Idols Idols Everywhere

Sunday, October 29, 2006

Acts 17:16-34

I’m not much of a sports fan. I played some sports growing up – basketball for a few years on the city parks and rec team and then in junior high I was on the school basketball and track team. But it was never really my thing. Dance was more my thing and I would consider dance a sport.

Now my younger brothers on the other hand, they were into sports, and still are. They played some basketball and baseball growing up, but mostly they played soccer, lots and lots of soccer. And they just loved and continue to love sports in general – following all the teams, memorizing all sorts of stats on their favorite players, blocking time on Saturday to watch the games.

I definitely can’t compete with either one of my brothers or Todd on that. But I do take an interest in some of the championship series, especially if the hometown team is competing for the top title. I guess I’m what one would call a fair weather fan. But I’m okay with that. And so I’ve been following the Major League Baseball World Series … because the Detroit Tigers were in it. And it was amazing that they were so good this year because in recent years they had done so poorly. I followed the World Series over the last week and a half and I was disappointed Friday night when the St. Louis Cardinals won the series in the fifth game and became the champions.

But I’m over it. I’ve moved on in life and I probably won’t care about Major League Baseball again until next fall and then, only if the Tigers are doing well. Yet for many Americans, the draw of sports does not start and stop so easily. For many Americans sports is an obsession – an idol constructed in the days of youth and pee wee teams and continued into adulthood; an idol that sits at the center of fanatics’ lives and rules schedules and dominates television and is so revered that it is worshipped.

And that idol is just one among many to choose from in today’s culture, for idols are grabbing our attention left and right. There’s the popular show American Idol on television which searches for the next great singer and lots of other shows that some fans follow more closely than their own lives. There’s the lure of academia – the classroom, learning and books – for others. There’s the idol of physical appearance, ability and image. And there’s the idol of high expectations and ideals, probably the idol with which I struggle the most. More idols are being added to the list every day; more images and representations of things and objects that if we are not careful could easily be turned into gods and worshipped.

Why is it that there are so many idols out there? … scattered among our cities and in the marketplace … taking up our time … eating up our money … taking over our lives … I would say it’s because we’re searching, searching for meaning in life, continuing a search that was begun long ago in Athens.

In today’s passage from Acts, Paul stands in the center of the city of Athens, the very heart of pagan culture and the very center of an intellectual university town; and he is unimpressed with what he sees. It is little more than a wasteland full of idols – so many idols that all of them are not even named. And the people of the city that Paul meets are searching, desperately searching for the next great idea and the latest cool thing and the up and coming idol.

And Paul stands in the middle of the crowd and addresses the people. First, flattering them – their impulse to worship is right even if the objects of their worship are wrong. Then, Paul presents the only true recipient of worship – God. He lays out the scandal of faith: unlike all those other gods the people are worshipping, the true God is not passive, only made of stone. The true God is living. And therefore, absolutely nothing deserves to be honored “before God,” as God’s people have been commanded in the First Commandment.

For the God whom Paul proclaims is not just another option for human devotion, not an accommodating God content to be one among many. The God who sent the Christ is still the Holy One of Israel, a jealous deity without rivals, an exclusive lover who tolerates no competition – money, ideals, institutions, sports, television, a jealous God who fiercely judges all idols made by hands or minds of humans.

Because God alone is to be worshipped and praised, honored and served. God alone deserves that level of devotion and enthusiasm. God alone is worthy. For God alone made the world and everything that is in it – the heavens and the earth; the sun, moon and stars; the waters teeming with fish and sea creatures of every kind; the sky swarming with colorful birds and butterflies; the land with its lush vegetation; the living creatures of every kind that creep and crawl along the ground; and us, humanity. The Lord of all creation is indeed worthy to be praised.

And not just because God so carefully crafted the world out of nothing. But because God didn’t stop there. The Lord of all the universe didn’t go away to hide after all that hard work; God began a relationship with humanity and ultimately came to earth as Jesus Christ.
God gave people a hunger for God, so they might grope for God and find God, even though God is never very far away from any one of us. For in God we come to life; in God we are motivated; in God we find meaning.

And as God’s children we gather as the body of Christ – this Sunday and every Sunday; as God’s beloved we gather as the church to worship the only One deserving worship. For the divine is not found in sports teams or the latest book or the highest ideal or the most popular television show – not any of the products of our own cunning and creation. It is found in God alone.

As we disperse we are called to place nothing on so high a pedestal that we are in danger of worshipping it. We can maintain an interest in any of a number of good things without worshipping them. For worship belongs to God alone. As God’s children, we are called to continue our worship beyond the songs and prayers of this morning, continue our worship when we exit the doors of the church at 11:30.

Many of you already do so. Some of you spend a morning or two a week volunteering at Operation Attack. Some of you serve as elders and work on committees to ensure that the work and mission of the church is accomplished. Some of you are committed to praying for the church and its members and friends. Others of you volunteer an hour a week to a child at St. Pete Reads. And still others give back in many unknown ways behind the scenes. God is being worshipped and served in this place. God is good!

As we start to think about the next year in the life of this church, consider how you might be willing to worship and serve God with your time, talent and treasure. Consider how you might think, meditate, remember, esteem, honor, adore, choose, love, desire, fear, trust, hope, delight and rejoice in the Lord our God.

For the Lord alone is indeed worthy to be praised. Amen.