Why Do I Do The Wicked Things I Do?

“Son of man, these leaders have set up idols in their hearts. They have embraced things that will make them fall into sin. Why should I listen to their requests? [Ezekiel 14.3]

"Set up idols in their hearts..." should be a scary, eye-opening, heart-seeking phrase to us.

This is something entirely different than forming a physical idol and putting it up to worship it. This is something much worse. An idol on the shelf and an idol in the heart are not the same. An idol in the heart is notably more dangerous and detestable.

Jesus spoke that it was from the heart that man was defiled.

The heart, we are told in the Old Testament, is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

The scripture of this post points out that idols in the heart lead to sin.

We often ask, "Why do I do the wicked things I do?"

The answer could be very simple: because we have not dethroned the idols we have embraced in our hearts.

However, because the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, it will require much more than casual religion and human effort to get control of it! It will take the power of God's Holy Spirit to dethrone the idols our hearts embrace.

How do we know idols are in our hearts? Because we fall into sin with little or no effort. Those nasty sins that seem to haunt us are prime indicators of idols embraced at the heart level. 

Who can know the human heart? Only God. Only God can overcome the grip of the human heart on its secret idols. God will only begin His work of cleansing our hearts when we seek Him in repentance. Only when we genuinely seek God first does His Holy Spirit convict and convince us of sin so that we might begin to repent.

All we can do in the process is humble ourselves and repent confessing our wickedness at the foot of the Cross of Jesus.

How will we know the idols in our hearts have been removed? The damning grip of sin that so easily besets us will be broken.

Jesus showed us the way on the Cross. The Holy Spirit leads to the Cross. We must, on purpose, take up our cross.

I just had a thought... about the cross... The cross was, for Jesus, a place of forgiveness for others. Jesus said that forgiveness was found in forgiving. Is our cross a place of forgiveness for others? Do we want forgiveness for others that much?

How related are those idols embraced by our hearts (that cause repeated nasty sin) and unforgiveness?

Hmm.

Father, show me the idols embraced by my heart that repeatedly cause me to fall into sin. Forgive me for holding on to those idols - perhaps carved images of unforgiveness toward others...