In the sermon titled 'Idol Worship' by Justin Meier, delivered at an unknown church, the speaker addresses the persistent issue of idolatry among believers, referencing Exodus 20 and the Ten Commandments. He emphasizes that while traditional idol worship of physical statues may not be common today, modern forms of idolatry are prevalent and often involve intangible aspects such as money, family, and personal success. Meier likens idolatry to a cancer that underlies many other sins and stresses the importance of addressing the root cause rather than merely treating symptoms. He calls for self-examination and challenges listeners to dethrone idols by recognizing God's rightful place in their lives, urging them to flee from idols and embrace God's commands. The sermon concludes with an encouragement to seek victory over idolatry through Jesus Christ and to remain vigilant in keeping God as the foremost priority.

I bring you greetings from Grace Baptist Church, Mount Vernon, Ohio. And we're thankful to be here. Thank you, King's Edition, for allowing us to come and be a part of the conference again this year. Open your Bibles, if you would please, to the book of Exodus, chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20, shall we stand as I read the word of God.

Exodus chapter 20 beginning in verse 1 we'll read through verse 6. And God spake all these words saying, I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt out of the house of bondage thou shall have no other gods before me thou shall not make into thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in the in excuse me that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them, for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation of them that hate me and showing mercy on two thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments and we'll stop there. Heavenly Father we thank you for your love to us, mercy and grace and watch care over us. We thank you our Lord for the privilege you've given us in coming into your house this evening.

And I ask, Lord, that you would be with us now as we have opened up once again the word of God, that you would open up our hearts, ears and minds to be open and receptive to thy word. Father, may you give me liberty and unction from on high to preach Thy Word in truth and in love. We ask Thee, our Father, to bless the efforts of King's Addition Baptist Church in putting on this conference, and we thank You, Lord, for it. And we ask, Father, again, that you would just be with each of us tonight We ask father for the forgiveness of our sins and we ask these things in Jesus name and for his sake Amen, thank you may be seated. We're gonna preach to you on the subject tonight of idol worship I had a worship I didn't come prepared to tickle your ears, so I hope you didn't come prepared to have your ears tickled every once in a while.

Of course, my reputation precedes me that this is all that I preach, but I promise you it is not. I pastor a church full-time, and if I preach this all the time they probably would get me out of there but every once in a while we need some correction from the very Word of God we can sit back and relax and enjoy Bible conferences and I'm not telling you not to do that. We should enjoy Bible conferences but sometimes we need to be rattled a little bit children of God. Otherwise we become complacent in our walk with the Lord. We become complacent in our faith.

We're never challenged. We're never told that we're doing anything wrong. Everything is right. I mean we hear enough of that garbage today in our culture, in our society, that John is a good old boy. He's never done anything wrong.

But we as God's people and we as the ministers of God have got to stir up God's children every once in a while. Now I begin tonight with a very familiar passage of scripture in the book of Exodus chapter 20. Of course we know these as the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mount Sinai. Very powerful and very profound indeed for all of God's children. Now you say tonight, preacher, why do you go to the Old Testament?

Don't you know that we're not under the law anymore? Of course I know that and I thank God that we are under his marvelous, wonderful grace, but God did not remove his law from his Word and he never said that we are not to read it or study it anywhere else so in the New Testament. But I thank God that I am not bound by it, if you understand what I'm saying. Now, many a times we go through the Ten Commandments and we love, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal. Very often times I think we glance over verses 3 and 4 of Exodus chapter 20.

We say we've got this, we do not build a statue such as Nebuchadnezzar built, we do not build a statue of Buddha, we do not serve idols, but oh contraire, dear children of God, I believe that if we were honest with ourselves we would find that we honestly and truly do not have verses three and four and five all together down like we think that we do. So we tend to skip over these two commandments because again we think we have them under control. But the truth is just like every other part of the Word of God and because we still live in the flesh, we do not have idol worship under control. Do you know that God's Word speaks of idolatry more than one thousand times in the Word of God? I think that is a message to us today.

Over a thousand times it is spoken about in God's very Word. Idolatry is the number one issue, or really close to the number one issue in all of the Word of God. All throughout history, people have had trouble with idol worship, and who maketh us to differ? Who maketh us to say, oh everything is perfect, I have no idols, I have no statues in my home and therefore I've got this under control. My friends We need to get into the Word of God, and we need to get the Word of God in us tonight to see that we don't necessarily have this as well-whipped as we like to think.

Idol worship, the little Gods that are at war with your heart today are not necessarily statues. You see what we're bowing down to today is the idols of our imaginations, the idols of our checkbooks, the idols of our internet search engines, the idols of entertainment, the idols of our family, the idols of our children, the idols of ourselves are the idols that we have trouble with today. And we must use God's word to examine ourselves in the light of his word and ask God to conquer the, well, he has conquered, excuse me, through his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, but ask God to help us to conquer these idols in our life. So we're gonna look at idols tonight. First of all we're gonna see that idolatry is the issue and then secondly we're gonna understand today's idol a little bit and then thirdly this battle of idolatry as we will see in the Word of God, is fought in our heart and in our mind.

Now I want to begin tonight with a little illustration. Let me begin as I begin this message. Imagine a man who has been coughing consistently. It keeps him up at night, interrupts any conversation that he has that lasts for more than a minute or two. Finally, the man, because he's a man and it took him a while, decides to go to the doctor.

The doctor runs some tests and finds out that he has, indeed, lung cancer. Now imagine the doctor, who knows how tough it will be to bring this news to the man doesn't tell his patient about the cancer. Instead, he writes a prescription for some cough syrup. The man goes home and takes a cough syrup, delighted with the prognosis, and surely sleeps better that night. And to him, the cough syrup has seemed to solve the problem.

Meanwhile, very quietly, the cancer is eating away at his body. Tonight, I'd like to say that many of us, many times, try to cover up the symptoms, or the effects of idolatry, without getting back to the root problem. That is the cancer. And we can treat the symptoms all we want, but unless we get back to the root problem, which of course is sin, that's all we'll do is treat the cough. Folks, idolatry is just one, again, not just one of the many sins, rather it is the one great sin that all others come from.

That's why idolatry is such an issue and something that as a God called minister do not want to just cover up tonight with some cough syrup. As easy as that would be to do. As you go to your homes and you examine yourselves and you start scratching away at whatever struggle you're dealing with underneath it all, and eventually you'll find that it is a false idol god that you worship. In the book of 1 Corinthians chapter 10, 1 Corinthians chapter 10, and we'll not read all the verses I have here but you can look later it's verses 13 through 21 1st Corinthians chapter 10 beginning in verse 13 Therefore hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to man. But God is faithful, and thank God that He is.

Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able? But will with the temptation also make a way to escape that you may be able to bear wherefore my dearly beloved flee from idolatry God doesn't just say tiptoe around it. He says flee from it. Get away from it. Get to the root cause of sin in your life and get it out.

And ask God to remove it. Stop trying to cover it with cough syrup. And ask God to remove whatever idol it is. As Paul goes on under the inspiration of God in this discourse, basically he summarizes and he says to these Corinthians, he says either serve God or serve the idol. And I'll tell you, it is far better to serve God.

And until that, listen to me, until that little God is dethroned, and that's exactly what the idol God is trying to do, he's trying to take the place of God the Father, now he can't, now you understand, you've known me for a little while now, You know that I know that God will always be on His throne. There's no one that can take Him away. You understand? I know that. But what that little idol is trying to do is take the place of God.

And until He is dethroned, until you have asked God to remove whatever idol it is in your life, and the lord god almighty takes his rightful place you will not have the victory over whatever idle it is and still god almighty is not just more of all through your words but that he's Lord of all through your actions your attitudes and your inner most things you see God is Lord over all whether you want to omit it or not He's the sovereign God of the universe, but whether or not you have accepted his lordship in every area of your life Is a different story He is Lord overall You see idolatry isn't an issue it is the issue It is the cancer There are a hundred million different symptoms, but the issue is always idolatry. Idolatry is at the root of it all. Something in your life has taken the place of God. You say, oh no it hasn't. I'm not here to judge you.

But I ask that you would take an honest examination of your life in the book of Colossians chapter 3 in verse 5. Colossians chapter 3 in verse 5 in the Word of God says this, Mortify Therefore your members which are upon the earth fornication on cleanliness in honor and affection evil conspicuousness and covetousness which is idolatry put it away mortify it and again idolatry is talked about throughout all the Word of God. But we should do as God's Word says in the book of 1 John. You'll hear me use this verse a couple times tonight, the Lord willing. 1 John chapter 5 verse 21, little children, keep yourselves from idols.

Amen. We've learned we should flee from them. We've learned we should mortify them and we've learned we should keep ourselves from them I think God is pretty serious about idol worship. Now please do not misrepresent this verse. When the Lord says in Exodus, thou shalt have no other gods before me, this was not a pre-warning verse, no rather.

The Egyptians were saturated in other gods the children of Israel saw them and most likely struggled with some of them and he says that they shall have no other gods before him. God is commanding this also for us right now. We've read three or four different New Testament verses about idols also. Now folks you can call whatever symptom you have a cough instead of calling it cancer but that doesn't make it any less deadly does it it doesn't make it any less deadly number two now let's understand today's idle a little bit let's be clear for one moment I also want to say this before I get misunderstood. Money and pleasure and work and our family, meaning our wives and our children, our husbands, feeding the hungry, and all these things are all good things.

And God has instructed and designed that we should do them. But when they take the place of God, that's when it becomes a problem. We ought to love our families. I love my wife. Yes, this weekend marks 11 years of marriage for us.

And I thank God for every one of them. But we must be careful that even our children and our spouses do not take the place of God. You say that's hair as you get away from the pulpit. No. Because they can't.

We must understand today's idol. As I said a moment ago, the problem is the instant, the instant, the moment, the place of time that something takes the place of God, the moment that it becomes something as better or bigger than God, the instant that it is not something to lay at God's throne and thank Him for. It becomes an idol. When someone or something replaces the Lord God Almighty in our lives. That thing or that person or that ailment or that sickness.

You know, some people turn sickness into idols. Their whole life is about their sickness and not about God. It's an idol. He becomes an idol. God is very clear beloved in His word and we'll not go back and reiterate Exodus 20 and verses 2 and 3.

You read them later. But as I already mentioned, people, husbands, wives, children can quickly become idols when we lift them up higher than God. And we must flee from idols. We must never, ever set anything up higher than God. You say you're just preaching to the choir.

No, listen. You've got to understand today's idols. You must ask yourself the very challenging questions. Have I ever lifted a loved one to the place of God? You say no I've been in church my whole life I know better.

Now I know you know the scripture, okay? I'm not fighting that. But apply it. Please apply it. Has my job ever come before God?

Has my career come before my family, before God? Have I ever thought of myself more than I have thought about God? We have a very self-centered society. That is the teaching of the society. It would be natural for our minds to think of ourselves as better than God.

You say, but I know better. I know I know better too. But when the promotion comes, right, when the new home comes you think oh man I've done so good look I mean I I've kept my finances in order and I've done this and I've done that and those are all good things and I believe that God's word tells us to be financial stewards of things but who do we praise first? How great a job we did? I'm not trying to make us leave here feeling this big, but sometimes that's not the worst thing ever either.

Right? These are not easy questions that we have to ask ourselves. We have to ask who are we serving? You may see some symptoms like you may see that maybe you're spending too much time at work. You may see that maybe you're spending too much money at the store or online.

But you have to get to the illness. You have to get to the cancer. You can't just stop the symptoms. You've got to get to the root cause. You've got to dethrone the idols.

Because work come between you and missing church. Say well you're a pastor it's easy for you to tell your work that you can't you know you can't work because you're a pastor. No I've also not pastor for many years also and I was in the Lord's house and I and I understand we need to provide for a family all right I got to move on let me just here we go I know that it hurts yeah I know that it hurts But we've got to dethrone the idols in our lives. Listen, God must be first. You know in His Word, He says that He is to have the preeminence.

That is first before the first. If you understand what I'm saying. He's to be first before the first. He is to be the first. D.L.

Moody said, the main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing. Right? Is God the main thing in your life? Then the main thing in your life is to keep the main thing the main thing. We've got to do it.

We must never trade the creator God for God of our own making in Psalms 106 Psalm 106 again we have more verses than we'll probably read verses 19 through 25 They made a calf in Horeb and worshiped the molten image. Thus they changed their glory into the similitude of an ox that eateth grass. They forgot God their Savior which had done great things in Egypt, wondrous works in the land of Haman, terrible things by the Red Sea. Therefore, he said that he would destroy them had not Moses his children stood before him in the breach to turn away his wrath, lest he should destroy them. Yea, they despise a pleasant land, they believe not his word, but murmured in their tents and harkened unto the voice and harken Not excuse me harken not unto the voice of their Lord they turn It's easy to turn And again anything we can become an idol once it becomes a substitute for God in our lives.

It doesn't have to be the golden calf. It doesn't have to be the statue of Nebuchadnezzar. It doesn't have to be the statue of Buddha. It doesn't have to be a picture of the supposed Lord Jesus Christ to be an idol. Once anything in your life has taken the place of God, it is an idol.

Let me ask you another challenging question when we say that we don't idol worship let me ask you what if all you had tomorrow morning is what you thanked God for today. That's all you had, what you remembered to thank Him for. Number three, there is a battle. A battle in our heart, a battle in our mind. Your heart, by Old Testament, determines and defines who you are, how you think, and what you do.

In the book of Proverbs chapter 4 and verse 23. Proverbs chapter 4 verse 23. Just hang with me. I've only gone 22 minutes. I got good time today.

Stopwatch is working good. So I'm not done yet. Alright Proverbs we're almost there chapter 4 and verse 23. Keep thy heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life. The heart is so much more than just the blood pumping muscle.

Out of it flows the issues of life. In the Hebrew culture it was the center of core personality. It was a spiritual hub. We learn to love God with what? All our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind.

Your heart reflects your true identity. In the book of Proverbs 27 and verse 19, Proverbs 27 and verse 19, as in water face, I'm sorry, as in water face, anther is to face, so the heart of man to man it identifies us. Now folks, I want to encourage you tonight to stop focusing on the garbage in our lives and Go back to the source. Get back to the heart. It's much easier just to clean the garbage than to stop the flow from where it's coming.

Now I have a story for that too. Let's say you were walking in a forest. You came upon from a distance you could hear a stream in the middle of the forest. You're already there, aren't you? Isn't that gorgeous?

It's beautiful. You're walking up to this and it sounds wonderful and from the back it looks wonderful but as you get closer you notice that that entire stream bank is filled with garbage filled with pollution and it bugs you and so you clean it and You spend a good couple of weeks cleaning just the garbage from the stream. And you leave there and you say, oh, that feels better, that looks better. And you walk back a couple weeks later and that stream is filled with garbage again. Because upstream is a trash dump, dumping the trash into the stream.

All you've done is cleaned out the garbage, and you never went back to the source. A lot of times we just want to get rid of the symptoms, We just want to clean the garbage. We don't want to confront ourselves with the source. And that is what we're talking about today. It's like the idol in our heart.

You can clean up some of the symptoms. You can say, well this week I determined to get home from work a little bit earlier, but next week you're right back in the rat race. You haven't you haven't got rid of the problem, you just cleaned up some of the garbage. And use that example in any way that you would like. We need more than trash removal.

We need a heart cleansing. Trust me, the little gods of this world, the prince of power of the air, wants control of your heart, he wants control of your mind, he wants your affections to be on anything or anyone but God. And he will use anything or anyone to distract you from your king. A couple quick scriptures here 1st Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 16 if we would do these things I believe it'd be a great help to us in 1st Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 16 says For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him, but we have the mind of Christ. Beloved, put on the mind of Christ.

Think like Christ. We might not know everything about our Savior, and this preacher here doesn't know everything about our Savior, but we can learn about them. We can learn about them. Philippians chapter 2 and verse 5. Philippians chapter 2 and verse 5 Philippians chapter 2 and verse 5 as we begin to wind things down here Philippians 2 and verse 5 Let this mind be in you which is also in Christ Jesus Later on you read verses 1-4 and you can go ahead and read verses the rest of the chapter and you can see the mind.

Let it be in you. Now as I said, we can love. There is biblical command to love our wives. Biblical command. He says love your wives as I've loved the church.

There's command to love our children. There's command to love our neighbor. There's command to love our enemies, but we cannot allow even those that are the closest to us to take the place of God. We must take a look inside folks. We must look inside our lives, our motives, our desires, our wants.

Because as we close with Matthew chapter 15, the Lord knows your inside from your outside, from your upside to your downside. He knows it all. In Matthew chapter 15 verses 8 and 9 This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth and honoreth me with their lips but their heart is far from me but in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men." Also verse 17, same chapter, do you not yet understand that whosoever entereth into the mouth goeth into the belly and is cast out of the drought, but those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth of the heart they defile the man for out of the heart proceeded evil thoughts murders adulterous for corner fornicators thefts false witness blasphemies these are the things which defile a man but to eat with unwashing hands defile if not a man. So you see there are things that defile. We must remember 1st John little children keep yourselves from idols.

Flee from them. Trust in the Lord with all thine heart. As it says in the book of Proverbs. If you're struggling with idols, without the Lord Jesus Christ, there will never be victory. Without Jesus Christ, you'll never have victory over the idol.

But with Him, you can have victory. There is victory in Jesus Christ. I thank you for your attention to the Word of God tonight and I pray this message will bless your son.