Angelic Conflict part 194: Human history (idolatry) – 1Ki 11:1-13; Deu 4:19; Mat 12:22-33; Luk 16:13; 1Co 6:12; Isa 40:12-22.Title: Angelic Conflict part 194: Human history (idolatry) – 1Ki 11:1-13; Deu 4:19; Mat 12:22-33; Luk 16:13; 1Co 6:12; Isa 40:12-22.
Idol worship centers around the things or events in life that people believe are important, desired, or needed.
The Egyptians based their gods on the earth, the Nile, and the sky. In modern times there are various things that people need to live that become idols, or greatly desire that become idols. The believer with some doctrine in his soul comes to know that he is alive only courtesy of the grace of God and so he loosens his grip on his old idol worship.
When the true God enters the life through faith, doctrine eventually replaces his idols, and some of these, which he has gripped very tightly, will only see their replacement with time.
Herein lies grace. God gives us the time to let go of those idols that we have held on to as we pursue the truths regarding His complete fulfillment of those areas in our soul that we secretly think the idol will suffice. In grace we still walk with Him despite our lack of perfection in the flesh.
Phi 3:12 Not that I have already obtained it, or have already become perfect, but I press on in order that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus.
God replaces what we thought was important:
Luk 10:41-42 But the Lord answered and said to her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and bothered about so many things; but only a few things are necessary, really only one, for Mary has chosen the good part, which shall not be taken away from her. "
God becomes the only source of that which we need:
Phi 4:19-20 And my God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus. Now to our God and Father be the glory forever and ever. Amen.
God becomes the only source of that which we desire:
Psa 37:4-5 Delight yourself in the Lord; And He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, and He will do it.
As the word of God that is alive and powerful:
Heb 4:12 For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
God influences the spirit of a man so that he may know himself in the light of God's will.
Pro 20:27 The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord, Searching all the innermost parts of his being.
We trust in God to reveal to us the areas of our heart where there exist desires, needs, and priorities that are not in alignment with His perfect will. Acknowledging a perverted system is not enough. Changes must be wrought. Acceptance of the correction and the will to change are all apart of humility.
2Ti 3:16-17 All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.
The reality of God, His program, His glory, and His victory is beheld in the eyes of the heart and not the physical eyes.
We don't study doctrine in order to become Bible scholars, but in order to see the reality of what is unseen.
Eph 1:18 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened
When we lose sight of these invisible realities we lose fellowship with God and remit to fellowship with the world. The world system or cosmic system has used the physical world to prop itself up with idols designed to replace the honor and thanksgiving that only belongs to God.
Col 3:2-3 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
2Co 5:7 for we walk by faith, not by sight
Heb 11:27 By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king; for he endured, as seeing Him who is unseen.
And we must remember to always apply grace to any situation for none of us ever arrive. We all have areas that need change. To think that we do not is put ourselves in a dangerous arena of arrogance.
1Co 10:12 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.
Israel would always weep bitterly when God pronounced their discipline, but so often, after the emotions died down, they did not change their hearts into alignment with His perfect will.
There are different gods in Canaan than there were in Egypt, but these are allowed to show themselves to Israel after they have witnessed the works of Jehovah.
1Ki 11:1 Now King Solomon loved many foreign women along with the daughter of Pharaoh: Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian, and Hittite women,
1Ki 11:2 from the nations concerning which the Lord had said to the sons of Israel, "You shall not associate with them, neither shall they associate with you, for they will surely turn your heart away after their gods." Solomon held fast to these in love.
1Ki 11:3 And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines, and his wives turned his heart away.
1Ki 11:4 For it came about when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been.
1Ki 11:5 For Solomon went after Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and after Milcom the detestable idol of the Ammonites.
1Ki 11:6 And Solomon did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and did not follow the Lord fully, as David his father had done.
1Ki 11:7 Then Solomon built a high place for Chemosh the detestable idol of Moab, on the mountain which is east of Jerusalem, and for Molech the detestable idol of the sons of Ammon [the same man who built the Temple].
1Ki 11:8 Thus also he did for all his foreign wives, who burned incense and sacrificed to their gods.
Solomon made a treaty with Hiram the king of Tyre, which established a widespread commerce both by sea and land, through which ever increasing treasures of gold and silver, and other costly goods, were brought to the king. None of this was wrong for it was the fulfillment of God's promises to Solomon.
The Lord Himself had promised and had given Solomon wisdom, riches, and glory above all other kings for the glorification of his kingdom and so all Solomon had to do was follow Jehovah and reap the benefits. Yet Solomon began to look at these blessings differently. He began to look at them from the flesh.
When the blessings from God are perceived from the viewpoint of the flesh, the Giver can be forgotten and the gifts can become idols.
Solomon's accumulation of riches helped to nourish his inclination to a love of show, and created a kind of luxury which was hardly reconcilable with the simplicity of manners and the piety of a servant of God, so the foreign trade led to a toleration of heathen customs and religious views which could not fail to detract from the reverence paid to Jehovah.
His wisdom, which should have found sufficiency in the wisdom from God led to a thirst for the knowledge of other cultures which so easily seduce and did seduce him from the open and clear regions of the truth to the dark knowledge and magic arts of the kingdom of lies and so he was led to the paths of superstition.
Even the wisdom from God can become arrogance in the heart that is under the mastery of the flesh.
The widespread fame of his wisdom brought distinguished and wise men from distant lands to Jerusalem and into alliance with the king, and their homage flattered the vanity of the human heart, and led to a greater and greater toleration of heathen ways.
This didn't happen to such a pious and faithful young man overnight. It was gradual as his heart was tainted with the environment around him and while simultaneously the truth from God was not enough to satisfy his flesh, for nothing can satisfy it.
Yet God did not blame any of the riches, or the wives, or the many visitors from foreign lands, but He did blame Solomon, because none of these things, though they be all around us are to blame for idolatry. They are at best an indirect impulse to it, but even if a man were to distance himself from all of it by living alone in an ascetic, monk-like life, he will still find his idols in something else if he does not find that God is sufficient to provide that which is important, his needs, and his desires.
Solomon forgot the commandments of the Lord and suffered himself to be silly and foolish by the lusts of the flesh, not only so as to love many foreign wives, but so as also to take to himself wives from the nations with which Israel was not to enter into any close relationship whatever. He became easily flattered and desirous of approbation from others all of which are the insatiable lusts of the flesh.
1Ki 11:9 Now the Lord was angry with Solomon because his heart was turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice,
1Ki 11:10 and had commanded him concerning this thing, that he should not go after other gods; but he did not observe what the Lord had commanded.
1Ki 11:11 So the Lord said to Solomon, "Because you have done this, and you have not kept My covenant and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom from you, and will give it to your servant.
1Ki 11:12 Nevertheless I will not do it in your days for the sake of your father David, but I will tear it out of the hand of your son.
1Ki 11:13 However, I will not tear away all the kingdom, but I will give one tribe to your son for the sake of My servant David and for the sake of Jerusalem which I have chosen."
Idolatry reveals man's desire for a visual representation of God.
Deu 4:19 And beware, lest you lift up your eyes to heaven and see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, and be drawn away and worship them and serve them, those which the Lord your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven.
The word of God by no means indicates that we should shut off our reasoning powers, in fact, quite the contrary since a mind at peace will reason far more effectively, but it does mean that when human reason is in opposition to divine revelation then the reasoning is wrong.
Man who chooses reason over revelation chooses to walk by sight and not by faith. Yet this does not mean that we do not use reason.
God has made us in His image and that includes an intellect which should be used properly for revelation and not against it.
Mankind, in laziness and ignorance, tends to oversimplify what he perceives and then makes erroneous conclusions about the world around him, being fed in his fleshly mind from the world system that does not want man to reason.
Psa 14:1 The fool has said in his heart, "There is no God."
Evolutionary theory, as one example, is by far way oversimplified, but yet, for an unbeliever to really see that he would have to learn the details, for the devil is in the details, but it suffices for them to accept the erroneous conclusion since it fits their desires.
And often, when desires are high and opposed to God and His glory, lies are accepted without reason. This makes easy dupes for religion.
This is what leads to religion, which is the other side of the coin of satan's realm; the one side being idolatry and the other being religion.
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