Idolatry is really just a strange-sounding word for a pretty simple concept: being obsessed with things that are good, but not good enough to warrant obsession. And the way to know whether you’re obsessed with anything is to imagine how you would respond if it were taken away from you or destroyed. If you are attached to it, you’d be sad or angry. If you idolize it, you’d be devastated.
See, everyone worships something, and idolatry is just the misdirection of this impulse to worship. As such, it can’t be stifled, only redirected. Since only God warrants such adoration, the choice is fairly simple: be properly obsessed with God or be improperly obsessed with something else.
The challenging question is whether we are so attached to God that losing Him would be the most devastating thing we can imagine. Few of us can say we are because, in all honesty, we’re just part-time lovers. And salvation is simply God’s promise that one day we will know the joy of loving Him full time.
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