If It Makes You Happy
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The Next Marvel Movie
The Next Marvel Movie
The storm God is challenged by his brother, the sea God, for dominance as King of the Gods. With two magical weapons (Driver and Chaser) given to him by Kothar-wa-Khasis (god of wisdom and magic), the God of Lightning is able to cast down his brother, whose name is Yam.
The storm God is challenged by his brother, the sea God, for dominance as King of the Gods. With two magical weapons (Driver and Chaser) given to him by Kothar-wa-Khasis (god of wisdom and magic), the God of Lightning is able to cast down his brother, whose name is Yam.
With the help of his mom (Athirat, or sometimes called Asherah) and his sister, Anat, the goddess of war, the storm God persuades his father (El, the all-father, the most-high God) to give him a palace. Kothar-wa-Khasis makes his palace and the storm God is feeling pretty hot.
So he shouts out that he is invincible and even death (Thanos) can’t take him!
Death personified, Thanos (also called Mot) comes up, and fights him and then swallows him. But now, since the storm God is gone, there is no rain and the land is desolated. So Anat, his sister, goes down to the Kingdom of death and starts making trouble. She attacks Mot with a knife, grinds him up into pieces, scatters the pieces far and wide.
And the storm God is resurrected and is able to return and bring rain to the earth once more. Mot also returns, and he is about to fight the storm God again, but the other gods say that El is on his side now, and sow Mot, death, acknowledges the storm god as King.
That storm gods name? Not Thor. Ba’al Hadad. And this is the story of the Baal cycle, aka, one of the oldest comic books in the world.
The cycle of Baal
These are the gods that Israel discovered in the land they were given to possess by their God, Yahweh.
These are the gods of the surrounding nations. Some different names, some slightly different worship customs, but surrounded by the great cultures of the world: Egypt and Mesopotamia and Greece… the gods of Canaan (or often called Phoenicia in the study of mythologies) take on all the flavors of the surrounding areas.
Why do we keep chasing after idols?
Try all the different workouts. What works?
Idolatry
Idolatry
Intro:
After Abimelech there arose to save Israel Tola the son of Puah, son of Dodo, a man of Issachar, and he lived at Shamir in the hill country of Ephraim.
And he judged Israel twenty-three years. Then he died and was buried at Shamir.
After him arose Jair the Gileadite, who judged Israel twenty-two years.
And he had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys, and they had thirty cities, called Havvoth-jair to this day, which are in the land of Gilead.
And Jair died and was buried in Kamon.
God gives them judges again, delivering them from the chaos and bloodshed that followed in the wake of Gideon and Abimelech. I think the highest praise these judges get is that there isn’t much to say about them. They did the job God called them to. No drama, no chaos, no controversy, no crisis. Not all that much to say about a job well done.
The people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth, the gods of Syria, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. And they forsook the Lord and did not serve him.
So the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of the Philistines and into the hand of the Ammonites,
and they crushed and oppressed the people of Israel that year. For eighteen years they oppressed all the people of Israel who were beyond the Jordan in the land of the Amorites, which is in Gilead.
And the Ammonites crossed the Jordan to fight also against Judah and against Benjamin and against the house of Ephraim, so that Israel was severely distressed.
Tactical Repentance
Judges 10:6-9
And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, saying, “We have sinned against you, because we have forsaken our God and have served the Baals.”
And the people of Israel cried out to the Lord, saying, “We have sinned against you, because we have forsaken our God and have served the Baals.”
And the Lord said to the people of Israel, “Did I not save you from the Egyptians and from the Amorites, from the Ammonites and from the Philistines?
The Sidonians also, and the Amalekites and the Maonites oppressed you, and you cried out to me, and I saved you out of their hand.
Yet you have forsaken me and served other gods; therefore I will save you no more.
Go and cry out to the gods whom you have chosen; let them save you in the time of your distress.”
And the Lord said to the people of Israel, “Did I not save you from the Egyptians and from the Amorites, from the Ammonites and from the Philistines?
The Sidonians also, and the Amalekites and the Maonites oppressed you, and you cried out to me, and I saved you out of their hand.
Yet you have forsaken me and served other gods; therefore I will save you no more.
Go and cry out to the gods whom you have chosen; let them save you in the time of your distress.”
Judges 10:11-14
Judges 10:10-
And the people of Israel said to the Lord, “We have sinned; do to us whatever seems good to you. Only please deliver us this day.”
So they put away the foreign gods from among them and served the Lord, and he became impatient over the misery of Israel.
Judges 10:15-
Whatever Works For You
Whatever Works For You
The people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth, the gods of Syria, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. And they forsook the Lord and did not serve him.
Why do they keep doing this?
The text doesn’t flat out say, but we can see some pattern in which gods keep coming up.
Baal - god of storms, of rain, and therefore related to fertility of the land and harvest.
Ashtaroth, also called Asherah, mother of the gods, related to sex and fertility.
Both of these named gods are DIRECTLY related to prosperity in the land. What do I want after I have peace? Prosperity. More crops, more children, more wealth, more of the good life.
They aren’t reaching out to sea gods, they aren’t sailors.
Not merchant gods, they aren’t really traders.
Not
How am I going to get that? Well, I am watching my neighbors and watching what is working from then. In the same way that the locals might know the soil, and what crops grow well, and where the good springs are… the locals also know the layout of the local spiritual forces, and how to appease them to avoid negative consequences, and how to please them to gain favor and blessing and gifts.
So, we try it and see what works.
Whatever makes you happy
Whatever floats your boat. If it makes you happy! If it makes you prosperous, than who is it hurting?
After you have peace, what do you want? Prosperity. More. Much more.
If your neighbor is trying something new, and it works for him, why not give it a try?
We see this today in the stock market with mutual funds. Is one mutual fund manager better than another? No, statistically no better than a monkey with a dartboard.
But it is all really self-worship.
I worship an idol because I hope it will bring me what I want, what I need, my happiness, my desires, me, me, me. It’s all about me.
If I can manipulate some higher being into helping me do that, than that’s what I will do!
And, “scientific idolatry” or, “whatever
New Workout
New Workout
Mace workout
Whatever works for you. If it makes you happy, who is it hurting?
The problem is: there is an answer to that question! That philosophy really holds together under the assumption that you are not hurting anyone. But if you are directly hurting someone, it is horrible.
If you come across someone just beating up a child, you don’t say “whatever works for you!” You stop them from hurting the child! You call the police. You intervene because someone is getting hurt.
What if my new workout regimine is punching blind people?
“You can’t do that!”
“Of course I can, it’s easy, they never see it coming!”
There is someone on the other end of that! There is someone being hurt by your “whatever works, whatever makes you happy.”
God says it this way, and he cared about it so much he chiseled it into stone with his own finger!
“You shall have no other gods before me.
“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,
but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
I am a jealous God! I
God or Me
God or Me
Baal - god of storms, of rain, and therefore related to fertility of the land and harvest.
Ashtaroth, also called Asherah, mother of the gods, related to sex and fertility.
Both of these named gods are DIRECTLY related to prosperity in the land.
But it is all really self-worship.
I worship an idol because I hope it will bring me what I want, what I need, my happiness, my desires, me, me, me. It’s all about me.
If I can manipulate some higher being into helping me do that, than that’s what I will do!
Idolatry: Manipulating natural and spiritual forces for personal gain.
To get ahead, to be happy, to be fulfilled, to experience pleasure or satisfaction or any and all of the things!
And, “scientific idolatry” or, “whatever
You don’t have to like it. That’s a work God does within our heart as He pursues us and redeems us and woos our heart to His...
What’s Your Idol?
What’s Your Idol?
What are the things you are looking to for security? For prosperity? For self-gratification?
Altars of materialism. Money, possessions?
Altars of pride and ego. Accomplishments, reputation and status?
Altars of
You don’t have to like it. That’s a work God does within our heart as He pursues us and redeems us and woos our heart to His...
As the beloved and we can respond to the Father. I don’t know what it is about “this” thing, this area of life, I keep setting this person or this ambition or this pleasure at the center of myself: “God help me!” Help me cast down the idols that nothing should live at the center of myself but you.
Knowing (even when we aren’t feeling it), knowing that the throne of my life was made for you, Lord, and you alone and that nothing else is worthy and nothing else can satisfy, and anything else is a pale and shadowy and illusory imitation of the King of Kings.
Time in prayer to cast down idols
Worship you alone.