Tim Keller, in Counterfeit Gods says:

An idol is something we look to for things that only God can give. Idolatry functions widely inside religious communities when doctrinal truth is elevated to positions of a false god. This occurs when people rely on the rightness of their doctrines for their standing with God rather than on God himself and his grace. It is a subtle but deadly mistake. The sign that you have slipped into this form of self-justification is that you become what the book of Proverbs calls a “scoffer”. Scoffers always show contempt and disdain for the opponents rather than graciousness, This is a sign that they do no see themselves as sinners saved by grace. Instead, their trust in the rightness of their views makes them feel superior.

Does that sound personally familiar to you? It has to me. Perhaps not as severely right now, but in the past, definitely. Sometimes we may not even realize that we have placed some of our hope in something other than the Gospel.

Many churches look at the churches around them as competitors, rather than partners. Or theological diversity as a threat to their ministry. I doubt this is anything short of a sense of religious idolatry.

Even if our theology is right, and our church is healthy, our attitudes toward other people’s theological ideas and churches reveal a good deal about what our own thought and theology means to us. “Scoffing” and “disdain” for anyone is not a good thing. But it’s especially revealing when those things are directed at people who share the same salvation we do.

I have often heard people (even Christians) poke fun at various religious beliefs which seem to be especially outrageous. Reincarnation (Hinduism), the third coming of Christ (Unificationism), virgins awaiting the newcomer to heaven (Islam), Xenu and evil extra-terrestrials (Scientology). And sure, like any religion with a supernatural element, any objective, unfamiliar assessment (which may well not exist) of it will lead one to scratch their head and think how silly it sounds.

But while most Americans don’t seem to bat an eye at the basic concepts of Christianity, I submit that Christianity would be, in fact, the craziest.

When we hear the ancient bells growling on a Sunday morning we ask ourselves: Is it really possible! This, for a jew, crucified two thousand years ago, who said he was God’s son? The proof of such a claim is lacking. Certainly the Christian religion is an antiquity projected into our times from remote prehistory; and the fact that the claim is believed – whereas one is otherwise so strict in examining pretensions – is perhaps the most ancient piece of this heritage. A god who begets children with a mortal woman; a sage who bids men work no more, have no more courts, but look for the signs of the impending end of the world; a justice that accepts the innocent as a vicarious sacrifice; someone who orders his disciples to drink his blood; prayers for miraculous interventions; sins perpetrated against a god, atoned for by a god; fear of a beyond to which death is the portal; the form of the cross as a symbol in a time that no longer knows the function and ignominy of the cross — how ghoulishly all this touches us, as if from the tomb of a primeval past! Can one believe that such things are still believed?

from Nietzsche’s Human, all too Human

“Sins perpetrated against a god, atoned for by a god.” This is the cornerstone of Christianity’s would-be madness. Though none of us bats an eye, or even wonders at it.

If the statement “It’s so crazy, it must be true”, were ever true, it would be so of Christianity. In this way, Christianity is completely unique among world religions. Of course, it has its similarities as well. The core principles are absolutely all its own and unlike anything else.

Man would sin against God and lose all hope in himself for reconciliation, but in the face of that, God himself would become the reconciliation for man.

In the climate of the many world religions out there, For me, and many others, the uniqueness and, in a sense, the absurdness of Christianity adds a drop into the bucket of evidence which helps to strengthen my faith. Ironically, quite the opposite of Nietzsche.

1 Corinthians 11:1

Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.

Paul writes these words to the Corinthians. He has just explained some of how he chooses to interact with the Lost. Giving up many of his own liberties, at times, to better meet those people where they are. And so he tells the Corinthian church to imitate him, as he imitates Christ.

This verse is often used in the more direct sense that we should imitate our leader’s as they attempt to imitate Christ. This is an apt application of the scripture. But it occurred to me this morning as I was reading that we could also probably apply this in a broader sense as well.

As believers we all are imitators of Christ. We all have his Word and his Gospel. While the early church needed leaders to be a kind of ‘walking scripture’ to remind them of the Truth (they didn’t have very may written copies yet, and no one had a copy all to themselves which they could study daily), we now have the written transcripts and almost all of us have one all to ourselves. Those leading figures in our community remain important, but perhaps not always in the exact same way.

Because of this, we are all in a position to learn from each other and pour into one another. In some ways, we are all to each other, as Paul was to the Corinthians. We are all imitators of Christ to each other.

It stands to reason, with some limit, that we ought to not only look to our assigned leaders for our example, but also each other as to how to imitate Christ. To assess what is honorable in each other and imitate that.

Perhaps I have a great will and ability to read and study God’s word, while you have a great will and ability to seek God in prayer. These are both honorable things, and looking to each other, we should see what is good and attempt to emulate that as well.

I suspect this would help us to have a healthier view of following and serving God in our various ways, rather than idealizing church leadership and viewing that as the ‘pinnacle’ of following Christ.

Mark 5: 24:31

And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve years, and who had suffered much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was no better but rather grew worse. She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment. For she said, "If I touch even his garments, I will be made well." And immediately the flow of blood dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, "Who touched my garments?" And his disciples said to him, "You see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, ‘Who touched me?’"

In this story, Jesus is traveling to heal a girl who was sick and would eventually die, then later be brought back to life by Jesus. In transit, Jesus is surrounded by a large crowd who is pressing up against him, attempting to hear what he might say or see what he might do.

In the midst of this crowd was a woman who was suffering from a constant discharge of blood. The physicians of the day only served to drain her finances and leave her health worse off than when she started. Discovering Jesus, she wanted to get close to him. If nothing else, only to touch the fringes of his clothing. She succeeded and was healed. But when this happened, Jesus took notice. Even in the midst of a huge crowd that was obviously pressing up against him at times, he noticed the woman who had been healed.

Do you suppose she was the only one in the crowd afflicted with something? Perhaps she was the only one who was written about. But it could also be that, though there were many other people touching him, she was healed, while their experience was irrelevant.

She, presumably unlike the others, went to touch his garment in faith that she would be healed, while the others perhaps just out of hype or personal curiosity.

For me, this reminds me that simply knowing about Christ, or being in close proximity to the truth (i.e., in church every Sunday) isn’t enough to bring significant change to our lives. We have to press up against him actually believing that something will happen.

This is hard to do. But  remembering is a good step in the right direction.

Psalm 81:11-13:

"But my people did not listen to my voice;
   Israel would not submit to me.
So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,
   to follow their own counsels.
Oh, that my people would listen to me,
   that Israel would walk in my ways!”

In this passage, Asaph illustrates an important principle which runs throughout all of scripture. And, it’s one I’ve written on before.

There are times when a believer succumbs to destructive habits in his or her life and rides them out for a time. The severity varies, but most of the time the root is the same. God, at times, gives a believer up to his or her own sinful inclinations as a means of discipline. Discipline is good. Something like a parent allowing a child to get burned so they learn that it hurts.

While at times indulging our flesh feels rewarding, the underlying fact is that it is destructive and bad for us. When a believer enters a time like this, it isn’t long before they realize that they are suffering and return stronger than before.

This is why, I believe, a consistently good relationship with God won’t always look like obvious sanctification. Rather, sanctification will sometimes actually include times of serious struggle or even repetitive failure. For the believer, I believe, this is part of the sanctifying process we have to go through.

Of course, that doesn’t mean we go out in search of ways to gratify our flesh. No, we continue to seek God and seek to be like him. But when, we face times like these, we should feel encouraged. God is patient, molding and teaching us to be more like him, employing even the unexpected things we do and experience in order to meet his intentions for us.

Psalm 80:19:

Restore us, O LORD God of hosts!
   Let your face shine, that we may be saved!

I love this.

While perhaps the context doesn’t translate directly, it reminds us that God’s grace, God’s grace in revealing himself to us in Jesus Christ on the cross, is where we find our salvation.

Seeing God, as he is, is the only way we see our need for him and so receive his total blessing.

That is beautiful.

In Tim Keller’s book Counterfeit God’s he has a chapter devoted to the allurement of power and how, as human beings, we often elevate power a success (both socially and professionally) to the level of a deity.

As Americans we often have the idea that we can do ‘whatever we set our mind to’, but Keller asserts that:

“We are not nearly as responsible for our success as our popular views of God and reality lead us to think.”

As Keller describes, we have a tendency to want to see our lives as a blank canvas for us to draw on as we go. As children and young adults, we see things in our family and parents that we vow never to emulate. But before long, any rational assessment of our lives will reveal just how much our family and life circumstances have shaped who we are, what we do and what we like to do.

With just a quick step back, we can see these are things we have had no control over whatsoever. We do no choose when we are born, where we are born and to whom we are born.

If these are three things shape a massive amount of our character and person, they are also sure weights in the balance of our success in all kinds of areas of life.

We are therefore profoundly naive to ever honestly believe we are really ‘in control of our destiny’ so to speak. If we believe in the God of the bible, we must be humble and confess that we are not in control of our lives in the way that we would like to be.

Keeping this in mind is a humbling thing and massive step toward trusting God and having confidence in his decision making.