What’s your golden calf?

You must not make for yourself an idol of any kind, or an image of anything in the heavens or on the earth or in the sea.

Commandment 2 of the Big 10 from Deuteronomy 5:8

I am doing a “Bible in a year” study. I should be done in around 18-months. Well, I go down rabbit trails. My reading this week has taken me to Deuteronomy. God used Moses to deliver his people from slavery in Egypt (that’s back in Exodus) to the promised land. But the Israelites, Moses included, screwed up. SO God wandered them about the desert for 40-years.

In Deuteronomy, their time has come. God is about to give them the land of milk and honey. Moses, because he screwed up, won’t get to go in. But God is speaking through him before he lets his people in, reminding them of their history and the laws given to them by the Lord, their (and my) God. He recounts the Ten Commandments and for some reason, number two really took me back this time. No idols. Of course, number one is “no other Gods but me.”

People have other gods. Buddhists. Hindus. Muslims. Wiccans. All good people pursuing enlightenment through a being bigger than themselves. I know a few. Well-intentioned. But unless they discover Jesus Christ, they will be cast into the fiery furnace of hell. It sounds harsh, I know, but the road is narrow and the Bible either is true or it isn’t. I believe it to be the ultimate Truth (with a capital T).

While my faith dictates it to be wrong and the very heart of blasphemy, I at least understand the “other gods” thing. But idols?

Through my 2024 eyes, idols seems kind of silly. Yes, the Israelites, at the base of the very mount where Moses was getting the Big 10 from the Big G, got bored and hammered out some golden calves to worship. The people God was equipping them to toss out of Canaan worshipped a bull named Baal. But the whole “idols” thing seems sooooo 3,400 years ago.

Or does it?

In the morning, I get up early, get coffee and breakfast, and head to my spare bedroom study/studio for my daily reading. Here’s a picture of this morning’s spread. Do you see any idols?

There’s my bible, lit by that little table lamp to help me see. My breakfast (since it’s Saturday, I made that tortilla, egg, cheese thing I like so much). But no golden calves, so I’m safe, right?

I’m too fat and I love food. Love it. I get up on Saturdays and make that tortilla, egg, and cheese thing. I start looking forward to it somewhere around Wednesday. Idolatry or not?

For purposes of photograph, my breakfast is propped atop my computer keyboard. I spend way too much time on that computer. I’m on it now. I enjoy surfing and reading and learning and writing. Idolatry or not?

And that between my Bible and my breakfast is my phone. An appendage. It never leaves my side. I’m with my phone more than I am with my wife. Certainly more than I am with my Bible. I know it when my phone is not near – my Apple watch tells me as much. Idolatry or not?

While we are three and one-half millennia separated from the golden calves of the wandering Israelites, I believe that there are idols that we actively worship today. Social media. Phones. Food. Politics and politicians. Celebrities. Sports teams. Money. Cars. Possessions. I would posit that the idols of 2024 are more pervasive than the idols that made God jealous in 1440 B.C.

Of course the only ones that really know are you and God. And He can be jealous. He also forgives and gives you strength to put no other gods before Him. Just a thought I wanted to share this morning between bites of that egg, tortilla, cheese thingy. Now excuse me while I go smash a few modern day calves…