Monthly Archives: April 2010

Jeremiah 12:1 (ESV)

Righteous are you, O Lord, when I complain to you;

yet I would plead my case before you.

Why does the way of the wicked prosper?

Why do all who are treacherous thrive?

God is righteous when we complain to Him. Things are not going our way. We do not like the difficulties we face, the evils that abound, and the hardships that mark the world. So we grumble. We question God’s wisdom, love, righteousness. We speak and act and perhaps think that if we were in charge things would be different.

The prophet Jeremiah knew this temptation. His life was a dreadful compilation of opposition, angst, persecution, ridicule and doubt. But this he knew. Even when he did not like what was going on, God was still righteous.

I attended a function last week where pastors were encouraged to counsel people to be “angry at God” and not sin, when their loved ones died. The impression I got was that the anger at God is much more important than the not sinning. The concept of justifiable anger at God for the things that happen to us or others is growing in popularity. It is considered therapeutic, helpful in the grieving process when one has lost a loved one. And it is wrong.

In Jeremiah 12 Jeremiah makes it known that he does not like the things that are happening around him. The wicked are prospering and Jeremiah does not like it. But he could not bring himself to accuse God of doing something wrong. And anger at God is just that. Anger is directed at others for the wrongs they have done. Our anger can be right or wrong depending on the motives and the reasons. Jesus got angry at the Pharisees and at His disciples. He was right. Jonah got angry at God for withering up a protective plant that he was sitting under for shade from the sun. He was wrong.

This world is a very wicked place. It is filled with unbelievably horrifying acts of cruelty, injustice and abuse. We would be less than human to not feel anger at those who express the sinfulness of their wicked hearts in such awful ways. But to turn things around and charge God with doing wrong because of the evil in the world or because He did not come through for us in the way that He could have and the way that we know He should have, is to believe that we know better than God. It is idolatry.

It can be made to sound compassionate and caring for others. But we are never truly compassionate when we allow people to charge God with injustice, cruelty, or abuse of power. Job lost all his possessions, all his children, all his money, and his health. When his wife suggested that he curse the God who had done this to him, Job’s response was to ask a question “Shall we receive good from God and shall we not receive evil?” The Christian counsellors of our age would say “yes”. And they are wrong. We do not know better than God. It is not for us to tell God that this time He has gone too far and that He is wrong to treat us as He is. It is evil on so many levels that it is hard to find an area of faith that is not effected by it.

Jeremiah did not like what was happening to him, to his city, or to the wicked who were prospering through the hardship. But he would not allow himself to charge God with wrongdoing, even though he was very perplexed. “Righteous are you O Lord, when I complain to you.” What a grand testimony.

You are going to have things happen to you that will challenge your faith in the goodness and benevolence and love of God. If someone says to you that you should be angry at Him, run away. Know that the God who has allowed you to travel through the deep waters is the God who is, in the very thing that hurts you, working it for your good. The God who could have stopped it from happening is the God who calls upon you to find your rest and hope in Him. He has not forsaken you. He will comfort you. He will make you better through this thing.

But He will not surrender up His rights to do as He knows best. He is God. We are not. Find Him to be all that you need in a very distressful life. But do not fall into thinking that you know better. That will not help you. Go with Jeremiah.

Proverbs 25:2 (ESV)

It is the glory of God to conceal things,

but the glory of kings is to search things out.

It is the glory of God to conceal things – What a glorious truth! God is in the business of hiding things with the express purpose of having us seek them out. It is the glory of Kings to seek things out. God does not tell us everything we need to know. He orchestrates things in such a way that we will have to seek things out and find them.

Every discovery of science is a testimony of God’s purposes being realized for His glory and the good of mankind. When man discovers something and uses it for his own glory or the death of people (think of dynamite, stem cell research, “safe” abortions, cloning … ) then he is living in direct contradiction of the purpose of the discovery and running away from God.

This is great wickedness. Christians are to be in their fields of work and study for the benefit of mankind and the glory of God. The two do not disagree and the world is crying for such voices of ethics and intelligence.

May God grant that we would use the knowledge that He has allowed us to develop in ways that will not have the charge of sin levelled against us in their use.

Psalm 1

1Blessed is the man

who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,

nor stands in the way of sinners,

nor sits in the seat of scoffers;

2but his delight is in the law of the LORD,

and on his law he meditates day and night.

3He is like a tree

planted by streams of water

that yields its fruit in its season,

and its leaf does not wither.

In all that he does, he prospers.

4The wicked are not so,

but are like chaff that the wind drives away.

5Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,

nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;

6for the LORD knows the way of the righteous,

but the way of the wicked will perish.

The man who does not do what the wicked do is not a lonely, desperate, recluse. He is a happy man. Going God’s way and doing God’s will and heeding God’s Word do not produce misery. The man in this Psalm takes great delight in the Law of the Lord. It is his happiness.

This doesn’t mean that the man of Psalm 1 is king of the nerds who just enjoys weird stuff. This is not someone who can’t get a date, who no one likes, is socially inept and everyone avoids. It also does not mean that the man is never sad. But it does mean that the Word of God is a tonic to the soul. It gives hope in the midst of despair, joy in the midst of sorrow, strength in the midst of weakness.

Because of his meditation and delight in the Law of God this man is strong, like a well watered, and well rooted tree. How many Christians today are accurately described in this way? Maybe the weakness of some is due to the fact that they put their focus too much on not being the nerdy type just mentioned.

We are full of reasons, explanations and excuses as to why we are neurotic, depressed, anxious. We have all kinds of explanations as to why we cannot meditate on the Word “day and night”. And we are not like trees planted by the rivers of water.

We should not believe that the man of Psalm 1 had no issues or no reasons to be depressed. He most likely did. Those problems would have bothered him. But they could not take away his delight in the Word of God. They did not stop him from getting into the Word of God. And they could not prevent him from becoming a man of strength and fruitfulness and real success.

People clamour today to be the things that the man of Psalm 1 had become. But they will not believe that the Word of God is part of the reason he has become that. So they chase after all the wrong things and miss the goal they were aiming at.

Spend some time in the Word today. Meditate on it. Pray to understand it and have it pierce to your soul. Strive to obey it.

So many voices to listen to. Don’t rob yourself by listening to all the ones that make great hollow promises that will never be fulfilled. Hear Him.

Proverbs 26:1 Like snow in summer or rain in harvest,

so honor is not fitting for a fool.

Foolish people should not be honoured. Praise to a fool will only make him more foolish. The honour will go to his head and he will live as if he is worthy of the press clippings. How often is honour lavished on fools for the sake of political expediency, peace, money, or some other less than ethical purposes? And see how this addresses the whole concept so prevalent in our culture today that maintains that there are no fools. Everyone, it is said, is wise in some fashion and therefore should never be labelled as a fool.

There are such things as fools and the Bible is clear that there is a cure for it. Biblically, of course, the supreme mark of a fool is the denial of the existence of God. This is far from saying that there are no fools on their way to heaven. The fool says there is no God but there are plenty of other types who believe in Him who, while not having atheism as their mark still do some pretty stupid things and act the fools that they are.

But in this most important respect of all, the smartest of men are fools for denying that there is God. Christian fools, while not having the supreme mark of foolishness, do have a collection of other marks that they should be endeavouring to eliminate from their lives and which they can because of the presence of the Holy Spirit in them. The fact that they use their faith to defend their foolishness is a sad scar upon the church and we pray that their numbers will only diminish as time continues. We rejoice that the adage “The intelligence on the earth is a constant – the population is growing” is not true, despite so much evidence to the contrary.

Don’t think that because you believe in God that you have nothing foolish about yourself. Get into the Scriptures and be wise. A foolish Christian is the most pathetic thing there is. Let us never be content with our level of wisdom and let us rejoice that God makes people truly wise.

Psalm 9

1I will give thanks to the LORD with my whole heart;

I will recount all of your wonderful deeds.

2I will be glad and exult in you;

I will sing praise to your name, O Most High.

3When my enemies turn back,

they stumble and perish before your presence.

4For you have maintained my just cause;

you have sat on the throne, giving righteous judgment.

5You have rebuked the nations; you have made the wicked perish;

you have blotted out their name forever and ever.

6The enemy came to an end in everlasting ruins;

their cities you rooted out;

the very memory of them has perished.

7But the LORD sits enthroned forever;

he has established his throne for justice,

8and he judges the world with righteousness;

he judges the peoples with uprightness.

9The LORD is a stronghold for the oppressed,

a stronghold in times of trouble.

10And those who know your name put their trust in you,

for you, O LORD, have not forsaken those who seek you.

11Sing praises to the LORD, who sits enthroned in Zion!

Tell among the peoples his deeds!

12For he who avenges blood is mindful of them;

he does not forget the cry of the afflicted.

“Count your blessings. Name them one by one. And it will surprise you what the Lord has done”. There is so much truth in that old hymn. We are often unthankful because we fail to see or recall just how beneficent God has been. Psalm 9 is a corrective to that.

David gives an impressive list of how God has been good to him and how thankful he is for those things. Some people are so miserable that they respond to such things with “yes, God was good to David, but what has He done for me lately?”. This is the intransigence of sin.

To read this, you need a computer (or access to a library, a friend, internet café, or at least the ability to steal one), electricity to get it turned on or to power up the battery, the ability to read, absorb information, think about abstract things like thanks and love and the whole concept of God. To complain about how God has not been good enough to you demands enough faith to believe that He exists, the ability to project into the future and want more and better things to happen. You are not likely reading this naked, which means that you have clothing. You are not likely reading this outdoors because of lack of a place to live and you have, or are, or will, have something to eat. You probably own a Bible – the undisputed best gift God has given you outside of the incarnate Son of God Himself. And if you are a Christian you are going to live forever in the presence of Jesus Christ, free from sin, sadness, sickness and pain. (If you are a Christian then understand that ingratitude is a supremely unchristian thing to do.)

Yes, you can be thankful, because you have such an incredible amount to be thankful for. And the last thing to mention? You can be thankful that right now you can go to God and confess the sin of ingratitude and be forgiven and treated by God as if you had never even committed it. Today, count your blessings. But don’t count them all. It would take too long and there are things to do.

A few thoughts from some former devotionals this week, while I get caught up on a few things.

Psalm 150

Let Everything Praise the LORD

1 Praise the LORD!Praise God in his sanctuary;

praise him in his mighty heavens!

2Praise him for his mighty deeds;

praise him according to his excellent greatness!

3Praise him with trumpet sound;

praise him with lute and harp!

4Praise him with tambourine and dance;

praise him with strings and pipe!

5Praise him with sounding cymbals;

praise him with loud clashing cymbals!

6Let everything that has breath praise the LORD! Praise the LORD!

Psalm 150:2 – Praise God according to His excellent greatness – If the verse said “praise Him for His excellent greatness” we might not be so overwhelmed as we are by the use of the word “according”. We are called to praise God according to His excellent greatness. This is completely beyond the ability of any human being to do. We cannot praise God to the degree that He is great.

This is a call to praise God with an understanding that He is far above whatever we are able to attribute to Him. It is a call to praise Him from our hearts, in sincerity, in truth, without hypocrisy, without our minds wandering off somewhere else.

We simply cannot praise Him to the degree that He is great. But we are able to praise God through Jesus Christ and that must be what this means. Come to God through Christ. There is no other way to approach Him, either as a repentant sinner or as a blood bought child. To praise God through Christ is to praise God according to His excellent greatness. We praise God through Christ, in Christ, by Christ. And God counts all that and more as if Christ was the One approaching . That is the only way to worship God according to His excellent greatness. Lost people simply cannot worship God acceptably and far too many believers come to worship thinking that it is a matter of them approaching in the right way. We certainly must not worship with wrong altitudes and wrong motives and actions. But we must never think that we are able to devise a method by which we can worship Him in such a way that He will find it acceptable. No. The only acceptable One is Christ Himself and we are hidden in Him and this is the greatest miracle of all.

Psalm 100:1-5

Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth!

[2] Serve the Lord with gladness!

Come into his presence with singing!

[3] Know that the Lord, he is God!

It is he who made us, and we are his;

we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

[4] Enter his gates with thanksgiving,

and his courts with praise!

Give thanks to him; bless his name!

[5] For the Lord is good;

his steadfast love endures forever,

and his faithfulness to all generations.

Every parent knows the importance of teaching children to be mannerly. They all know that their children are going to do things that they should not and that when they do they need to express true sorrow for what they have done. So, here is little Brandon who has just slugged his little sister with his fist. She has gone bellowing to mom and now he is being encouraged to apologize.

“Say you’re sorry”.

“No”

“Say you’re sorry!!”

“I’m NOT sorry”

Is mom teaching her little criminal to lie? Is she encouraging him to be dishonest about the way that he feels? Will he grow up thinking that as long as he says the right words it doesn’t matter if he really means them or not? Not at all. She is teaching him how he should feel when he hurts people. She is teaching him that the proper response to others when we have hurt them is repentance and reconciliation. She is teaching him, among a host of other things, what he should be feeling and that even if he does not feel that way he had better learn to bring the right feelings along.

Can we be commanded to feel? Does God merely require that our actions be right regardless of what our motives are or how much we hate doing what He has said? God is eminently concerned about our motives. The Scriptures are full of commandments and principles and stories and teachings which have the point of telling us that mere form is not what God wants. He wants our hearts. Jesus’ greatest criticism of the religious leaders who opposed Him was the hypocrisy that obeyed in form but not in heart.

Quoting Isaiah Jesus said of the Pharisees:

Matthew 15:8-9 – ” ‘This people honors me with their lips,

but their heart is far from me;

[9] in vain do they worship me,

teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ “

The fact that He was quoting from Isaiah means that God had the same issue with the people of Israel 700 years before. David writes that God does not delight in sacrifices, but rather a broken and contrite heart (Psalm 51:16-17). Amos scathingly tells the people he is sent to prophesy to that God hates their religious celebrations (Amos 5:21-24). One can hardly read the Bible and come away thinking that all that matters is form. But people do.

Where does all this take us? Psalm 100 begins with a call, a command from God to worship God with joy, to serve Him with gladness. Don’t just sing – sing with joy. Don’t just be there. Be there with all your heart. How can God command us to feel? How can we be called upon to worship with joy and gladness? Must not the pain stop first? Must not the money flow in, the children get in line, the community be safer, the world be less polluted, the neighbours be less obnoxious? Don’t we, like little Brandon, have the right to say “But I’m NOT joyful!”?

The world in which Psalm 100 was written was much harsher and much more difficult than the one we live in, in 21st century Canada. The Psalmist was not ignorant of the hardships of life when he wrote those words. But he knew that no matter what happens to him, or around him, or even in him, God is good and there is nothing that could separate him from his God.

If we need our circumstance to improve before we can worship God with our hearts then we will never worship God at all. And the problem would not be the problems we have. The problem would be that we do not know God. The world is commanded to worship God with joy. Those who have been brought, by grace, to God through faith in Jesus Christ, have had their hearts so changed that they are able to come into the presence of God in worship, with great joy. The only people who can truthfully say that they cannot worship God with joy, are those whose hearts have not been changed by grace.

The Psalm tells us what the problem is if we have difficulty worshipping God with our feelings. Verse 3 says “Know that the Lord, He is God”. There you go.

Finding it hard to bring your emotions into your worship? You don’t know God well enough. You need to know God better. You need to understand what He has done for you. You need to see yourself as He saw you before He saved you and loved you anyway. You need to come to grips with an unimaginable love that put the eternal Son of God on a cross to take punishment for your sin so that you could worship God. You need to see the goodness of God to you (verse 5) even in the midst of all the yuckiness of life. Chase after Him. Find Him. Know Him better. Then you will worship Him with great joy.

Jeremiah 11:6-8 – And the Lord said to me, “Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem: Hear the words of this covenant and do them. [7] For I solemnly warned your fathers when I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice. [8] Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of his evil heart. Therefore I brought upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did not.”

“Why is God doing this to me?” “Why did God allow this to occur?” “Why has God forgotten me?” These are questions that have been asked from almost the very beginning. When horrible things happen we want to know why God allowed it, caused it, or did not make it stop.

Sometimes the horrifying things are because of faithfulness to Jesus. He promised that tribulation would come to the faithful because of their faithfulness. Sometimes the troubles come simply because life in a fallen world is very difficult. God has never promised that His children will be spared the normal hardships of living in a fallen world that is sorely in need of redemption. Sometimes the troubles come because God is treating us like sons and as a good Father, God will not allow us to ruin ourselves through the sins that would carry us off and cause us to forget Him. He knows what it takes to keep us close to Himself. And sometimes the trouble is because God simply sends judgement upon the world in various forms for the purposes that He does not always reveal to us.

In Jeremiah 11 the people of Israel and Judah are about to enter into the worst conglomeration of troubles that they have ever experienced. And they will not be able to ask “Why are these things happening to us?” God tells them before they occur. They are about to be punished for their rebellion, their idolatry, their forgetting of God. God tells Judah that there is no more time for them. The die is cast. The judgement is coming. And they have no one to blame but themselves. He reminds them of all the warnings that He has given them. It is a mind boggling thing that He tells them. Verse 7 says:

For I solemnly warned your fathers when I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice.

From the Exodus out of Egypt until the time of Jeremiah God has been warning the people to turn from sin. That is a period of about 800 years. 800 years. Canada is 143 years old. 800 years ago everyone knew that if you sailed far enough you would go over the edge of the world and be lost forever. Galileo and Copernicus had not yet been born. North America was not yet discovered, atleast not by Europeans. The Reformation was not to come for 300 years. 800 years is very long time.

Over thirty generations of Israelites had heard the message of God to not get sucked into the idolatry around them. Some got the message. Most did not. God sent Judges, prophets and kings. Some of them turned out to be as bad as those they were sent to. God warned and warned and warned. He sent defeat in battle. He sent judgement on others. He even sent a captivity to the northern kingdom of Israel. But Judah will not believe that God will do it to them. Out of all that Judah has been through they know that God is not upset with them.

Amazing. How blind does sin make us? And how patient is God with people? The patience is stunning. Perhaps people have become so accustomed to the patience of God that they think patience is the default position. God simply will not punish. They treat him like they treat a mother who makes great threats that they know will never be carried out. But this time God has had it. And the judgement came. And it came hard.

North American colonization by Europeans began less than five hundred years ago. It has known a level of prosperity and peace on its shores unprecedented in the history of humanity. And we carry on like nothing will ever interfere with the culture and way of life that we have come to think of as normal.

The church in North America has benefited greatly from it. The church has been a large part of creating it. And the North American church seems to think that it will always have the luxury that it has come to regard as normal.

But we, like the Israelites of old, are barely indistinguishable from our unbelieving neighbours. The cardinal doctrines that have marked the church for millennia are being denied. Jesus as the only way, salvation by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone is simply mocked – in the church. Social justice is seen as the Gospel. Money is seen as the measure of God’s approval. Church growth and large numbers prove to us that we are doing things right. Humility, gentleness, and kindness are notably absent among those shouting that they are Bible believers. The Scriptures warn and warn and warn. And we need to hear the warnings.

Of course I could be wrong. There are lots of things that point to the  fact that God is doing a great deal through the church in North America. But a little self examination wouldn’t hurt at all. Just in case.

On the other hand, we’ve only been here for 500 years. There’s lots of time.

Jeremiah 10:11-14 (ESV)

Thus shall you say to them: “The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under the heavens.”

[12] It is he who made the earth by his power,

who established the world by his wisdom,

and by his understanding stretched out the heavens.

[13] When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens,

and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth.

He makes lightning for the rain,

and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses.

[14] Every man is stupid and without knowledge;

every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols,

for his images are false,

and there is no breath in them.

The debate rages between proponents of intelligent design, pure evolution from nothing, and the creation of all things by a wise and powerful Creator God. It is a debate that matters. There is much more at stake than just the truthfulness of a few texts of Scripture, although that is not an insignificant issue.

The fact that God is the Creator of all things and sustains the created order is a testimony of His wisdom

Proverbs 3:19 – The Lord by wisdom founded the earth;

by understanding he established the heavens;

It speaks of His power

Psalm 65:6 – the one who by his strength established the mountains,

being girded with might;

It reminds us that He owns the whole thing, meaning that to misuse the planet is to abuse someone else’s property.

Psalm 24:1-2 – A Psalm of David.

The earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof,

the world and those who dwell therein,

[2] for he has founded it upon the seas

and established it upon the rivers.

It tells us that God is more glorious than we can possibly imagine

Psalm 19:1 – To the choirmaster. A Psalm of David.

The heavens declare the glory of God,

and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.

The creation is a reminder to us that God is in charge

Isaiah 45:9 – “Woe to him who strives with him who formed him,

a pot among earthen pots!

Does the clay say to him who forms it, ‘What are you making?’

or ‘Your work has no handles’?

The debate between those who believe that the universe is the product of a wise God and those who believe the universe is the product of itself is of crucial importance. Take God out of the creation and there is no reason for worship. There is nothing or no one to whom we are accountable. There is no truth to be received, but only principles that we make up depending on the situation. There is only survival of the fittest, not compassion and mercy.

God, as the sovereign Creator of all that is, is where the Gospel begins. God made everything and He made us – the God who made us has told us how to live in peace with him – we have violated every command and precept handed down to us by a loving God and we need to be recreated. And this is what He has done.

Take God out of the picture in creation and there is no one to be accountable to. There are no laws that are handed down to us. There is no higher authority. This is why there are atheists. Easier to believe that God does not exist than discover that He does and have to govern one’s life accordingly. Actually, take God out of the picture, and there is nothing at all.

There may be allowances made regarding some details of how God created everything, but this cannot be surrendered – God did it. The earth is His and we are his creatures. Mankind has always been man and is made in the image if God and is eternal and can only find forgiveness and purpose and meaning and help, in the God who has made him. If this is not true then nothing in the Bible is true either and followers of Jesus Christ are deluded fools, which is precisely what the “new” (and old) atheism maintains.

God who made us is the only One who can tell us how to live our lives. Since He made us in his image we can only find hope and satisfaction in Him. He is the reason we are here and we are all wandering souls with no direction until we rest in Him.

The Apostle Paul compares God’s fiat “let there be light” to what happens in the soul when a person realizes his need for Jesus Christ. So God is still creating. Every time someone comes to Christ for the forgiveness of sin God has said, “Let there be light”. That is how dead we are. If He does not come and enable us to believe we will not. O Lord, thank you for being the great God of creation that you are. And thank you for creating new creatures in Christ. Forgive us for acting and thinking at times as if you had never said “Let there be light” into our souls. Help us to live as children of light.

2 Cor. 4:6 – For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

Jeremiah 10:3-8 (ESV)

for the customs of the peoples are vanity.

A tree from the forest is cut down

and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman.

[4] They decorate it with silver and gold;

they fasten it with hammer and nails

so that it cannot move.

[5] Their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field,

and they cannot speak;

they have to be carried,

for they cannot walk.

Do not be afraid of them,

for they cannot do evil,

neither is it in them to do good.”

[6] There is none like you, O Lord;

you are great, and your name is great in might.

[7] Who would not fear you, O King of the nations?

For this is your due;

for among all the wise ones of the nations

and in all their kingdoms

there is none like you.

[8] They are both stupid and foolish;

the instruction of idols is but wood!

Jeremiah 10:10-14 (ESV)

But the Lord is the true God;

he is the living God and the everlasting King.

At his wrath the earth quakes,

and the nations cannot endure his indignation.

[11] Thus shall you say to them: “The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under the heavens.”

[12] It is he who made the earth by his power,

who established the world by his wisdom,

and by his understanding stretched out the heavens.

[13] When he utters his voice, there is a tumult of waters in the heavens,

and he makes the mist rise from the ends of the earth.

He makes lightning for the rain,

and he brings forth the wind from his storehouses.

[14] Every man is stupid and without knowledge;

every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols,

for his images are false,

and there is no breath in them.

Jeremiah 10:21 (ESV)

For the shepherds are stupid

and do not inquire of the Lord;

therefore they have not prospered,

and all their flock is scattered.

The second of the Ten Commandments commands that God not be portrayed by anything in heaven or in earth. Nothing in heaven or on earth is to be used to portray God. Nothing. Why not? Because the Creator cannot adequately be pictured by something that He has made.

It would be like focussing on the smile of the Mona Lisa and saying “that is Da Vinci”, or a chip of stone off St. Paul’s Cathedral and saying “this is Christopher Wren”. It’s stupid and insulting. The things God created can tell us that our God is very great but they cannot capture God inside themselves so that we can call them God.

There is no way to try and portray God without insulting Him, without bringing Him down to our level. There is only one way that God can be brought down to our level and that is if He chooses to come down and be here. And that is exactly what He did.

Jeremiah 10 talks about the stupidity of idolatry (verses 8, 14, 21). People carve something from stone or wood and then bow down to it. The creator bows down to the creation. Stupid.

Jeremiah 10 tells us why we must not make images for worship. 1) Verse 6 – it is because there is none like Him. Nothing we make can properly portray God. If the image is of another god then it cannot come close to even representing the power and majesty of the real One. If your god can be pictured it is a testimony that it is not much. The real one is beyond comparison. To picture God is to bring Him down. It is to try to tame Him and taming God is unthinkable. It is stupid. 2)Verse 10, 14 – The Lord is the true God and every image of God will be a false representation of Him. He makes the earth quake. He cannot be fashioned by it. 3) Verse 15 – the images are worthless. They can do nothing. They stay where you put them and they shall cease to be when God rains down His judgement. The god who can be destroyed is no God at all.

Now then. Unless you come from a tradition that actually makes idols you are not likely guilty of this sin in its literal sense. But we do make our idols don’t we? As the man who goes into the forest and cuts down a tree and fashions an idol from it so we fashion our houses and cars and jewellery and put them in a place in our lives that God alone deserves. We value what the god of our culture, money, can provide us with. We value the gift from God more than the God of the gift.

We will use the things that God gives us, to do those things which God has commanded us not to do. We will take the money and the cars and the cottages and the days off that God grants us to forsake meeting with believers. We will use the computers and the televisions that God has allowed us to enjoy, to watch all kinds of godless idolatrous things. We will treat God like a delivery boy for the things that really matter to us. We will even ask God to give us things that we love more than Him and then grumble against Him if we do not get them. We pray and act like His purpose is to come through for us in wealth and health. It is all idolatry.

Then Jeremiah says in 10:21 “For the Shepherds are stupid and do not inquire of the Lord; therefore they have not prospered and all their flock is scattered”. As usual the idolatry is led by the religious leaders. Pastors who do not pray and then they produce people who have no spiritual depth or stamina. How can they? They have none themselves. They produce people who are just like them.

It is all a very shocking picture and we would be very wrong to think that we cannot and have not committed these same sins to some degree. We read Jeremiah and shake our heads at how godless Israel had become. But we are being tempted in exactly the same sorts of ways and God is no more pleased with us than He was with them when we give in to those temptations.

Idolatry is insidious. It creeps up on us when we are least expecting it. We become guilty of it without even knowing it. No Christian plans to put something ahead of God. But they do. Are we willing to ask ourselves if we are guilty of the idolatry that we condemn when we read the Old Testament prophets? If we are not then we can be sure that we indeed will commit the very sins that brought them into the judgement of God.

God is so much better. God is so great and so worthy of all our worship. It is so stupid to let anything ahead of Him. And I want to be smart.