God has a wife? – Ezekiel 15 & 16, Part 2

I’m excited to feature the photography of my friend, Heather Leicy! Please learn more at her website. She does amazing work!

God has a wife! Am I talking about Jesus marrying Mary Magdalene, as was popularized in The Da Vinci Code? No. While that is a thrilling story, it based on fiction. What I am talking about is a different section of the Bible that tells a story about God getting married. Unfortunately for God, the marriage is difficult. Before we talk about God’s wife, we need to learn the answer to a riddle.

We talked about the riddle in the previous post. Here’s the riddle from Ezekiel 15 verse 2: “How is the wood of a vine better than that of a branch on any of the trees in the forest?” As we learned in the previous post, the main purpose for grapevine is to make grapes!  When grapevine wood is no longer making grapes, it has only one purpose remaining!  What do you think that one purpose might be? 

Look at Ezekiel 15, verses 4-5 for the answer.

Vine wood is better than the other word of the forest, because it is the best fire starter.  Kindling.  Dead vine wood is not good for much else, but to be burned!

Why does God share this riddle? God explains it to the people in verses 6-8.  The riddle about dead vine wood is actually a prophecy against Jerusalem using figurative language.  What is the figure of speech?  It’s a metaphor: just as the dead wood from the vine is best used for starting fires, God will treat the people of Jerusalem in like manner.  Why?  Because they have been unfaithful, he says in verse 8. That word “unfaithful “is the perfect transition to chapter 16, where God gives another prophecy against Jerusalem using metaphor.  Turn in your Bible to chapter 16.  It is a long chapter, and rather than comment on it verse by verse, I’ll summarize it. I think you’ll see how the metaphor in chapter 16 connects to the word, “unfaithful.” 

God compares the city of Jerusalem to a baby that is unwanted and left out to die.  He rescues the baby, speaks life over the baby, and brings it to health and maturity as a beautiful woman.  Then, surprise, through the covenant of marriage, he makes her his queen.  But the queen becomes arrogant and proud, caught up in her own beauty and fame, and she becomes a prostitute.  Through this metaphor, God is describing his people, the Jews.  How they broke his covenant and pursued foreign nations and false gods. In verses 30-34 God describes the people of Jerusalem as a reverse-prostitute, where instead of receiving pay for services, they run after suitors offering them bribes. 

Imagine being God.  He is the husband in this scenario.  Though he rescued the people and made them flourish, what do they do?  Look at verse 32.  They prefer strangers to their own husband.  God is so emotional in this prophecy, as I’m sure any spouse would be when their spouse is not just receiving other lovers but chasing after them with bribes.  God is basically saying, “How much do you hate me?”   

What is so surprising, then, is that God says he will restore their fortunes. 

Why? And how? We’ll talk about it in the next post, and what seems to be a rather dark section of Scripture, turns out to have great hope!

When someone close to you wanders away – Ezekiel 15 & 16, Part 1

My college roommate was best man in my wedding.  We were very close. After graduating from college, we even worked together for a few years.  Then he asked me to be his best man.  On the one hand I was elated, but on the other hand, my wife and were very concerned about his relationship with his fiancé.  There was enough trouble in the relationship that we felt it was very unwise for them to get married.  So, out of that concern, I told him I couldn’t be his best man.  I’m guessing it will not come as a surprise, then, when I tell you that my decision pretty much killed our relationship.  We had a mediation with the pastor who was doing their premarital counseling, and we worked things out, but not to the point where I was still his best man.  We attended the wedding, but that was about it.  It was a wound that lingered. We didn’t talk much for the next six years.

Maybe you know the feeling.  It is exceedingly emotional and painful when a close relationship changes level.  It is even worse when it is the other person that wanders away, and you don’t want them to.  I am not talking about when someone close to you passes away.  Certainly, that is a change in relationship that carries very similar emotions.  I am specifically talking about a very close relationship that gets broken.  It could be a spouse.  It could be a friend. 

While I am deeply grateful that my friend and I reconciled to the point where we are close again, I know many broken relationships don’t. In our continuing study through Ezekiel, in chapters 15 and 16, God expresses the heart-wrenching emotion of a person whose loved one is wandering, unreconciled.

From nearly day one, God has given Ezekiel prophetic messages about a coming destruction of Jerusalem.  Many of those prophecies have been in the form of skits.  In Ezekiel 15 and 16, however, God gives Ezekiel two prophecies in the form of figurative language.  Turn to Ezekiel 15 and read verses 1-2, looking for a riddle that introducing the first prophecy using figurative language.

The riddle is in verse 2: “How is the wood of a vine better than that of a branch on any of the trees in the forest?” Do you know the answer?

Before we see if you correctly guessed the answer to the riddle, God has two other questions in verse 3. First, is wood from grape vine useful for making things?  What do you think?  I asked two carpenters in our church family, and neither of them have used grape wood, and hadn’t really heard of it being used.

Why?  It’s too small!  Too thin.  And it is really twisty.  Google it and you’ll see.  Of course, in 2021 you can find furniture made from grape wood.  It is cool-looking because of how twisted grape wood is.  But in Ezekiel 15, God is talking to people living 2600 years ago, and their options for using wood for furniture were extremely limited.  They didn’t use grapevine wood for making things. So we have an answer to the first question in verse 3.

God asks a second question, because someone in that culture might respond, “Okay, true, you’re not going to be making tables or chairs from grapevine wood, but you could use it to make pegs, right?”  Pegs for hanging things are very small.  We make pegs out of dowels, wood that is made into rods.  Maybe grape wood would work for that.  Of course someone could try.  Someone probably had tried.  But the reality is that it is not the normal process for carpentry.  You don’t use grapevine wood for making things, because it is too thin or twisted.  What God is doing here is speaking the obvious.  Everyone in that culture already knew that you don’t use grape wood for making things, even small pegs like dowels. The main purpose for grapevine is to make grapes!  When grapevine wood is no longer making grapes, it has only one purpose remaining! 

What do you think that one purpose might be? 

We’ll find out in the next post!

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Do you feel disconnected from God – Ezekiel 15 & 16, Preview

When is the most recent time you encountered God?  Maybe it was long ago.  Maybe it was today.  Maybe you wonder if you have ever encountered God.  Maybe you encounter God on a regular basis.

What was it like when you encountered God?  Did it happen during worship?  Maybe you felt his presence in nature?  Perhaps you were reading the Bible, and you sensed God speaking to you?  The famous movie, Chariots of Fire, is about Eric Liddell, an Olympic runner, and he said that when he ran, he felt God’s pleasure.  Maybe you know what that’s like.  We can encounter God while we are creating art, singing songs, praying, serving, working, driving…anywhere.  God is not limited to manifesting himself during worship services.

Maybe you’re reading this thinking, “I haven’t encountered God in a long time, and I feel distant from him.”  You might admit that you haven’t encountered him even in worship services, which have the specific purpose of helping us connect with God every week.

Do you feel dry?  Spiritually dead?  Disconnected from God?  If so, you’re not alone.  You might remember the story of Mother Theresa.  Yes, that Mother Theresa, the famous nun who gave her life to serve the poor in India.  She claimed that for most of her ministry years she experienced what some people call a dark night of the soul, a sense of disconnect from God, in which the felt presence of God seems nowhere to be found.

In Mother Theresa’s case, she remained faithful, of course, even though she longed for God, and only rarely felt his presence.  In other words, she remained spiritually vibrant.  Some of us, and perhaps many of us, don’t feel spiritually vibrant.  In fact, it could be that we have neglected God.  It could be that we have turned away from him.  Sure, we still believe in him, but we must admit that we haven’t done much to cultivate a relationship with him.  We haven’t really tried to encounter God.

Does that describe you and your relationship with God?

In the next series of posts we study Ezekiel chapters 15 and 16, and God has some very emotional things to say about his relationship with his people.  Read it ahead of time and see what you think, then check back in next week as we discuss it further.

Photo by Jackson Douglas on Unsplash

Does your life need a U-turn? – Ezekiel 14, Part 5

Is there any way you might be heading in the wrong direction? Maybe it is obvious and you know it, but you are plowing ahead anyway. Maybe it is not so obvious, and you suspect it, and in your moments of quietness you long for something different, but you don’t really believe it is possible to make a change. We can feel trapped. Is it possible to make a change?

What we have been learning in our five-part series on Ezekiel 14 is God’s message to the people of Israel, that they needed a U-turn, in their hearts’ desires and in their actions. They were headed for deep trouble, and he calls them to repent, which is a theological way of saying, “Turn around! There’s disaster ahead.” Read Ezekiel 14, verses 12-23, and you’ll hear him talk about the disaster ahead.

Did you hear the names of three men: Noah, Daniel and Job.  It seems like God is referring to the famous Noah, who built the ark, and the famous Job, whose story is in a book of the Bible.  The Daniel, though…we’re not sure.  The famous Daniel from the book of Daniel, was likely alive at the same time as Ezekiel and starting his famous career in Babylon.  The point of this section is not so much the identity of these three guys, but how they would react to the situation God describes.  You heard how the pattern is repeated four times over in verses 13-20.  God says if he sends disastrous judgment to a nation because they have been sinful and unfaithful, even if those three men were alive, they could only save themselves.  The rest of the nation would face judgement. 

So God says, this will happen to Jerusalem.  Four dreadful judgements, and it will be awful.  With that in mind, notice verse 22. There will be a remnant that will come to Babylon where Ezekiel and the 10,000 exiles now live.  Here’s where it gets interesting.  Ezekiel and the 10,000 exiles will observe the newbies when they arrive, and they will see how wicked their conduct will be.  What they see will tell Ezekiel and the exiles that God was justified in allowing Jerusalem to be destroyed.  God’s judgment isn’t random, and it isn’t unjust.  It is instead a response to the fact that the people had set up idols in their hearts and committed wickedness.

The focus of the chapter, however, is not God’s judgment, but his invitation to repentance!  God is separated from his people, and he is not at all happy about that.  They chose to leave him, and now he invites them to return to him. 

God is passionate about being in relationship with his people.  So have you allowed anything to capture the desire of your heart?  Ezekiel chapter 14 is a clarion call for us to examine our hearts.  What do you desire? Is God your desire? 

Or better yet, how does your desire for a vibrant relationship with God stack up to your other desires?  For example, I can eagerly desire to be done with my dissertation, to have my dissertation published as a book, for it to make the New York Times best-seller list, etc.  But do I desire God like that? 

Is the God the ruler and focus of your desires? 

This is why we so often talk about inner transformation, so that our desires, which we all have, are being transformed by God, to be in line with his heart.  Do your desires match up with God’s desires?  This is what Paul describes in Galatians 5 as walking in step with the Spirit. 

So often our desires are different from God’s desires.  Maybe a little, maybe a lot.  We live in a world that feeds our desires, and often not because it truly cares about us.  Think about how businesses tap into our desires, making us desire their products.  While they say that their products will change our lives and give us the good life, the reality is that they want our money.  They want our money more than they have our best interest in mind. 

God, however, has our best interest in mind.  When he told the Jews in Ezekiel’s day that they should repent and return to him, it was because that was the best possible situation for them.  They would be far better off if they were in a vibrant relationship with God, then if they continued down the pathway of setting up idols in their hearts and performing wicked deeds.  God is trying to give them a vision for a better reality, for a world where the true good life is reality. 

So I ask, what idols have you set up in your hearts?  More than likely those idols have promised the good life.  But those idols make promises they cannot keep. They are not telling the truth about the good life. Where then is the truth to be found? God’s message to the elders in Ezekiel 14 is the truth.

In Ezekiel 14, God gives us an important reminder to examine our hearts, our desires, and to evaluate if they are aligned with God’s heart and desires.  This can require vulnerable work on our part.  Sometimes hard work.  Sometimes uncomfortable work.  This can require that we include people in our lives who speak honestly to us, asking us the tough questions about our heart’s desires.  Perhaps the best thing for us is to have our lives placed under that kind of examination, to see if we do in fact have godly desire or not.  If we do, then we should do what God asks of the people in Ezekiel 14, repent!  Turn back to him.  Make a U-turn. Restore your relationship with him. Repentance brings renewal.

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A curious case of God making a prophet sin? – Ezekiel 14, Part 4

Long ago I attended a church’s Sunday School class in which the teacher claimed that God is in control of everything, which includes creating and causing human sin, and then punishing humans for the sin. I found that very strange and wrong. I questioned the teacher, but he explained that God is holy and perfect, even in something that doesn’t make sense to us. That didn’t sit well with me. As we continue reading Ezekiel 14, we come to a section that seems to prove that Sunday School teacher correct. So maybe I am wrong. Or is there another way of looking at the passage?

In the previous post we heard God say emphatically in Ezekiel 14, verse 6 to his rebellious people, “Repent!  Turn away from the false gods.  Come back to me!  Let me be your desire.”  God doesn’t want to be separated from his people, and he doesn’t want divorce.  He wants to be in close relationship with his people. So will they return?  He doesn’t tell us yet. Instead he addresses a situation where one of the prophets also needs to hear the message of repentance and return.

In verses 9-10 God sends a clear warning to false prophets. When you read verse 9, it might sound like God is saying, “I will cause the prophet to prophesy, and then I will punish him to the point of death.”  Wait…that doesn’t sound right, does it?  I want to ask God, “Are you saying you’re taking away his free will, and then punishing him for something you made him do?”  If so, that’s not fair, right? That’s actually evil.  Whenever you read Scripture and it doesn’t make sense or it makes God out to be evil, something is amiss.  Could be a cultural difference, a mistranslation, or a misinterpretation.  We know God’s heart is a heart of love.  He is not a God who plays manipulative unfair games. 

So what is going on here?  I think there is an explanation.  Go back to verse 7, which is where God first mentions the prophet.  There we see God describe a situation where people in rebellion go to a prophet.  God says he will intervene and speak straight to the people himself.  He will not use the normal method where the prophet is the intermediary.  Now in verse 9, God continues describing that situation.  What if, God says, the prophet speaks anyway?  It seems that God is describing a prophet who is arrogant or power hungry, to the point where God has already spoken, God has already dealt with the situation, and yet this prophet still speaks.  How bold, right?  It reminds me of seminary classes where students would disagree with the professor and almost start teaching the class.  I would be thinking in my head, “Shut up…these classes are super expensive, and we are not paying all this money to hear you talk.  We want to hear from the expert, the professor.”  In like manner, this arrogant prophet speaks up, after God already spoke!  What more could the prophet add?  Nothing!  God handled the situation quite well.  The prophet should be quiet.  But nope, they can’t keep their mouth shut, and they speak. 

But what about the part in verse 9 where it says God enticed them?  I do not believe that means God has overridden their free will and made them speak.  Instead, it seems best to understand it as the prophet, though they heard God talk and deal with the situation, they are still very eager to add their two cents to the discussion.  You know how you get in a discussion and people are sharing their stories and you think you have the ultimate story to share? You are chomping at the bit to tell your story, because then you are sure you will be the star of the conversation!  Everyone will think you are hilarious or knowledgeable or wise.  I think something like that is going on here in Ezekiel 14, verse 9.  The prophet should have kept his mouth shut.  God handled the situation.  Of course God handled it.  It is God we are talking about here.  Why in the world would the prophet think he has anything at all to add after God has spoken?  Well, some people are know-it-alls.  They can’t shut up.  The temptation to get their voice heard in the discussion is so enticing, they gave in and let it fly.  Rather than becoming the star of the discussion, God says to the prophet, “You’re done.” 

But notice the drastic shift that happens in verse 11.  After God places the guilt on the prophet, the people no longer stray from God, no longer commit sin, and they have returned to God.  They will be his people, and he will be their God. This is a picture of repentance that has led to renewal! 

Hold that thought: Repentance leads to renewal. In the next and final post, we’ll work through the rest of Ezekiel chapter 14, and then we will talk more about what it means: repentance leads to renewal.

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When you might not want God to talk to you – Ezekiel 14, Part 3

How would you describe your relationship with God? Close? Distant?

In Ezekiel 14, verse 7, God describes the status of his relationship with his people.  He says that they separated themselves from him.  They chose to separate themselves from God, and they showed this choice by setting up idols in their hearts and putting the wicked stumbling blocks in front of them. 

God’s indictment is strong.  He says that they are no longer in relationship with him, because they have willfully chosen to be separate from him.  When we talk about separation in marriage relationships, it is serious.  Divorce is often not far away.  That’s why we only rarely advise separation. 

In this case, though, it is not God who has agreed to the separation.  It is the people who have chosen it.  They did it, not God.  They walked away from him. 

Now when these elders show up at Ezekiel’s house asking Ezekiel to give them a message from God, they still have idolatry in their hearts, and they are still doing wicked sinful actions. They have not repented.  They are still in a separated state, still in rebellion, and yet they have the audacity to show up and ask God for help.  They don’t really want to be in relationship with God.  They just want him to do their bidding.  It is very selfish on their part.  Imagine being God in this situation.  In verse 5 he uses a vivid word to describe how he feels.  He says, “You deserted me.” 

So in verse 7 God says, “So now you’ve come to my prophet to inquire of me?  Guess what?  I’m going to answer you myself.”  Woah.  That’s new.  This is direct communication from God.  God talking straight to you sounds intimate and personal, but there is a big problem.  Because the people have not repented, because they are still in rebellion, God’s direct communication to the elders might not be what they are hoping to hear. 

Look at verse 8.  God says “I will set my face against them.”  Yikes.  Remember the Prophetic Stare from chapters 6 and 13?  That’s when God told Ezekiel to set his face against the mountains of Israel, and then against the false prophets.  Now God says, “I will be the one to stare at you.”  The Prophetic Stare was like a judgement, shining the light of God’s truth on a situation.  You do not want God to unleash the Prophetic Stare on you. If Ezekiel stared at you, Ezekiel was just a person.  People might say, “Stop staring at me.  Weirdo.”  But when God stares at you, I think we are safe in believing it would be very different.  Look at how he describes it in verse 8.  God will stare at them and make them an example and a byword.  That’s a way of saying that they will become a proverb, and it is not going to be a proverb about what to do.  It will be a proverb of what not to do.  A cautionary tale.  “Don’t be like those guys who set up idols in their hearts and committed wicked sinful acts.”  Worse, in verse 8 God says, “I will cut you off.” 

It’s almost as if God has said, “So you separated yourself from me?  OK, I divorce you.”  You don’t want God to say, “I divorce you.”  Divorce is always painful and awful.  But when God divorces you, you will experience an aloneness and bleakness and a despair that you cannot imagine.  But you will know one thing, God says.  You will know that he is the Lord.  You will know that the idols you set up in your hearts were false, empty promises.  And you will know that God is the one true God.

This is why God says emphatically in verse 6, “Repent!  Turn away from the false gods.  Come back to me!  Let me be your desire.”  God doesn’t want this separation, and he doesn’t want divorce.  He wants to be in close relationship with his people. 

But will they return? Check back to the next post to learn what happens next.

For now, though, ask yourself: do I need to return to God?

Photo by Darius Bashar on Unsplash

God’s surprising response to idolatry in the heart – Ezekiel 14, Part 2

Have you had a person in your life who screws you over, hurts you, chooses to barely ever talk to you, and yet when they need money, they are so bold to come ask for your help?  They haven’t had anything like a good relationship with you for a long time, and suddenly they appear out of the blue asking for help.  How does that make you feel?  Used.  In Ezekiel 14, it seems like God is feeling something like that. 

In the previous post, we learned the elders of Ezekiel’s town came to visit him, seeking a prophetic word from God. God, however, says that the elders have set up idols in their hearts and they are committed sinful acts. God calls those sinful acts a stumbling block. This is literally the idea of tripping on something that makes you fall. 

Whereas the first concern God has was for their inner being (idolatry in the heart), now he draws attention to what is outside them.  It could be committing sin with a prostitute.  It could be cheating on someone.  It could be stealing from a store.

If the first problem is their corrupted desire, the second problem is the acting out of that desire.  Both lead to sin.  Both lead to brokenness between God and humanity.

At the end of Ezekiel 14, verse 3 God asks Ezekiel, “Should I let them inquire of me at all?”  It’s as if God is saying, “These guys are so far gone.  They have chosen to set up idols in their hearts, and they are acting in sin! Yet they come to inquire of me?” 

The question is not “How will God respond?”, but “Will he respond at all?”  These elders have come to inquire of the Lord, and yet God has revealed that they have set up idols in their hearts and put wicked stumbling blocks before their faces.  God has every right to say, “No way.  I’m not talking with you.” 

How will God respond? Look at verse 4, and prepare to be surprised.  God says, “When you act like that, and then come to me looking for answers, I’ll answer you in keeping with how you’ve acted.”  What will that look like?  Punishment?  Judgment?  Silent treatment? 

No.  Read verse 5.  Amazingly, God wants to recapture their hearts!  They have all deserted him, and yet there he is still longing for relationship with them, still inviting them.  That’s how he answers them.  That’s what it means to respond to them in keeping with their idolatry.  He says, “Before we can talk, we need to deal with your idolatry and sin!”  God will not interact with them until he has their hearts.  He is saying that there is a serious issue that needs to be dealt with first.  He is not going to say, “Oh hey, guys, thanks for stopping by, how can I help you?” ignoring the fact that they have ventured so far from him in their hearts and in their behavior.  God is saying to them, “Full stop.  Before we can even talk, we need to deal with the idolatry in your heart and your sinful ways.”  This shows how he is merciful, gracious and loving, but also that he is concerned with truth and justice.

But how?  Look at verse 6.  Here’s what they have to do.  One word.  Repent.

Repent is a powerful word.  It’s actually used twice in a row here in verse 6.  Repent and Return.  They are the same word in the original.  The first is an emphatic command.  Repent!  It means to turn around.  It gives the image a person who is going one direction, the wrong direction, and turns around to go back in the right direction. That is the very literal sense.  God is using the word in a theological or spiritual sense, saying to the people, “Come back to me! Return to me!  Restore relationship with me!” 

The second use of the word includes specific details as to what God expects.  Those idols they have set up in their hearts?  They are to turn away from them.  The wicked stumbling block activities?  Turn away from them too!  When we repent, we turn away from anything that keeps us from God, and we restore our relationship with him.

How is your relationship with God? Do you need to repent?

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Do you have idolatry in your heart and not know it? – Ezekiel 14, Part 1

What do you long for?  What do you desire?  A relationship?  Debts paid off?  A big enough savings account so you’re not living paycheck to paycheck?  A new car?  New house?  A different personality?  Different looks?  Good health?  Healing?  Success?  Athletic ability?  Artistic ability?  A raise?  What do you long for? 

We all have desire.  We all have longings.  God created us to be people with desires.  That means that desire is not wrong.  Desire, all by itself, is neutral. Desire and longing is a normal part of what it means to be a human.

Desire can be good.  It can drive us to achieve, to right what is wrong, to discover, to lead, to grow.  But desire can also be bad.  In fact nearly every bad thing that people do is rooted in evil desire, whether the tiniest white lie or the most awful crime. 

This week we continue our study through Ezekiel with a five-part series on Ezekiel chapter 14.  There we will meet people who have some longings, some desires. 

In verse 1 we read that the elders visit Ezekiel.  This is the second time the elders have had an audience with Ezekiel.  The first was in chapter 8, when Ezekiel had a grand vision in which God transported him to Jerusalem.  Now they’re back.  It seems the elders identified Ezekiel as a prophet, and they would visit him likely to hear a word from the Lord.  So even though Ezekiel was a prophet with a unique method of prophesying, using street skits, and he likely wasn’t taken seriously by many people, there must have been at least some understanding or agreement among the elders that Ezekiel was a true prophet of God.  They show up at Ezekiel’s house to ask the prophet to inquire of God. What will God say to the elders?

We read in verses 2-3 that God says these men have two major problems.  First, they have set up idols in their hearts, and second, they have put wicked stumbling blocks before their faces.  What does God mean?

We’re going to spend most of our time talking about that first one: they set up idols in their hearts.  We’ve heard a lot about idolatry so far in the book of Ezekiel.  There were idols in the high places, up in the mountains, of Israel.  There were idols in the temple in Jerusalem.  Idols were figurines made of stone, wood or metal.  What, then, is an idol in the heart?  We’re not talking about putting a little idol figurine inside a person’s blood pumper.  No heart surgery going on here.  The word “heart” used here refers to a person’s inner being.  This is source of our emotion and feeling.  It is similar to how we use the concept of mind or will. 

God is saying that idolatry has taken root in their inner being. They are longing after something, and that something is not God.  It is an idol, a false god, an idea.  In the ancient world, the gods were conceived to be the source of protection, healing, fertility, wealth, and blessing.  You would pay tribute to the gods, make sacrifices to gods, giving them money and animals and grain, all to earn their favor, believing that doing so would result in blessing.  Do your crops need rain? Make a sacrifice to the gods.  Are you childless?  Make a sacrifice.  Is your enemy attacking you? Make a sacrifice.  Pagan gods were seen as having power, and people would grow within their hearts a desire to acquire that power. 

In this sense, idolatry of the heart was very much like what we think of as lust.  When we lust, we desire that which is not ours.  That thing, whether it is another person, a possession, a version of ourselves, or a new job, if we let it, can become like an idol, a god we worship.  Have you had that happen to you?  If it’s a person, maybe you daydream about what it would be like to be with them.  If it’s a house or car or vacation, you find yourself scrolling at pictures online thinking about how it will make your life so much better. 

It is also very much like greed. It’s the belief that money is what will take care of us.  The right training or education will lead to the right job which will lead to the right insurance and salary which will lead to the right possessions and home and investments and retirement and travel, and put it all together and we call it the good life. 

At the center is desire.  It is a craving for the new thing, the next thing, a better thing.  So many things in our world promise us this good life.  It could be a politician, it could be a preacher.  If we believe them, we can grow idolatry in our hearts.  It is a seeking for answers amidst the uncertainty of life, and believing those answers are found in nearly anywhere else but God.  That is idolatry in the heart.

Idolatry in the heart is so dangerous because of where it is located, the center of our being, the foundation of our inner life. 

I had poison ivy twice this summer.  I get it so easy, and it seems to spread all over me.  Both times I had to get prednisone to heal from the poison, otherwise it takes forever for it to clear up, and it is so itchy.  But if prednisone wasn’t available, and I had to just deal with it, letting it run its course, I would be okay.  Why?  It’s on the outside.  My vital organs are fine.  But if I got heart disease, or if I had blockages in my blood vessels, or cancer, it would be a different story. Those things don’t just run their course.  You have to take drastic action, or they will kill you because those diseases attack the organs that preserve your life. The principle is the same for our spiritual heart.  When we have set up idols in our hearts, it is a critical condition, because it is affecting the deepest part our lives.  We cannot set up idols in our hearts and be okay, with God, with others or with our world.  Our relationship with everything around us will be impacted negatively.  If we do not take drastic action to deal with the idolatry in our hearts, we will die spiritually. 

Check back to the next post, and see what action takes place next and the surprising source of that action.

Photo by Christian Lue on Unsplash

Should we eliminate desire in our lives? – Ezekiel 14, Preview

Years ago, I remember listening to a new song thinking, “I don’t think I should be listening to this.  It doesn’t seem appropriate…but I’m not sure.”  Why was I concerned?  Because the song touched on themes that seemed to be getting really close to a line I knew I shouldn’t cross. I felt uncomfortable.  At the time I was in middle school, and in the mind of a middle schooler, I wondered if I should turn the song off, but I was intrigued.

The song, by my favorite band, Irish rockers, U2, is called “Desire.”  Desire is a subject that we evangelicals are very cautious about.  And rightly so!  Evil desire, James writes, can lead to sin.  U2’s song is not shy in talking about many kinds of desire.  Now years later, I understand that the song is not trying to entice a person’s desire to become sin.  Instead, the song is a social commentary on how easily we succumb to evil desire.  In that sense, it is a courageous song, a truthful song, and I respect U2 for bringing up a topic we need to talk about. 

I encourage you to listen to the song.  You can watch the music video here.  Even if rock music isn’t your style, you’re probably very familiar with the themes the song covers. Here’s a sampling of the lyrics that ooze with desire: “Bright lights and the big city.”  “Needle and spoon.”  “Shotgun.”  “Everybody’s got one.”  “The dollars…my protection.”  “Promise in the year of election.”  And my favorite, “a preacher stealin’ hearts at a traveling show for love or money, money, money.”

Do you see how lines from the song describe desire?  “Bright lights and the big city” point to a longing for fame and opportunity.  “Needle and spoon” is a drug reference, evoking the image of a person eager to ease the pain of life under the influence of mind-bending chemicals.  “Shotgun” speaks to our national obsession with guns and military power.  “Everybody’s got one” is about peer pressure, the temptation to be like others and to be liked by others.  “The dollars” is perhaps the most obvious, as we crave money to be our protection.  “Promise in the year of election” should be no surprise, as we can place our hopes in a particular politician who guarantees they will right the perceived wrongs of the previous politician.  Finally, the “preacher stealing hearts” speaks to the sway a pastor or compelling preacher can have, but deep down they are motivated by a desire for financial gain.

Do any of those descriptions of desire speak to you?  Are you familiar with any them in your life?  Maybe you’ve had those desires from time to time, and maybe you’ve even fallen prey to them.  So what do we do with desire?  Is Buddhism right when it teaches that we should eliminate all desire from our lives? 

As we continue to study Ezekiel, in chapter 14 we’ll discover that God has something important to say about desire.  Read it ahead of time and see what you think, then next week we’ll discuss it.

Photo by Mikel Parera on Unsplash

Examples of folk theology and how to avoid it – Ezekiel 13, Part 5

The snow was falling heavy, covering the road. A young man in my church was driving in the middle of the storm, lost control of his car, and it spun into a snowbank along the roadside. The car stopped with a thud. Breathing heavy, heart pounding, his hands tightly gripped the steering wheel. He looked around the interior of his car, and nothing seemed wrong…yet.  No air bags deployed. He opened the door, and walked into the blinding storm. Walking around the sides of the car that were not up against snow, it seemed like the car was fine. No damage. He got back inside, and found to his surprise that by turning the wheel, driving slowly back and forth, he was able to extract his vehicle and continue on his way.  Would you be surprised to read that he was very happy? Know what he credited his safety to?  An angel figurine he placed on his dashboard.  A piece of plastic.  

This week in our study of Ezekiel 13, we’ve been learning how false prophets were deceived themselves, and then deceived others, by practicing folk theology. What is folk theology?

The young man whose car drifted off the road and attributed his safety to an angel figurine was practicing folk theology.  The Bible says nothing about creating angel figurines that we should display in various places for protection.  What do you think about that? Is it just silly, maybe an over-reaction on my part, as if angel figurines are no big deal?  Perhaps.  But I don’t think so.  It seems to me we would do well to remove those kinds of charms or talismans from our lives, whether physical or ideas, so that we can focus on trust in God. Remember how God removed the charms from the false prophets in Ezekiel 13? Read about it in the previous post here.

There are plenty of other examples of folk theology I’ve encountered over the years. Another person once told me that they place an open Bible in their home because they heard it would ward off evil spirits.  Is it wrong to display an open Bible in your house?  No.  I sure hope not, because we have one in the church sanctuary!  But does the Bible say anything about placing open Bibles out for protection?  No.  Not a word.  Then why do we have an open Bible in our sanctuary? We place it on our platform as a symbol, declaring that we hold in high regard the word of God.

Then there was the time my Amish neighbors hired a “water guy.” This man held a wrench, walked around their property, and when the wrench shook, he said that’s where they should dig for a new well.  That’s called divination.  A few days later, I was over at their house buying eggs, and they asked me what I thought. I said I believed it was divination, and God forbids us to participate in that practice.

Finally, I was once asked about mediums who claim to be able to contact the deceased.  A person in our church family had a relative that paid a medium who, in a seance, had allegedly helped them contact a dead family. The person from my church family very much missed a relative of their own who had passed away, and felt a desire to consult a medium as well. I urged them to have nothing to do with a medium. At best a medium is simply lying, and at worst, they could be connecting a person to the demonic realm. It is quite painful and difficult to mourn the loss of a loved one, but we are to trust in God as our sustenance and avoid any occult practices.

All of these are examples of folk theology, sometimes blended with the occult.  There appears to be truth in them, but it is a biblically unexamined truth, and turns out to be no truth at all.  The net result of these kinds of beliefs is that they end up deceiving us and turning us away from the truth.  These false beliefs don’t help us to get to know God; they turn us away from God.

What we should do is submit our ideas and beliefs to the truth of the word of God.  Often, though, people hold tightly to folk theology: “Don’t try to tell me that the angel figurine on my car dashboard didn’t protect me!” 

What is going on there?  What is this hardness of heart?

There can be within us a pride that equates “My mind is made up,” with faith in God.  As if we are only faithful to God if hold so tightly to something that we refuse to allow any examination of it.  That is perhaps the root sin of folk theology. Pride. That is precisely why people can think they certainly know God but end up not knowing him at all. 

The people in Ezekiel’s day, the false prophets, were Jews, children of God, and yet look at them making up false prophecies and practicing the dark arts.  They couldn’t have been further from God! 

So I encourage you to do the tough work of paying attention to your heart and mind.  Do not assume that you know God and his ways and that you are believing and living like he wants you to.  Our starting place should one of humility and teachability, with an eagerness to place our beliefs under examination.  Has folk theology crept into your heart and mind? 

Photo by Kyle Cleveland on Unsplash