What sits beside your God?

I love the Old Testament -the whole thing! Falling in love with the Word of God over and over and amazed at it all. It thrills me and blesses me and convicts me all in one sitting. One of the stories that just grabbed me this week is from the book of 1 Samuel, Chap. 5.

Short summary (Kim's version): The Philistines have captured the ark of God and have taken it home with them. They then proceed to just plop the ark of God down beside their god Dagon in Dagon's temple. They leave the ark of God beside Dagon and when they return in the morning there is Dagon flat on his face on the ground before the ark of the LORD. They pick it up, set it up and leave again. Return the next morning. Same thing. Dagon is flat on his face on the ground before the ark of the LORD, but this time Dagon's head and hands broke off.

Even stone, lifeless, powerless man-made gods must bow before the LORD. There isn't room in any situation for any idol to stand as though it is equal to the LORD. And God will see to it that it doesn't stand. One day we will all fall down before the LORD, whether it is willingly or unwillingly, every single knee WILL bow. You can be sure of it.

But I had to stop and also wonder how many times do we believe that we can bring God into our lives and just sit Him (figuratively speaking) beside the other idols and gods we have allowed in our life. As though somehow there is room enough for both God and our worship of other idols (money, materialism, fame, pride, TV, internet, shopping, etc.). We want God. We want him in our life. But we are not willing to get rid of the things of this world that God has called us to lay aside. You can laugh at the thought of bowing down to some stone or metal figurine, but we bow down to man-made idols every single day if we are not careful.

Sadly, the Philistines still chose their lifeless, headless, handless god over the living all-powerful God. Instead of removing the broken god in their lives, they chose to remove the ark of the LORD. How blind must they have been. They knew there was power in the ark of the LORD. They saw their god defeated and fallen, but it was the ark of the LORD and the presence of God they chose to get rid of.

I pray that God's presence is prominent in our lives and that we do not fall for the lie that someone or something can ever sit in equal prominence to God. He alone is worthy of honor and praise.