"American Idols" I Corinthians 10:14-22

American Idol(s) (or, Idol Talk 2)

I Corinthians 10:14-22

Introduction: One of the creations of television over the last twelve years or so has been a program called, “American Idol.”  We don’t need a television show to inform us that there are many “American Idols” today, and I am not talking about our love for music and entertainment.  Over a hundred years ago, D.L. Moody said, “You don’t have to go to heathen lands to find false gods, America is full of them. Whatever you love more than God is your idol.” Nearly 2,000 years ago, Paul said in Romans 1:20-23,  

²⁰ For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.  ²¹ For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.  ²² Claiming to be wise, they became fools,  ²³ and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Rather than worshipping the God who is, the creator who made humans in His own image, humans, though they recognize that there is a God,  refuse to come to him on His terms, and fashion their own ideas about God in their minds. A.W. Tozer said,

“A god begotten in the shadows of a fallen heart, will, quite naturally, be no true likeness to the true God.”

Fallen humans seems to have an overwhelming desire to fashion a god in their own image, a god that thinks like they do, a god that they can live with.  In the Greek world in which Paul ministered, idolatry was running rampant. For all of its love of philosophy and culture, and its supposed pursuit of wisdom, the city of Athens was filled with idols when Paul arrived there.  Corinth, where Paul planted a church to which this letter was directed was no different.

       You remember that the Corinthians had written a letter to Paul with some questions that they wanted him to answer. Paul referred to it in I Corinthians 7:1 when he said, “Now concerning the things you wrote…” We don’t have that letter, but in this second part of first Corinthians we have Paul’s answers to their questions. Chapter 8:1 began his response to an issue they had asked about involving meat sacrificed to idols. An aspect of that seems to have been that some Corinthians felt free to attend meals at pagan temples.  Paul showed them in chapter 8 that we are free in Christ, but love for our brothers, and especially concern for our weaker brothers, should govern the exercise of our freedom. He turned to himself as an example in chapter 9 and talked about how he voluntarily set aside certain rights so as to not to be any hindrance to the gospel. In chapter 10 he urged the Corinthians to learn from the example of Israel, who, for all their blessing and privilege, still drifted from a walk of faith into idolatry. They had experienced the power and provision of God, they had seen the parting of the sea, the pillar of cloud and fire, the manna in the wilderness, water from a rock, and yet they brought Aaron their gold and said “make us a god.”  You remember Aaron’s pronouncement, “This is your God, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt” (Exodus 32:4). Some truth, but distorted and so idolatrous. God is real. He has revealed himself in history. He has given objective propositional truth about Himself in the Bible.

The Big Idea: We need to worship God as He is, in accordance with His revelation, and guard against the enticements of the Enemy to idolize distorted images in our hearts.

I. Review: Allow nothing to take God’s place in your heart (14,15).

 ¹⁴ Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.  ¹⁵ I speak as to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. 

         “Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry…” Paul loved the people that he ministered to, including those who weren’t easy, like the Corinthians!  That is where having the perspective of a family really helps. We have the same Father, we are brothers and sisters, so even though we won’t always agree, we always forgive, always love, always want the best for each other.  Paul will talk more about love in I Corinthians 13, for example he says in 13:4-8a,

⁴ Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant  ⁵ or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;  ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  ⁷ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.  ⁸ Love never ends…

At this point in the letter Paul was not going to mince words, He felt compelled to tell the truth. Though his words are direct and firm, he wants to leave no doubt that he is motivated by love.  Paul is writing a stern letter to the Corinthians, and now he urges them, as brothers and sisters who he loves, to learn from the example of Israel’s history, and to “flee idolatry!”

       Most of us don’t fall down before graven images, nor are we tempted to do so. Idolatry, however, can be much more subtle. The point we need to take from this passage is that idols were indeed a problem in Corinth, and so Paul needed to admonish the Corinthians concerning it. But as we point a finger at them we need to acknowledge that idols are also a problem in America in the 21^st century.  “American Idols” are all around us. Any wrong conception about God, any attempt to decide for ourselves “what God is like,” rather than seeking and submitting to what He has revealed about himself in Scripture, puts us at risk of forming an idol in our heart, a distorted image of God that is not based on His revealed truth.  Think about it: if “the just shall live by faith,” and that means taking God at His word and submitting to His authority, any time we live in a way that denies His presence or fails to trust in His power and provision, we are subtly laying a foundation on which we can begin to construct an idol.  As surely as Aaron said “this is your God” to Israel, if we decide for ourselves what “our god” is like, without submitting to His self-revelation, we are making an idol! 

       What are some of the pervasive dangers we face?  In America today there is great appeal to a gospel that talks about prosperity and health, that assures us God’s plan is for us to have comfort and security and even abundance in this life. The problem with that doctrine is that it fails to acknowledge God’s commitment to His design in creation. This world is under the curse, the consequences of sin are all around us. If we are saved, if we have believed in Jesus, we are already kingdom citizens, experiences some preliminary blessings of the new creation, but the fact is we are not home yet. We are pilgrims, living in a fallen world.

       “I speak as to sensible people…”  Most people consider themselves unbiased, “sensible” judges of truth. Remember the debate that Ken Ham had with Bill Nye the Science Guy, and Bill Nye several times insisted that he has a “reasonable man”?   The problem of course is that for those who don’t know Christ, they may be intelligent, eloquent, and even passionate about what they say, but when it comes to spiritual truth they are deaf, blind, and dumb, “…unable to understand the things of the Spirit of God…” (I Cor 2:14). That is a serious problem!  It reminds us that our witness, to be effective, has to be used and empowered by God. But to the Corinthians, at least those who genuinely knew Christ, Paul could speak to them as to “sensible people.” The old nature was still present, but they were changed. They had been renewed in their minds. So Paul could appeal to them, as to “sensible people.”

       “…judge for yourselves what I say…” One of the doctrines we affirm is the priesthood of all believers. We believe that every follower of Jesus can read the Bible and understand truth and discern the intent of the writers and the direction of God.  We don’t always do it well and consistently, because we are still affected by our fallen human nature.  As we hear teaching and preaching, we can and should, like the Bereans in Acts 17, “search the Scriptures daily to see if these things are so…” As your pastor I can do my study, and stand before the church, and proclaim what I see in Scripture, but where the rubber meets the road is when you test what I say against what the Bible says. By the way, that is one reason we put the study questions on the back page of the bulletin. We want to encourage examination and discussion of what is preached from this pulpit by me and others. I don’t want to preach error or false doctrine, but I am fallible, and I need to be held accountable.  And I am thankful for your prayers as I study and prepare.  I would love to see more small groups form around those study questions, and I would be happy to facilitate that.   

       We need to worship God as He is, in accordance with His revelation, and guard against the enticements of the Enemy to idolize distorted images in our hearts.

II. Assess the implications of your communion with the Lord Jesus Christ: We are intimately identified with Christ who died for us (16-18).

¹⁶ The cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a participation in the blood of Christ? The bread that we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ?  ¹⁷ Because there is one bread, we who are many are one body, for we all partake of the one bread.  ¹⁸ Consider the people of Israel: are not those who eat the sacrifices participants in the altar? 

       “Participation” in verse 16 is from the word koinonia, which can also be translated “sharing,” “fellowship,” or “communion.”  It seems pretty certain, in the light of the context, that Paul is pointing to the communion table, the Lord’s Supper, as an illustration in this context. “The cup of blessing we bless” and the “bread that we break” are the cup and the bread of communion. He is pointing to the symbolism of the ordinance, that our participation in the elements indicates our identification with Christ. This is not teaching “transubstantiation,” i.e. that the cup and the bread literally transform into the body and blood of Jesus. We are, by our participation expressing our faith in Him, our trust in what He accomplished for us in the cross. The “one bread” that is broken and shared represents our unity in Christ. We are “one in Christ” and we are members together.  I like the way the Message translates this verse…

“…because there is one loaf, our many-ness becomes one-ness—Christ doesn’t become fragmented in us. Rather we become unified in Him…”  

Similarly Paul points to the example of the sacrifices of the Jews – those who eat the sacrifices are “participants” (i.e. “sharers in”) the altar. Paul isn’t saying that in some way they literally eat the altar (or even the sacrifices offered on it), but rather that they share in the meaning and benefits of what takes place there on the altar, i.e. the sacrifices. Paul’s point is that we don’t want to knowingly participate in a cultic meal that dishonors Christ, even indirectly, by implicitly identifying us with idols. The idol is nothing, they were right about that. And it certainly had no power to change the food. But there were spiritual forces of wickedness lurking behind the pagan cults.

       We want to be in the world.  Salt can’t exercise much influence if it stays in the salt shaker!  The challenge is balancing being in the world but not of the world. As J.B. Philips put it in his paraphrase of Romans 12:2, “Don’t let the world force you into it’s mold!” We might add, “And don’t be tempted by the world to force God into your mold!” Our desire is to glorify the one true God, that God who is, the God who reveals himself on the pages of the Bible.   We need to worship God as He is, in accordance with His revelation, and guard against the enticements of the Enemy to idolize distorted images in our hearts.

III. Be aware of the enticements of the enemy and accuser of the brethren (19-22).

¹⁹ What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything?  ²⁰ No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons.  ²¹ You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.  ²² Shall we provoke the Lord to jealousy? Are we stronger than he?

       Idols are nothing in themselves, but can be used of demons to turn our hearts from the one true God (19,20). An idol is something we put in the place of God, something that receives the devotion that only He deserves. Who do you think might be behind those things? In Corinth, the idolatry that was visible and rampant and at the heart of the issue Paul is addressing here did express itself outwardly in cults surrounding pagan idols. That is how it was expressed, but then as now idolatry starts in the human heart. Take a look at a couple of more verses from the pen of Paul…

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Ephesians 5:5 For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

-         Colossians 3:5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

Notice the slight contrast in the two verses. The “indicative” statement of Ephesians talks about hearts that are set in a position of rebellion. It is what they “are,” it characterizes their lives. In Colossians we have an imperative, “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you…” This tension between the indicative and the imperative highlights the struggle of the Christian Life, the call to “work out our salvation with fear and trembling,” to live worthy of the calling with which we have been called.  Idols would creep into our lives, as surely as they sprung up in the camp of Israel.

       Notice that he says, “covetousness is idolatry.” What is that about? The idea seems to be a warning against allowing anything to seduce the devotion and loyalty and love that we owe to the Lord, our Creator, King and Savior. When we are covetous, we somehow put ourselves at the center of the universe; it’s all about me and what I want, what I think I deserve. Right before Paul reminded the Philippians of our citizenship in heaven, he laments the position of those who have constructed idols in this world,

¹⁸ For many walk, of whom I often told you, and now tell you even weeping, that they are enemies of the cross of Christ,  ¹⁹ whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite, and whose glory is in their shame, who set their minds on earthly things (Phil 3:18,19).

What do we long for, what do we focus our desires and hopes on?  If it usurps our longing for God, our desire to know Him better and walk in obedience, we need to be on guard, we need to flee!

       You can’t toe the line between worshipping God and the Enemy (21, 22). God alone is God and worthy of our devotion. We are talking about light and darkness, they are just incompatible!   To quote The Message once again,

“…you can’t have it both ways, banqueting with the Master one day, and slumming with demons the next. Besides, the Master won’t put up with it. He wants us—all or nothing. Do you think you can get off with anything less?”

What is God saying to me in this passage? We need to worship God as He is, in accordance with His revelation, and guard against the enticements of the Enemy to create and to idolize distorted images in our hearts. 

What would God have me to do in response to this passage?   Has the enemy tried to whisper into your ears lies about God?  Have some “American Idols” worked their way into your heart? Are you tempted to think of God as something less than the awesome, omnipotent Creator of the universe who is worthy of all of our devotion and praise?  Could it be that living in the comfort of the security of our life in America causes you to lose sight of the truth that we are pilgrims, we are just passing through, and that our citizenship is in heaven?  If we keep that perspective our desire will be to know God and to make Him known.  We want to know Him as He is, as He has revealed Himself in His Word.  

      God is love. Do you believe that?  His love has to be understood in relation to His holiness and justice. Sin could not simply be over looked. He showed us the depth and the extent of His love when He sent His Son into the world to make possible our reconciliation with God. Do you believe that? The Scripture says, “…as many as received Him, to them He gave the power to become children of God, even to those who believe on His name.” If you have not yet taken that step, could it be that even now you feel a prompting in your heart? Believe—receive—and know life! And if you have trusted in Him, and know that you are His, seek to know Him better through His Word. The best protection against the lure of idols, is an intimate, authentic, growing relationship with God. Don’t allow the enemy to whisper lies in your ears and lead you away from the truth!   Jesus said, “My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me…”  Think about that.     AMEN.