Graven Images (5-2-12)

Exodus 20:4-6 - "You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments."

This second commandment goes hand in hand with the first commandment. If the first commandment dealt with exclusive worship of the one true God, then this second commandment deals with worshiping the right way. The first commandment dealt with not worshiping false gods, this second commandment deals with false worship of the true God. It would seem, at first glance, that this commandment is merely an extension or a clarification of the first commandment, and it would seem that it is almost unnecessary. But, of course, we know that the Word of God is divinely inspired and arranged, and that nothing is included for no purpose. And we see upon closer inspection that these two commandments, while related, deal with two different things, both of which we need, otherwise they wouldn't be here for us to consider.
The first commandment stated very simply - "You shall have no other gods before Me." And of course included in this commandment is that in worshiping God exclusively we do not worship any idol or statue or graven image. But along with worshiping God exclusively, He wants us to worship Him correctly, without the visual aid of any idol, statue, graven image, etcetera. This is what the Lord Jesus was talking about in John chapter 4 in His discussion with the woman at the well. In John 4:23 He says - "But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers."

God reminds His people again and again throughout the Bible that He doesn't want them to worship, or even make any image for the purpose of aid in worship. In fact at the end of Exodus 20, after the Lord gives Moses the ten commandments we read this in verses 18-23 - "All the people perceived the thunder and the lightning flashes and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking; and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood at a distance. Then they said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen; but let not God speak to us, or we will die.” Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid; for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear of Him may remain with you, so that you may not sin.” So the people stood at a distance, while Moses approached the thick cloud where God was. Then the LORD said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘You yourselves have seen that I have spoken to you from heaven. You shall not make other gods besides Me; gods of silver or gods of gold, you shall not make for yourselves." God reiterates this second commandment. The people of Israel heard God, they saw the lightning and heard the thunder, but they didn't see God. And indeed we're told elsewhere in Scripture that "no one has seen God at any time." We read in Deuteronomy 4:15-20 - "So watch yourselves carefully, since you did not see any form on the day the LORD spoke to you at Horeb from the midst of the fire, so that you do not act corruptly and make a graven image for yourselves in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the sky, the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water below the earth. And beware not to lift up your eyes to heaven and see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, and be drawn away and worship them and serve them, those which the LORD your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven. But the LORD has taken you and brought you out of the iron furnace, from Egypt, to be a people for His own possession, as today." God makes it a point to show the people that in all their dealings with Him they have not seen Him. This is in direct contrast with all the other nations. Israel had just come out of the land of Egypt where they were surrounded with all kinds of idols and images that were called gods. And they were going into a land where the exact same kind of idol worship was going on. But God called the nation of Israel as His own special people and He called them to be separate, different than all the surrounding nations. With all the nations their gods were visible, they were depicted by these graven images, but not so with the Lords people. Their connection with God was audible, not visual. They heard Him speaking and saw the mighty works which He performed, but they never saw Him.

In Psalm 115 the psalmist recognizes this distinction between the people of God and the heathen nations, and he says in verses 2-8 - "Why should the nations say, “Where, now, is their God?” But our God is in the heavens; He does whatever He pleases. Their idols are silver and gold, The work of man’s hands. They have mouths, but they cannot speak; They have eyes, but they cannot see; They have ears, but they cannot hear; They have noses, but they cannot smell; They have hands, but they cannot feel; They have feet, but they cannot walk; They cannot make a sound with their throat. Those who make them will become like them, Everyone who trusts in them." All these graven images have a certain form, but they have no function, whereas our God, the only true and living God doesn't have these visible attributes and doesn't live in temples made with hands. He, as the psalmist says, is in the heavens and does whatever He pleases.

In Exodus 32, at the same time the Lord was righting these commandments in stone, the children of Israel were at the base of Mount Sinai, and it says in verse 1 - "Now when the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people assembled about Aaron and said to him, “Come, make us a god who will go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.”" They referred to Moses as "the man who brought up from the land of Egypt." The Lord is the one who brought them up, but they saw Moses as God's visible representative. And when they no longer saw Gods representative they called out for Aaron to make a god for them that they could see. So it says in verses 4 and 5 - "He took this from their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool and made it into a molten calf; and they said, “This is your god, O Israel, who brought you up from the land of Egypt.” Now when Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the LORD.”" I don't think that the children of Israel were intending to go into full blown idolatry, but that's what they did. This is how the people in Egypt worshiped, they worshiped their gods by honoring their idols, and this may be what the Israelites were intending to do. In fact Aaron even says "Tomorrow shall be a feast day to the LORD." And the people celebrated this feast day to the Lord by worshiping this graven image. But we know the Lord wasn't pleased with this. In fact He sought destroy the entire nation, and I believe He would have if Moses had not interceded on their behalf.
The Lord is very clear that He didn't want them and He doesn't want us to make any form or image to aid us in our worship of Him. It's an abomination to Him.

This message, this commandment is not only for the people of that day, but it's also for us today. John tells us in 1 John 5:21 - "Little children, guard yourselves from idols." We're not excluded from this commandment. Mankind is very visual, we retain and understand information a lot better when we see it as opposed to hearing it. But the Scripture states in Romans 10:17 - "So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." Many, even in our churches today, are breaking this second commandment because they fell like they can draw closer to God with the help of some visual aid. Many people in their worship use a statue, or a picture of Jesus, or a crucifix, or some other religious symbol to help them worship God, but this isn't what God wants.
One reason being that anything we would be able to make would limit the limitless God. Nothing made by man can encapsulate the fullness of God. This is what Paul spoke to the people of Athens about in Acts 17. The Athenians had all kinds of idols and graven images, items of worship, but Paul pointed out to them that we must not think about God in this way. We read in Acts 17:22-31 - "So Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus and said, “Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, ‘TO AN UNKNOWN GOD.’ Therefore what you worship in ignorance, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things; and He made from one man every nation of mankind to live on all the face of the earth, having determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their habitation, that they would seek God, if perhaps they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us; for in Him we live and move and exist, as even some of your own poets have said, ‘For we also are His children.’ Being then the children of God, we ought not to think that the Divine Nature is like gold or silver or stone, an image formed by the art and thought of man. Therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance, God is now declaring to men that all people everywhere should repent, because He has fixed a day in which He will judge the world in righteousness through a Man whom He has appointed, having furnished proof to all men by raising Him from the dead.”"

Whenever a statue or an image is used in worship we begin to treat that thing as holy, and really our worship shifts from God to the image. This happened, again, in the history of the nation of Israel. In Numbers chapter 21 the children of Israel were complaining against Moses and against the Lord, and the Lord sent poisonous snakes into the camp to judge them. The people then cried out for salvation from these snakes and we read this in verses 8-9 - "Then the LORD said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a standard; and it shall come about, that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, he will live.” And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about, that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived." So here we find Moses making a bronze serpent by the command of the Lord, and as many as looked to the bronze serpent were saved. But then we come to 2 Kings 18  and we read of a king by the name of Hezekiah who did what was right in the eyes of the Lord. At the beginning of his reign he began to cleanse the land of Judah of all it's idolatry, and 2 Kings 18:4 says - "He removed the high places and broke down the sacred pillars and cut down the Asherah. He also broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the sons of Israel burned incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan." This reminder of Gods salvation and healing had to be destroyed because rather than worshiping God the people turned and began to worship this visual representation of Gods salvation. It became an idol.
An idol is simply anything or anyone that takes supreme devotion away from God. A person, a possession, etc. Anything could become an idol, and so we must be careful to watch ourselves that we do not get caught up in idolatry, especially under the guise of worship.

We have an invisible God who doesn't want us to make any idols or graven images. This then raises the question, how do you have a personal relationship with a person you never see? Our relationship with God is one of faith. As Romans 10:17 says - "So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ." 2 Corinthians 5:7 says - "for we walk by faith, not by sight." And Peter says in 1 Peter 1:8 concerning our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ - "and though you have not seen Him, you love Him." We have never seen God, and we have never seen His Son, and yet by faith we have a deep, intimate love relationship with Him. It's all by faith. And faith comes by hearing the Word of God. We don't need an image to help us draw closer to God, all we need is His word. The more we get acquainted with the Word of God, the more we get to know Him. And the more we look by faith at the life of the Lord Jesus, the clearer we begin to see Him with the eyes of faith. For Scripture states in Colossians 1:15 - "He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation."

Isaiah 40:18-26 - "To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare with Him? As for the idol, a craftsman casts it, A goldsmith plates it with gold, And a silversmith fashions chains of silver. He who is too impoverished for such an offering Selects a tree that does not rot; He seeks out for himself a skillful craftsman To prepare an idol that will not totter. Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been declared to you from the beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is He who sits above the circle of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He it is who reduces rulers to nothing, Who makes the judges of the earth meaningless. Scarcely have they been planted, Scarcely have they been sown, Scarcely has their stock taken root in the earth, But He merely blows on them, and they wither, And the storm carries them away like stubble. “To whom then will you liken Me That I would be his equal?” says the Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high And see who has created these stars, The One who leads forth their host by number, He calls them all by name; Because of the greatness of His might and the strength of His power, Not one of them is missing."