iWorship

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“I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me.” — Exodus 20:1-3

I used to sneer with prideful arrogance whenever I read Exodus 32:1-4:

“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.’  Aaron said to them, ‘Tear off the gold rings which are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.’  Then all the people tore off the gold rings which were in their ears and brought them to Aaron. 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.’”

You might recall this story of Moses, how he went up to the mountain for forty days where he met with God face to face. While there Moses bowed in adoration, listened and heard commandments from the Almighty. In the meantime . . . . his whining, self-absorbed followers decided they wanted to worship a golden calf instead. I could never imagine as I read this rendition that while the very Creator of the Universe was only a mountaintop away they could possibly want to bow to a baby cow molded from rings and things. “Silly, silly people” I would think.

Recently, however, I’ve been personally reminded about this act of worshiping in front of something other than the Almighty. The Creator of the Universe is only inches away from me—after all He lives in my heart. Yet instead of bowing in adoration, listening and hearing from Him I find myself otherwise enthralled. Instead of a golden calf I am preoccupied for many an hour with an idol that sits within arms reach. My “golden calf” isn’t made of rings and things, though. This one is made of bits and bytes and everything nice. My icon, my pal, is none other than my Mac. We spend hours together and just like the Israelites who rose up early to pay homage, who sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play in front of their effigy, so I find I do. “Silly, silly me.”

I’m not saying that technology is all idol worship—or even idle worship. But in my case I found myself checking my inbox first thing in the morning before doing anything else. And more often than not the last thing I did at night was read my email or catch up on the news.

We are in a world of fingertip access to information, data, and facts. Our relationships are emailed, twittered or facebooked. We stay connected through Bluetooth, android, or iWhatevers. In the meantime our Lord is only a whisper away. We can have an intimate conversation with God, yet so often we choose a man-made machine instead. “Silly, silly us.”

Now, not everyone is sitting at the feet of this golden calf of computers and smart phones. But maybe you struggle with this like I do. So as a reminder the next time you’re tempted to start the day on the iPad, or iPhone, or Blackberry, or whatever, why not stop and seek the iGod first. After all, all He is asking of us is a little byte of our time.

Questions to Share:

1. How has modern communication technology helped you stay in contact with loved ones during deployment? Take a moment to thank God for that privilege which He designed.

2. John Piper once said, “If Twitter and Facebook are good for anything they will prove on the Last Day that our prayerlessness was not for lack of time.” Do you think this is true in your life?  How?