How do we fight idolatry?

Social media has been abuzz over an ad released recently by Doug Wilson’s Canon Press. In this ad, Canon Press seeks to recruit a particular kind of young man, who is not afraid to (as the ad says) give the middle finger to idolatry. The idolatry in view is illustrated with a clip of the opening ceremonies from this year’s Paris Olympics when people mocked Jesus’ last supper.

It is entirely appropriate that every sincere believer took exception to this open blasphemy. We know that the world hates Christ, and this outrageous display served as a further demonstration that sinful people by nature hate God. However, many Christian responses have evidenced a fleshly anger, seeing idolaters as enemies to be destroyed in the name of saving Western civilization.

Is this the proper response to idolatry according to Scripture?

When we consider how God responds to idolatry in Scripture, we see that God always brings devasting destruction upon idolatry. He tolerates no rivals, nor does He allow other gods to take His place or usurp His glory. Yet how does God destroy idolatry? A wrong view will certainly lead to a fleshly response to idolatry and idolaters. There are two parts to this answer of how God destroys idolatry. The first is that God offers idolaters terms of mercy and peace through the Gospel.

God could destroy idolatry and idolaters in one fell swoop in divine judgment, but He doesn’t. Instead, the Lord destroys idolatry by redeeming idolaters through the Gospel. Scripture shows us God’s heart for people who have fallen headlong into idolatry and details how He rescues idolaters from certain destruction.                                    

Let’s start where idolatry began with Adam and Eve.

We perhaps do not think of idolatry when we consider the fall of humanity into sin (Genesis 3). At the very heart of Adam and Eve’s temptation was the central issue of idolatry. Who gets to be God, and who gets to determine who is God? Is it the true and living God, or should the creatures get some of the worship that God deserves?

Adam and Eve decided they would try to become gods, rather than worshiping God. Rather than reflecting the divine glory, they sought their own glory. Their idolatry led to the fall of humanity into unspeakable sinfulness.

God’s response to their idolatry, however, is not entirely what we might have expected. The curses upon the serpent, the woman, the ground, and the man are not surprising, but the heart of God’s response is unexpected and surprising: humanity would be victorious over sin and death through the seed of the woman (Genesis 3:15).

The Garden of Eden sets the paradigm for God’s response to idolatry. Judgment comes because of sin. However, God destroys idolatry through redemption, offering humanity terms of mercy and peace through the good news of the Gospel promise.

Next, let’s look at the father of faith, Abraham.

Abraham did not receive God’s blessings because he was a faithful worshiper of the living God who rejected idols. To the contrary, Joshua implies that Abraham worshiped false gods just like his relatives did (Joshua 24), but God reached down by grace and called Abraham out of idolatry to serve the true Lord.

We often see rightly that God’s judgment destroys idolatry, but we can fail to see that God’s grace also destroys idolatry, as it did for Abraham, who went from being an idolater to a paragon of faith. Abraham abandoned idolatry only because God’s grace intervened, changed his heart, raised him from death to life, and called him to salvation through faith. The devastating destruction of idolatry occurs when God’s grace smashes the idols of our hearts.

We also see God’s constant appeal for repentance with the nation of Israel.

Although Israel was supposed to be a people set apart for God, they constantly embraced the idols of the nations around them. Yet, as we see through the Old Testament prophets, God continually called them to salvation, offering them terms of peace and mercy for their sins.

In Ezekiel 18:30-32, Yahweh declares He will judge the Israelites according to their conduct, making it clear they need repentance. They require a new heart, which God, through the new covenant, will provide. God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but He loves to destroy idolatry by saving idolaters through His grace with the gospel of the Messiah.

It’s easy for us as Christians to take pleasure in the death of the wicked (i.e. idolaters). That is not God’s response, though. He would rather idolaters repent and live through faith in Christ.

This grace was not merely proclaimed to Israel, but to the Gentiles as well.

If there was one thing for certain when Paul preached the Gospel to Gentiles, it was that they were idolaters. There was no end to the Gentile pantheon of false gods.

One example of how Paul dealt with the Greco-Roman culture of idolatry is in Acts 17, which is a detailed description of his ministry to idolaters in the philosophical capital of the Gentile world: Athens.

Paul’s spirit was provoked by the idols he observed, which is the natural and proper response of Christians to idolatry in our culture. Christians understand the affront that idolatry is to God’s glory, and it rightly provokes us when we see people made in God’s image rejecting true worship of the Creator. But did Paul walk by the idols of Athens and give their altars the middle finger?

No! Instead, Paul proclaimed the Gospel. He showed these idolaters God’s plan of salvation through Jesus, and he called them to salvation through the Gospel of grace. Some did repent, and God destroyed their idolatry through the humble yet passionate preaching of Paul as he shared the hope of salvation from sin and judgment.

Paul was on a mission to destroy idolatry — not with anger, vitriol, vulgarity, or physical warfare, but with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

When Paul entered Thessalonica, he also encountered people who were steeped in the false worship of pagan gods. Paul, then, worked to devastate those idols and destroy the idolatry running the city — through the Gospel. Many were saved (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10).

The news quickly spread about the incredible transformation of these idolaters, who had turned from their idols to serve the true and living God. This all happened because Paul went into Thessalonica, not to save a culture or a civilization, but to preach the gospel of eternal salvation with grace to idolaters who were perishing apart from Christ.

Why does it seem that the Gospel does not always exhibit the same power today that it did in Paul’s day? Sometimes we want to use the Gospel, not to destroy idolatry, but to protect our particular forms of idolatry. We must go after all idolatry with the Gospel of Jesus Christ, especially the idolatry residing in our own hearts. To preach a Gospel that safeguards one form of idolatry over another is not to preach the Gospel at all.

Lastly, this offer of mercy and peace through the Gospel extends to all the ends of the earth.

In Isaiah 45:20-22, God calls idolaters to reflect on what they’re doing and who they’re worshiping and to see the futility of idolatry. Then, God reminds idolaters that He is the true God and that He is the righteous Savior. We need a Savior who will deliver us from our idols and who will devastate and destroy idolatry. So, God calls to us, to anyone who will hear, from all the ends of the earth.

That offer of mercy is the cry of our merciful God and Savior. He cries to sinners everywhere to turn to Him to be saved. He calls out to sinners to recognize He alone is God and there is no other. God will save all those who cry out to Him for deliverance. The Lord’s response to idolatry is to destroy it with total devastation, and He has commissioned the proclamation of the Gospel of grace that He might bring destruction to false worship and deliver those who are enslaved to idolatry. Why would our response be any different?