Resonance of Idolatry

“Follow your heart” is a slogan popularized by Disney movies, pop psychology, and social media. Ultimately, it is just another version of the oldest lie in the world: That you and I can be our own god.

In his new book Don’t Follow Your Heart: Boldly Breaking the Ten Commandments of Self-Worship, Professor Thaddeus Williams of Biola University has exposed “the cult of self” behind these mantras. The cult of self is in a sense, the largest religion in the world. I like to refer to it as the Evil Trinity: Me, Myself & I.

Like all forms of idolatry, self-deification promises to elevate its adherents to godhood. In the end, however, like all bad ideas about God and self, it dehumanizes us, leaving us empty, unsatisfied, and isolated.

Williams notes that everyone worships something.

For Paul, it’s never a question of the theist versus the atheist. For Paul, everybody worships. Everybody’s a worshipper. Everybody’s on their knees to someone or something, either the Creator or the creation.

Why is idolatry so attractive? Why does it resonate so easily within the soul of men? Simply put, I want to be God. I want to be in control. I want my will to be done, my kingdom come, both now and forever. This is the essence of sin, and the basis of idolatry: Self-worship!

As Psalm 115:8 observes... “Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.” This verse suggests that when people create or worship idols, they are essentially creating gods in their own image, reflecting their own values, beliefs, desires and characteristics.

Today, voices across our culture urge us to put ourselves first, in place of God; to make ourselves the central object of our devotion, allegiance, and obedience. This idea, however, has consequences. Again Williams notes,

When you erase the creator-creature distinction, which has happened in the mainstream culture, ... we start attributing a lot of the divine attributes to ourselves... I’m the functional deity in my own universe, I’m the authoritative source and standard of truth. As one of the Columbine mass murders explained in his diary, "My belief is that if I say something, it goes. I am the law, if you don't like it, you die."

Tragically, if I become the doctor who treats himself, or the lawyer who represents himself, then I have a fool for a client. God made me; knows what's good and right for me. I often don't. I wish someone could have read to Klebold and Harris the words of Solomon:

Remember now your Creator in the days of your youth, 
Before the difficult days come,
And the years draw near when you say,
“I have no pleasure in them."

Fear God and keep His commandments,
For this is man’s all.

For God will bring every work into judgment,
Including every secret thing,
Whether good or evil.

[Ecclesiastes 12:1 & 14]

So, if somebody validates me over here but doesn’t validate this or that way I self-identify, you see how that’s not just two finite creatures agreeing to disagree, and they can go out and hit a round of golf or share a cup of coffee? No, it is heresy. It is blasphemy. It is sacrilege. If you’re denying my self-identity, you have committed the theological equivalent of blasphemy by refusing to acknowledge who I have identified as. So, we need to understand these cultural moments. ...

Francis Schaeffer said in the 80s when he wrote Christian Manifesto, on the first page, he says, one of the biggest problems with Christianity in the end of the 20th century is we’ve seen things in bits and pieces instead of as totals. We sort of missed the big picture. So, we think, oh, the problem is over here. It’s pornography. The problem is over here. It’s the gay rights movement. The problem is over here with fill-in-the-blank.

And he says, no, we need to think not in bits and pieces, but in wholes. And part of what I’m up to in the book is to say, we need to see all the political headlines, all the controversial issues of the day, all the flashes in the pan, questions about bathroom access, questions about women’s sports, questions about Israel-Palestinian conflict—underneath all that are worship questions. Ultimate questions of meaning. They’re all theological debates at the end of the day.

And if we see that more clearly, we can reach our neighbors more effectively because we can see where they’re actually coming from is the impossible, the burdensome, the soul-crushing perspective that they have to bear the burden of the God-sized task of creating and sustaining their own identity. So, I think that’s the “in” with a generation reared on this stuff, is to sort of ask them like, “How’s that working out for you? ... Are you a little bit tired? Are you a little worn out?” Cause man, oh man, from my perspective, I know if I was trying to create and sustain a meaningful identity over time, I would buckle under the weight of anxiety and depression and panic. Wouldn’t it be more freeing to let God do what God does best, be the sovereign meaning-maker, and live an authored life rather than continuing this unsustainable self-authorship?

If the “follow your heart” religion is indeed the dominant religion of our cultural moment, as Williams has argued, Christians, for the love of God and the love of our neighbors, will need to commit cultural heresy. We only find our “true selves” in right relationship with God. Reject the death spiral of self-worship. Embrace the abundant life Christ offers.