Family Idolatry

Over the last several years, I have watched people as they relate to “family.” By the word in quotes, you can expect that there is much more to this word than a simple definition implies. There is biological family, there are blended families, there are relationships that are more familial than technical family, and there is family as metaphor for intimate relationships, in general.

    The Christian faith has a high view of the metaphorical “family.” We (I am aware of the presumption being made that I speak for all of Christianity!) speak respectfully and intensely about the importance of ‘the family of God.’ Both Jesus and his appointed successors used the term “brother” and “sister” with ease. And this was not as odd to the Roman culture at the time as you might suppose. There was a long cultural notion that everyone in a family is adopted in – no matter if you were blood or not. To be in the family was an active moment, not an accident of birth (as we tend to think of it).

    Just to clarify, “Idolatry” (which I use in the title) is not merely an old-fashioned word. It is a very current issue, though most people do not use the term. “Idolatry” is the practice of placing anything above, or beside, God’s rightful place. For example, as only God is worthy of worship, worshipping a golden statue that is supposed to represent God is idolatry. As the idea was further developed in Christian scripture, idolatry was living as if anything (money, relationships, ambitions, possessions, desires, and so forth) was greater than God himself.

    Speaking of relationships, let’s bring in “family.” Jesus himself seemed ambivalent about blood relationships. For those unfamiliar with Jesus’ story, the episode where he states that he values God’s spiritual family over his blood relatives is startling. The episode can be found in Matthew 12:46-50.

    Yet Jesus valued his blood relatives and this is clearly shown in the interaction that he had with the Apostle John regarding Jesus’ mother, Mary. Essentially, assuring that Mary would be taken care of, Jesus seems to give her to John as his ward. You can find this interaction in John 19:26-27.

    What is striking is that Jesus did not share the – dare I say it? – obsession with family that seems to have gained so much currency in the last few decades. The evangelical Christian movement has – rightly – recognized both the importance of family for society, as well as the actual decline of family, and has worked hard to strengthen family, marriage, and even sexual morality. And this is important – I personally am highly committed and invested in this work and share the movement’s aspirations.

    However … there is a dark side to “family.” Family can become an idol, even and especially in the church. I remember attending an event for a Christian family close to us and listening to one of the children state publically, “We need to do everything we can to keep our family close. After all, family is everything!”

    And that is where I respectfully and lovingly disagree. As a Christian, nothing is to displace God’s supremacy and centrality in our lives. The whole epistle to the Colossians can be summed up with the text, “Jesus is all.” If you are willing to sacrifice everything, literally everything, for the sake of family, then you are making a religious statement and engaging in the activity of worship. And the god is your family.

    This is wrong.

    Just to play with this more; what about churches who are very up front about being “Family Oriented,” or even “Family Centered?” As Jesus followers, aren’t we supposed to be Jesus-oriented or Jesus-centered?

    OK, OK – I get it. I really do. Churches that are ‘family-oriented’ are not really displacing God with family loyalty. Are they? I hope not, but this is not always clear.

    Christianity is occasionally not “family friendly.” Again, Jesus was not endorsing “blood is thicker than water” (nor the guru-esq ‘love, peace, tranquility’ stereotype) when he said: “Do you think that I have come to give peace on earth? No, I tell you, but rather division… father against son … mother against daughter ….” (Luke 12:51-53).

    It seems to me that Jesus preached a strong message, generally, against ‘fleshly,’ ‘worldly,’ and ‘established’ loyalties. In the case of family, Jesus seemed to say that if your blood family is contrary to God, you need to turn from them and toward God. This is, in practice, a Very Hard Thing for many people. Many people struggle to take Jesus at his word because they are so engrained into what they have always been told (and have come to believe) that “(Blood) Family is everything.”

    But that is not a Christian notion. That is idolatry.

    Where I have seen the pain of this counterfeit thinking is when a family abuses one of its members, but they will not seek help from loving, gracious, and mature Brothers or Sisters in Christ because, “we have to keep this in the family.”

    BTW, this extends further, “Christian” or “spiritual” or “church” family is not everything, either. There can be idolatry in placing church above God – oh, yes, this happens a lot. In the Bible, there are times when people, deluding themselves into thinking they were serving God before family, actually disobeyed God by not living up to their family responsibilities (Mark 7:10-13; 1Timothy 5:8). And, of course there is the abuse that church family can heap on one of its members (I’m not talking about loving corrective discipline, I’m talking about clear abusive behavior). That is failure and sin.

    At the end of this, my point is that God values natural families, but not above the healthy relationship we should all have with him. And for many, it is important to recognize that one’s spiritual family should overtake one’s loyalty to their natural family.

Idolatry in the Church

I was reading 1 Corinthians 10 and Paul starts talking about idolatry – to a church! Well, that’s pretty strange right three. But what is even stranger is that he weaves all this talk about running away from idolatry with a doctrinal discussion of the Lord’s Supper.

Now what is going on here? Throughout the history of Yahweh-followers, there has always been a problem with ‘worship distraction.’ Sometimes it happens when leaders thought that God was just not around anymore (Exodus 32), or that worship of God was too inconvenient and sought to provide more convenient (and politically expedient) options (1Kings 12:25ff), or no longer believed that Yahweh was as powerful as the alternatives (1Kings 14ff). And, periodically, Yahweh would confront these delusions by sending prophets and displaying mighty acts to show the reality of the situation. One of the most scathing denunciations was spoken by the prophet Isaiah who mercilessly ridiculed those who would seriously worship their own creation.

But after Jesus came, surely (you ask) wasn’t idolatry a thing of the ancient past? Well, no. There were still people very actively worshiping other gods and expressing veneration to statues and images of those gods. All that’s fine, you might say, but we live in the 21st century where we just don’t do such silly things.

Again, no – our society is full of worship and especially of idols.

Now it would be too easy to suggest that the current popularity of “American Idol” feeds into actual idolatry. But to properly understand idolatry you must read what the Bible says about it. Idolatry is not only the worship of other gods than Yahweh in the form of statues and images – it is the worship of any thing or person other than Yahweh. That is, when you make a thing into a god, that’s when it become idolatry. And you know that you’ve made the thing into a god when you start engaging in functional worship of it. Worship is “veneration” and “sacrifice;” or – to put it another way: attention-dedication and money-time.

Paul says, in 1Corinthians 10 that people in the past worshipped feasting and sexual gratification. That is, they made food and sex into gods by giving food and sex the kind of attention and resources that rightly belongs to God.

And that’s how idolatry can get into a church. Paul, in other places, also tells us that covetousness (wanting what we shouldn’t have), evil thoughts, and even grumbling can all be idolatrous. In the 21st century we can easily see that materialism, pornography, addictions, celebrities, and even dysfunctional relationships can be sources of idolatry. Watch the average American Male on Sunday afternoons and you’ll see idolatry while they worship Rams, Tigers, Bears, Colts, Bengals, Cubs, Bulls, Bucks, Grizzlies, Orioles, Ravens, Blue Jays, Eagles, Seahawks, Giants, Pistons, Cardinals, Mariners, Marlins, Broncos, Texans, Lakers, Pirates, Vikings, Saints, and Kings - but (regional joke here) not Lions.

And that’s what Paul is warning the church about: when people who spend their week in functional worship of other ‘gods’ come in to church on a Sunday and then participate in the Lord’s Supper, they are doing a bad thing. Paul says that the Lord’s Supper is, in some way still not fully understood by Christian theologians, a union with Jesus as God. To engage in such a significant event while also worshipping other gods is disloyal, disrespectful, insulting, and delusional.

I’m now ministering in a movement that – rightly – takes the Lord’s Supper seriously. We weekly practice this reminder of Christ’s atoning death for our sin – a HUGE part of The Good News that we Christians should be talking about and acting out. This section of the Bible reminds us that we, even as “Jesus People,” can be distracted from true worship of God. And this reminds us that we must be especially attentive to the other ‘gods’ in our lives that attempt to worm there way into the place where only God should be.

Election Perspective

So I’m writing this on Election Day with the intent of it being posted on the day after. I was thinking about some things I read recently from one of my heroes, Mark Driscoll.

First, congratulations to the winners - what a big day for you! Second, my condolences to those who didn't win this one - there will be another chance in the future.

Today, if there is not another protracted legal battle for election results, there will be some disappointed people in this country. Some will have “won” and others will have “lost.” The unfortunate thing, from my perspective, is that many Evangelical Christians will be too invested in the results.

Here’s my concern: too many Christians are bought into an insidious form of idolatry. It is the problem of political messiah-ship. During this season, too many Christians have been enticed away from the raw fact that Jesus is not Republican and he’s not Democrat; he is the Lord.

Far too many Christians in both parties have been seduced into bad theology: “The country is going to Hell in a hand-basket if the election doesn’t come out my way.” This is, seems to me, a dangerous denial of God’s sovereignty.

Of course it’s important to vote, to be in the political process. My dad, as well as numerous civics teachers, impressed upon me that voting is not a privilege but a positive duty. For those of us in the United States, it seems to me that Romans 13:1a - “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities.” - applies to our duties as citizens. If the Constitution (our governing authority) gives a duty to vote, then our Christian obligation to the governing authority is to fully engage in the political process.

Still, there are too many, who should know better, that take their duty to participate to such an extent as to become idolatrous. They invest their time, treasures, talents and even spiritual well-being into politics to such a level that can only be compared to worship.

It seems to me that such a posture, for a Christian, is wrong. We worship Jesus; not our party, candidate, ideology, or political position.

For some of us, after seeing our candidate lose, we will need to repent of our sin of idolatry. Others of us, who have seen our candidate win, will need to repent of our sin of idolatry and resist the temptation to continue in that sin.

Others may talk of political history, cultural healing, "unifying the nation;" but there is a spiritual issue in how we've allowed politics to become our 'functional savior.'

That’s how it seems to me.