New Voices: By and about young adults

In January 2010, I read my first book by Timothy Keller. Since that time, I have become a huge fan, reading his books and blogs and listening to his sermons online. Keller is the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City, which is having a significant impact there and around the world through its many church planting initiatives. In his book Counterfeit Gods, Keller discusses the pervasive sin of idolatry. Even though it’s been close to a year since I read this book, the ideas are still percolating in me.

The most significant takeaway from this book is the idea that idols are good things. That’s right; the vast majority of the idols in our lives are good things. For me to understand this, I first needed to understand what an idol is. I had always dismissed the passages in the Bible about idolatry because I don’t have any shiny things I bow down to in my home. I am a monotheist and never struggled with polytheism. With this understanding, I never thought much about idolatry and certainly didn’t see myself as being idolatrous. This is because my definition of idolatry was lacking. An idol is anything we elevate above God in our lives, and most things that we elevate above God in our lives are good things.

We quickly want to jump to the “evil” things that “bad” people do to replace God in their lives. We talk about lost individuals, people groups or generations that look to drugs, alcohol, sex, gambling or false religions in the absence of God in their lives. As true and as sad as this reality may be, this is not the type of idolatry most Menno­nite readers struggle with. There are many good things that can play the same idolatrous role in our lives.

The list of good idols in our lives is endless: family, friends, success, education, financial stability, spouse, children, grandchildren, acceptance, good grades, athletic achievement, entertainment, food, hobbies. As you can see, all these things are good, and I am certainly not proposing that we attempt to eradicate them from our lives. What I am saying is that all these things (and more) have the potential to become the ultimate reality of our lives, thus making them idols in place of God himself.

To take it a step further, we can look at Mennonite Church USA and ask: What have become idols for us? What are the things we are tempted to elevate above Jesus Christ? Have we elevated our peace and justice stance above Jesus himself? Have we made denominational unity a false god? Have we emphasized our Mennonite distinctives to the point of idolatry? Have we held up our history and tradition to a point where it is more important than the Good News of Jesus Christ? Have we declared creation care more important than the Creator? Have we bowed to the gods of politics and power? Have we succumbed to the almighty dollar? Have we become idolatrous?

The easy answer is yes; we are all in our hearts idolaters. To keep our hearts turned toward God above all other things is a daily struggle for all of us. It is important to realize this because idolatry is such an insidious sin. It can creep into and become deeply seeded in our hearts while we remain oblivious to it. We comfort ourselves by saying, “I’m not bowing down to any little golden idols.” We are all prone to wander, but thanks be to God we are not left to wander on our own. We have such a high priest in Jesus Christ, who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses. “Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Hebrews 4:16)