In the sermon 'To Whom Will You Liken God?' by Scott Brown, the speaker delves into the theme of God's incomparable majesty and the folly of idolatry as outlined in Isaiah 40, verses 18-20. Brown emphasizes that beholding God is the most beneficial act for believers, contrasting the eternal and supreme nature of God with the temporal and disappointing nature of idols. The sermon outlines the challenge of idolatry, its business aspects, and the foolishness of idol worship. Brown highlights that our perception of God is crucial, influencing our lives significantly. He warns against modern forms of idolatry, such as materialism and self-centeredness, and calls for repentance and a return to God's true image. The sermon also discusses the historical prevalence of idolatry and its manifestation in various forms, urging believers to be wary of false representations of God. Through this exposition, Brown encourages a focus on the transformative power of truly beholding God, referencing theological insights and biblical doctrines to underscore the importance of aligning one's life with the divine nature of God as revealed through Jesus Christ.

As we turn to our scripture today, let us thank God in reverence and honor the word before us. So we begin with verse 18. To whom then will you liken God? For what likeness will you compare to him? The workman molds an image, the goldsmith overspreads it with gold, and the silversmith casts silver chains.

Whoever is too impoverished for such a contribution chooses a tree that will not rot. He seeks for himself a skillful workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter. Let's pray. Almighty God, loving shepherd, sweet comforter, O Lord, before you we come, bowed down, seeking to show reverence and honor to your word and to your all-mightiness where we look to behold you we look for your much-needed grace in our lives Oh Lord we thank you for this time. We ask your spirit to quicken us and heighten us to the words before us.

Lord we thank you for this body. We thank you for our elders. And now, Lord, we thank you for Scott, who's coming forward. Lord, lift him up by your mighty right arm in righteousness that he deliver the word and spirit and truth. Oh, Lord, heighten our senses, open our eyes and our ears to the great word before us.

Bring forth your wonderful words of life. In Jesus' name. The prophet Isaiah continues to help us to do the thing that is most beneficial for us at any time in our lives, and that is to behold our God. This is absolutely the most life-giving and helpful thing for any of us at any time. To behold our God.

And here Isaiah is contrasting God and his might with the madness of idolatry in view of the great majesty of God. And so Isaiah is continuing in this passage to show us the majesty and the superiority, the utter holiness and separateness of God and here in verses 18 through 20 He does it by making a comparison in the previous section. He has been talking about about God and and declaring that all flesh is grass and all its loveliness is like the flower of the field. The grass withers, the flower fades because the breath of the Lord blows upon it. You know surely the people are grass.

The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever. Isaiah has been, you know, proclaiming this God. And The whole theme of the whole chapter is, behold your God. We ran across that phrase in verse nine, and he continues to speak of this. And verse 18, then we come to this question, to whom then will you liken God or what likeness will you compare to him?

And Isaiah is continuing to just make the contrast of the greatness, the beauty, the power, the eternality, the immensity of God, and how banal, how temporal, how ridiculous it is, how disappointed you will be when you rest your hopes on anything other than God. And he's saying God is everything. Man and the nations are nothing. All flesh is as grass. God is everything.

And that's the good news. And he sets before us here. And so the main theme of Isaiah 40 is the majestic supremacy of God and the beauty of all of his ways. You know, as we were reading this morning, it just struck me again, just the beneficial nature of God. And at the very end of Isaiah 40, he speaks of just how beneficial he is for the young, particularly for the young.

Are you young here today? And he says that he gives, even the youth shall faint and be weary, but those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength. That he gives power to the weak. Are you weak? This is your God here.

And so Isaiah's drawing these contrasts, going back and forth, almost like going from one end of the piano to the other, to play the majesty of God in all of its brightness, in all of its softness and beauty and tenderness and shepherdliness. And then he goes into some just ridiculous cacophonic tones to describe the idols And how foolish and silly you are when you embrace idols. And it's such a critical matter for us because we're always becoming the thing that we behold. We're always becoming like the thing that we behold. And that's why Isaiah says, Behold your God.

Any healing you desire, it's found in God. Any good thing is there. And so he says, Behold your God. There's a theologian by the name of Greg Beale who wrote a book called We Become What We Worship. Here's how he states this.

What people revere, they resemble, either for ruin or for restoration. And so Isaiah says, behold your God, not for your ruin, but for your restoration. And so he's just speaking of what it looks like to change the glory of God for a lie, and what it's like to truly behold your God and he started out, you know in in this wider Context of Isaiah 40 at the very beginning He speaks of of what really is the essence of Christianity and that is that God comforts his people Comfort come yes comfort my people says your God and how he how he pardons iniquity, how he makes peace by ending the warfare, how he gives a double blessing for your sin. He is so merciful, he is so kind And how he sets you high upon a mountain. And there you're caught saying something.

You're saying, all flesh is grass. You are so happy to declare that God is so good. And he gives you this picture of you, the Christian, on top of a mountain proclaiming that the word of your God stands forever because you know that is true and because of it you proclaim it like that. And then he speaks of God as the one who rewards. Remember where we read he comes with his reward.

He's a rewarder of those who seek him. He is a fountain of blessing. And then he proclaims himself like a shepherd. Remember, he feeds his flock, how? Like a shepherd.

He gathers the lambs, how? In his arm. And he carries them, How? In his bosom. And he gently leads those who are with young.

He speaks of this intensely personal and compassionate God, yet he's vastly powerful. He's above all things. He's sovereign over absolutely everything. And he says, you know, who can hold the waters in the palm of his hand? God can.

Who measures heaven with a span? God. Now, compare that with this. And that brings us to this next verse here, that God is so far superior to all of the idols. I think that when we find ourselves in verse 18 and 19 and 20 we learn a secret and that is that Isaiah wants to disappoint you about your idols.

He'd like to tarnish them now. He would like to belittle them now. He would like to make fun of them now. And he actually is going to make fun of the idolater. And he uses mocking language in order to do it.

And so the outline here is before you this disappointment about idols. First of all, there's the challenge of idolatry in verse 18. Second, there's the business of idolatry in verse 19. And then the third, there's the way of the idolater in verse 20 and then after we go through the exposition I want to back up and just talk about idolatry and what the Bible says about it we'll talk about the history of idolatry I'm going to give you seven marks of idolatry from scripture and then I'm going to speak about how others have defined idolatry. So this whole time together is really a discussion of idolatry in contrast to the superiority of God.

And that's why we find ourselves with this question in verse 18. There's this challenge to idolatry in verse 18, to whom then will you liken God or what likeness will you compare to him? And what Isaiah is saying is that he is incomparable. This is a doctrine of holiness. What is holiness?

The holiness of God is this, that God is different than anything you've ever seen or thought or heard of. God's thoughts are not like yours. God's morality is not like your morality. God is wholly different. He is absolutely and unutterably different, separate, holy, and and this is why he asked this question God is is beautiful in all of his holiness and this is the challenge to whom will you like in God or what likeness will you compare to him you know there are many things in scripture where we're given language to help us understand the great contrast, but I want to submit to you that even the things where we read that God is like, we're still only on the edges of what He is, because he is only sort of like he's like that he's not exactly that he is like that he is so far superior to anything that you can even think about you know he has said you know he measures heavens with the heavens with the span well that's actually a radical infinitely understated way to talk about it.

Because he is so massive and great, there's nothing that you can actually compare him to. There are these comparisons that we're given, like he is a shepherd, but even that doesn't grasp everything about what he is. And we find so many beautiful things that are likened unto God. He is utterly different. This is why before his throne are the streets of gold.

Nobody can conceive of streets of gold. Is there going to be actual gold on the streets? It could quite possibly be figurative. It's like the most incomprehensible, ridiculous thing you could ever imagine is paving your streets with gold. And God is far beyond that.

You know, there's a rainbow that surrounds his throne and it sparkles like an emerald. Well, it's sort of like this, it's sort of like that, But he's far greater than all of that. And so that's why he has this question here. To whom will you liken me? And so with this question, In verse 18, Isaiah is belittling idolatry.

He's trying to take the shine off. He's trying to place a comparison in order to help us to see the banality, the stupidity, the unprofitability, and the unworkability of our nursing our idols. So the prophet is here to show us that he wants to diminish the idol so that he can say, Behold your God. You know, your vision of God is the most important thing in your life. The way that you think about God is absolutely the most controlling thing in your life.

If you think little of God, you will think much of triviality. If you think little of God, you will think much of your lust. If you think little of God, you will think much of yourself. The way that you view God is absolutely the most defining thing in your whole life. And that's why Isaiah says, behold your God.

A.W. Tozer in his book the knowledge of the Holy he says that He says that what comes into your mind when you think about God Quote might be able with some precision to foretell where the church will stand tomorrow The church's view of God will determine its direction. And this is why when it was such a tragedy in the 20th century when the knowledge and the doctrine of God had been set aside and the knowledge and the doctrine of pragmatism and man's pleasures was exalted in the churches. And we're in recovery mode, all of us are in recovery mode from this psychologized man-centered view of everything. And our only hope, and the only hope for this church, my only hope, is that God would become central in all of my thinking.

And that He would be the one that would be the force and the reason for everything that we do. Everything comes from God. Your view of God is absolutely the most defining thing about your life. And that's why Isaiah says, to whom then will you liken God or what likeness will you compare to him? And he's saying you cannot compare.

And so in verse 18 is a challenge to compare your idols to God. This is really the ground of repentance, when a person compares the glory of God with the banality and the foolishness and the triviality of their idols. Isaiah here wants to disappoint us about our idols because we're always becoming like what we behold. We're always becoming like what we behold. And so it absolutely is the most pivotal thing.

And this is one element of the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ and how wonderful it is that God has sent His Son. Because that question, to whom will you liken God? There is an answer to that question. There is one to whom you can liken God. And He is the Lord Jesus Christ Himself.

Colossians chapter one speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ this way, He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins. Now get this in verse 15. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers, all things were created through him and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things consist.

And he is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he may have the preeminence. For it pleased the Father that in him all the fullness should dwell, and by him to reconcile all things to himself, by him whether things on earth or things in heaven, having made peace through the blood of his cross. And here we learn that Jesus Christ is the answer to Isaiah's question, who will you liken God? To the Lord Jesus Christ, to the Savior, to the one who says, come, follow me, to the one who says, repent and be baptized. The Lord Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God.

He has explained him, so says the writer of the Hebrews. And so when we read Isaiah's question, we should know exactly how to answer it. The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld as glory, glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." This is the one that he is speaking of here in this passage. And so the call of the Word of God today for all of us is to repent, to believe in the gospel, to follow the Lord Jesus Christ, to turn to him and renounce your idols. And so after this question, Isaiah then turns to show how insane, how wrongheaded, how absurd it is to hang on to your idols.

He's proclaimed the glory and the beauty and the majesty of God and now he's going to take you down into the bottom of the sewer and show you what it looks like when you do not turn from your idols. And Isaiah offers up two illustrations for this. And the first one is an illustration of the business of idolatry. He shows you how the industry works. This is the industry.

This is how money is made in idolatry. And we should always recognize that there's a business around idolatry. There's always buying and selling going on in idolatry. Secondly, he speaks of the idolater himself. In verse 19, it's the business of idolatry.

In verse 20, it's the idolater himself. So we'll take each one of these individually. And so in verse 19, we find this continued thrust of Isaiah to disappoint you about your idols, to take the tarnish, to put the tarnish on it. And There's kind of a clinical feel to this, Isaiah's description. It's sort of a, it seems kind of a dispassionate deadpan, you know.

The workman molds an image, The goldsmith overspreads it with gold, and the silversmith casts silver chains. You know, it's kind of like a news report, you know? This, this, and this. There it is. There's the whole banana right there.

This is the business of idolatry. And so with this clinical description, you know, he speaks of this fact that it takes a workman. You have to have a man, and there are all these contractors that are involved in the idol making industry. Because you always have to have contractors in order to proliferate idolatry out there. And they all have their specialties.

And it just brings forth the absolute observable fact in human life that businessmen serve the kingdom of the idols. There will always be a business in idolatry. This is why you should be very careful what industry you go into. But there's idolatry in almost every industry. That's the problem.

But idolatry sells. And people can make a marvelous living being involved in the business of idolatry. And idolatry stimulates the economy because idols are bought with money, and it takes people to run the system. And in verse 19, there are three people involved in this. First, there's the workman who molds an image.

That's the first guy. And Then secondly, there's the goldsmith who overspreads it with gold. And then thirdly, there's the silversmith who casts silver chains. And this just makes it very clear that idols need the help of human hands. Idols need to be made to look good on the outside.

You have to do something to an idol to shine it up. And Satan is always offering delusion. The seduction of idolatry is its delusion. It's fake. It looks good, it's alluring, it makes a promise, but actually there's not much to it really.

But the delusion for an idol is actually really easy to see. The gold and the silver, they're only a thin covering. They're made to look beautiful to the senses. But even so, they can't speak, they can't hear. They're just a lifeless facade of beauty.

And anybody who has made any kind of even cursory evaluation of what happens to people with their idols, they know this is exactly what it's like. It's a delusion. Their lives become a delusion because idols are a delusion. Hosea says it like this. He says, a workman made it and not God.

It's really simple. A workman made it! Okay? That's the whole contrast that Isaiah is trying to to deal with here. Now we know idolatry is big business.

We see this in Acts chapter 19 where Demetrius the silversmith who was over all the other contractors was losing big money because the apostle Paul and the apostles were preaching the gospel and people were actually collecting their idols in the city and burning them and they weren't buying them anymore. And Demetrius was mad. And he was so mad, he riled up the whole city. And there's this big amphitheater in Ephesus. And we had the privilege of going there a couple years ago, and in this amphitheater there are 20, 000 people screaming, you know, screaming about their idolatry.

But it was all fomented because of the economy of Ephesus was built upon it. And so there's a tremendous business in it. But the devastating punishment of idolatry is very, very clear. Psalm 115 verses 4 through 8 speak of how harmful it is to nourish your idols. In Psalm 115, 4, we read, Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men's hands.

They have mouths, but they do not speak. They have eyes, they have, but they do not see. They have ears, but they do not hear. Noses, they have, but they do not smell. They have hands, but they do not handle.

Feet, they have, but they do not walk. Nor do they mutter through their throat. And then in verse 8 is perhaps one of the most helpful and powerful interpretive grids about idolatry that's ever been written, and here's what it says. Those who made them are like them. So is everyone who trusts in him.

The secret of idolatry is that you become like your idol. Oh, you love money, you'll become like it. Dead, cold, lifeless, fleeting. You love your lust, you will become like it. You will be controlled and destroyed.

You become like your idol. That's the problem with idolatry. And all of us should ask, you know, in what ways have I become like my idol? We shouldn't think that this form of idolatry is dead in the world. Hinduism is one of the religions where idol worship just like this continues.

Hinduism is the third largest religion in the world behind Christianity and Islam. So there are hundreds of millions of people who still do this exact thing today in terms of a physical idol. This is one form of idolatry. You know, it's interesting, Sennacherib, the Assyrian ruler, when he was threatening Israel, he was mocking them for their idols. And he was basically saying, he said, my hand has found the kingdoms of the idols.

And he said, you know, your idols in Judah and in Samaria, your idols are nothing compared to the idols in this other nation over here. Your idols are ridiculous. And it's often that way, where the idols of the church look so ridiculous to the other unbelievers. They can see through the sham. They see how lightweight they are.

You know, it's like in the church today when people say, well, you know, the church can have fun too. Christians can have fun too. And as a result, they create this strange version of fun, these odd games and these weird things that Christians do you know, but they're so weird, you know, and it's it's kind of like Sennacherib saying your idols are really dumb you know and That's really the problem by Dollar Tree. You can actually see it, you know, the music is ridiculous. They do a play and it's embarrassing.

They put on ridiculous parties and make everyone look foolish. And they do this all in the name of, you know, Christians can have fun too, which is the idol. So that's the business of idolatry. And then there's the idolatry, the way of the idolatry in verse 20. Whoever is too impoverished for such a contribution, I sure do wish I could have heard Isaiah say that.

Because it just seems so mocking here. He chooses a tree that will not rot. He seeks for himself a skillful workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter. Here Isaiah just continues to want to disappoint us about our idols because we're always becoming like what we behold. We're always becoming like our idols and they're so unprofitable for us.

We want a replacement for God. That's what this idol, idolater does. It's interesting, he first identifies the poor idolater. This is the person who's too impoverished. He doesn't have very much money.

He can't really have the super duper good looking idol. But he's not completely without hope in this world. You know, he can make a replacement for God. It's going to be kind of a dumber replacement for God. It's going to be a more banal, cheap, ridiculous replacement for God.

It's not going to look as cool as that calf, that other idol that's so shiny and golden and silver with chains, it's not as beautiful, but it works. It's a poor man's idol. Everybody gets to be an idolater. That's the economy of the kingdom of the world. And the richer you are, the nicer your gods.

At least in your own eyes. But idolatry is no respecter of wealth at all. It's interesting, you know, in Christianity God takes care of you, he seeks you out. In paganism you take care of yourself you have to go find your idol you have to go take care of it it requires maintenance you have to pay and so there's this process that Isaiah identifies he goes out into the woods first. He goes out into the woods and he chooses a tree that will not rot.

Like he's saying, no, no, not that tree. Not those pine trees, they rot. I wanna find a tree that's not gonna rot. So it'll last. I don't want to keep having to come out here all the time.

And so it's just insane, really. And then he goes out into the woods, and then he goes into town and to get a labor. He seeks for himself a skillful workman to prepare a carved image that will not totter. But he has to make sure that it won't totter. I mean, Isaiah is mocking.

He's really speaking of how crazy this is. And there is a story of a god that did totter. You remember in 1 Samuel chapter 5, the god Dagon tottered. The Philistines took the Ark of God, and they put it in the temple of Dagon and then they woke up the next morning and Dagon had fallen over. His arms and his hands had broken off and he was just laying there on his torso.

And the ones who made it, the priest there after Dagon fell down, after Dagon tottered, you know, they worked so hard that it wouldn't totter. And then it tottered and it fell down and then the priests of Dagon refused to go back into that temple after that. That was smart. So there it is. I mean this is a very simple passage.

You have this challenge to idolatry where God says who are you liking me and then you have the business of idolatry where the craziness is shown and then it gets even crazier with the idolater. He's now paying the money because you always have to pay for your idols. Idols are never free. They always cost you dearly. So let's just back up a little bit and talk about idolatry in general and then try to drill down on some of the specifics.

First of all, I think it's helpful to speak about idolatry in terms of history and particularly the history that we find in the Bible. I mean, idolatry was the first sin in the garden. Adam sought to elevate his will above the will of God, And that is the beginning of all idolatry. Cain would worship God in his own way. He did not bring a blood offering.

He presumed that he could worship God any way that he wished. Idolatry surfaces right at the very beginning, at least at its core. There are examples that come in the third generation. In Rachel's house, idolatry shows its ugly face. In the third generation after creation, Abraham's family through Laban has idols.

You remember that famous story of Rachel with her family gods underneath her saddle. And then you have the golden calf and then you have the god of Tyre the Asherah you have Dagon the god of the Philistines you have the Ashtoreth who were the Canaanite gods you have Molech who is worshiped through child sacrifice you have the golden images made by Jeroboam, you have Baal, who was the god of Canaan, you have Rimon, the god of Naaman the leper, you have Nisrock, the god of Sennacherib, you have Nebo, the Babylonian god. All of these gods are just like all the other idols. That they are representative. They all represent a philosophy.

They represent a morality. They represent a way of work and relationships and absolutely everything. They are representative of other things. So when you think of the idol kind of idolatry, where there's a physical idol like it's speaking of here in Isaiah, you always have to recognize that that that is one category of idolatry but it bears witness to all the others because you and all all of them are the same in this sense they all represent something of morality or or thought or anything like that or lifestyle. And they are all dead.

And they will all do you in. And they will all make you pay. They're all the same. They have different names in different cultures, but they're all generic in that sense. It's interesting, you know, although all through the history of Israel there was this besetting sin of idolatry.

In Psalm 106, we read, they made a calf at Orab and worshiped the molded image. Thus they changed their glory into the image of an ox that eats grass. They forgot God their Savior, who had done great things in Egypt. This was the Achilles heel of the people of God. They always were trying to borrow the gods of the other nations, and they wanted to be like the other nations.

This idolatry is a seminal sin. It's something that influences absolutely everything. It's formative, it's influential. It defines everything, which is why Paul said in 1 Corinthians 10, flee idolatry. But it seems like when you get to the days of the Lord Jesus Christ and the apostles, this kind of idolatry had fallen out of use in Israel.

Like you don't find Jesus and the apostles speaking of these kinds of idols as existing in Israel. They do run across these idols in Rome, in Corinth, in Ephesus, in Philippi. They run across the idols like this there. But It seems like this exact kind of idol worship may have fallen out of use in Israel. And there were more urbane idols of self-exaltation.

And there's a lot to speak of that. I think if you look at the religion of the Pharisees, they do everything to exalt themselves. That's idolatry as well. But what Greg Beale said is true. What people revere, they resemble, either for ruin or for restoration.

That's the problem with idolatry. Now I'd like to give you seven marks of idolatry out of the Bible. You know, what does the Bible explicitly say about idolatry? And I can't think of a better place to begin this discussion as Exodus chapter 20 where we learn that idolatry comes through deceptive images of God. Idolatry comes through deceptive images of God.

Of course this is the passage of the Ten Commandments where God says, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love me and keep my commandments." This is the issue of the second commandment and the making of images in order to depict God.

And The lie of the making of an image is that it lies about God. His glory is diminished. Because God isn't like anything on this earth. You can't paint him. You can't put him in a movie without disfiguring and marring and making an idol.

I know millions of people have watched the Jesus film. They have watched idolatry. There are so many people who have children's Bibles. When they look at that picture of Jesus, this is an idol. It's a disfigurement.

It is implicitly misleading. And that's why God says you cannot make God into a graphic form at all. In Deuteronomy 4 verse 12, God makes this very clear. He says, the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sounds of the words, but you saw no form.

You heard only a voice. This is the way that God has designed for himself to be described, is through words and not through images. So idolatry comes through deceptive images of God. Secondly, rebellion and stubbornness are expressions of idolatry. How do you notice idolatry in your family?

Look for rebellion and stubbornness. When you see it, you're seeing an idol. 1 Samuel 15 verse 23 says, For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry, because you have rejected the word of the Lord. He has also rejected you from being king." But this is a very clear statement that rebellion as witchcraft and stubbornness is idolatry. This is why God gives parents to children to help them to see their idols coming out.

You have to have a parent there to see them coming out to deal with them. Not that parents are free from rebellion and stubbornness. That's not the point. The point is that when you see rebellion and stubbornness, you see idolatry. Number three, the third mark of idolatry from scripture.

The works of the flesh are idolatry. The works of the flesh are idolatry. The works of the flesh are idolatry. Galatians 5.19. Now the works of the flesh are evident, which are adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like.

So he's saying that the works of the flesh are idolatry. And Number four, sexual immorality is connected with idolatry. Sexual immorality is connected with idolatry. Struggling with the internet, this is idolatry. Struggling with images, This is idolatry.

You have a girlfriend on the side, idolatry. You're flirting with someone, this is idolatry. You have to put the right name on it. In Hosea chapter 4 verses 13 through 15, this is made very, very clear. Idolatry had, at least in the ancient Near Eastern societies, always had immorality connected with it.

The high places were places of immorality. By the way, that's why people like to go there. They didn't go there because the image was just so interesting. It was what the image was all about, was what was interesting. In 1 Corinthians 6 verse 9 there are various elements of idolatry that are listed there and that you will not inherit the kingdom of God neither if you participate neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor homosexuals nor Sodomites nor thieves nor covetous nor drunkards nor revilers nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.

But the good news is that you can escape sodomy, you can escape thievery, you can escape fornication and adultery, you can escape these things. And that's why Paul says, but such were some of you. But you were washed, but you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ by the Spirit of our God." In Ephesians chapter 5 verses 3 through 10 you find that sexual sin is also central in idolatry as well. He mentions three sexual sins and then he says, but fornication and uncleanness and covetousness, Let it not even be named among you as is fitting for saints neither filthiness nor foolish talking or coarse jesting Which are not fitting but rather of giving thanks in Verse 5 he says that that no fornicator or unclean person or idolater has any inheritance in the kingdom of God. And what is the remedy?

What is the remedy that the apostle Paul brings in Ephesians 5 for this idolatry? You guessed it. Thanksgiving. Giving thanks to God. Seeing God is good.

Seeing that He is the fountain of life, seeing that He is truly wonderful, giving thanks to God, that is the cure for idolatry. The fifth mark of idolatry is embracing false ideas of God. Is idolatry. Embracing false ideas. In Zechariah chapter 10 we read that for the idols speak delusion.

The diviners envision lies. They tell false dreams. They comfort in vain. Therefore the people will wend their way like sheep. They are in trouble because there is no shepherd." Embracing false ideas.

Number six, covetousness is idolatry. Colossians 3, 5, therefore put to death your members which are on the earth fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. Covetousness is idolatry. Wanting what someone else has. Being dissatisfied with what you have, that's an idolater.

If you're not happy with what you have, with what God has given you, you have to recall that what that really is. It's idolatry. Covetousness is idolatry. The 10th commandment gives us our coordinates about that. The seventh, your vision of God can be idolatry.

This is, I think, probably the heart of all idolatry. It's a false view of God. Idolatry is sometimes seen in your own designer God, the God that you like, the Christian of the comforting, warm-hearted verse. They like their Bible because there are like a few amazingly heartwarming things in here. And that's sort of their God.

They've done their systematic theology, but it's pretty much pick and choose their God. They like this sweet thing and that sweet thing. Kind of like Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson got his scissors out and cut out the parts he didn't like. He had a designer God.

And the God who does not judge, the God who loves everyone. You know, there are Christians out there who think that God loves everyone. The only reason they think that is that they never read their Bibles, Because the Bible says that God hates some people, and he's angry with them all the time. So your vision of God can be idolatry. And so here, you know, Isaiah just wants to disappoint us about our idols because we're always becoming like what we behold.

And whether we behold our God or not makes all the difference in the world. It is the most critical thing, God. How you behold God. It controls everything. Some of you are discouraged maybe today.

You can trace it right back to you have not been beholding God, you've been beholding yourself. You're fearful, it's because you've been beholding your fears. You're greedy and you're unsatisfied, you because you've been beholding your covetous desires. The root of so much of what ails us is that. Our desire for God.

It's our greatest need. Now let me give you some ways that others have defined idolatry. Martin Luther said it this way, whatever your heart clings to and relies upon, that is your God. Here's Matthew Henry, Proud people make themselves equal with God. Covetous people make their money equal with God.

And whatever we esteem or love, fear or hope in, more than God, that creature, we equal with God. Here's John Angel James, hence it is obvious that whatever we love most and are most anxious to retain and please, whatever it be, we depend upon most for happiness and help. Whatever has most of our hearts, that is in effect our God, whether it be Jehovah or Jupiter, whether it be friends, possessions, or our own desires, or our own selves. So from this you can see that you know idolatry has many faces. It's what you lust after, it's what you revere, it's what you fear.

Everything can be an idol. You know, pride and idolatry have so many different faces. In one person, the pride and idolatry might look like this magnificent gate or fence entry into his property, this marvelous structure and the gates open and it's there because of his pride. In another person, the pride might look like a cattle fence because it's so understated and so humble. In one man, pride might look like the shiniest, most expensive, fastest car.

In another man, it might look like his crummy car that he drives to exalt himself in his humility. Pride has many faces and you cannot tell by the size of the car or the house or anything you can't tell. So when you think of idols you think of what you covet and you think of the manifestations of immorality in your life, you think of what you fear. You can test idolatry by your love for the Word of God, your hunger for God, whether you like other things better than God. You can look at your Facebook pages and see what you like if it is a reflection of your heart.

If all you have on there are worldly things you should fear, it's just a reflection of what you love. You will post what you love. You can't help yourself. And if all you have there is triviality, then you need to recognize where you have come. Look at your Facebook page.

What does it say? Does it betray the truth? You know, yesterday a friend told me that there are three kinds of people in their relationship with the Word of God. We were talking about idolatry and he said, he said ask them their relationship with the Word of God, you can tell what their idol is. He said there are three kinds of people.

There are sick, they're sick people, they have no appetite. There are full people who have no appetite. They're full of themselves. They're adequate, they're glutted, they're saturated with all kinds of other things. They're just full of fillers.

And then there are the dead, Those three kinds. The sick are sick often because of pornography or other things that are polluting them and they're just sick and they have no desire. Often people have no desire because they're just sick. When you're sick you don't want to eat usually. Or they're full.

Their lives are just so busy, they're so full of everything, full of themselves, or they're dead. One of those three he said. I thought that was very interesting. You know, one thing we know from scripture is that idolatry will disturb the Christian. Idolatry will disturb the Christian as it did in Acts 17 with the apostle Paul when he went into Athens and his spirit was provoked within him because he saw that it was a city full of idols.

If it provokes you, give thanks to God. The mark of true Christianity is to turn from idols. 1 Thessalonians 1, 9 says, for they themselves declare how they turn to God from idols to serve the living and true God. This is why the apostle John said, little children keep yourselves from idols. Little children.

He tells why right there in that phrase because we're like little children we're so vulnerable we're so easily taken by idols little children keep yourselves from idols So Isaiah is here to take the shine off of our idols. He's here to say, Behold your God. And it's so helpful for us because we are changed into the images of those things which we behold. We are always becoming like whatever we revere, either for our ruin or for our restoration, as Greg Beale has said. This is why the apostle Paul spoke of it this way in 2 Corinthians 3, 18, but we all with unveiled face beholding in a mirror the glory of the Lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory just as by the Spirit of the Lord." And so the question of the day is, would you let Isaiah disappoint you?

You know, whose likeness is it that's creating our lives? You know, the Bible has such a wonderful vision of life for the Christian. John spoke of it in 1 John 3. He said, Beloved, we are now children of God, And it has not yet been revealed what we shall be. But we know that when he is revealed, we shall be like him.

For we shall see him as he is. And everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself just as he is pure. We shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. This is the doctrine of glorification. We see Jesus Christ, we behold our God, and we become like Him.

That's why Paul said in Colossians 3, 3, when Christ who is your life appears then you will appear with Him in glory. This is why the Lord Jesus Christ said to his disciples in John 17, 22, The glory that you have given me, I have given them. And it's why Peter said that we are partakers of the divine nature. It's why Paul said, I am crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And the life that I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." And this is why Paul spoke to the Corinthians about how helpful this is. He says, Therefore we do not lose heart, even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding eternal weight of glory. While we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal." And this is Isaiah's argument.

Behold your God. Who will you like in Him? It's God the unseen seer. It's God the majestic, perfect, immense God who feeds His flock like a shepherd, who gathers the lambs in His arms, who gives the weary youth strength, who puts up on wings like eagles so that they would run and not be weary and they would walk and not faint. This is your God.

This is the God that Isaiah desires to use to put a tarnish on your gods. Would you pray with me? Oh Lord, we thank you for your servant Isaiah, for His arguing with us, His exposing us, showing us where true beauty and goodness exists, so that we would become like what is good and beautiful, so that we would be caught up, that we might bear the marks of your glory. Amen.