Some of you may have heard me say this before but fifth grade was the highlight of my life I was at the top of my game in fifth grade So it's been a long steady downhill ever since and It was fun. I don't know what it was. I was already the shortest in the class But nobody else had really shot up there yet. So wasn't that big of a deal and I love the talking class I love to tell stories. I love to kind of be the center of attention and the teacher knew this and therefore she gave a test and And she never said it was specifically for me, but looking back on it it was for me and the test was called a test on following instruction The first thing it said was read completely through this test before you start now What you need to know about me is this Some people think I'm competitive. I'm not all of life is not a competition. I Know that because I'll lose too often But all of life is definitely a race You know that right. I mean if you can be the high if you can be the last person to go into the self-check out out and the first person to get out You won you won and Why would you not want to win? It's a clearly I'm not gonna read through the test and so first one you know number one underline the word The everywhere you see it on the space circle every even number you see on the space And then number three begins to get weird balance a book on your head for five seconds Number four stand up and say the pledge of allegiance number five from your desk yell out in a loud voice I am the first one to this place in the test and you know You can't get crazier and sillier and sillier and the number 10 Say in a loud voice I must be the first person to complete this test which means I am the smartest person in the class and Then underneath that it says and I've done all these things and notice the giggling just because I'm a funny guy and Then underneath that it says now that you've read through this test don't do any of these things Sign your name and turn to page over and everybody was laughing at me and And that first instruction at the beginning that seemed so Unimportant was actually the only one I say that because we're doing the Ten Commandments this summer and Honestly from a childlike perspective when you're looking at the Ten Commandments and it looks like the first one's the easiest to keep You know don't worship any other gods check There is no statute of Molek in my house. I've got no bail statues hidden under my bed
But as you get a more mature Understanding of the faith you begin to understand what Martin Luther said when he said The first commandment as a harsh one to keep it is the first one we break We break it every time we refuse to believe that God loves us and When we look to something else to please us Indeed it is impossible to break any of the other commandments without breaking this one first and breaking this one Compels us to break other commandments for instance Lying why would you lie You lie to a boy being inconvenienced You lie to avoid looking bad to say face You lie To gain a competitive edge And each of those cases you're lying because you're God that your functional God the thing that is the most important to you is being threatened And if the Lord were your God you would never have to lie You wouldn't care how you looked and you wouldn't care if you won and you thought you don't think that the saving face is the most important thing in the world It's more important to be honest and to love the Lord Does that's not your God? Your God is your own image The first commandment is the hardest commandment to keep it is the one that we break the most often and whenever we break it We are called we are compelling ourselves to break all the others But when we keep this when we believe what God says about us when we seek and worship him first We will be spared a life of despair and heartache Please stand as we read this text about Making false gods from Isaiah chapter 44
Here's the word of the Lord The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm He becomes hungry and his strength fails. He drinks no water and his paint The carpenter stretches the line. He marks it out with a pencil He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass He shakes it into the figure of a man with a beauty of a man to dwell in a house He cuts down cedars or chooses a Cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest He plants a cedar in the rain nourishes it then it becomes as fuel for a man He takes part of it and warms himself. He kindles a fire and makes him bread He also makes a god and worships it. He makes it an idol and falls down before it Half of it he burns in the fire over the half he eats meat He roasts it and is satisfied also he warms himself and says, ah, I am warm I've seen the fire 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 the do that nor do they discern For God has shut their eyes so they cannot see and their hearts so they cannot understand No one considers nor is their knowledge or discernment to say half of it I've burned in the fire. I also baked bread on its coals I roasted meat and have eaten and I should make the rest of it an abomination So I fall down before a block of wood He feeds on ashes a deluded heart has led him astray He cannot deliver himself or say, is there not a lie in my right hand? Remember these things O Jacob and Israel for you are my servant. I formed you. You are my servant, O Israel You will not be forgotten by me. I Have blotted out your transgressions like a cloud And your sins like mist return to me for I have redeemed you As far the reading of God's word all men are like grass and all their glories like the flowers in the field The grass withers and the flowers fall but not God's word God's word stands forever. You may be seated God loves us too much less worship other things He knows that if we would just believe what he says about us If we would seek him first then we would be spared alive of despair What I want you to see in this text is this irony that that that that that Isaiah is pointing out to us this Idol this thing that you're worshiping is the work of your own hands and the work of your own hands is limited The work of your own hands isn't bigger than you the work of your own hands can't deliver you the work of your own hands Can't keep you safe the work of your own hands cannot forgive you. It's not a God
Think about this first commandment. I want you to think about what where God puts us in this first commandment Think of the whole thing. What does he say? He says I am the Lord your God. I am the Lord your God I brought you out of the land of Egypt out of the house of bondage. What is he already saying about you? I'm yours I The Lord of the universe the creator of heaven the creator of the sustainer of space time and dimension the source of all that there Is I'm yours. I'm your God. I Called you by name You were mine. I have already redeemed you. I already love you and That's the place where we are created to start from That's the place we're created to have is art is our starting point we are designed by God to begin life From from a pedestal really from this place of already knowing who we are For a place of already knowing that I am beloved I am important I am beautiful somebody Somebody takes great joy in me the Lord himself takes great joy in me and pleasure in me I'm created to start that way not earn that Think about Jesus. How did he start his ministry? Sunday school lesson Was a very first thing was the initiation of Jesus's public ministry wrong. It was his baptism Very first thing he did he was baptized and went to John John said why am I baptizing you should baptize me and he said how I should do it John baptizes him and then what happens A dog comes out of the Holy Spirit comes down from heaven in this form of a dove and the rest upon Jesus and a loud boy says This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased What did he done to earn that? nothing That's the key. He was just starting He had healed no one he had taught nothing He had not saved anybody He started with this declaration from God This is my beloved son In whom I am well pleased that was his starting point That's how you're designed to function. That's how I'm designed to function We're designed to have this starting point and we're designed to move toward a completion point when we hold our God life up to God just as Jesus did in John 17 and he said I've done everything that you've given me to do And he commits his life into his father's hands You know, I'm the person on the cross when he says into your hand. I commit my spirit. It is finished and God again Receives his work and confirms it with the resurrection That's how we are designed to function, but we don't believe that message We don't believe God when he says I'm your God. We don't believe God when he says we're already in covenant relationship I already love you. I've already redeemed you We don't believe he could possibly be that good. So what do we do? We look for other things to make us feel important to make us feel secure and We don't do it like it did in the Old Testament. We don't do it like it did in that you know in that era We don't have little statues to the things Right, what would they do? They would they wouldn't worship a statue. They would worship fertility So they had a God named Bale that they would worship as the God of fertility or they would worship strength power So they would have a God molek or Mars They would worship love and a God eros They would worship beauty We're so much smarter than them and they would had a God named Aphrodite Like they had all these gods for the things that they worship they would worship wealth and they had a God named Artemis and they would pray to Artemis for wealth We don't have those things. We're far more advanced, right? We don't we still worship the things We don't worship the fertility God. We worship the family portrait over the fireplace And we we we feel judged that we're not actually that beautiful family smiling for the portrait But we kind of pray to it. We we aspire to it. It's our it's our life. It is what has the power to judge us We don't worship Success and we do worship success. We don't have a God for it. We have a diploma We put over our desk that we sacrificed for And we slaved away for and that confirms us. We don't worship Artemis the God of wealth We just worship the status symbol the car or the watch We don't worship the God of success, but we do have the trophies We don't worship the goddess of beauty. We don't have a statue to Aphrodite But we definitely have mirrors in every room and fashion magazines and a picture of what we ought to be That the idol still to continue. They just continue What are they? What is your idol? What are your functional idol? Your functional idol is the thing that you serve your functional idol is the thing that you look to to give you happiness Your functional idol is the thing that has the power to judge you the thing that calls you a failure because you didn't do it You didn't achieve it your functional idol is the thing that Justifies you you are important because you did it receive it Jesus he he talked about our functional idols and the one he seemed to worry about the most was wealth And you read the words of Jesus he was very concerned about wealth becoming your idol and he says it In the ceremony on the mountain several other places. You cannot serve God in wealth You'll you cannot have two masters. You'll love one and hate the other you'll hate one despise the other You'll serve one despise the other you cannot serve both God and wealth You possible Paul and in the context where he was doing ministry worried more about Pleasure being your idol He talked about those who made a god of their stomachs Feeling good, gluttony, or God of sex, you know, in collotions, he says avoid sexual immorality Which is idolatry? It's the thing that we look to that to get us through the week It's the thing that has our heart. It's the thing that we sacrifice to Tim Calder has a list of different head of hand out for identifying your idols And he he encourages us to use our emotions our Problem emotions to identify our idols. He says if you're angry ask is there something too important to me? Is there something that's being threatened? Is there something I'm telling myself? I have to have is that why I'm angry? Am I being blocked from having something I think is necessary when it's not if I'm badly worried should I ask is Is there something I'm telling myself that I have to have is that why I'm so scared is something being threatened? Which I think is necessary When it's not if you're in despair or hating yourself ask yourself why am I so down? So the psalmist prays and I say it's all 40. It's what I've been praying lately. So why are you so down? What about a lost or failed that that I think is necessary when it's not what are our idols? One of the things that we worship instead of God now we're talking we're calling this the series the laws of freedom How is this freeing us? How is God's First commandment here to worship me and worship me only how is that freeing us? How is that a symbol of his love? He is lovingly trying to rescue us From a life of spare One how because these gods that we worship these idols that we worship they're the work of our own hands They can't deliver us we need something bigger than us our heart is crying out for something bigger than us That can forgive you That can protect you That can confirm you Idols can't give you a foundation It can't give you that that pedestal that you're supposed to be born from That you're supposed to be born with you're supposed to be born already knowing you're supposed to live your life already knowing I am valuable because I have the love and the appreciation of people who are important to me Idols can't replace that when I was When I was in school they're you know you know about y'all that's been a lot of time to school board Thinking about hard problems that the teachers would never teach us about and the two the two problems I always used to think about were Can a man be so strong That he could pick himself up Now I look back on a good what I'm asking is is the gift of flight a thing But at the time like I had my mind you know, I knew you could pull yourself up But that that hug is supporting your way with nothing else supporting your way and I and I would draw it out Right all these contraptions where if I push up on this and something would go down But that would be supporting my weight could I is there anyway? The answer's no You can't lift yourself up no matter how strong you are. It's a physical thing. It has something to do with Newton and his look stupid laws Another question I would always have was if you were in a hole Could you dig on this side of the hole and put it on that side of the hole and make it tall enough that you would be able to get out Digging yourself out of the hole. The answer's no. You can't do that either gravity is stupid laws You can't build yourself up by the work of your own hands
why Because whatever you achieve is going to be short-lived That's that's the way life works If you're trying to justify yourself by accomplishment If you're trying to adjust By achievement the problem with that is no matter how much you've achieved It is meaningless tomorrow
There's a great example that's going on right now. The only sporting thing that's going on in the world is this documentary about Michael Jordan Finishes up tonight and there's something haunting about it. He really was the greatest ever play the game At least it wasn't his generation But when you see the interviews with him you're like you're not that guy anymore And it is Descroying him the knowledge that he's not that guy anymore But I don't have to look to Michael Jordan for an example. I'll tell you about myself I was on the phone with my spiritual counselor this week and he was trying to convince me of this Very thing and he said you don't have to achieve another thing for the rest of your life You have already wildly overachieved what anybody would rightfully have expected from your background and I said to him that is BS. I Have a sermon to preach on Sunday Don't bother lying to me and tell me the achieving is over It is not Achieving will never justify us because the past is meaningless Secondly, not only can the idols not give us a foundation. They can't give us security Once you have it you're terrified of losing it an idol is something that is It kind of can pull you along until you get it and But once you get it all you can do is be terrified of losing it I the greatest example is is the idol of family the idol of that perfect family if I only had the family that everybody else has on Facebook then I could be happy And once you get it once you finally get those kids you're either terrified of losing them So you give them everything and spoil them or you're terrified they won't succeed And so you push them and push them so that they can never So they're never good enough And either way those stinking kids are going to leave you they're going to do that cruel cruel thing called growing up Selmin And leave you with nothing but memories Idols can't give you security. They're always moving idols can't give you approval. They can never say enough They could never say enough and finally idols Cannot forgive you and we're gonna be forgiven if you struggle with guilt if you don't struggle with guilt I love to talk Figure out how you work that one out But if you struggle with guilt what you need to know is this in order to be forgiven something higher something bigger has to forgive you I got that lesson one day when I was in seminary I Used to go to lunch with a man in John Reed Miller He was an old pastor. He had retired. He was in his 80s and he would He would let seminary students take him to lunch and it was just a wonderful time to gain wisdom and And there's a couple rules you always wore a tie it was funny like we wore T-shirts to class I didn't go to one of those tie wearing seminaries, but if you picked up Dr. Miller you wore a tie because you dressed for the person you were coming to see in The second rule was you were never late never late for Dr. Miller and I just forgot one day. I was supposed to pick him up totally forgot Looked at the clock. I was 40 minutes late through on my tie drove across town My car broke down as I arrived and so he thought that was the reason why I was late, which it wasn't but I let it slide
But I just felt terrible I Just felt terrible And I'll never forget like the you know, I apologize. I explained in my car. My car just broke down and you'd call a a Racker and I've been after as we were eating lunch. I apologize again I'll never forget his words. He said I Have forgiven you for that and it will not be spoken of again. Okay. I Have been forgiven It will not be spoken of again. I No longer have permission to bring it up He was the offended party. He was By all accounts more honorable than me He was above me and he had the authority to forgive me and I needed that When we go through life unable to forgive ourselves that phrase that people say over and over again I know God is forgiving me, but I just can't forgive myself. I Want to look at them and go I do look at them and go Who cares what you are able to do for you? If you weren't making such an idol out of your own self image you wouldn't care God is above you infinitely above you Just think about the sentence. I Know God has forgiven me, but I can't forgive myself If God has forgiven you who cares what a little peon like you says The Lord of the universe is forgiving you if you really believe that if you let his opinion of you Be greater than your own opinion if you believe your identity in Christ that would be enough An idol cannot give you a foundation it cannot give you security it cannot give you approval and Ultimately cannot give you forgiveness. So what is God? How then how do we stop worshipping idols? How do we get ourselves out of this slavery to constantly putting all of our hopes and that which will only disappoint? How do we keep the first commandment? What are you telling me to do Ricky? Just love things less? No, that never works I just told you to go out and just love money less Worship family less that doesn't work What I want you to do is love God more he doesn't he doesn't say these things are worthless He says worship me more love me more Okay How do I do that? By remembering what he's done to rescue you the entire old testament is one long narrative of God continually going after his love Israel and them continually turning away from him and turning to other idols and he begins to To describe this narrative in the form of adulterous relationship of him pouring out his love and claiming his bribe for himself and and she keeps going after other boyfriends and and keeps going and Continues to cheat on him with others and he actually goes so far as he has one of his prophets name Hosea Act this this out he goes and marries a woman that he knows will be unfaithful and she keeps Committing adultery on him to the point then he actually names his third child not my son Can you have you going through life with that for a name? What's your name not my son? Who names you that Low a me And finally This wife gomer leads him completely and God says letter go And she is she lives with a wealthy man for a while and then she lives with a man of less wealth and then she She keeps getting dumped and left by the curb and picked up by someone even less desirable and finally She's just poor and living by herself and God says to Hosea take her groceries Just leave him on the porch And she gets the she wakes up and she sees the groceries and one of her lovers comes by and says oh did you get the groceries? And she thanks him she thanks the wrong person for them And she she spreads her love on this man that did not anything for her did not do anything for her and God says Hosea that is me. I have continually sought after Israel. I continue for blessings on my people When they're thinking they're thanking other things for it That's me And he continues to let her go further and further down until finally she has to sell herself in the slavery and God says to Hosea okay go get her back And so he goes in This nasty shack and he says I've come for my wife and the man who owns her stands up and says you're going to have to pay just like everybody else
And Hosea stands up to him and says how much? And he names the price and Hosea gets out of his money back And he pays the price and bronze and then he pays it in silver and then he pays it in gold and then he calls for his servants We begin to haul in and Bag after bag of barley and grain And he makes it clear to everyone. I'm not paying for one night I am buying her back forever and God says to us. I have given my son for you. Do you think that diploma cares about you? Do you think that job would give his own son for you? Do you think that fleeting beauty would die for you? I've given everything for you to buy you back from your adultery Nothing else loves you And if you would just believe that about me You would not find it hard to love me more Please pray with me. Our father in heaven. We confess our unbelief We just don't believe that you love us that much
It's hard for us to believe you still love us when the economy is collapsing And our bank accounts are going down
And when our children are sad When the relationships don't come When the phone doesn't ring Would you give us the faith to believe that you love us more than any of those things ever will That only you will never leave us
Would you give us the grace to believe that And to worship you alone as our God Amen