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Authors: Ann Voskamp
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can be our sinking. The Baal of success and the Baal of Pinterest, the Baal of perfection and the Baal of affirmation. It’s alwaysBaals that keep us from God, the Baals of work and agenda and accomplishment that keep us from prayer. We don’t pray enough only when we are practicing idol worship.
You can see how it goes —how there at the altars the Baal worshipers danced for rain. They strove and they flailed and they kept focused on trying to get all the steps just perfectly right —and that is how you ultimately know.
You know you have an idol whenever you have to perform.
You know you have a Baal that needs to be cut down whenever you cut yourself down. Whenever you slash yourself, you have an idol that needs to be slashed down.
Because that is what every idol ultimately wants: to make your blood run wild and dance you mad and drive you right into the unforgiving ground. Every idol wants you to be cut open for it.
But if you slow and still and wait, Advent whispers to you: there is one God who was cut open for you. He let His blood run so you can stop running. “The only way to overcome idols in your life,” beckons Tim Keller, “is to see that Jesus gives you freely what every other god says that you can only get through your performance. Jesus gives you through His blood what every other god demands through yours.” [21]
Jesus, the Gift, comes to give you freely through His passion what every other god forces you to get through your performance.
There in the nave, in the sanctuary, in the vaulting cathedral of your soul, you can hear how the notes come —one quaking, grateful note after another —as worship to the infant God who comes to the manger, the only God who comes to the wood on the altar, the God who takes the fire and who is the sacrifice to take you.
And you let everything go. And kneel. Kneel here and behold only Him —the only place where you can receive the gift of acceptance, so the gods of acceptance have no hold on you.
O come, let us adore Him . . .
The notes burning like a fire in the heart.
Think of the Baals in your life —things you set your heart on besides the one true God. What is one thing you can do today to loosen the grip of one of those idols in your life?
Give me the Love that leads the way
The faith that nothing can dismay,
The hope no disappointments tire,
The passion that will burn like fire
Let me not sink to be a clod
Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.
AMY CARMICHAEL
What emotions are evoked in you when you realize that God doesn’t expect you to perform for Him —that He has already given you everything?
What sets God apart from every Baal, from every false god?
Set aside some time in the nave, in the sanctuary of your own heart, to come and adore Him.
Go . . . and deliver the message I have given you.
JONAH 3:2
The LORD gave this message to Jonah son of Amittai: “Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh. Announce my judgment against it because I have seen how wicked its people are.”
But Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the LORD. He went down to the port of Joppa, where he found a ship leaving for Tarshish. He bought a ticket and went on board, hoping to escape from the LORD by sailing to Tarshish. . . .
Now the LORD had arranged for a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was inside the fish for three days and three nights. . . .
Then the LORD ordered the fish to spit Jonah out onto the beach.
The LORD spoke to Jonah a second time: “Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh, and deliver the message I have given you.”
This time Jonah obeyed the LORD’s command and went to Nineveh, a city so large that it took three days to see it all. On the day Jonah entered the city, he shouted to the crowds: “Forty days from now Nineveh will be destroyed!” The people of Nineveh believedGod’s message, and from the greatest to the least, they declared a fast and put on burlap to show their
You can see how it goes —how there at the altars the Baal worshipers danced for rain. They strove and they flailed and they kept focused on trying to get all the steps just perfectly right —and that is how you ultimately know.
You know you have an idol whenever you have to perform.
You know you have a Baal that needs to be cut down whenever you cut yourself down. Whenever you slash yourself, you have an idol that needs to be slashed down.
Because that is what every idol ultimately wants: to make your blood run wild and dance you mad and drive you right into the unforgiving ground. Every idol wants you to be cut open for it.
But if you slow and still and wait, Advent whispers to you: there is one God who was cut open for you. He let His blood run so you can stop running. “The only way to overcome idols in your life,” beckons Tim Keller, “is to see that Jesus gives you freely what every other god says that you can only get through your performance. Jesus gives you through His blood what every other god demands through yours.” [21]
Jesus, the Gift, comes to give you freely through His passion what every other god forces you to get through your performance.
There in the nave, in the sanctuary, in the vaulting cathedral of your soul, you can hear how the notes come —one quaking, grateful note after another —as worship to the infant God who comes to the manger, the only God who comes to the wood on the altar, the God who takes the fire and who is the sacrifice to take you.
And you let everything go. And kneel. Kneel here and behold only Him —the only place where you can receive the gift of acceptance, so the gods of acceptance have no hold on you.
O come, let us adore Him . . .
The notes burning like a fire in the heart.
Think of the Baals in your life —things you set your heart on besides the one true God. What is one thing you can do today to loosen the grip of one of those idols in your life?
Give me the Love that leads the way
The faith that nothing can dismay,
The hope no disappointments tire,
The passion that will burn like fire
Let me not sink to be a clod
Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God.
AMY CARMICHAEL
What emotions are evoked in you when you realize that God doesn’t expect you to perform for Him —that He has already given you everything?
What sets God apart from every Baal, from every false god?
Set aside some time in the nave, in the sanctuary of your own heart, to come and adore Him.
Go . . . and deliver the message I have given you.
JONAH 3:2
The LORD gave this message to Jonah son of Amittai: “Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh. Announce my judgment against it because I have seen how wicked its people are.”
But Jonah got up and went in the opposite direction to get away from the LORD. He went down to the port of Joppa, where he found a ship leaving for Tarshish. He bought a ticket and went on board, hoping to escape from the LORD by sailing to Tarshish. . . .
Now the LORD had arranged for a great fish to swallow Jonah. And Jonah was inside the fish for three days and three nights. . . .
Then the LORD ordered the fish to spit Jonah out onto the beach.
The LORD spoke to Jonah a second time: “Get up and go to the great city of Nineveh, and deliver the message I have given you.”
This time Jonah obeyed the LORD’s command and went to Nineveh, a city so large that it took three days to see it all. On the day Jonah entered the city, he shouted to the crowds: “Forty days from now Nineveh will be destroyed!” The people of Nineveh believedGod’s message, and from the greatest to the least, they declared a fast and put on burlap to show their
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