One
evening I had done laundry and had some clothes folded that needed to go
upstairs, so I laid them on the bottom step to take up with me on my next trip. It was dark when I started up, but I didn’t
bother to turn on a light because I was familiar with the steps. I should have
turned on the light! Those clothes became
a stumblingblock and caused me to fall. We need to consistently walk in God’s
light…even when we are in the familiar, normal places. We are not capable of navigating this world
alone. When we try, we will fall.
Ezekiel 14:1-3
warns us about stumblingblocks that keep us from God. It says, “Then came certain of the elders of
Israel unto me, and sat before me. And
the word of the Lord came
unto me, saying, Son of man, these men have set up their idols in their heart,
and put the stumblingblock of their iniquity before their face: should I be
enquired of at all by them?”
These
elders were men who had authority in Israel.
They had probably come to the prophet Ezekiel many times before wanting
to hear what God had to say about whatever situation they were in at the time.
The Scripture tells us they came before Ezekiel. It would be like us walking
into someone’s office and sitting across the desk from them. But when they came before Ezekiel, God spoke
to him so he would know what the situation really was beneath the surface.
He did not give him the answer to whatever they came seeking. The Bible doesn’t tell us if the elders even
had a chance to tell Ezekiel why they came.
It just says God spoke to him about their spiritual condition.
God
told Ezekiel that these men had set up idols in their hearts. Yet these rulers of Israel would know better
than to serve idols. They had been
taught the law of God and that serving idols was an abomination, because God
commanded them and their fathers before them concerning idol worship. He said in Exodus 20:3-5, “Thou shalt have no
other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image…Thou
shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them.” And yet they had chosen to
worship the idols of the nations around them.
Idol worship is still
prevalent, but it doesn’t always involve statues of stone or wood. An idol is anything that takes the place of
God in our hearts. It could be the love
of money, entertainment, our goals, our children, our spouse, or our accomplishments. Yet 1 John 5:21 tells us "Little
children, keep yourselves from idols." In other words, stay away from them. Don’t invite them in.
These elders had
‘set up’ these idols. That means they
raised them up above the worship of God.
They allowed these idols to take the place of God, and they bowed down
before them.
It’s possible to
bow to the demands of certain things in our lives…our routines, our traditions,
our jobs, our preferences…and we allow them to take first place. But we know we are to bow only to Jesus and
nothing else. We are to yield to the
Spirit of God, not man or idols.
They had given
these idols a place of prominence ‘in their hearts’. Our hearts are our mind, will and
emotions. Our hearts were made to have
God on the throne...not the attractions of this world, the will of our flesh or
the will of the devil. We are to yield
our thoughts, our feelings and our will to God’s authority.
Deuteronomy 6:4-5 says, “Hear, O Israel:
The Lord our God is
one Lord: And thou
shalt love the Lord thy
God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might.”
To love is to
desire, to long for. Being totally
honest, what do you long for? What is your
passion? What captures your thoughts
during the day more than anything else?
As Christians, we are to love the Lord God with all our heart and soul,
and with all the strength we have.
This idol
worship all started in the hearts of these elders before they ever bowed down
to the first piece of wood or offered the first sacrifice to some god that was
no God at all. Somewhere along the way
they set aside the commandments of God and their relationship with Him. Something in their hearts began to turn from
God. I believe idol worship can begin
when we exchange what God said for the voice of the world and the enemy. Then we begin to doubt Him and will be
deceived into believing a lie just like Eve did in the Garden of Eden. It can happen when we become disappointed in
God because He didn’t do what we thought He should. If we meditate on those lies, we become
depressed and begin to feel hopeless.
But God has never given us reason to be hopeless. He Himself is our hope, and to become
hopeless is to turn from Him. Notice the
progression through our feelings, thoughts and then the decision to change gods.
And we don’t even recognize when it happened.
But that’s not
the only way Satan tries to turn us to idols.
Idol worship can also begin by looking around at the pleasures of the
world and envying those who seem so happy and carefree. That leads to letting go of God’s hand to
grasp the pleasures of this world. Looks
are very deceiving and many find out too late that life without God is not
happy or carefree. It is far from
fulfilling. It leaves a void crying out
to be filled, and that need will either draw us farther from God or turn us back
to Him.
We have been
told what to love. Now, in 1 John 2:15-17, we are told what not
to love. “Love not the world, neither
the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the
Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh,
and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is
of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he
that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.”
Remember, love
means to desire or long after. The world
is the whole circle of earthly riches, advantages, pleasures, etc. It is temporary and empty. It turns us from God and is an obstacle to
the cause of Christ.
Lust is a craving, a longing, but it is not a
good longing. It is a desire for what is
forbidden (the exact opposite of our love and desire for God). Verse 16 defines those things that are in the
world.
The flesh is our
earthy nature apart from God, our unregenerate nature that is opposed to God,
therefore it leads us away from Him.
The eyes refer
to vision in this passage, but not in a healthy way. The lust of the eyes is
the instrument luring us toward evil desires.
It is the principal avenue of temptation causing us to fall into sin.
The pride of
life is boasting or arrogance. It is that part of us that says “I can trust in
my own power and resources; I can handle it.”
Pride trusts in the stability of earthly things…the things that will not
last. We need to recognize our need to
be sustained by God’s resources, wealth and goods, not that of the world. When we follow after the things of this
world, we exchange the temporary for the eternal, and it will cause us to
stumble and fall.
Ezekiel had
before him men who had put a stumblingblock before them by their own
iniquity. They had set up idols in their
heart, and that became the obstacle that caused them to stumble. The sad part is that they gave permission for
this stumblingblock to lead them into iniquity.
Iniquity is
willfully determining to go against what is expected or desired; to turn away
from or reject what is right and choose what is wicked or corrupt instead. It is exchanging what is good for what is
evil. It is choosing to love the world instead
of God.
I find it
interesting that they put this iniquity before their face. They put it in
front of them. They erected a wall that
hid the face (or presence) of God from their face. God had not put up a wall between Himself and
His people. They had put up the wall. It was their wall of iniquity
that cut them off from God.
Isaiah 59:1-3
tells us, “Behold, the Lord's
hand is not shortened, that it cannot save; neither his ear heavy, that it
cannot hear. But your iniquities have separated between you and your God,
and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear. For your
hands are defiled with blood, and your fingers with iniquity; your lips have
spoken lies, your tongue hath muttered perverseness.”
God said,
“Should I be enquired of at all by them?”
Should God allow them to come and consult with Him? Should He let them sit face to face with Him
or His prophet to hear the word of the Lord?
They had been consulting their idols and worshipping them – why come to
God now? He knew they had not come in
repentance. He knew they had not given
up their idols. Therefore they did not
hear from God.
We are all
capable of allowing iniquity to come between us and God. When that happens, we put up a wall between
our face and God’s face. We ban
ourselves from His presence, His protection, His wisdom. Psalm 66:18 says, "If I regard iniquity
in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." To regard means to be aware
of the iniquity, but permit it to stay.
It is a willful act of sin. Yet we
try to yell over the wall, “God, please help me…get a promotion, get out of
this trouble, pass the test, get well from this sickness….” And God says, “I want a relationship with
you. Take down the wall so we can have
fellowship.”
If we want a
relationship with God, we will make certain there is not a stumblingblock of
iniquity separating us from Him.
Remember, iniquity is something we know shouldn't be there, yet we give
it permission to stay. Real repentance
will remove the wall. It will open up
the presence of God in our lives.
Psalm
139:23-24 is a prayer that will invite God into our lives to cleanse, renew and
restore our hearts if we pray it with a sincere heart.
“Search me, O
God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts: And see if there be any wicked
way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
I believe very
soon we will be facing extremely difficult days. I don’t know how to prepare physically or
financially, but I do know our hearts need to have God securely on the throne. Nothing is worth the risk of losing our
souls.
