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Holy Trinity Anglican Orthodox Church
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Like Unto Them |
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Psalm
115:8 Twentieth
Sunday after Trinity October
5, 2008 Some have said, “you are what you eat.” That, to a great extent, is true. In another sense, you are what you admire. Or at least you will become like that which you admire. Someone has correctly observed that if you want to see what you will be in five years, look at the TV and movies you watch, the books you read, and the friends you choose. They will influence you in countless ways, and you will become like them. The Bible adds another dimension to this. According to Psalm 115:8, we will become like the gods we worship. I think this is evident in history. The Vikings worshipped warrior gods. Their idea of heaven was Valhalla, a place where you become a mighty warrior and fight battles all day, and drink and carouse in mead halls all night. The Viking raids into Europe are well known. Small towns, even churches were attacked and sacked in their relentless wars. Less well known is the fact that, even in their homelands a man kept his weapons on him at all times for fear that another Viking might attack him, take his land and kill his family. Before them, the Canaanites worshiped warrior gods and fertility goddesses. You can guess the effects that kind of religion had on their culture. One of their religious rituals centered around slowly roasting babies alive during drunken orgies. This is one reason God told the Hebrews to drive them out of Canaan. If it is true that we become like our gods, it is also true that we make gods like ourselves. Our gods, reflect our values, and it so happens that when fallen people create gods for themselves, these gods almost always accommodate our lower instincts and baser desires. In fact, one of the reasons for creating deities is to validate our lusts. We can live in wantonness because it is what the “gods” want of us. I will not dwell on that. Instead I want to look at our culture today and see the interplay of gods and activities. Like the cultures I mentioned a few moments ago, our culture has dethroned God and made our own gods. Only our gods are not even deities. Our gods are people. Our gods are ourselves. We are not the first to do this. It is the heart of the sin of Adam and Eve that they wanted to be as gods (Gen. 3:5). They wanted to be their own gods so they could be in charge of their own lives rather than obeying God. The result was tragic then, and it is tragic today. You don’t need me to list the details of our problems, or to say they are growing more complex and more difficult and more dangerous as we depart from God and enthrone our own desires. You see that clearly already. But I want to ask a question. Why don’t we go upward when we deify Man? Why don’t we deify knowledge and wisdom and kindness and peace? To be sure there is a part of our culture that wants this. But the fact that we are sinners always leads us to follow our baser desires when left to our own devices. And so it is today. Having concluded, as a culture, that life is meaningless we have devoted ourselves to the endless pursuit of pleasure in all forms. We have decided that no one can tell us that our pleasures have any less value than another’s, as long as they “don’t hurt anyone.” This, more than anything else, accounts for the weakness in Western culture in general, and in America specifically. Fortunately there is an alternative. That is to turn to the Living God who created us to be the recipients of His love and blessings. It is to enthrone Him as Lord of our thoughts and lives, and to learn and obey His will as revealed in the Bible. He knows best what we need. He knows best what real happiness and peace are. And if we will become like our gods, let me recommend the God who became flesh, and spent His life healing the sick, raising the dead, and healing lives and healing souls. Let me recommend the God who looked at our sin and saw the gates of hell opened wide to receive us, and to save us from a fate worse than death endured death on the cross bearing in Himself all the wrath and anger of God for our sins and offering Heaven as the free gift of His grace to all who “truly repent and unfeignedly believe His holy gospel.” His generosity, His compassion, His love, and His self-sacrifice are well known. If we are going to be like any god, let us be like Him, The God. May our God, the only true and living God, grant that it may be so. Amen. The Rev. Dr. R. Dennis Campbell, Vicar, Holy Trinity Anglican Church,
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