2012 A.D.: A Land of Chariots and Idols
The first and second commandment given by God the Holy Father to Moses, written along with the other 8 commandments by God's own finger upon tablets of stone, read like this in some Bibles:
2 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 “You shall have no other gods before[a] me.
4 “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments. "
End Quote
Why is it that God told us before anything else that He was our God, and no other 'gods' should be worshiped before Him? And why did He say that first of all we should make no images of things in the air, the land, or the sea, and that second of all we should not bow down to them or worship them (referring to idols that we just accidentally found, or which were made by someone else, I suppose.) Why did He make sure that we knew He was jealous for our love and attention, our acknowledgement and our worship?
I offer that question as a rhetorical one. You could give an opinion and I could give an opinion, and it is nearly certain that neither of our opinions would be quite the same as God's.
But we Americans surely won't listen to God, that much is certain. We defy Him at every turn with our puny, ungrateful, selfish little brains, and we seem to learn nothing from reading repeatedly in the Bible that those who have defied God have always regretted it terribly later on.
I love my birth land, America, in many ways. Nearly all people are somewhat patriotic. It's hard not to be. But that doesn't mean I'm blind to all of it's faults, just as I certainly can't see all of them. We are great opposers of the Almighty here in America. We have idols already, build more constantly, and love to name things after false Gods. But we name very few things indeed after God or Jesus, or the Holy Spirit.
I suppose that you have to name a car model something. But there are a lot of things to draw inspiration from. So why do we name our cars so consistently after false gods? True, it might not be a good idea to name a car after Jesus, because if somewhere down the line it became a dented up blue smoker with peeling paint, that wouldn't reflect well on our Lord. But, Mercury was a false god, Lincoln was only a man, Saturn is the name of a false god as well as a planet, Ahura Mazda was the name of the 'Uncreated god' according to Zoroaster....the next time that you drive around just look at the names of cars.....really look at their names from the viewpoint that our Lord might. Try to appreciate what a great proportion of the automobile names advertise the names of gods who are falsely worshipped, tragically believed in now or in the past, enemies of our Lord, so to speak. Our land is full of the names of false gods. Bursting at the seams, really.
Our NASA spacecraft bore the names of false gods almost exclusively, it seems like. Apollo, Mercury, Saturn....why was that necessary?
And the truth is that the Book of Genesis tells us that about 1/3 of the angels revolted, fought against God's loyal angels, and came down in defiance of God and lived on Earth doing pretty much as they wished, taking any woman they wished to be their wives the scriptures tell us.
Josephus, a Jewish historian, says that they were powerful, arrogant, and violent. He said that mankind could not contend with them, and that makes sense. Jesus said that the least being in heaven is greater than the greatest being on Earth. They took as many wives from among humans as they wished, and their children were the 'mighty men of old' it says in Genesis! So, many of the names that we think of as ancient false gods might actually be the names of fallen angels, or their hybrid children the Titans, or 'Chitons' in other languages. Or some of the ancient mighty god-like figures might have been demons that dwelt within some human body or another and reigned mightily for a time.
Imagine being God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit and looking down to see the names of your worst enemies plastered upon the chariots of your children among men, openly celebrated and displayed! What parent wouldn't be deeply wounded by that? And God really is our true Father, Jesus really is our true King and God's Son, and the Holy Spirit really is the Spirit of Truth, the Comforter that proceeds from God to help men gain victory over sin and death by helping us to find and stay true to Jesus.
How many sports teams have names that could be hurtful, could seem to betray the Lord? I went to a school where we were the 'Devils' (Satan is known as the Devil) in earlier days, though we became the 'Raiders' (Raiders travel to other people's lands and steal, kill, rape and burn.)
I know we are used to it, pretty much oblivious to it, but aren't there far better names we could have chosen if we were choosing to please God? How many people that do or did belong to a sports team had a 'pagan' sports team name, or played others that did. It helps keep those names - the names of God's enemies, or names used by God's enemies - alive. I suppose that a football team called the Daisies might not inspire great fear in their opponents, but there are lots of other choices. The Oregon Ducks have proven that a relatively non-ferocious name doesn't necessarily kill your chances of playing a sport well.
So, we ride around in our modern-day chariots, and probably 15% to 20 % of them have names associated with false gods, if not more so. We do this right beneath the eyes of our God, who gives us the land we live in, the good soil and rain that makes it produce food for us, and the rivers and the streams and the lakes that help make it beautiful. This same God tells us how much He detests idols, which are images or likenesses of beings or created things or imagined things. Idols are supposed to resemble or bring to mind the thing that they are modeled after. So, all of those car emblems which call to mind makes or models of cars that are named after false gods are doing the very same thing. Such car emblems might be called idols, couldn't they? Can't they be idols even if we don't 'bow down or worship them'?
Here is a bit of scripture from Isaiah Chap 22 about a steward named Shebna that was supposed to take care of the house of the Lord and was raised up to greatness by God so that he could perform that service. But he became more concerned with his own glory and comfort than with his service to the Lord:
“Go, say to this steward,
to Shebna the palace administrator:
16 What are you doing here and who gave you permission
to cut out a grave for yourself here,
hewing your grave on the height
and chiseling your resting place in the rock?
17 “Beware, the LORD is about to take firm hold of you
and hurl you away, you mighty man.
18 He will roll you up tightly like a ball
and throw you into a large country.
There you will die
and there the chariots you were so proud of
will become a disgrace to your master’s house.
19 I will depose you from your office,
and you will be ousted from your position.
20 “In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. 21 I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the people of Judah. 22 I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. 23 I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will become a seat[a] of honor for the house of his father. 24 All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots—all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars." End Quote
America has been brought to brief prominence among nations, but surely, we realize that there have been other nations before us that shone the brightest for a time, but then faded. Is there even the slightest chance we will not follow them? It is a pattern that has held true for thousands of years so far: rise, rise to the highest group, become perhaps the highest among that group for a time, then fall, usually from within at first, then, as others see you crumbling and spiraling downward, they race in to seize the booty. And there you are...the lowliest of the low for at least a while.
Rise, boom, peak and bust! It's a well-established pattern, and only God could prevent us from seeing both our zenith and our downfall, right? Isn't America - without God as our ruler - merely another nation going through the cycle? God could maintain us in a prominent place if He chose, of course. But should He? Don't we need to be an earnest, willing, industrious and valuable administrator, one who is mindful of the Master's preferences and sensibilities, if we wish to keep our job? Can America just act any way that it wishes and still maintain the favor of a God that is particular about how he wants His children to act? We all know the answer to that one in our hearts! We are raised up to teach of Jesus to the world and to protect Israel as Joseph loved and protected Benjamin - or so I think.
What impresses our eyes can impress our spirit. What occupies our visual concentration can command the attention of our thoughts as well. What starts as appreciation can become admiration and in cases a passionate affinity, even a worship of sorts. God, who designed our brain and our thinking patterns, knows that we should not make idols of anything in the air, the land, or the sea beneath the land. He knows that we should not bow down and worship them, either. When He wrote the commandment, He made sure to let us know that both parts of that behavior are off limits: It's not enough to not bow down and worship 'idols' - statues or graven images of things from the air, the land, or the water. We are also commanded to not even make them. If no one even makes them, we certainly can't bow down and worship them, right?
So, should we take note that the capitol city of America - Washington D.C. - has many prominent monuments to things which are not about God or Jesus. Will God chuckle about it? What if you take a classical pagan monument and try to make it more palatable to a Christian people by inscribing a Christian sentiment on it somewhere. Did it suddenly become a monument to God? Will God be thrown off the scent? That's how it is in Washington D.C. Which of those monuments actually calls Jesus immediately to mind? If they were actually trying - even in the least - wouldn't they just put up a large cross? I don't know if a large cross should be there either, but I greatly prefer it to what is there. I know that if you put up a giant Egyptian style stele and say it represents George Washington, then you're only lying and trying to mislead a Christian people into accepting the ostentatious trappings of the false gods that you are secretly seeking to honor. Imagine how stupid it would look if we found out that Egypt had been making 500' tall statues of George Washington to honor their false Egyptian gods. We would laugh our heads off at the absurdity of it.
Essentially nothing associated with Jesus is secretive or sneaky. He shed a light, and called men to come into the light, but most would not because their deeds were evil. Secret societies probably seldom or never have Jesus' interests at their innermost core. Jesus has never called on his followers to put the lamp under the basket, but rather up on the lamp stand, where it can give light to all in the house. So... secret societies have their right to exist and go about their secret business, but there's no point in imagining it's Christian business.
Mount Rushmore is an awesome sight and an amazing sculptural accomplishment, but.... I'm pretty sure that they are sculptures of humans - venerated American ancestors - but humans. And humans are a land creature. It's an engraved image of a land creature. It's a little like deifying your ancestors. How many of us make the pilgrimage to Rushmore to see it? Can't we see it just as well on a post card? So why do we make that far and distant trip to say we have seen it? Because it is worthy of our admiration? Worthy of our awe? Worthy of our veneration? Large, impressive statues catch people's attention! It's true!!
So why doesn't our government fund lots of statues of Christian subjects? They will fund statues of the things that God our Maker says are offensive to Him. So why won't they fund things which would honor Jesus? They don't want to offend non-Christians. But they will fund Egyptian style stele? That was part of the Egyptian religion. So that is the worship of false gods, which is an offense to both God and Christ! So why purposefully fund offenses to God and Christ, then purposefully withhold funding for things which honor God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit?
The Statue of Liberty holds out a light to all people, right? But wait, didn't Christ have that job? And didn't He instruct his Apostles and after them His Church to hold out that light - the light of Jesus' teachings - before men? So why is a giant colossus of a female goddess doing it? She is a false goddess statue...nothing but that. The statue represents a version of Semiramis, the ancient and nefarious rebellious wife of Nimrod. It is a green statue, due to its copper, and it is to be rejected as the proper representative or protection of our nation. Just as the green leaves that Adam and Eve thought to make, at the first, to cover their nakedness were rejected by God, and instead He showed them how to use the hides of innocent animals. It set the precedent: something innocent must die to atone for sin...to cover the sinner's guilt.
Hasn't goddess worship been a thorn in God's side and a misleader of God's people since time began? Where in the Bible have the Lord's people been instructed to deify any woman or mere man? Or to build colossal statues of either? It is honestly and truly a wickedness in our land, a mistake in our history, even though the great green goddess statue is supposed to denote and commemorate some noble sentiments and intentions. She is portrayed as being a generous and welcoming figure. Yet who is 'she' to offer things to immigrants? Everything here in America is God Almighty's to give or not give. It all belongs to Him....not to a copper statue of a wicked and false goddess.
Remember Semiramis, who was supposed to have been Cush and later Nimrod's wife, about 4,000 years ago? She supposedly started the first post-flood false religion which - after the division of languages and the dispersion of the disobedient builders of the Tower of Babel - led to so many people in so many places having their vestigial version of her false religion, a story that they wholly or partially retained as the centuries unfolded? She did huge damage!! She did inestimable damage!! So many false religions in so many places stem from her. Some people say they can trace the name Columbia to her...to Semiramis! She was known as 'the Dove' to some, it was her nickname in her time, it seems. And words sounding very similar are used in many ancient languages for the word 'Dove'...the bird we know as a dove. Columbidae is the dove's genus in Latin. We have that name Columbia (or some root of it) all over the land of America. The great Columbia River. The District of Columbia. Columbia is a city name you'll see. It's a celebrated name in America, a land where the name of Christ or Jesus is rarely to be found in a place name or a city name. And the reason the word 'Columbia' is used is not to honor the bird, but to honor the legendary wicked woman.
And to the rest of the world, the Statue of Liberty is probably America's most iconic symbol after our national flag. The Holy Spirit of God came down upon Jesus like a dove. If the Holy Spirit takes the form of a dove, how did it come about that this woman, Semiramis, should accept it as her symbol? Wasn't the first post-flood false religion a thing planned through Satan's devices, to lead people away from their true God and Maker yet another time. Satan is a famous counterfeiter of what is God's. A famous usurper of what is good, of what is holy, so that he can turn it to his bad purposes.
Liberty within the teachings of Christ is counted as a good thing. But unbounded liberty for the wicked and the God fearing alike? Liberty sounds very good when you contrast it to imprisonment or oppression, but if everyone has unbounded liberty, then the wicked, the evil, the violent, and the corrupt can avail themselves of it as well as anyone else, can they not? Unrestricted liberty is simply the law of the jungle: the peaceful will use it gently and lovingly while the violent and the wicked prey upon the peaceful and the gentle with no one to stay their hand.
I think that liberty, as most of us envision it in our mind, is actually something like 'liberty to pursue good and reasonable things in a good and reasonable nation.' Such liberty requires structure enough to restrain the very wicked, the very greedy, and the very violent. And it also requires a commonly held understanding of what the words 'good' and 'reasonable' ought to roughly mean. A commonly held understanding that the laws of God and Jesus are just and good and reasonable provide just that very structure helped make the noble experiment of a free nation called America a signal success in its early days. It was understood by the formers of the rules of America's early government that the nations' ideas of what was good and what was bad would mirror the Lord's definition. Unfortunately, that went without needing to be said, they felt, and they therefore mentioned it in writing much less than they ought to have. Now that a wickedness has seeped into portions of the United States government, those evildoers are taking advantage of the fact that our founding documents mention the honoring of Yahweh and Jesus too little. They are saying that it is proof that God's rules of right and wrong were never meant to be binding upon us as a people. It is a lie, but when they tell it, they fool some.... they mislead some.
But, even in Andrew Jackson's day (he was only the 7th President) a titanic struggle against the banks and financiers was waged in America to prevent them from trying to seize control of the nation through controlling the nation's finances. That struggle was very narrowly won.... very, very narrowly. It has since been waged against us again, in a quiet and slowly creeping manner, and has been won almost entirely by the bankers. We stand today in a nation most thoroughly enslaved by the great financial men of the world, and the noose grows tighter. That too is of Satan. God teaches specifically and in many places against money lending, against corruption of leaders, and against both greed and envy. If He was heeded, banks and financiers would be either rare or non-existent, and their corrupting influence and corrupt ways negligible both in scope and impact.
The 'great commission' was to seek souls for God through Jesus, and afterwards to die and join our Lord forever in beautiful Heaven. It was not to seek personal wealth through the embracement of Satan's principals. 'Out of debt' should be every Christians way of living. How else can we be free to move or change our mission as the Lord directs us without breaking promises or commitments to men or businesses? Believe me, I am a poster child for self-inflicted wounds. But even so, we can all try to get right, and we can encourage our children and others around us to avoid this crippling impediment to living a Christian life. Those little coins are engraved images, aren't they? Should little idols rule over us, should money rule us?
Money will rule or be ruled, every time and in every instance. Only the wise can handle money well, yet almost all of us must interact with it. So, it must be handled like a dangerous snake, I suppose: seldom, and then only carefully. Save some, but not greedily; give generously, but through Christ only; gift, when you feel it's right, what you can afford to, but don't loan; and do not borrow! Do not buy anything at all on payments. Nothing!! That approach would avoid a great deal of life's financial troubles, and banks would shrink back to a reasonable and unthreatening size if that policy was widely followed, wouldn't they? Coins and bills are little idols, and they will certainly rule our lives, cruelly and in short order, if we choose money as the power we will serve and the source of our personal power. God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are our rightful objects of worship and sources of power. Not graven coins and paper currency.
Cinema? Well, whether titans are clashing, or Thor is smashing, we Christians flock to spend our money on movies that fancifully delight upon the fictional doings of fictional forms of those false gods (actually demons, deified ancestors, or fallen angels) who once opposed God powerfully to the detriment of humankind. Hollywood saw how much money was made by 'the Passion of the Christ'. But they stuck with what they know best: murder, adultery, sexual misbehavior of about any sort, war, fornication, theft, the celebration and normalization of all things homosexual, and the digital enhancement of various members of Satan's pantheon of misleaders from the last 60 centuries of history. Hollywood opposes God - end of story. How many R-rated action movies can be made without one of the characters cursing boldly in the Lord's name somewhere in the middle? Is that a big deal really?
Well, let's just put it this way: the use of God's name was so important to Him that He addressed it in His 3rd of 10 commandments, saying we should not use His name in vain and that He wouldn't hold us guiltless if we did! And action heroes don't just say whatever comes to their mind. This cursing in the Lord's name is very carefully and purposefully written into the script. It doesn't just come shooting out of their mouths because they actually were shocked and surprised.... they are just actors. They fake shock. They fake surprise! It's a purposefully planted insult to God. Most script writers probably aren't Christian, granted, but then why choose the name of our God to use as a filthy curse word? Why doesn't the character ever yell out "Holy blanking Muhammed, or Confucious, or Braham, or Budda!!"? Why does Hollywood so carefully and systematically choose Jesus, Christ, or God as their worshiped names to smear? Let me guess....it would be insulting to those other religious groups?
Why don't they have their dramatic actors cry our "By all the queers in Hell!!" That would be insulting both to gays that work in Hollywood, and to gays in the audience, right? It would probably provoke shows of outrage by gay groups. But, doesn't Hollywood know equally well that Christians are warned and commanded by God, in very strong terms, to never use His name in vain, and hence the name of Jesus either? Of course, they know. So why does Hollywood use the name of our God to add emphasis to their actor's dramatic utterances? But they know that gays or Hindus will never mind if they work to purposefully offend the Christian faith, whereas gays would act like it was the end of the world if Hollywood insulted their group, and Hindus would be provoked as well, I would guess.
Hollywood has worked hard to establish the name of Jesus and God as a widely used curse word throughout the entire movie watching world, which includes nations all around the world. Where did they get the money to make those movies? From the Christians that bought the tickets and never complained much when they heard their Lord's name used as a curse word. We Christians must love hearing Jesus' name being used as a curse word. We will pay to hear it used that way.... over and over again, as a sneering Hollywood laughs at what pathetic and ungrateful followers Jesus has, even as they pocket our money.
America claims to be about 70% Christian. If Hollywood had any notion whatsoever that we would avoid movies where our Lord's name was insulted, they would edit such things out so that they wouldn't offend that 70% of the movie going public. But they know that Christians are so glad to hear their Lord's name used as a curse word that they can be relied upon to never object to it much - and to keep on coming back to the movies, with their impressionable children in tow.
What if there was a requirement to list "Offensive and purposeful misuse of God's and Jesus' name for dramatic affect" right along with "Adult Content" and "Brief Nudity". We could demand that if we wanted to...there are enough Christians to demand it if we determined to have it added. If Muslims threw a fit because some movie character screamed out a curse using Muhammed's name, Hollywood would probably pretend to be twice as outraged as the most outraged Muslim. And you know what.... the Muslims would probably do just that if they thought Muhammed's name was being purposefully scripted in as a curse word in Hollywood movies. But not to worry, it would never get out of the editing room. Someone would see it and say "This is hate speech! Are you trying to spark a riot? Substitute the name of Jesus Christ. The Christians won't riot. They'll reward you with their wallet. And all the people from other religions that hear Jesus' name used as a curse word in the movie certainly aren't going to cry out that it's hate speech. They are always happy to hear the name of mankind's only Savior and God's only Son degraded out loud."
America is the absolute best place for Satan to be entrenched right now. Our 'enchantments', our 'delusions' go out to all of the world. So, all of the world can be impacted, for God and Jesus, or in defiance of God and Jesus, from America.
America probably better decide, and soon, while we still can decide, if we are to go down in history as "One nation under God" or "One nation undermining God". Right now, either case can be made, and strongly. There are steps we could take. We could entreat the auto makers to choose names that are not associated with false gods. They might respond. We could ask for replacement monuments that don't mimic the monuments of false religions in their design. Monuments aren't holy. God is holy. We could change them out, or not have them at all. Then God could look down on something not designed to offend Him in the nation that claims to revere Him. And when the One World Government guys in Washington throw a fit about it, claiming that we forsake our heritage, we could just remind them that God is our heritage, though not theirs. And anyway, they could take a picture of it for the sake of history before they changed it out, right?
Listless worship, faint praise, collusion with the Lord's enemies as well as support of their stratagems against our Lord and His unblemished name, open and widespread celebration and display of the names of our Lord's enemies.........how could God not bless us? Who could ask for better followers than we Americans? Boy, Satan better look out for us, huh? Because we trust in God. It says so on our money.... those little bitty idols of copper and nickel and zinc, and even the paper stuff.
Here is one last thought: our youth flock to the movies to watch these 'superheroes' battle bad guys and save the world. Some of those 'superheroes' openly bear the name of false gods. Others just sort of fit the bill for being a character that a kid would 'idolize'. And these 'superheroes' thrill our kids! Cities are crushed, cars are destroyed, planets are blown up, mighty one battles mighty one! It's all just delusion, of course. But it gives our kids some great ones to look up to, to admire!! And these superheroes do mighty deeds (on film, anyway!) So, why should a kid be afraid of the power of God? Has any kid ever seen God knock down cities, throw automobiles, battle in the streets, fly through the air, etc.? No!
But how often do parents remind them of the truth: those television demi-gods are fictitious. Even the myths and legends that they represent were only demons of myths or fallen angels. But God - the Mighty Father, Maker of All - really has destroyed all land species on a planet (save 8 people) once. God Almighty really has destroyed cities with super-powers that He has. Jericho was one, Sodom and Gomorrah are two others, and God sends the earthquake, the tsunami, and the volcano as He wishes, just as with the meteor shower or the glacier or the worldwide flood.
God is the real and actual power. The phony superheroes on TV or movies merely steal our children's admiration away from the real God and give it to the fake gods. How can God compete with the Hollywood superhero? Guess what...God could compete. But whenever God destroys, it is real. Actual lives are lost, actual kids and their parents die.... when God's anger breaks forth, it can be immeasurable. So, Christian parents...ever heard of the 'family outing'? That is a way to do something as a family, use time to teach your children about the real God and Jesus and Holy Spirit, and to please God with your lives. It's parents that guide their own children into transgressing against God through not providing family times of togetherness and learning about what is real, what is not, what is loving, what is of Satan, and Who it is actually wise to fear and admire and worship. It's parents who are supposed to make kids see that time spent watching fake super-heroes on a movie screen are a waste of a kid's time. Are we doing that?
Right now, America can still repent and change its direction, change its nature and character before the face of a watching Almighty God. But do we have our ancestor's common sense and moral discernment (though they too were sinners, but biblically educated ones!) What would America be like if we purified ourselves for the Lord? What would America be like if we cleaned out our minds and our communities and demanded the same of our leaders and our schoolteachers and our pastors and priests and ministers? National repentance...do we have it within us? Or must we face the harsh and bloody reckoning historically allotted by God to wicked and unrepentant nations? Our time must surely be very short if we continue on in a state of calculated offense and smirking disregard towards our Maker, His Son who came, taught, and died to be our Savior, and towards the Holy Spirit of Yahweh our Creator and Father, that proceeds forth from our common and long-suffering Father and Maker. Yet, His patience has definite limits, and once He rises in disgust to end what His eyes can no longer bear to look upon, then there is no opposing His punishments, no escaping His punishments, and no hiding our guilt as people fully deserving of those punishments. When God has had enough and rises to set things straight stuff gets real...and it gets that way real fast! It is outlined in Revelation, and other Bible books, and it is not pretty for most of mankind. Endlessly tragic in fact.