I’ve been thinking about idols a lot lately – all those things that we humans are prone to putting in God’s place, from wealth, possessions, romance and position to food, entertainment, education, safety, personal health and fitness.  
 
I’ve been thinking, too, about how guilty I remain of dwelling on temporal things, after all these years of seeking and worshiping the living God. I still spend more time and energy on my garden than the average bear; more idle hours on old books and old movies; more money on special foods, toys and veterinary care to keep our pets happy and healthy. And that’s just a start; it seems that every day, I find new ways of putting other things before my Savior.
 
How about you? Do you find yourself idolizing anything (or anyone) by ardently:

• Seeking it, in order to know it
• Pursuing it, in a drive to possess it
• Thinking of it extensively and perhaps exclusively
• Fearing, and protecting against, its loss
• Spending a ton of money on it
• Talking about it to anyone who’ll listen
• Devoting excessive amounts of time to it

 
Of course, some of these things are inescapable. We have to earn some money, to care for our families, to keep our homes from becoming eyesores, even to take decent care of our bodies -- which are, after all, the temple of the Holy Spirit. And surely, as our Good Shepherd, the Lord wants us to have life, “and have it more abundantly” (John 10:10); He invented pleasure, and gave us lots to enjoy in this life. 
 
But for each of us, there are lines that we can cross into idolatry. We’d best be on the lookout for it in our own hearts, guard against it prayerfully as we meditate over scripture, and be prepared to flee from it, as the apostle Paul advises in 1 Corinthians 10. 
 
Fortunately, as Paul also tells us in this chapter, resisting idolatry is far from impossible for the child of God.   “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man,” he wrote. “But God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.”

Some years ago, a young man I know bought himself a new mulching lawn mower from a local Toro dealer. He loaded it in his truck and headed for home, almost beside himself with excitement; the sales rep had promised that its mulching feature would transform his lawn in very short order. “Just put some gas in and fire it up,” the salesman said. “You won’t believe the results!”
 
Unfortunately, the young man followed the salesman's instructions to the letter, not pausing to check the operator manual. Which means he missed the part about putting in both gas and motor oil before operating his new machine. As a result, the engine soon seized up and died. And not surprisingly, the dealership refused to replace the mower, insisting quite rightly that the young man should have read the manual.
 
It was a costly mistake. But what’s really sad is that the young man apparently did not learn his lesson about the importance of reading the directions; he recently told a mutual friend that he was definitely heaven-bound, because he’d been following his priest’s instructions almost perfectly.
 
It seems that this young man didn’t feel the need to consult our Manufacturer’s instructions personally. Once again, he’d chosen to rely on the word of a middleman.

Sadly, he’s far from alone. According to Christian researcher Barna, only 24% of American adults consult their Bibles frequently.  And even among the well-churched, many let a minister, pastor or priest tell them what God has said instead of doing their own research. As a result, far too many are missing the most important part of all – the part about how to become irrevocably heaven-bound.  
 
I talk to such trusting souls all the time, especially among the elderly who’ve spent their entire lives following man-made instructions as faithfully as humanly possible.
 
“I sure hope so,” they say when asked if they’re sure they’re going to heaven. The reason? Almost invariably, it’s some variation on “I’ve tried to live a good life.” Often, they proceed to list all the things they’ve done, from going to church and performing the requisite sacraments to saying their prayers and doing lots of good deeds.
 
Alas, these people remain ignorant of what’s arguably the Bible’s most important message: Eternal life is not a reward for a life well-lived. It is God’s free gift to all who repent and trust in Jesus Christ to have paid the penalty for their sins.  
 
In the end, the cost of ignoring the directions will depend on what’s at stake. Blowing up a lawn mower will set you back hundreds of dollars. But that’s nothing compared to the everlasting tragedy of ignoring the word of God.
 
Bottom line? Begin studying the Bible now, before it's too late – and encourage your friends and loved ones to join you! 

We’ve all heard of designer dogs – pups produced via deliberately selecting and mating distinct breeds in an attempt to produce a cross offering the best of the parents’ qualities. It probably started with the cockapoos introduced 40-plus years ago; today we see a bewildering array of options, from adorable Labrador/poodles to clever dachshund/cavalier spaniels to rare afghan/collie crosses.

Unfortunately, this same idea is being applied with abandon to theology these days. Not satisfied with the one true Creator God who revealed Himself in the Bible, many lost souls have invented their own New! Improved! hybrid gods in a vain attempt to improve on the real thing.  

There’s nothing new about this; “spiritual” people have been doing it for millennia. Nor is there anything new about the nature of these designer gods. They all just happen to agree with whatever his or her inventor believes and wants to do.

You’ve probably heard some version of this explanation more than once: “The God of the Bible is nothing but an ancient myth, and a vengeful one at that. Whereas my god understands why humans may have a need for _____________.”

Fill in the blank with the speaker’s sin of choice – committing adultery, for instance. Stealing from the fat cats. Lying to protect themselves or flatter others. Drinking themselves into oblivion every night. Even becoming obsessed with something like gardening, home decorating or entertainment -- activities that might otherwise have been nice little hobbies.
 
This is how people make up designer gods that bear an astounding resemblance to ancient deities like these:

• Egypt’s Isis, who would have endorsed the all-out nature worship practiced by modern pagans
• The Baal of the Carthaginians, who sacrificed their children to him in an ancient prelude to 21st century abortion
• Rome’s Bacchus, who promoted the sort of religious ecstasy and libertinism we see in certain circles today
• Taoism’s Caishen, the prosperity god who promised wealth and good fortune to all who would worship him

 
And that’s just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. With designer gods, the possibilities are virtually endless.
 
The common denominator?  Perhaps most notably, designer gods approve whole-heartedly of whatever pursuits their inventors favor – usually something explicitly condemned by the God of the Bible.
 
What’s more, proponents of designer gods often believe that their personal righteousness is just the ticket to eternal joy. “Of course I’m not perfect,” they might say. “Who is? But my god will welcome me into the afterlife with open arms, knowing that I’m much better than most people. After all, I’m good with tradespeople, I’m very tolerant of alternate lifestyles, I donate a lot to charity every year, and I even do some very important volunteer work.”
 
Sadly, those who embrace this line of thinking are taking risks of eternal proportions. In ignoring the Bible, they are rejecting the only source of divine authority that is demonstrably true.  And that means they are ignoring what the true God has said is prerequisite to a heavenly eternity: repentance and trusting in Jesus Christ alone to have atoned for their sin on the cross.
 
If you know someone who worships a designer god, I hope you’ll make an attempt to lead him or her to the truth. Your efforts may not be appreciated, at least not now. But some may end up being eternally grateful that you cared enough to introduce them to the One who is the way, the truth and the life. 

“How ‘bout starting that puzzle?” I asked Dave one Saturday morning in January of 2006, as I got ready to run some errands. “At least get started on the frame?”

“Mmmmph,” said my aging and aching husband, who had just crammed the upper half of his body into the cabinet under the bathroom sink in yet another heroic battle against an apparently permanent clog. It would have been a painful task even for a young fellow, and I admired his persistence.

As it turned out, we didn’t start the puzzle that morning. But as I drove down the gray streets toward the stores that at least add some color to our bleak winter landscape, the image of that jigsaw frame kept dancing around in my mind.

At first, I thought it was just wishful thinking, because for some reason it’s the part of puzzle-making I like the least; perhaps I was hoping I’d come home to find that Dave had already completed it.

But later, as Dave and I sat and watched an AFC divisional playoff game between the Broncos and the Patriots (a game of little interest to us, since the Packers had weeks earlier been eliminated from playoff contention), I picked up my knitting and found that the puzzle frame was still hanging around in the back of my mind.

“Get lost,” I thought to the image. “Maybe we’ll get you started next weekend.”

It grinned at me like the Cheshire cat – no doubt because I’d seen Disney’s “Alice in Wonderland” again just before Christmas.

“Okay,” I told the image. “What are you trying to tell me?”

The analogy suddenly became obvious: A finished jigsaw puzzle represents truth. And the frame – that all-important first step in puzzle-solving – represents one’s worldview.
I wish I could say that this was an original idea, but I’m quite sure it wasn’t. Although to my shame I can’t say specifically which of the authors I’d read over the previous five-plus years had used the jigsaw analogy, I know that more than one had done so.

But thanks to these writers, whoever they may be, as the Broncos were whipping the Patriots, I saw my jigsaw frame as a worldview.

It winked at me, Lewis Carroll and Walt Disney conspiring to entertain me into thoughts deeper than defensive strategies and the knit-one-row, purl-one-row scheme of my sweater-in-progress.

What if we could see the Truth in a jigsaw puzzle – a puzzle so enormous and elaborate that it couldn’t be completed in this life, but one that anyone with any sense is compelled to work on?

Well, then, we would start out just as I wanted Dave to begin our mystery puzzle: By identifying and positioning the corners, each having two straight edges, as well as the pieces making up the frame’s four “legs” – those having a single straight edge.

These pieces would share certain characteristics making them trustworthy as contributors to the worldview of Truth. There would be none based solely on speculation or emotion or fantasy; all would be verifiable. There would be no missing pieces, and no pieces that merely came close to fitting. In the end, they would all have to fall into place perfectly, without the need for force or distortion.  And there could be no edge pieces left over, to be discarded because they just didn’t fit into the framework.

I liked this idea. My fingers flying fast and furious on automatic pilot as I knitted up the no-need-to-count sweater back, I tried the idea out on various worldviews.

For instance, I figured that if we chose the frame of biblical Christianity, we might find that the corner pieces are the evidence for Jesus Christ’s resurrection, for a young earth having undergone a catastrophic hydraulic event, for the Bible’s unfailing historical accuracy, and for thousands of detailed prophecies fulfilled.  And we might find that the rest of the frame is composed of associated evidences, everything from archeological findings at Jericho and Sodom to modern science’s discovery that the sun does indeed have its own orbit, just as Psalm 19 revealed thousands of years ago.

From what I’d learned over the last five-plus years, was there any piece that would fit only when forced, or one that would have to be discarded because of incompatibility with the biblical framework? I couldn’t think of one, not even from all the atheist stuff I continued to put to the test.

Dave woke me from my reverie with a disgusted groan. I focused on the TV again: Denver had apparently scored again, putting the game out of the Patriots’ reach. Not that it mattered, of course, but because Denver had defeated the Packers in SuperBowl XXXII, whereas we beat the Patriots in SuperBowl XXXI, we would’ve been slightly happier with a Patriots victory in this game.

“Oh well,” he said, returning to his paperback thriller.

“Oh well,” I agreed, returning to my knitting and phantom jigsaw puzzle.

I tested the framework of evolution-powered naturalism, and immediately ran into a problem with what would have to be a corner piece: positive, additive genetic mutation, the mechanism evolution relied on for transforming creatures from one kind into another. This sort of mutation is necessary to this worldview – and yet the evidence says it doesn’t happen: Instead of adding information to a creature’s DNA, genetic mutations almost invariably distort or destroy existing information.

I tried substituting another corner piece: TBD, as in To Be Determined. “Scientists just haven’t figured it out yet,” an advocate of this framework would say. “But they will some day.”

But TBD was speculation – way too shaky a premise to serve in the framework of a worldview, let alone as a corner piece. It wasn’t verifiable. And that meant we were left with another gaping hole in our frame.

I took a spin with what I knew about pantheistic religions, and again found myself without decent corner pieces. “Because it works” just doesn’t cut it when “it” involves entirely subjective criteria.

I tried the “everyone’s right” philosophy of One World Religion and noticed immediately the two-sided “Jesus was nothing more than a great teacher” piece. That ruled out this framework; I’d determined long ago, with the help of writers from C. S. Lewis to Lee Strobel, that this idea had no legs.

“Go Steelers,” Dave said.

The Patriots had just been intercepted, ending any chance of a miracle come-back.

“Or Colts,” I added. We were torn. We liked Bill Cowher and his Steelers a lot. But we’ve always liked Tony Dungy a lot, too, and he and Cowher would be facing off the next day.

“Or Colts,” Dave agreed.

It struck me that for years, I’d been willing to use any Jesus-free worldview frame, even though they provided practically nothing to work with; that’s probably why I figured no one could answer these big-picture questions. I was immediately grateful that I was no longer stuck in that no-man’s-land, because now my puzzle was coming along very nicely.

It won’t be finished this side of heaven; we can’t even imagine what the finished picture will look like. But there’s only one spot for each piece – and every time I put another into place, I get another glimmer of eternity.
 
(from Heaven Without Her, pages 186-190)