Confessions of an Idol Worshipper

I am an idol worshiper. Yep, you heard me right. How many times have I read that verse in the Ten Commandments that says, "You shall have no other gods before me...you shall not make for your self a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, you shall not bow down to them nor serve them."? I can remember thinking, "oh, well, at least that is one thing that I won't be doing". Oh, well that is what I thought.

I have heard it said over the years in different ways that we were made, created, to worship. And the more I have sifted that through my heart and mind, I have come to see how utterly true that is. We are all born with an innate desire to fill our lives with something that we ascribe worth and beauty to...so from the get-go we are on this path to find something that we think will satisfy us and we pour our entire beings into it, hoping with all we've got that it will fulfill us. It looks different in everyone's life, though some of us ascribe value to the same things. Nevertheless, we are ALL ascribing value to something and in turn, living for those things in some way or another.

Take me for instance...my confession here today is that I am an idol worshiper. I have several idols that I have been bowing down to in my life over the years. Several things that I have let take my energy and my joy; things that I have sought after to fulfill me, yet I have come up empty handed and distraught. I have tried to serve these things in my life to get satisfaction, to feel of significance, to justify my existence. This things are my idols. You think I am crazy, right? An idol worshiper? Well, let me say that these things in my life are the things that fill my thoughts and manipulate my life and can bring me to tears and...whatever.

Listen to this excerpt from my pastor in a sermon a couple Sundays ago:

"We are worshiping the wrong thing. Darkness is tragic...it is not only evil, it's tragic...We were built to worship Him...we are bent on worshiping something else. So idolatry becomes our biggest problem. Idolatry is the thing that is wrong with the world. We are worshiping something inferior to the living and glorious God.. We are living for what can't satisfy us. So idolatry says, the drunk lives for his bottle, the despite lives for his power, the socialite lives for respectability, the entertainer lives for adulation, the sloth lives for his ease, the revolutionary lives for his cause, the playboy lives for his trysts, the materialist lives for things, the glutton lives for his next bite, the people pleaser lives for his approval, the control freak lives for his dominance, the perfectionist lives for her performance, and what is sad and tragic is that they don't know that they don't know...darkness blinds you, it keeps you blinded from becoming glorious in worship..."

So what are the "idols" I have been bowing down to? Honestly, I have a couple. I confess that I have bowed down to the idol of approval from people; I have bowed down for the idol of performance. So for years I have felt inadequate and discouraged because I have been seeking people to approve of me and seeking perfection in ways that could never be attained. I have let these things fill my thoughts and my life. Beating against the wind, bowing to these things as if they could somehow fulfill. They cannot!

My greatest idol that I have bowed down to in my life is fitness and weight loss. Recently the LORD showed me in a greater way than ever, that these things have an unhealthy place in my spiritual life. Not because they are not good attempts, but because I obsess over them, bow down to them, use them to fulfill desires within me that only He can fulfill.

I don't need people to praise me, I don't need people to approve of me, I don't need to be perfect or perform and do all the right things. I don't need to be thin (though that may seem in this culture to be the "right" thing). I NEED HIM! I need more and more and more of HIM! Only He can satisfy, only HE is worthy of all my exhaustive efforts and energies that I have poured into these things.

I confess to be an idol worshiper, because that is the first step in telling the God Who is worthy of all my love, all my praise, all my efforts, all my attention, that HE is enough. He is enough.

And even as I write this I am tempted to think, "what if they misunderstand what I mean?", "what if they think this?" "what if...?". Right here, right now, I lay down the idol of caring what others think and I bow to my God Who calls me righteous and loved, simply because He made me and has called me His own.

Some more words from my pastor on this,
"God declares what you are...no matter what your IQ is, no matter
what you think of your appearance, no matter what you have or have not accomplished in life, no matter how much money you have, none of that compares to God's simple declaration that, "YOU ARE MINE". You have wealth, significance, love, eternal beauty because God decrees it so. Wow! That's hope for us...striving to prove there's a reason for my existence. God declares it, "I have redeemed you, I have made you, I love you, that's it!" This is a good report."

What do you bow down to? What do you let rule your thoughts and actions? What do you elevate to unhealthy levels in your life? In your attempts to do and be, what leaves you distraught and dissatisfied? Let's cast off these things, let's bow to the One and only One Who could ever satisfy, Who could ever be worthy of all our worship. Who says, "I love You, love Me in return. Turn away from those other things. Only I can give you peace."