Daily PresenceSample

There was a season in my childhood when my dad co-owned a junkyard. That should tell you everything you need to know about the type of household we were! I can remember jumping from hood to hood of old, beat-up cars and scavenging the seats and compartments for coins, lighters, and other paraphernalia. But one of my favorite memories is when the cars were getting ready to go through the crusher. As a fun game, before the car was crushed, we would get to beat the snot out of it with anything we could find! My brothers and I would take hammers, exhaust pipes, and ratchets to the hood, doors, and windows of these soon-to-be crushed heaps of metal. The act of destroying something was liberating!

In Deuteronomy 12 that’s exactly what God is calling His people to do – liberate themselves by destruction! After leading them into the promised land, He carefully instructs them to, “destroy completely all the places on the high mountains, on the kills, and under every spreading tree, where the nations you are dispossessing worship their gods. Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and burn their Asherah poles in the fire; cut down the idols of their gods and wipe out their names from those places.” (Deut.12:1-3)

Getting the picture? Now here’s the best part. In verse four God adds a paradigm shift to an increasing problem in religious culture. He instructs, “You must not worship the Lord your God in their way.” In other words, we’re not worshiping God if we fashion that worship after the ways of the world or the impulses of our feelings.

God longs for our worship – He’s desperate for it. But His desperation is unwilling to compromise, which means the only “bend” we have in our expression of love for God is our own will, desires, and interpretations. God desires to be worshiped His way.

In a world of “my truths” and “to each their own” God is calling us to destroy the idols of man and resurrect worship of Him, in His way. How does that mirror your worship and interpretation of God? If it doesn’t, grab a sledgehammer and start smashing. It’s demo day for you!