(Wisdom Wednesday) What Do You Worship?
Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “A person will worship something, have no doubt about that. We may think our tribute is paid in secret in the dark recesses of our hearts, but it will come out. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshipping, we are becoming.”
When we think of worship, we usually think about the gods of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and so on. Each of these religions demonstrate worship in a variety of ways, but I don’t think we are limited to worshiping just these religious gods. There are also many other subtle ways that we worship. Think to your self… what are some things that you spend a lot of time doing? Back when I was in high school, I loved video games. It was a place for me to escape the difficulties of being a teenager and most of my friends were gamers; games were what we talked about pretty much all the time. I remember spending hundreds of dollars on the newest game systems and games. Not only that, but I pretty much devoted entire summer and winter breaks to playing hours and hours of video games, living out my life in a non-existent world while time continued to pass me by in the real world.
Maybe gaming isn’t a big thing for you, but what about television? How many hours of tv do you watch each day? The average American spends 4-5 hours a day watching tv. Let me simplify this… if you spend one hour a day watching tv, that’s 7 hours a week and approximately 28 hours in a month. So basically you loose a whole day each month if you watch tv for one hour a day. At the end of a year, you have lost about two weeks, and if you are like the average American who watches 4-5 hours a day… you have wasted over two months of your year watching tv.
Let’s try another approach, maybe you are a sports fanatic. You know every detail about every team in whatever sport you follow. You talk about these people as if you know them on a first name basis. You know their jersey number, injury history, their current and past stats, and a ton of random facts about them; you always kill it at sports trivia! You go to games and tailgate for hours waiting to get into a game. Then you paint yourself in team colors and yell until you lose your voice because you are so passionate about “your” team. If they win, it’s a good day. If they lose, you spend the rest of your day angry and depressed.
Maybe none of these things have a great influence in your life, but my question for you is: What does? Maybe it’s relationships, family, food, sex, porn, school, success, comfort, money, or power? When we look at our lives, we often say that the priority list should go something like this: God, family, friends, work, etc… For many of us it is _________, God, family, friends, work, etc… or maybe it doesn’t resemble that order at all… So what would that list look like for you, and what is in the blank? What is the thing or things that you put too much time into? There are at least two good ways for us to see what we value and ultimately worship. 1) What do you spend you time doing? 2) What do you spend your money on? Answering these questions will help you see what you attribute worth to… and thus what you worship.
If you were challenged by this post, I encourage you to pick up a book that I am currently going through at my church. It is called Gods at War: Defeating the Idols that Battle for your Heart by Kyle Idleman. Kyle talks a lot about these “gods” we worship and does so in a way that is easy to read and remember. I highly recommend it!
