Is Your Use of the Word “Idol” Poor Hermeneutics?

Ben Fallon: Paul, today's question comes from Jim, who is reading New Morning Mercies for the first time, and he has a bone to pick with you about the August 3rd entry. He was just introduced to you in this devotional by his friend, and he's very grateful for it, but in reading it with his friend, it triggered a conversation about the word “idol.” Your August 3rd entry begins with this, “The purpose of the cross is to completely decimate your loyalty to the most seductive and powerful of all idols, the idol of self.”

Again, Jim wants to express his gratitude and respect for you, but he is not okay with the way that you use the word “idol,” and it's not just you, he says, “It is many modern preachers and Bible teachers who use the word “idol” metaphorically,” and Jim's interpretation is that Scripture only uses a word idol to describe a physical object. He believes that the correct methodology for interpreting the Bible is that we should read it literally, that is, with a natural, literal sense of the language, taking into consideration the genre and context. He says the Bible teaches that idols are physical objects. This current teaching reaches beyond that.

So, “If someone can give a new meaning to one biblical term, what stops someone else from creating meanings for other terms? What hermeneutical principles protect us from error here?” So, questions for you, Paul, are both about your definition and use of the word ‘idol’ specifically, but then more broadly about hermeneutics and a literal or metaphorical biblical method of interpretation?

Paul Tripp: Well, in answering this question, I want to say that I actually like being taken to task for something I speak or write. I think that I will never get it right till I'm on the other side; I am very aware that I'm still learning, I'm a student of God's Word. I have a deep desire, almost an obsession, to represent my Lord well and his Word well. And I want to make sure that things I say are an accurate representation of what God says. So I don't mind this. And when I go to answer questions like this, I think of the end of Ephesians 3. After Paul has laid out the gospel, he said, “It’s together with all the saints that we’ll understand the depth and width and breadth of the love of God” (Paraphrase).

That biblical understanding, the biblical interpretation process or what we call, formally, ‘hermeneutics,’ always must be done in community. And so, I feel blessed that there's a community of people out there who will say to me, “Oooooooh, wait a minute, I'm not sure.” So this question of the biblical use of the term ‘idol’ and idolatry is, again, very, very significant. It has very powerful practical implications on how we understand the Christian life and the nature of the spiritual struggle between our conversion and our homegoing.

Now, I'm going to give my best understanding of a biblical definition of an ‘idol.’ I'm going to go to a couple of passages of Scripture, and then just for a little support, I'm going to quote John Calvin and Martin Luther. My best biblical definition of an idol is ‘anything that functions in our life as a God-replacement, claiming the worship and allegiance of our hearts that only God can have.’ I think the Bible is quite clear that an idol can be a physical representation of something that is worshipped in a religious and ceremonial way and claims our hearts in a ruling and life-shaping way. Of course, the Bible uses ‘idol’ that way.

But it is not true that the Bible only talks of idols in a physical religious sense. And that's not just true of the New Testament, it's true of the Old Testament. Listen to Ezekiel 14:1-3, I'm just going to read a couple of verses, those who are listening or watching this can read more.

Then certain of the elders of Israel came to me and sat before me. And the word of the LORD came to me: “Son of man, these men have taken their idols into their hearts, and set the stumbling block of iniquity before their faces. Should I indeed let myself be consulted by them? (And he says.) “I'm going to answer them in keeping with their idolatry” (Paraphrase).

Now, notice, this is something different than formal religious idolatry. It's something that has so gripped the heart of these guys that it causes them to do wicked things in their lives. It puts a wicked stumbling block before them. And God says, “I'm not going to answer your questions because the only thing that I'm interested in is this thing that has replaced me in your hearts. Because, if I answer your questions, any answer I give will be used in service of whatever is ruling your heart” (Paraphrase). I mean, there it is! Is there present in Israel at that time cultural, religious idolatry? Yes, there is. But what God is addressing in these men is something that has replaced him as the controlling force in the hearts of these men. Now on the surface, it looks like the right guys are doing the right thing. The right men, the elders of Israel, are coming to God to get his wisdom, but there's something dramatically wrong. And it is the presence of idolatry in their hearts; it's something fundamentally different than formal religious idolatry.

Or how about Colossians 3:5? “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is (Are you ready for this?) idolatry.” Now what Paul is saying is that covetousness, my craving, for something that God hasn't given me but has given to somebody else, can become such a powerful life-shaping thing in my heart that it replaces the rule of God in my heart. It replaces the worship of God in my heart. And therefore, my covetousness makes me guilty of idolatry. It's not a physical, formal religious idol, but it's something that has replaced God in my heart.

Ephesians 5:5, “For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous, (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of God and Christ.” Now this passage even expands it. Sexual immorality, impurity, and covetousness can live in the heart in such a life-shaping, God-replacing way that it is as if it is an idol. It's a God-replacement. It's a thing that I worship, and a thing that sets the direction for my life. Matthew 6:19–24 says:

Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there is your heart also…No one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.

Now, everywhere that the Bible talks about idolatry, it talks about something that masters me in a way that is God-replacing. And my love for money can do that for me; it can become an effective, functional idol, a God-replacement. 1 John 5:21 says, “Little children, keep yourself from idols.” You may think that he's talking about former religious idolatry. This is where Scripture interprets Scripture. If you go back to 1 John 2:15, he says, “Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” There it is, the idolatry that he's talking about is “love of the world,” that that love of the world actually functions as a replacement of my love for God. So, these passages make it very clear that this side of eternity, there's a battle for the rulership of our hearts. And idolatry is anything that replaces the rule of God in our hearts and, therefore, replaces God as the central reason we live the way we live.

The biblical writers, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, do not restrict their use of the term ‘idol’ to physical religious idolatry because they understand that whatever effectively, functionally controls our hearts will replace the worship and rule of God there, and live in our hearts as the deepest, most profoundly life-shaping form of idolatry. An idol of the heart is way more formative than a religious idol. This means that idolatry is not just a religious thing, but an every day, every person thing because every human being is a worshiper. We all surrender our hearts and lives to someone or something else. John Calvin said famously, probably the thing that is quoted most of John Calvin, “The heart is a perpetual idol factory. For what is an idol if not this? To worship the gifts in place of the giver himself.” I love that definition, “For what is an idol? What is idolatry if not this? To worship the gifts in place of the giver himself.”

And dear Martin Luther, who never was known for mincing words, said:

“A god (small ‘g’) is a term for that to which we are to look for all good and in which we are to find rescue in all need. Therefore, to have a god (small ‘g’) is nothing else than to trust and believe in that one with your whole heart.” As I have often said, “It is trust and faith of the heart alone that make both God (capital ‘G’) and an idol. If your faith and trust are right, then your God is the true one. Conversely, if your faith, if your trust is false and wrong, there you do not have the true God. For these two belong together, faith and God. Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that really is your God.”

That's another incredibly clear statement, “Anything on which your heart relies and depends, I say, that is really your God (god).” An idol, again, is anything that functions in our life as a God-replacement, claiming the worship and allegiance of our hearts, that only God can have.

BF: Well, Jim was introduced to New Morning Mercies and Paul for the first time by a friend, and we would love if you were to do the same. Many of you already do this and share New Morning Mercies with others.

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