What we worship will always shape us.
August 23, 2022
"No issues touch us more profoundly or universally, No topics cause more controversy. No human realities have greater power to bless or curse. No three things have been more sought after or are more in need of a Christian response.' Money, Sex and Power discerns the biblical principles that enable us to live out a relevant and authentic response to the three greatest temptations of our age."
-Richard Foster
"The idols of the nations are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but do not speak;
they have eyes, but do not see;
they have ears, but do not hear,
nor is there any breath in their mouths.
Those who make them become like them,
so do all who trust in them. "
- Psalm 135:15-18 ESV
How do we become like the idols we create?
What are the characteristics and limitations on the objects we worship that shape us into their own image?
We make them in our images and find ourselves sucked into that place where we were when we made them and from there, we descend.
But these are the the psalms that follow after the Songs of Ascent. We have arrived at the holy hill and we must decide what we will worship.
I have been told that I married up and, it is true. I did well. Why would I worship down?
It is meant to be an ascent, not a descent.
We can still go higher, but not as long as we impose our own ideas, desires, motives, and biases upon our own worship. We cannot build our truth around our lifestyles. We must conform our lifestyles to truth.
Not only our lifestyles, but our thoughts, our theological constructs, our worship, and our devotion must conform to truth.
What we worship will always shape us.
We will become more and more like what we worship or who we worship.
If we worship what we ourselves create, then we are worshiping something less then ourselves (much more -- far less than God who created us). We will be worshiping that which, by nature, disintegrates and we shall disintegrate as well.
It is not that we are not made in the image of God nor than our creations are made in our images. It is that, We are not God and they are not us. With each degree of separation, there is disintegration. We must aim for what is authentic and true ... and above us.
If we worship that which infinite and eternal, the potential for growth is eternally expansive.
It is our choice.