When we invent our own ideas of God, we simply create Him in our own image. Kenneth FW Prior
Devotional Reading: Exodus 32:1-8
While Moses was on Mount Sinai receiving the law - which by the way began with “You shall have no other gods before Me. “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth (Exodus 20:3-4)." - the recently redeemed people of the covenant were at the bottom of the mountain making a false god. Despite an overwhelming body of evidence that the transcendent God of the universe had powerfully delivered them from Egypt and promised them a land of their very own. With a promise like that in my hip pocket, I might just be a little slow in my effort to mess things up. However, the people decided that after a few days with an absent leader, the promise was just so much hot air and bluster. So faith and belief fell right off the cliff into a bottomless chasm. The God who had redeemed them with a mighty hand and an out stretched arm just up and disappeared; could not be found anywhere. So they did what we all sometimes do when God seems to leave us behind at the worst possible time to fend for ourselves - We create a new one in our own image.
That is the tendency of the human heart. We want a God who is always accessible, a God that we can see and reach out to and touch and even taste - kinda like Mom's best homemade Apple pie. And when the true God offers us Himself, "accessible" turns into "intrusive." We want our slice of the pie Mom made so lovingly - but we don't want Mom around to cut any of the slices for us or when we eat it. What we really wanted was a God who we could control and manage. God was okay as long as all He did was bake the pie. When you think about this, it is more comfortable this way. We don't really want God to lead us into the kitchen on His terms; we want a God who will bake the best Apple Pie and then leave it on the table for us to enjoy at our own convenience. We create an illusion of contentment, create an illusion of faith. It is a small price to pay for our autonomy, a small price we are willing to pay just to get our bellies full of Apple Pie.
But it always turns out to be a huge price, much more devastating than we first allowed ourselves to believe. We don't always factor in the incredible belly aches from too much sugar etc. We don't always take the time to remember the bland taste of Maalox or Pepto Bismal to settle our stomachs down and so on. No matter where we choose to put our faith - in our cast iron stomachs or God - no matter who we credit with knowing it all, it turns out in the end, that there is only one who does, only one who can deliver us from ourselves - and, truth be told - that is God. Truth is not a personal choice. Truth is true, whether we follow it or not.
We live in an age of relativism. Truth is relative. If the true God is too absent - or too present - for us, we will just make one that is most convenient to our circumstance. That way, our God can command us only what we want Him to command us. And we can follow Him only when it makes the most sense for us to do so. The people of the covenant made for themselves a golden calf and said "This is your god, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.” What shape would your own idol be:
Fill in the Blank: "This is my god, ________ O family of mine, who brought me up from the land of Egypt.
God Bless
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