Idols on Fire

Luke 21:5-6

When some were speaking about the temple, how it was adorned with beautiful stones and gifts dedicated to God, he said, “As for these things that you see, the days will come when not one stone will be left upon another; all will be thrown down.”

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Burn down the mission, Lord,
If we're gonna stay alive.
Watch the black smoke fly to heaven,
See the red flame light the sky.

"Burn Down the Mission" by Elton John

There is something historical about this bit of scripture from Luke. Something that just gets written off as exaggeration. When we read "not one stone will be left upon another" it's easy to write it off. Well, that is what happened.

When the temple was burned, all of the gold gilding that was on the walls melted. Then it flowed into the deep recesses of the foundation. To get all of the gold, the Roman's slaves would have to remove all of the stones to get the gold that fell into the nooks and crannies and into the foundation. By the end there was not one stone left upon another.

The temple in Jerusalem burned, and it burned so hot that gold ran like water.

The people loved the temple. It was beautiful. It was holy. And in a way it became an idol. To some the temple and the earthly things it stood for were more important than the the Lord who sanctified it. When things get more important than God, they become idols.

What is it that we love? Is it the church building? Is it the stuff inside the building? Let me ask my fellow Presbyterians, is it our polity? Or maybe I should ask was it our old polity? Sometimes, to get past the things we love about God, we have to burn down the mission so that all we have left to love is God.

Everything else can be a guide post, but only the grace and peace of God is our hitching post. Everything else can become an idol. We need to discover our idols and burn them because the last thing we want to hitch our lives to are our idols.