I've been recently reading through 1 and 2 Kings in my bible reading plan. I know how important the truth of God's Word is and so I've been trying to stay committed to this reading plan. Man alive, it is a discipline. I am SO NOT rocking it. One chapter a day is hard for me. Our reading plan combines New and Old Testament readings together that share a theme. So of course, I conveniently read all the New Testament because it is easier to digest and I now need to go back and read the Old Testament. I know the Lord is teaching me through 1 and 2 kings but it has been a journey.
If you haven't read 1 and 2 kings, it is about the kings of Israel and Judah and how they lead their people. Some were totally committed to the Lord and lead their people to love Him and obey Him. Others had no respect or care for the Lord and chose to lead their people to worship false gods, even to sacrifice their own children for these false gods. It is about how the kings of Israel failed to worship God alone over and over and forgot to chose to love Him alone over and over.
Stupid kings. They couldn't learn lessons from the kings before them?!
Oh wait, the whole log in the eye while pointing out a stick in someone else's thing.
Stupid ME. How often I see the one true God work in my life time again and again and still choose not to worship Him alone.
It got me thinking about false gods and Easter dinner. One thing I love about my husband's family is that they LOVE food. Food = time together = love in their home. You walk in and everyone is gathered around the kitchen: talking, helping set up, preparing, baking, cooking. Meals last a long time and food and good conversation are savored completely. For Easter dinner, we ate ham and french toast casserole with syrup and potato casserole and fruit and chocolate. After dinner, we all had coffee and lingered longer, talking, laughing. It got me thinking about nourishment and how GOOD a hearty meal is when you are so, so hungry. I compared it in my mind to going to McDonalds. The McDonalds looks so good: the salty fries, the coke. You think it will fill you but it always seems like an hour later you are hungry again. That's how false gods are in my mind. We think they will fill us but they leave us empty again and again. Wanting and needing more nourishment.
A false god is anything we put in place of the one true God. Anything that takes "the high place", where God should be in our life.
I like to think about it as a fill in the blank statement. Whatever I am filling in the blank with this statement is my false god: If only I had ___________, I would be complete.
Sometimes that can be thinking that if you had a certain friendship or a certain person or people like you, you would be complete. Sometimes it can be a certain job or a certain amount of money or marriage or more children or being able to have children. Sometimes it can be material things like a bigger house or car or decor or clothes. Sometimes it can be thinking that more time or more sleep would make you happy. Maybe it's health or a clean house. Sometimes it can even be being a good person, a good mom or a good wife. Those are good things, but those are not God. Striving to be a good mom and not a Christ following mom will leave you empty, wanting and needing more.
My brother in law so wisely shared that you can think about this statement like a void, an empty place. Our void, our empty places in our soul should be filled with the Lord. But we like to fill it with all kinds of things that keep us empty, hungry, and bitter.
I wish I could say I fill that statement every day with Christ alone. But then I would just be lying. The truth is I am much too often like the Kings of Israel, seeing how GOOD it is when God fills my high place, my complete statement but forgetting again and again. I have to remind myself of who God is every second, every minute, every day. I am so thankful for a God who is full of GRACE, who takes me back and welcomes me back as His child despite my actions. God looks at me and sees Christ and I am so thankful for Christ's work.
"And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, according to all that his father Uzziah had done. Nevertheless, the high places were not removed. The people still sacrificed and made offerings on the high places." 2 kings 15: 34-35
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