Worship and Idols | A Foundational Understanding
Whenever one brings up the issue of “worship” immediately, it seems that everyone garners a preconceived notion of what worship is, how everyone should do it, and ultimately, how the way do it is far superior to everyone else’s. People have left churches over issues of worship style. Arguments have stirred up controversy as to which instruments, if any, can be appropriately used within a service. For all the intense argumentation and heated debates resulting in loss of friends and family, it is possible that the root of these debates stems from a misunderstanding of what it actually is. In fact, it is more likely that we have created idols under the guise and mask of worshipping “in the name of the Lord.”
The concepts of worship and idolatry are deeply connected with one another because they have to do with either a right and true placement of our affection and submission or a wrong and false placement. An idol is anything that takes the rightful place of God in the lives of people, whether they have placed their faith in the work of Jesus Christ or not. The first two commands in Exodus 20 address the issue of worship and idolatry at the beginning, marking their importance for an ordered life.
You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.” (Exodus 20:3-6, ESV)
It should come as no surprise that our modern day culture wrestles with the issue of worship and idolatry. John Calvin famously stated in his Institute on Christian Religion that mankind is “a perpetual factory of idols.” The nature of our flesh wrestles with a constant desire to elevate ourselves and our ability to the status of God rather than bowing down in worship. To understand worship, we must wrestle with the idea of idolatry in an effort to dethrone anything that our heart has sought to elevate the world to a place that only God can sustain. Worship bows before the Lord with all that we are in total submission to Him but idolatry bows to anything other than the One, True God. With God being a reigning, sovereign, and victorious King, nothing will be able to remove God from the throne. Thus, we look to worship God and remove the idols we place between us and the throne.
Understanding Worship
Before we dig our heels in to any preconceived notion of worship, it is best to turn to scripture to define what we seek to understand about God. Scripture, being the authoritative self-revelation of God, provides the best understanding of worship. It moves beyond musical style, service order, and instrumental usage, going much deeper and penetrating the soul. “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:1-2, ESV)” The biblical command to worship, given by Paul to the church in Rome, does not build on the foundation of musical style or preference. Instead, the foundational understanding of worship comes by our total submission to the Kingship and Lordship of Jesus Christ. Worship is our response to knowing even a taste of who God is and what He has done in our lives. To lay down our lives as living sacrifices leaves nothing left for the person to cling to as their own.
In the Old Testament, sacrifices would mean that the object being sacrificed would be submitted and consumed in its entirety. Nothing would be left of its former self. While Jesus served as our perfect sacrifice, with no needed sacrificial atonement for our sins, our worship involves the laying down of ourselves. Worship bows before God, laying down every aspect of ourselves for the King to do with whatever He sees fit. Offering our bodies as an act of worship submits everything we have and everything we are to the will of a benevolent God. Worship submits to and glorifies God as the true sustainer and creator of the universe who alone is able to uphold, rule, and reign over all creation. Only one being in all the universe is worthy receive worship as the ruler over all creation but physical and spiritual. This sovereign King is worthy to received our worship as God and ruler and King of the universe as we rightfully submit everything to Him. We honor Him with our worship by submitting ourselves fully to God.
Understanding Idolatry
Worship being the rightful declaration that God is the sovereign ruler over all creation, leave us with the problem of idolatry. Idolatry, simplistically speaking is misplaced worship. It elevate anything other than God to the position that God rightfully holds. It places the creation over the creator and subjugates our personhood and identity to the creation, defying the intended position and order that God created for existence to be in harmony with one another. Idolatry knows God but bows before another, thinking that the idol is more fit than the creator and ruler of the universe. “For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves.” (Romans 1:21-24, ESV) Idolatry is tantamount to a declaration of war against the rightful ruler of the universe who will not fail to maintain His position on the throne.
Idolatry turns the created order on its head and elevates creation above the God who created it and who reigns over it. Thus as God hands people over to their idolatry, their life rebels against the creator order, almost as if everything is turned upside down. When we worship creation we forge idols out of the things of this world rather than the one who created all things. Then, as the things of this world become our god, we quickly find that the idols we have created cannot sustain us, let alone the fabric of creation without quickly crumbling. The war that idols create hand a person over to the falsehood of their impotent rule and lead the person astray to impurity and dishonor. Idols pretend to stand in a place of rule and reign over ourselves only take our very being from us and cast us into the depths of hell in our rebellion against the only One who is worthy to receive worship.
Everyone will stand before the King of Kings one day. Those who worship will bow before Him, submitting to His Lordship. Those who do not will be made low, having chosen rebellion and idolatry rather than worship.
About The Author
Daniel Burton is the founder of The Gospel Outpost. He is passionate about discipleship and seeing people grow in their relationship with Jesus Christ. To find out more about him, check out his Author Page.
