It is a recurring challenge for me as a pastor—getting home to watch “the game” without someone at church divulging the score. The ubiquity of smart phones and loose lips has made this nigh to impossible. Sadly, even when I do make it home without knowing the score, the illegal fireworks going off in my neighborhood, long before I’m done watching the game, for a Seahawks score or victory, tend to lessen the thrill of the unknown. So, the question is, why don't we just cancel church or even host a game at the usual service time followed by an evening service? If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em, right? Actually, wrong. Why? Because God is not in competition with the Seahawks. Nor is He in competition with Dawgs, Cougs or the collegiate waterfowl I so love to watch. God is God. In some ways, saying God is God seems unnecessarily redundant. But, I assure you, it is not. For we live in a culture that has forgotten that God is God. Even if we don't say it, our lives more often than not reflect the notion that football or technology or sex or Hollywood is God. The Bible has a Word for the tendency to put the created before the Creator—Idolatry! It is common knowledge that idolatry is condemned in the Bible. The first and second commandments, alone, are pretty clear on this point. However, what may not be common knowledge is that the very thing God condemns, He gives His people over to. In Deuteronomy 4:27-28 we read, “The LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and only a few of you will survive among the nations to which the LORD will drive you. There you will worship man-made gods of wood and stone, which cannot see or hear or eat or smell.” The very idolatry God forbade, which Israel pursued, would become their punishment. They traded in the Invisible God who speaks for the visible gods who cannot speak. In a sense, it is God's version of, “Have it your way.” C.S. Lewis paints a similar picture with regards to hell. In his powerful book, The Great Divorce, he writes, “There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, ‘Thy will be done,’ and those to whom God says, in the end, ‘Thy will be done.’ No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who knock it is opened.” Ultimately, hell is God giving people what they want, life without their Creator. In the idolatrous culture in which we live we face daily the temptation to marginalize God for temporary things and pleasures. Want proof that our culture is idolatrous? Just look at the way our nation responds when the latest iPhone debuts (every other month), when the latest Adele album drops, when the latest lottery jackpot reaches into the hundreds of millions, when the latest Star Wars movie premiers. The problem is not the iPhone, Star Wars, lotteries or Adele. The problem is a culture that virtually ignores the God of the Bible, the God of all Creation, in its values, laws, and public discourse, but obsesses over the things that are temporary, ephemeral, fleeting. We set aside the eternal God for things that will be brushed aside or forgotten within a few months, weeks or days! That's idolatry's irony. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Star Wars as much (or more) as the next guy. I still remember the excitement of experiencing Star Wars for the first time at the drive-in theater. And I don’t think I was ever as excited about bed sheets as I was about the Star Wars sheets I received that Christmas! The issue is not having a passion for movies or things or football teams. The problem is our lack of passion for that which really matters. And it isn’t just the “heathen.” Many Christ-followers are more engaged in the latest pop-culture sensations than they are in the things that matter to the Kingdom of God! So what am I saying? Stop enjoying these temporary pleasures? No. But keep them in perspective as temporary…and prioritize your life accordingly. Enjoy, each day, the temporary blessings of this world, but, more importantly, set apart time each day to enjoy God. Be passionate about your football team, but cultivate a deeper passion for God’s team—the church! And go ahead and give time and energy to the pastimes you enjoy, but devote your greatest time and energy to the timeless Kingdom of the living God. For soon and very soon, we are going to see the King. And every earthly pleasure will be nothing more than a distant dream in the presence of our Creator. Let us learn to live life accordingly.
0 Comments
|
Dan GannonDan has ministered at Renton Bible Church, with his wife Debbie, since 2003. Archives
June 2022
Categories |