, when he takes it and the mind begins to shift, Satan gets into the shift caused by the drug and operates his own pharmacia, his own pharmacy so that now the drug is now being inserted by the devil in order to create the addiction that started off with pleasurable feelings that now control you.

But on the other hand, there can be good things, things that are legitimate that Satan gets a hold of and makes it illegitimate, although it started off being legitimate. In Genesis chapter 3 verses 1 to 6, you know that was the fall of mankind. In the previous chapter of Genesis 2, God told Adam and Eve, every tree of the garden you may freely eat except the tree in the den, the tree in the middle of the garden. He put it in the middle so that when they went to the kitchen, they had to go buy it.

When they went to the bedroom, they had to go buy it. It was in the middle of the house. The reason why I put this Google tree in the middle of your den because it's an information tree, Google tree. It's the tree of the knowledge.

It's information of good and evil. Now Adam and Eve, I'm going to put this one thing I don't want you to do in the middle of the garden, all this other stuff you can have fun with. You can't have fun with this tree because I don't want you to get information apart from me. I don't want you to decide what's right, wrong, good, bad, up, down.

I want to decide that. So you can do that, and I want to put you a reminder that this tree is off limits to free you up to enjoy all the other trees because if you mess with this tree, you're going to lose the benefit of all the other trees. So leave this tree alone. Remember, you're not autonomous. You aren't on your own. So evidently, God wanted to make the point.

He disagreed with the Isley brothers. It's your thing. Do what you want to do. He said, no, we're not rolling with that. No, you can't do what you want to do when it comes to this tree, but you can do what you want to do when it comes to all the things that you can do.

So wait a minute. Any religion that spends more time on what you can't do than what you can do has flipped God over because the whole thing is to do all that God has given you freedom to do within the boundaries He's given you to do it. Because God is for enjoyment. He is for pleasure within His will. So now into the garden comes Slick, Satan. Satan comes to Eve, and the first question he says is, half God said. What God said? What God said about that tree? She said, God said we couldn't eat it, and my husband told me not to touch it. Don't even go near.

Just look at it and keep going. Just bypass that tree. Satan said, let me tell you something about God. He don't want you to have no fun.

He don't want you to have no fun. You see how pretty that tree is? You see how nice that tree is? You see how sweet, the sweet aroma coming from the fruit on that tree? God is holding out on you. He's a joy killer.

He doesn't want you to have fun. You know what He did? He took her mind off of the things she could enjoy and got her focused on the one thing she was prohibited from enjoying. But the one thing she was prohibited from enjoying became the only thing in the garden. It was like no other trees were there, because he fixated her mind on the one thing she couldn't have, and now it was the only thing she wanted. It says when she saw that the tree was good for food, now she had seen that tree every day.

She'd been walking by that tree every day, and all of a sudden she sees it. That's because he painted it. He colored it. He embellished it.

He made it look finer than it really was meant to be. And when she saw that the tree was good for food, and then it says, and it was, here's the word, a delight, a delight to make one wise. She was just feeling the tree. The tree was all over her. He said, delight to make one wise.

She took from it and ate. Satan's goal with pleasure is to embellish the pleasure without discussing the pain. He wants to tell you how much fun it is without telling you what the consequences will be.

He's going to let you discover that on your own. Dr. Evans will recommend a way to avoid the deceiver's trap when he continues our message in just a moment. Stay with us. The only constant in life is change, and currently we live in a nation where change is shifting for the worse, morally, culturally, economically, and politically. So how do you find balance and peace through all the chaos? Dr. Tony Evans' brand new message series called American Idols and his book America, Turning a Nation to God, will give you solid answers to what is really happening to our nation. God is calling you to return to Him.

How will you respond? Get both resources at tonyevans.org. America, Turning a Nation to God, will teach you practical steps you can take to put God first in your life, for the betterment of your family, your community, and your nation. It makes the perfect follow-up for what we've been learning today, which is why we're bundling this important book together with all eight messages from Tony's brand new teaching series, American Idols. We'll send this powerful resource package to you as our way of saying thanks when you make a donation in support of Tony's important work here on this station and around the world. This is a limited-time offer, so visit us soon at tonyevans.org, where you can get all the details and make your request. Or call 1-800-800-3222. Members of our resource team are there 24-7 to help you in person. Again, dial 1-800-800-3222. I'll have that contact information for you once again after part two of today's message, and this. Oneness Embraced.

Get yours today at tonyevans.org. If we're going to not become idolatrous with pleasure, then we have to say that certain things I won't watch, certain songs I won't sing, certain downloads I won't take, certain internet pages I won't read, because while it may be pleasurable, I'm not willing to lose God for the pleasure. Idolatry is when God cannot be included.

And we all face it, but that's why the Bible says, 1 John 5.21, brothers, keep yourselves from idols, because he's trying to keep us in fellowship with God. God wants to be the basis of your highest pleasure. In Hebrews chapter 11, verses 24 to 26, it says, Moses refused to be called the son of Pharaoh, and Moses would not accept the pleasures of sin for a season. Why not, Moses?

You've got plenty of money, you're the king's kid, Pharaoh's kid, you've got all this opportunity, why wouldn't you go with the crowd? He says, so that he wouldn't miss out on his reward. In other words, he didn't want to miss out on anything God had for him for something temporary. And I hope you know, the idols of this world, the pleasure idols of this world are always temporary, that's why you've got to keep going back to them.

You've got to keep going back for another hit, a higher hit, a deeper experience, you've got to keep going back to it because they're not permanent. He says, when he kept his eye on what he was looking forward to getting from God, he did not acquiesce to what the culture was telling him to do. The problem of worldliness today has engulfed the church and we're all pressed into it, called to conform to it, losing our distinction. And God is calling us back to himself and all through the Bible, he's calling people away from idols, leave the idols, destroy the idols, get rid of the idols so that you can have me. Psalm 16, David's prayer and his perspective.

And I want to read it because I want you to get the sense of God being central to pleasure. Preserve me, O God, he says, for I take refuge in you. I said to the Lord, you are my God.

I have no good besides you. As for the saints who are in the earth, they are the majestic ones in whom is all my delight. The sorrows of those who have bartered for another God, idol, will be multiplied. The sorrows of those who bartered for another God will be multiplied.

I shall not pour out their drink offerings of blood, nor will I take their names upon my lips. The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and my cup. You support my lot. The lines have fallen to me in pleasant places.

Indeed, my heritage is beautiful to me. I will bless the Lord who has counseled me. Indeed, my mind instructs me in the night. I have set the Lord continually before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad and my glory rejoices. My flesh also will dwell securely. For you will not abandon my soul to Sheol, nor will you allow your Holy One to undergo decay. You will make known to me the path of life. In your presence is fullness of joy.

In your right hand there are, watch this, pleasures evermore. David says, I'm going to hang out with God because that's where the real pleasure is. He said, I'm going to hang out with God because God is going to give me security, not my idol. God is going to give me protection, not my idol. God is going to give me joy, not my idol. God is going to give me to dwell in safety, not my idol. God is going to cover me, not my idol.

So the question is, who you want? Do you want your idol because it gives you a temporary kick, a temporary boost that you've got to pick up again? Or do you want a God whose life provides pleasures forever, who provides ongoing joy and stability? It doesn't mean there's no problem. It doesn't mean there's no suffering. It doesn't mean there's no difficulty.

In fact, when you drop the world's idols, you're going to have some problems because you're going to look like the odd man out. But the question is, do you want real pleasure or do you want a temporary hit, a temporary fix, a temporary pop? Do you want a temporary experience or do you want this ever abiding, dwelling, consuming presence of God?

The question is, how bad do you want it? Do we have any surfers out here? Anybody surf out here? Anybody surf out here? Okay, you've seen it on television.

All right, we'll go with that. Okay, so here's what a surfer does, right? A surfer waves out in the water on top of the surfing board.

And you know what they're waiting for? They're waiting for a wave. They stand up on the board and they begin to ride the wave. And oh, how pleasurable of experience it is to ride the wave because the wave has come and it's carrying them along and they are full of joy and excitement. The problem comes is that the wave runs out. So when the wave runs out, they've got to paddle back out again on top of the board and they've got to wait for another wave so they can have another thrill ride. When this wave comes in, they go for another thrill ride. But again, the wave runs out. So then they've got to paddle back out again because they need another hit. They need another wave to catch them and to roll them in so they can have fun one more time. But the wave runs out. So they've got to paddle out again and hope that there's another wave to grab them and bring them back in so that they can have another thrill ride.

And so all day long they are looking for a new experience, looking for a fresh wave, looking for a fresh roll of pleasure that will give them a momentary high. Oh, but there's another way you can handle the water and that's if you are skiing. You see, water skis. Water skis are a little different because they don't wait for waves. They create waves.

You see, on a water skier, they're tied into a power source because they're hooked into a boat and that boat is pulling them through the water. And the waves that they need are created by the power of the boat moving through the water so they never run out. And as long as they hold on tight, they can experience fun all day long. As long as they hold on tight, they can experience the ride all day long. They don't have to paddle out and wait for something to come in to give them a momentary thrill.

They just got to hold on because the power in front of them. And oh, one more thing. If they happen to fall over while riding the water skis, the boat will turn around, come back around, pick them up, and won't let them stay down. So do you want to be a surfer getting a little wave here and a little wave there and going out and trying to find a new one and take care of that one until it runs out of juice? Or do you want to be a water skier hooked onto the power of God, the presence of God, the joy of God because you've decided the Lord is my portion forever. The Lord is my pleasure and I'm going to hang out with Him.

And if I happen to fall, if I happen to let go, He knows where I fell short and He's going to pull around and pick a brother up one more time. Dr. Tony Evans with a message exploring how to experience God's best for your life as you seek to keep Him first. Before we go for today, don't forget to visit tonyevans.org to check out that new package of resources I mentioned earlier. It starts with Tony's timely and important book, America, Turning a Nation to God, and includes CDs and instant downloads of all eight full-length messages in his brand-new teaching series, American Idols. They're yours with our thanks when you make a donation to keep this listener-supported program on the air. But this special offer won't last, so don't wait. Visit tonyevans.org today or reach out to our Resource Center at 1-800-800-3222 where team members are always on hand to help you.

That's 1-800-800-3222. God gave us clear boundaries in life, but mankind has been smudging the edges and redrawing the borders in different places. Next time, Dr. Evans will explore the importance of taking our cues from God and not from culture. Be sure to join us. The Alternative with Dr. Tony Evans is brought to you by the Urban Alternative and is made possible by the generous contributions of listeners like you.