Idols

1 Corinthians 8:1,4-6 - Now concerning food offered to idols: we know that “all of us possess knowledge.” This “knowledge” puffs up, but love builds up…Therefore, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that “an idol has no real existence,” and that “there is no God but one.” For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth—as indeed there are many “gods” and many “lords”—yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.


Exodus 34:13-16 - You shall tear down their altars and break their pillars and cut down their Asherim (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and when they whore after their gods and sacrifice to their gods and you are invited, you eat of his sacrifice, and you take of their daughters for your sons, and their daughters whore after their gods and make your sons whore after their gods.

Isaiah 44:13,17-19 - The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house…And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!” They know not, nor do they discern, for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand. No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?”

Application:

· Am I filled with false pride? Do I love my brothers who doubt?
· Do I partake of things that invite compromise?
· Do I live for God and do I live through Jesus Christ?
· Man was made in the image of God, but an idol is made in the image of man
· Idolatry is worship of no god
· The eyes of those who worship idols are plastered and their minds are closed. Are my eyes plastered and my mind closed?
· Those who worship idols are detestable. Am I detestable?

All Scripture verses taken from ESV