Deuteronomy 12:1-7. God is telling the people, through Moses, what they must do when they come into the lands that will make up the Promised Land. First, they must totally destroy any and everything related to the idols of the lands that they will possess. There must be absolutely nothing remaining of those false gods or anything relating to the worship of them. Then they are to seek the place that the Lord chooses to put His name and go and worship Him there. There they shall bring their burnt offerings, tithes, votive and free will offerings, and first fruits, "and there you shall eat before the Lord your God and you shall rejoice, you and your households, in all that you undertake, in which the Lord your God has blessed you."

Good advice - not just for the Jews as they were going to be possessing lands with many false gods, but for us, as we try to live in this world of idols. We must root them out from our lives, entirely, in order to have true peace. Everything related to them must be gone. Then we will be prepared to offer our true devotion, worship, and sacrifice to the one true God. And the place that we must go, where he has chosen to put his name, is no longer a place, as it was for the Jews, but a person, Jesus Christ. So we must put Jesus first in all things, and cling to nothing that could be a rival for our affections. When we do that, we will rejoice. We will be participating in the song of the universe. Like a tuning fork, we will have found the right note and be in harmony with God.

But how do we do that in our current world? The idols of our time are no longer made up gods, for the most part, but things that we find essential to get through life. For example, smartphones cannot be lived without to a large degree. Perhaps, though, this is why we are not feeling the peace and joy of proper worship, even when we are trying our hardest to root out our idols. They have become so intrinsically woven into our lives, that we cannot root them out entirely, and this makes us "off tune" in our worship. Perhaps we are being called to give them up entirely, even though they seem essential.