Idolatry in the Church  

by Gene Easley  

    The missionary life is full of adventure, much of which one wishes he could avoid.  One such missionary trip took my wife and me to the village of El Rodeo in the hill country of southeastern Guatemala.  A pastor friend invited us to minister in a Watch Night service.

    There was no electricity in El Rodeo, except for those who could afford their own gasoline-run generators.  The church depended on kerosene lanterns to provide light for the services.  After the service was concluded, my wife and I spent the night in a small, one-room, dirt-floor, adobe (mud) hut.  It was the home of the assistant pastor and his family.

    En route to El Rodeo from our home in Guatemala City, the young minister who had invited us to make the trip related a story concerning his older brother (we will call him Juan, although that is not his name) who lived in a larger town near the village of El Rodeo.  Juan, along with the rest of his family, had been very active in God's work.  His family was involved in starting many new churches in that part of Guatemala.  

    But Juan began to prosper in his work above that of the rest of his family.  As time passed, he was able to purchase a motor vehicle for transportation.  It was a 1950 Land Rover (almost forty years old by the time of our visit to El Rodeo).  Juan was the only member in his family who owned any type of automobile.  His family soon began to notice a change in him.  Pride was entering his heart.  He seemed to feel that he was superior to the rest of the family.  Church began to lose its importance.  As time passed, Juan drifted away from God and lost the wonderful experience in Christ he once had.  

    "Pride goeth before destruction and an haughty spirit before a fall" (Proverbs 16:18).  So it came to pass in Juan's life that he was so proud of his great achievements and his valuable possession (the 1950 Land Rover) that he fell away from God.

    The plans for our trip to El Rodeo were that we would go first to Juan's house, leave our car there, and go to El Rodeo in Juan's four-wheel drive Land Rover. The trip was about ten miles along a paved highway.  Then we took a back road across a shallow stream up a hillside on a very rocky, rough road to the village of El Rodeo.

    As we rode along on the paved highway in Juan's vehicle, before we ever reached the "rough" road, I realized it would not be an easy trip.  The Land Rover had long lost its springs, shocks, and whatever else belongs to the suspension system of a car to make the ride smooth.  The highway had numerous "potholes" in it, as is common in Guatemala.  But even as we rode along on the smoothest parts of the highway, the old truck seemed to be hammering us into the pavement.  It was one of the most miserable rides I have ever had!

    As we rode along praying the Lord would see us through the adventure and remembering what our minister friend had told us about how proud Juan had been over that vehicle, I thought to myself, "How could any one backslide over a truck like this?"  It seemed unbelievable that pride could grip one's heart so strongly just because he possessed that worn out vehicle.

    Whatever causes people to drift from God—whether it be a limousine or a vehicle like Juan's—it all looks the same to God.  Whatever becomes an idol to us is foolishness to Him.  Anything that separates us from a close communion with God is idolatry.

    Idols are false treasures that hold within their grasp a deadly poison.  They are treasures of deceit that blind the wisest and bring destruction to many a spiritual life.  Thankfully, Juan came back to God.  He realized the folly of his actions.  But much of the Christian world today is caught in a frenzy of idolatry and doesn't even realize the foolishness of it.

    It was idolatry that brought down Israel while she was living in the Promised Land.  Moses pre-warned Israel of what could happen if she became settled in the land of plenty (Deuteronomy 8:10-20).  He warned her of the dangers of prosperity.  Israel forsook the living God and bowed down to senseless idols that profited nothing.

    In our modern society, we laugh at Israel's worshipping of hand-made gods.  We call it ridiculous.  We think how foolish it was for Juan to let that old Land Rover steal away his affections.  But the truth is, not only is our world overrun with the spirit of idolatry, the church is plagued by materialistic thinkers who are draining the church of its power and life.  The church's idols have come in through deception.  The church has been told to bow down, and it will be blessed.  In so doing she loses the true treasures of the spiritual life.

    It is not easy to convince another to discard his idols.  It took seventy years of Babylonian captivity to break Israel's affection for idols.  What will it take to cause us to turn loose of those things that don't profit and set our affections again on things above?  May God give us a revival that will turn us back to Him—a revival that will cause us to covet the spiritual gifts and not the earthly!

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"Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry" (Colossians 3:5).