Idols on the Altar and Images in the Pulpit, part 6

Images in the Pulpit

There’s a subtle difference between idols and images. I think we’re clear on what an idol is: anything we excessively (or obsessively) praise, hope for, dream of, sacrifice to—worship, other than God. Images are also focal points for worship, but the object of worship, at least initially, is God.

The best known Biblical image is the golden calf of Exodus. Aaron's intentions were good. The people needed to see God in a tangible form. Before Moses went away, they believed that God was with them. In Moses' absence, the hearts and faith of the people were giving way to fear. The calf was a familiar pagan image from Egypt. Aaron meant to show the people that God had not abandoned them. And, it worked—at first. The people held a festival to celebrate Yahweh, but then they fell into the old familiar rituals of Egyptian idol worship.

We, too, are easily distracted by the beauty of images, confused into thinking that blessings actually come from the image rather than God. That’s the problem with images. Though they’re designed to enhance our worship of God, we can become distracted by their beauty. We may even end up worshiping the image.

Still, we need visual evidence that God hasn't abandoned us. It's part of our nature, and God knows that. He provides for that need with the written Word, in answered prayers, miracles, the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and even in God Himself becoming flesh and blood. But, like the Israelites, we are often not satisfied to wait for God's provision of the tangible.

We may think we can only worship or learn under the leadership of one particular person, like Moses. Or we feel uncertain of the future so we demand that our leaders, like Aaron, come up with some evidence of God's blessing. What’s a leader to do? He or she is likely to try to meet the requirements of an image, perhaps even coming to think of himself as imperative to the spiritual lives of the people. Or he may respond to our desperate cries by building us a calf in the form of a ledger, building, or church growth strategy. We have something to look at, so we're happy. And we soon forget to worship God at all, focusing instead on the images that we have made, sacrificing our money, time, and energy to them. We like the looks of what we have created, and we celebrate "to the Lord" just like the Israelites did in the desert.

Much like the children of Israel mimicked the lives of the Canaanite peoples, the Church in the United States mimics the methods of our society at large. We don't like to admit it, but many churches today resemble stock-holder owned businesses far more than they resemble the first Church. We have board meetings; we consult bankers; we take out large loans; we buy and sell real estate. We take so much pride in our buildings and in the size of our programs that we often forget that those things were only supposed to be the means by which to serve God. We begin to exist for the sake of maintaining our existence and then cry out in fear when God doesn't bless our plans to build bigger buildings and establish larger programs. We are confused about the source of our blessings and the object of our worship.

BTW, Grace blogged on Temples and Shrines yesterday. Be sure to check out what she has to say.