5/28/19 Steve and Sophia (see HERE)
There’s nothing like a potluck dinner to fulfill one’s every
desire as you fill your plate with whatever looks tasty or interesting at the
moment. But approaching all the different
religious ideas out there like our own personal buffet table is a bad idea. The Israelites did so throughout the Old
Testament, and they were repeatedly denounced as people who “did whatever
seemed right in their own eyes.”
Proverbs 14 tells us about this approach: “There is a way
that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death.” That way is the way of the buffet table, the
picking and choosing of our own pet beliefs about religion, according to our whims
and desires at the moment. We can’t
afford to do what seems right to us like the Israelites, because when we pick
and choose what we will believe about God we end up forming an image of God in
our imagination that serves us, that makes us feel comfortable, one that puts
us in charge rather than God.
I talked with a young couple named Sam and Sophia at the
park, and they have clearly been forming their own ideas about God rather than
trusting in God’s revelation of Himself in Scripture. There is a reason that the Second Commandment
teaches us “Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image…” Idolatry results when we worship anything
other than God as He has revealed himself, whether formed by others or in our
own imagination. It might seem innocent
and fun at the time, fantasizing about different religious ideas such as
reincarnation, but its end is the way of death because it doesn’t lead us to
the creator and giver of life, the one true God, and to “the way, the truth and
the life” – the Lord Jesus Christ who brings us to a right relationship with the
Father.
God gives us plenty of opportunities and choices in life as
varied and interesting as a potluck table.
Let’s just not make our understanding of who God is – His character and commands
about how we might relate to Him – one of them.
Thanks, Steve and Sophia, for allowing me to record our conversation. It can be seen HERE
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