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2 Kings 21:4 "And [Manasseh] built altars in the house of the Lord, of which the Lord had said, 'In Jerusalem I will put my name.'"

 

The altars Manaseh was building were altars to false gods. He "erected alters to Baal, and made an Ashera" (2 Kings 21:3). Sometimes it seems so weird to me how easy it was for the people of the Old Testament to worship these strange gods. Especially the Jews, since they had such a close relationship with the one true God. They had seen His power, His miracles, His might but what had Baal ever done for them? Why would they be tempted to erect altars to him in the very house of the Lord who had saved them so many times?

 

But then I look around at the things we worship today, and I get a sense of how this happens. It is true that in our modern times most people are not purposely looking for a deity like Baal in place of God, but they are looking for a replacement for God nonetheless. Many think they are too sophisticated to believe in God, but they have the innate human need for Him, as we all do. So instead of looking for a stand-in deity, they search for things that give their lives meaning, and then ascribe to those things the place of God in their lives. A few examples of modern idols: politics; celebrity; the alphabet of disordered sexuality; climate change; and more private things like health, status, job, and comfort.

 

We all need God, so if we don't have Him, we try to fill that space with something else, and we can become very wedded to that thing, indeed. Unfortunately, when a culture does not have God, it can raise these idols to very heights, and demand their "worhip" by all. In those times, faithful people have to remember that God comes first, and resist the temptation (and even the orders) to worship the same things the world is worshiping. The "idols" of the world can often be good things, things worthy of our attention, but we cannot let them rule our lives, nor cause us to behave in un-Christian ways.

 

We really are no different from the Old Testament idol worshipers, we just have different idols. The Baals of our time are not carved images, nor golden statues, but more amorphous things that it can be harder to identify as idols. Sometimes it's easier to see that the culture is idolatrous, then the idols become easier to identify.