No wonder I am so angry! Watch how the children gather wood and the fathers build sacrificial fires. See how the women knead dough and make cakes to offer to the Queen of Heaven. And they pour out liquid offerings to their other idol gods! Am I the one they are hurting?” asks the LORD. “Most of all, they hurt themselves, to their own shame.” [Jeremiah 7.18-19]
What God describes here through Jeremiah is how idolatry had become a normal part of the people's daily lives. The people were indeed living, but only to serve their idols thus ultimately hurting themselves.
Sound familiar?
Debt, insurance, medicine and technology have become a normal part of people's daily lives. Like in Jeremiah's day, people now are routinely living to serve and service the gods of debt, insurance, medicine and technology. To have and hold these gods requires toiling bondage to pay for them. People speak openly among themselves of their bondage to debt, insurance, medicine and technology (usually how expensive they are) but stupidly never identify them as idols... Month after month, they ignorantly and literally "pay" homage to these idols all the while thinking that paying God ten percent as a tithe is a real sacrifice.
Such stupidity and ignorance! Their eyes are closed, and they cannot see. Their minds are shut, and they cannot think. [Isaiah 44.18]
The passage above is even more damning to our modern day idolatry because, in context, God is speaking through Isaiah how foolish it is to worship something made by man (just like debt, insurance, medicine and technology).
God pulls no punches when it comes to idols.
Father, may our understanding be enlightened to the truth about modern day idolatry. And then, may our daily lives reflect our service to You and not to idols! So be it.
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