In praise of idolatry
Many years ago, due to a strange concatenation of circumstances, I played the drums at the funeral of Manchester City footballer Marc-Vivien Foé, who had suddenly dropped dead during an international match. Foé was a Christian, and the funeral was an appropriate mixture of solemnity and joy.
But at the end, just after his team-mates had made a swift exit through the back door, there was a commotion among the congregation. Shouts of "we love you" were followed by a small crowd surging forward to a table at the front of the cathedral, where a photograph of Foé had been placed surrounded by flowers. A large candle placed nearby was knocked over as people reached out to touch the photograph, at which point the vicar intervened and ushered everyone away. It was an awkward and sad moment - a Christian funeral, with a message of hope and joy centred on Christ, ended in idolatry, as people treated a photograph of a dead man as a pagan shrine which could somehow bestow blessing or comfort.
So the title of this post might seem deliberately provocative. But that's because I recently re-read this deliberately provocative G. K. Chesterton quote:
Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, but not the god within.
G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy
Chesterton was not an idolater. What does he mean?
The primal sin, and what lies downstream
When I was at Bible college my fellow students and I had an ongoing debate about what constituted the primal sin - the most basic definition of sin which would act as a lens through which we should understand all other sin.
(A brief aside. Bible college was a useful opportunity to have all sorts of theological debates with brothers and sisters in Christ, and get our thinking clearer on lots of issues - the proper recipients of baptism, church polity and the relationship to the state, whether and how Christians should engage in politics, how to preach certain passages and so on. Most of these were friendly and non-combative. But the biggest full-on argument I ever had was when I expressed my opinion that Hobnobs are better than chocolate Hobnobs. A godly, mild-mannered friend of mine went silent for about 10 seconds before muttering - through barely clenched teeth - "that is the most ridiculous thing I've heard anyone say in my entire life.")
Back to the debate. There were two broad opinions on the primal sin. One was that sin is essentially self-love, or pride. My love for myself, my desire to rule my own life, is the source of all the other rebellion and transgression I indulge in - it causes me to reject God, to make my own rules, to hurt others, and so on. The other option was that sin is essentially idolatry. My rejection of God and the worship of something in the creation instead causes me to dismiss and disobey his commands and follow the desires of my own heart.
Of course these two are fundamentally linked. As we've explored previously, the knowledge of God and the knowledge of self are the joint foundations of wisdom, and so the rejection of God and the elevation of self are the joint cause of all folly. Our idolatry takes the form of creating gods in our own image - we idolise something that looks like us; and we become what we worship - we start to look like what we idolise, as Psalm 115 explores:
Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see.
They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell.
They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat.
Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.
Psalm 115:4-8
But my take on it is that idolatry is slightly down-stream of self-love. Self-love is more basic because it is more fundamentally sinful. Idolatry is horrific, and culpable, and stupid - it comes about from a darkened heart and futile thinking (Romans 1:21-23), and idolaters will be brought into judgement (1 Corinthians 6:9). But at least it's not entirely narcissistic, or solipsistic. At least we're looking outside ourselves for the answers; at least we're not saying it's all down to us. That's Chesterton's point in the context of the above quote. Classic idolatry (say, worshipping the sun) is far better than worshipping self (say, being led by the Inner Light), because at least it's looking in vaguely the right direction:
That Jones shall worship the god within him turns out ultimately to mean that Jones shall worship Jones. Let Jones worship the sun or moon, anything rather than the Inner Light; let Jones worship cats or crocodiles, if he can find any in his street, but not the god within. Christianity came into the world firstly in order to assert with violence that a man had not only to look inwards, but to look outwards, to behold with astonishment and enthusiasm a divine company and a divine captain. The only fun of being a Christian was that a man was not left alone with the Inner Light, but definitely recognized an outer light, fair as the sun, clear as the moon, terrible as an army with banners.
G K Chesterton, Orthodoxy
But before we delve a bit deeper into what Chesterton means, let's take a brief detour. Isn't this all a rather academic question? After all, in the West we don't have idols any more, do we?
Twenty-first century idols
In recent years it's become common in evangelical circles to say that we don't have physical idols any more, but that we've replaced them with other things, more abstract or generic things, that we tend to idolise. We want sex, or power, or control, or money - and we make these good things into god things. We say things like - anything can become an idol if it replaces God in your desires or estimation. This has been popularised by Tim Keller as well as others, and it's generally a very helpful and clarifying idea, and particularly useful in pastoral counselling (see David Powlison's seminal article Idols of the Heart and Vanity Fair).
But there are two reasons I'd like to push back slightly on this idea of "abstract idols." The first is that it's not immediately clear that this quite fits into the Bible's conception of idolatry, which seems to have a strong tangible or visible component to it. I won't go into that in depth, but you could do worse than to listen to (or read the transcript of) the stimulating conversation between Tony Payne and Phillip Jensen on the CCL podcast.
The second reason I want to push back, though, is that I simply think the premise that "we don't have physical idols in the West" is factually wrong. It might be true to say that many of our idols are generic things like sex or money or power. I'd contend that many of our idols are... idols.
I recently preached on Acts 19, when the gospel makes such an impact on Ephesus that there is an economic threat to the makers of statues of Artemis, the goddess of the Ephesians. These silversmiths try to combat this by whipping up the crowd to a patriotic religious fervour, and they succeed brilliantly:
But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours they all cried out with one voice, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!”
Acts 19:34
There's always a temptation to read this verse through a smug smile and an indulgent shake of the head. Those crazy, backwards Ephesians. A huge group, chanting and singing the same thing for hours on end in praise of an idol - how primitive! We'd never behave like that.
Except at the football. Where we all dress in the same clothes as the players, and give our children the same haircuts, and sing songs together about their prowess, and feel on top of the world when they've won, and get depressed and angry when they lose, and blame the referee, and fight those from the other tribe.
Except at the Taylor Swift concert. Where we sing along with the words that she gave us, and which we all know by heart, and which we feel describe us and understand us, and we call her "queen", and take her name to identify ourselves ("Swifties"), and compete to see who's her biggest fan, and copy her makeup and her dances on TikTok and Instagram, and Tweet her in a desperate attempt to get her attention.
Except at the launch of Apple's new product. Where we've been wooed with new images, and breathless praise of its beauty and power from its creators, and we line up for the midnight launch, and we're applauded by the identically-dressed store employees, and we hand over huge sums to get the thing which is finally going to unleash our creative potential, or mend our relationships, or give us meaning.
Except at the environmentalist march. Where we follow our courageous, young, talismanic leader as she prophesies doom, as she denounces our enemies, as she calls us to do more for Mother Nature, and she tells us to sacrifice our education to give life and a future to the planet.
Except when we clap for the NHS on Thursday evenings at 8pm, and paint rainbows and put them in our windows to say thank you, and rely on them to get us out of any and every crisis, and portray its workers as heroes, as saints, as angels.
I hope you realise that I'm not against sport, or music, or technology, or the care of the environment, or health. I'm for all those things. I even quite like Taylor Swift. My point is that as a society we are not just idolising these things in the abstract - we are literally worshipping real, visual, tangible things. Our idols have their own rituals and priesthood; their own worship services and iconography; their own sacrifices and devotees. If Paul were to wander our streets as he did those of Athens in Acts 17, I'm convinced he'd be just as agitated at our idolatry (Acts 17:16), and I think he would assume that we believed, say, Beyoncé to be our literal goddess. And he wouldn't be wrong.
Sophisticated regression
But my point for this post is not so we have a new set of people to mock or look down on - as if we can roll our eyes and snigger at the football fan or the teenage pop tragic as well as the Ephesian Artemis worshippers. Chesterton's point is aimed at those who look down on idolaters. He is like Paul in Romans 2:1, who, after criticising pagan idolatry, turns his gaze on those who pass judgement on idolaters:
Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgement on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practise the very same things.
Romans 2:1
The question is this - "all right, so you don't worship idols like these folks. But what do you worship instead?" The worst answer, according to Chesterton, is to worship yourself. We replace the idolatry of the goddess, or the pop star, or the footballing icon, with a belief in our own inner qualities. We look within; we dig deep; we do what feels right; we follow our gut. And we teach our children to believe in themselves; to follow their dreams; that they can be anything they want to be. We inculcate self-esteem and self-reliance and self-definition. You're amazing. We even give ourselves God's name - "I am who I am" (Exodus 3:14).
Chesterton's point is that this, although it sounds so much more sophisticated than idolatry, is worse. The idolater looks outward for something to worship, sinfully rejects God, and ends up with something in creation instead. But at least they're looking outward. The self-esteem guru looks outward for something to worship, rejects everything as substandard, and puts the whole weight of godhood on the self. "Give me meaning," we say to our own hearts, "forge my identity, choose my adventure, tell me my future, save me from myself." Is it any wonder that our world is experiencing unprecedented levels of self-loathing, anxiety, depression, and despair? This is a weight human beings were never meant to bear, much less sinful, contrary, irrational, rebellious, self-destructive human beings. As Chesterton says, it is a dreadful thing to be "left alone with the Inner Light."
So, young people, if your teacher tells you to believe in yourself, go to your bedroom and sing like Tay Tay, or go and practise free kicks like Ronaldo in the park. Stare at the poster on the wall (or on your phone, more likely) and fantasise about being in their squads. Go on Greta's march and buy a new iPad. At least you're worshipping something better than you. And if she fails, or he retires, or it breaks - get another goddess. Get several at once, actually - hedge your bets. If you're going to be an idolater, lean into it - get polytheistic!
Or better still - given that these things don't know you, don't love you, don't know the future and can't save you - put all your weight on Jesus Christ. He is the Creator God, the one who knows the depths of your heart and loves you anyway. He lived and died for you so that you might be forgiven your idolatry and your self-love, and liberated from both. He was raised for you so that you might have a future. He speaks to you with words of life and is always available to listen to your prayers. He can bear the weight of your failure and your future. Don't rely on your idols; whatever you do, don't rely on yourself - rely on Jesus.