Idolatry (UPDATED)

Sometimes when you're surfing, you find things that just need posting--a "coincidence," if you like.

Beware of manufacturing a god of your own: a god who is all mercy but not just, a god who is all love but not holy, a god who has a heaven for everybody but a hell for none, a god who can allow good and bad to be side by side in time, but will make no distinction between good and broad in eternity. Such a god is an idol of your own, as truly an idol as any snake or crocodile in an Egyptian temple. The hands of your own fancy and sentimentality have made him. He is not the God of the Bible, and beside the God of the Bible, there is no God at all.

Beware of making selections from your Bible to suit your taste. Dare not to say, ‘I believe this verse, for I like it. I refuse that, for I cannot reconcile it with my views’. Nay! But O man, who art thou that repliest against God? By what right do you talk in this way? Surely it were better to say over EVERY chapter in the word, “Speak Lord, for thy servant heareth”. Ah! If men would do this, they would never deny the unquenchable fire.

J.C. Ryle (1816-1900), Fire, Fire!

(Thanks to Conservative Black Woman)

UPDATE: The "Jesus" described by Liberation Theologies is most certainly an idol, as is the little-g god worshiped by Liberation theologians such as James Cone, prophet of Black Liberation Theology.  Of course we remember Cone's god: the one who will get revenge on the "white enemy."  And of course we remember who BLT's most famous adherent is.

Comments

[Buford Gooch]

Thanks. This separates religion from philosophy. Christianity is not a philosophy. One of the things that annoys me most from pastors is their tendency to preach things that "tickle the ears". I don't need fire and brimstone, but I do need the whole Truth.

[Ed Bonderenka]

Ray Comfort says something like this when trying to convict a sinner with the 10 Commandments.
When people say "My god would never..." he points out that their god is not the same as the one in the Bible. That they've created an idol.
Good post. Thanks.

[Wry Mouth]

Baldi; I had to create an account just to start commenting again. Such is the power of the Baldilocks blog on its adherents. :o/

I've just started serious Bible study again this summer for the first time in (too long) ages... I can't get out of Genesis 1:1 without hitting paydirt: the Hebrew translation begins, "In the beginning, WHEN God made the heavens and the Earth..." shifting the whole center of the sentence to about verse 3!

Sadly, this god: "a god who is all mercy but not just, a god who is all love but not holy, a god who has a heaven for everybody but a hell for none, a god who can allow good and bad to be side by side in time, but will make no distinction between good and broad in eternity" is all too often the god my students (a secular, private school) want to believe in (and then ignore). I am torn between retiring from the job, and seeking work elsewhere, and -- maybe -- actually trying to be a Christian model. But that, alas, is such a hard road. :o(

Still... maybe I'll be broken enough, by September, to give it a try...

[babylonandon]

Idolatry - translation - I am going to define my view as what God is and in so doing be my own God and am therefore not answerable to anyone.

Ah, the sin of Satan - Pride.

Pity poor player. Tis but the tale of a fool, full of sound and thunder - signifying...nothing.

Nothing is a fine answer to have when you stand before the White Throne of Judgment ... but it will do little to douse the Eternal Flames.