Dealing with your Idols

Introduction

Intro Self / Thanksgiving

READ Mark 14:1-11

The Stark Contrast

The Chief Priests, Teachers and this Unnamed Woman

This account is in all four gospels — John, the last book written of the gospels includes the fact that this woman was Mary, the sister of Martha

Mary and these Priests and Teachers — Who displayed a greater level of devotion? Who displayed love? For our purposes, which one had idols?

Let’s explore this today

PRAYER

VIRTUE

Reading Pete the Cat with the Boys (Valuable Lesson)

Our boys associating with the villain of the book

“Mine, Mine, Mine”

TRANSITIONAL PHRASING

The methodology, the maturity, and vehicle of our lives changes but often the underlying sentiment remains the same

The way we do most things is rooted in this “mine, mine, mine” mentality

Blaise Pascal: “Each man is everything to himself”

I have often found that the way the enemy attempts to instill himself in our world is not just through evil acts but by trying to get people to solely to consider themselves

To turn their devotion from being outward to it being inward

The problem is that this is the ROOT OF ALL IDOLATRY

Idolatry can be anything that we proclaim mine without regard to anything or anyone else

Martin Luther: “Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God, your functional savior?

What about you? What does your heart cling to? What does it confide in? What is your functional savior? Not just the savior I proclaim but the savior I live into?

THE INEVITABLY OF IDOLATRY

Story of how idolatry inevitably works. Often subversively.

This whole series we’ve looked at elements that quietly work to become counterfeit gods in our lives. They often work subversively and without us knowing

Power becomes the idol that shift from something honorable to a desperate hunger for control over every situation and circumstance

Money goes from the safety net to the ambition and sign of well-being and status

Love and sexuality shifts from something we crave to our own identity, our escapism, or our source of comfort

Said otherwise, these become our functional saviors.

WHERE’S YOURS?

The great temptation when thinking about idols is to assume you are immune to it

If you think they are somebody else’s problem and not yours, we miss the point of what idols are and how they impact us

If you think you don’t struggle with power because you’re not a CEO and you’re stay out home parent, how do you feel when you can’t control what your kids act like?

The question is not do I have idols. It’s what are they and where are they hidden?

If you ever wanted to know what growth in my faith looks like or in my discipleship?

Imagine a dark home. Often we get comfortable in one room. So we stay there. We don’t think to venture into the unknown that exists elsewhere. At worst, we assume every room in completely fine. At best, we just ignore that there are other places within us

Formation into Christlikeness is picking up a light and walking into a different room and discerning, what in here is an idol? What’s the blockade? What’s the thing that unsettles in this room?

This is what David was talking about when he wrote Psalm 139:23-24

Search me, O God, and know my heart!

Try me and know my thoughts!

And see if there be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way everlasting!

Examples:

When I look inside my soul, what do I see? Do I see anxiety? Why do I have that anxiety? Could it be the idol of control

When I look inside my family life, what do I see? Do I see anger, bitter, lack of forgiveness, or a lack of empathy? Where did that come from? Could it be the idol of unrealistic expectations or the need to be proven right?

When I look inside my work life, what do I see? Do I find myself posturing? Do I feel pride? Do I feel insecurity? Where does all that come from? Could it be the idol of gaining the approval of other people

When I look inside my social media life, what do I see? Does my mood shift with my amount of like? Am I consumed with making a name for myself? Where does that come from? Could it be the idol of loneliness where I am trying to be seen by people?

When I look inside my academic life, what do I see? Am I pursuing degrees to elevate my social status? Could it be the idol of recognition and being well thought

NOTICE HERE: The point is not that these are necessarily wrong things. It is that we can so easily elevate them to the degree that they become functional saviors

Power, Love, and Money are not inherently wrong things.

But pursuing them above all else puts them out of order

They become our functional idols

WE ALL HAVE THEM

David Clarkson: “Though few will own it, nothing is more common

There are idols in every room of the house.

Anytime we prefer our own wisdom to God’s wisdom

Anytime we prefer our own desires to God’s will

Anytime we prefer our reputation to God’s honor

The human heart is indeed a factory that mass-produces idols

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HOW DO WE DEAL WITH OUR IDOLS?

If they first few parts of this series are diagnosing the problem, the rest of today is about working on the problem

We must realize this is an ongoing journey that we must be one

With Kids - Lego pieces everywhere

The journey is like walking around the room, finding a lego piece, picking it up, and bringing it back to the bucket

There may always be lego pieces, but after some time, it becomes easier to find them

I don’t have to look so hard. I become aware and it becomes easier to pick it up and put it back

NAME YOUR IDOL

Often the greatest work you can do is to name your idol — naming an idol causes it to have less power

There are the obvious ones (Addiction, Lack of morality to gain money or power) But then are the not so obvious ones

Often, it does not necessarily feel like sin

I want to challenge you with this: Anything, if we’re not careful can become your god

The grind and the hustle for your side business can easily become your god

The constant fear and wondering if you’ll ever marry someone can become your god

The need to be promoted and seen for you to have a sense of identity and validation can become your god

Your social media can become your god

Your kids can become your god

Your calling can become your god

Church: This platform can become my god

This is the blockage, the hindrance. The thing I refuse to let go of. The thing I’ve put my trust in and my hope in. This is my sense of security and my sense of identity

Here’s a test: What would it feel like if it were gone?

We say we have trust and dependence on God but it’s easy to say that when we don’t actually have to have trust and dependence on God. Often we can trust and depend on our idols? But what if they’re gone?

PERSONAL STORY - FEELING CALLED TO MINISTRY

I realized it was more than a job. When it wasn’t there, I felt like my identity was under attack.

Who am I? I felt like I was in disarray?

You often don’t know something is an idol until it’s under attack

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL IDOLS

As we work through this, we must realize that there are external and internal idols

It is much easier to identify the external idols than it is the internal idols. There external idols is what my idol is. The internal idol is why it is there.

Israelites at the base of Mt. Sinani — Make a golden calf and call it YHWH

Why? What was there internal idol? It was the fear that Moses was taking too long and wasn’t going to come back down? They were following the idol of fear

Sports is often my external idol

Why? Why do I love it? Some deep work has made me realize that I use as an escape? What am I escaping? That’s my internal idol

It’s much deeper and harder to eradicate

I can delete sports apps off my phone but my internal need for escapism requires much more work

As we name our idol, we must also look to see if there is a source behind it

CONSIDER YOUR IMAGINATION

Another way to name our idols is to consider our imagination

Archbishop William Temple: “Your religion is what you do with your solitude” — not convicting at all

What is happening internally and in your mind, particularly when you’re alone describes your faith and your source of hope and security

In other words, the true god of your heart is what your thoughts effortlessly go to when there is nothing else demanding your attention

What is your default? What do you enjoy daydreaming about? What occupies my mind when I have nothing else to think about?

Do I develop potential scenarios about career advancement? Do I spend a lot of time thinking up my dream home? Am I occupied in my mind with a particular person and what a relationship with them come mean?

The goal is not to squash daydreaming. It’s to ask the question, what do I habitually think about?

My thought life in solitude will reveal where my hope and security are

2. RECOGNIZE THE ROLE OF GOD IN MY LIFE

The key to this is not just what I say but what I live

What is the role of God in my life functionally?

On a day to day basis, here is the role and the place I’ve God in my life

I will often do one of two things with God:

I will use God as a means by which I get something else or

I will use my means by which I get to God

When I use God to get to my means, the means is the idol

First, this happens when my chief and end goal is not God. But it is to get the things that God gives me

Think of the older brother in the story of prodigal son — he had the father but did not desire the brother. He wanted the father as a means by which he was celebrated and recognized for the good person he way?

What was the end goal of his life? Recognition

He wanted the father to help him get that

More often than we care to admit, we use God as the means by which we get something else

This is often where idolatry is at play

This is using God as a good luck charm

Or, it is following the path I want for my life and hoping God puts his hand on it and blesses it

Imagine a wedding day, and you are saying your vows

Today I choose, to love you and to be there for you because of all the benefits that you give to me

Mostly marital tax deductions, IRA and Health Insurance benefits, and the financial security you’ll give me because you’re a doctor

That’s ridiculous because the goal of our marriage is union. It’s each other. It’s each other’s presence

Friend, we don’t use God to get things. The goal is union with Christ and in that way, we are formed into his image

The beautiful part is that the stuff comes. But it is not the goal

Think back to that idol in your life:

Is it possible that we are using God to get to that idol?

Ask yourself the question, what do I really want and what is my goal?

If Jesus was all we had, would he still be enough for us?

Can we come to terms with the thought that Jesus + Nothing = Everything

Your goal and my goal on this earth is not to accumulate wealth or gain power. Our goal on this earth is to glorify God

3. WE MUST TURN IDOLATRY INTO WORSHIP

If idolatry is rooted in a paradigm of mine, mine, mine, worship is rooted in a paradigm of him, him, him

By definition, it moves attention off myself, my desires, and my idols, and on to God

Thus, the greatest thing we can do in dealing with idolatry is become people of worship

We all have a throne in our lives — We all worship something

Christian or not, something is the center of your life

We all have a throne and we place something on it

Often, it’s a mixture and combination of things

It’s thing we center our lives on and put our faith, hope, and trust. It becomes our functional savior

HEAR THIS: That thing, be it power, sex, money, identity, greed, career, politics, or idealism is all rooted in self

So in essence, we are putting ourselves on the throne

Worship is the act of getting off the throne and allowing for God to have his proper place

BIBLICAL NARRATIVE

This unnamed woman is there where everyone is reclining at the table right before passion week

They are at a home just outside of Jerusalem and they are there for the festival that is going on

The home of Simon the Leper

This to say that they have for years seen and first hand experienced all that Jesus did

And yet, their priorities were still in many ways misguided

This should give us some hope

The disciples should have been the ones who got it and still it wasn’t clear to them

It’s possible to be around Jesus and still have misguided priorities (I’m thankful that he has mercy for that)

She goes up to Jesus and breaks this alabaster jar of perfume over him

This perfume was said to not be ordinary perfume

It was imported, likely from India and incredibly expensive

The Bible tells us how much it’s worth. This would be the equivalent of years wages.

So this wasn’t something she bought at the mall. It’s was likely a family heirloom that had indispensable value to her

It was a common practice to anoint guests as a sign of honor. But anointing for most meant take some on your finger, put it on the forehead

If she had pulled out this incredibly expensive perfume and anointed him, people would have been amazed. Wow, she took the most expensive perfume and anointed Jesus with it.

But this act is not ordinary --- she breaks jar

Which means this, if it is broken, the perfume can’t be returned.

Which means every bit of it was poured out

A years wages, a family heirloom, gone in a minute

This woman is reckless, she throws caution to the wind, she’s extravagant, she’s over the top and everyone seems to think so, except for Jesus

Jesus calls it a beautiful thing

What everyone else calls a waste, Jesus calls beautiful

When it may feel like your prayers are just wasting time, Jesus calls it beautiful

When it feels like it’s a waste of time to live with integrity when your coworkers don’t, Jesus calls it beautiful

When it feels like going to church on a Sunday is outdated and unnecessary, Jesus calls it beautiful

Friends, the things that we do in the name of Jesus that the world doesn’t understand are beautiful in his sight

THE OIL

The oil was used in a variety of ways for kings, priests, and prophets throughout the scriptures

But the best understanding here is that she recognize that Jesus was the messiah --- meaning the Savior, the Christ, the One they were waiting for

If worship is about ascribing worth and recognizing who someone is, that this pouring out of oil is a beautiful act of worship

Now let’s be honest

She didn’t fully understand what was happening. She wasn’t totally sure he would die and she had no way of knowing he would be resurrected

But she did know that whoever this man is, he is worthy of an extravagant expression of love

This is what worship is all about. --- It’s about extravagant expressions of love

HOW DOES THIS RELATE BACK TO IDOLS?

This woman could have sat back and taken it all in

But if she had, perhaps she would have been succumbing to the idol of reputation (risking what everyone thought of her), the idol of financial security (the jar of oil)

Instead, she pours all of it out on Jesus

What’s not turned into worship can easily become our idol

Every good and perfect gift from God must not point us to itself

It must be used to point us to our creator

Your calling, the dream on your life, your skills and gifts, your relationships and family, your identity and value, all of it must be used to worship God

Romans 1:25 - They worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator

Anything that we don’t turn into a means of worship has the potential to become an idol

THE DISCIPLES

They missed this --- they had their own idols they were wrestling with

They mention the poor --- but it is not a real concern for the poor

Mark 6:36 - Let the hungry crowds fend for themselves

Mark 9:34 - Consumed with pursuing position of prominence in the Kingdom

At this point, Judas already knew he would betray Jesus

Concern for the poor here is little more than pretense. They are posturing themselves because of their own idols in their lives

The Idol of Comparison

They feel threatened because they are comparing themselves to her and realize that they don’t match up

So they posture themselves by criticizing her

Comparison takes our eyes off of God and places them on how we match up to others

The Idol of Insecurity

She’s giving a lot. We’re not.

Peter is over here rejecting that Jesus would die while she is preparing for his death

What do you when you feel insecure? You make yourself look and sound good

The Idol of Ministry

They could not believe she would do this because it felt like them to be a waste

This could fund so much ministry. Imagine how many poor people we could help with a year’s wages

They are actually distracted by ministry

It had become an idol to them

Good things, like ministry can become our idols when we place them first in our lives

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TRANSITION

Jesus goes on to say that everywhere the Gospel goes, the story of her will shared

After 2000 years, we are still talking about this extravagant expression of love

A woman who poured out all out of love for Jesus

I wonder what story will be shared among our friends and family about us over the years

Will it be said of us that we poured out all we had and all we are in worship?

Will it be said that we recognize who Jesus is when others may not have?

Will it be said that we were willing to give an extravagant expression of love?

I want to be known most as someone who loved Jesus

Imagine what this life looks like?

Reverse engineer it

What do we need to do today to have that kind of life tomorrow?