A MANMADE OBJECT HAS NO SUPERNATURAL POWER, AUTHORITY OR HOLINESS
Sakkie Parsons
Translated from Afrikaans: “‘n Mensgemaakte voorwerp het geen bonatuurlike krag of heiligheid nie.”
During the lockdown time in 2020, I participated in a series of 5 charity fundraising races to help disadvantaged children. (A few photos is available on my Website News)
Each race was 10 kilometres at the beginning of each month for 5 months in a row.
Each race also bore a child superhero's name:
July 19 – Superman race
August 9 – Wonder Woman race
September 6 – Aqua man race
October 4 – Batman Race
November 8 – The Flash race
Each race had that race's children's superhero emblem on the T-shirt.
Someone asked me what came down to this: If I had not involved myself with evil forces and evil objects?
Here is my answer to the person and I would also like to share it with you:
Here is what I believe shows us, among other things, how ridiculous it is for a child of God – with Jesus dwelling in you – to give a supernatural power or authority or holiness to something that has been made by an, ordinary human being and how we sometimes make a mockery of the Holy Spirit who dwells in us and His divine power that is in us.
Remember if you read the following:
Of every true child of God the Word say, and I quote only two of many I could have used, to show that our Lord's children, regarding evil forces or whatever you want to call them, we are completely in the hand and under the protection of our God and Saviour – from inside/within and from outside.
From Outside:
GAL 3:26-27
26 for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith.
27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. (We are now clothed with Christ)
The Amplified put it this way:
GAL 3:27 For as many (of you) as were baptized into Christ (into a spiritual union and communion with Christ, the Anointed One, the Messiah) have put on (clothed yourselves with) Christ.
This is my faith in Christ, about my protection from evil forces from the Outside.
To now use a little of my great hero Paul's writing style:
Now I talk to you like a fool.
Suppose those evil forces, if they are in this or that, will still bypass Jesus’ protection from the outside –
Now then my protection from Within:
GAL 2:20-21
20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now lives in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Will He now allow, if I worship Him in spirit and in truth, that a power or force, (if there has been such a thing in an object of some kind, which of course there is not as I will show you), come into me and drive Him out of me?
21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if justification were through the law, (or any other man-made law) then Christ died for no purpose.
I smile when someone tells me my Christmas tree and or candle decorations or the little silver cross I might be hanging around my neck, or the statue I have for example as a door stop or in my house just because it is beautiful to me, that they have some supernatural evil spirit or that it is an idol.
Because I remember:
JER 2:26-27
26 "As a thief is shamed when caught, so the house of Israel shall be shamed: they, their kings, their officials, their priests, and their prophets,(together with all those who give some power of life to a lifeless object made by man and sometimes made by God Himself in nature)
27 who say to a tree, 'You are my father,'(or you have some power or life) and to a stone, 'You gave me birth.'(or you have some power or life) For they have turned their back to me, (Yes, they fear satan aiming at them with his left fist to keep their attention away from the real danger , because what they fear has no power and as to what it is – nothing, like the cross around someone's neck, a pretty statue in someone's living room, or a stone wedge – and then satan hit them with his right fist between the eyes, when they enjoy looking at pornography, adulterous affairs, murder etc. on their TV, computers and cell phones and in that way openly make a mockery of Jesus Christ! )HAB 2:19 Woe to him who says to a wooden thing, Awake; to a silent stone, Arise! (or I fear him, he may destroy me. You – who are clothed with Christ and in whom Jesus Christ dwells) Can this teach? (whether it is good or bad or command or influence you to do this or that?)
Behold, it is overlaid with gold and silver, and there is no breath at all in it.
Another example:
In my great hero Paul's time there were people who did not want to eat idol meat.
Let me just quickly explain something:
When people in ancient times offered sacrifices, a large part of it went to the priests, for their livelihood.
The priests then, especially during religious festivals, took much of the sacrificial meat, which would otherwise rot, to the butchery and sold it to them. So they then had money to help them in other things that they might need.
Then there were Christians who held it against other Christians when they went to buy the sacrificial meat at the butchery again, because they reasoned that they ate idol meat.
They gave, in other words, a ‘power or supremacy’ to the meat, as if that could affect your Christian life even if you were clothed with Christ and even if Christ lives in you – and now Paul write to the Christians in Corinth:
What about meat sacrificed to idols?
1 COR 8:1-8
1 Now concerning food offered to idols: we know that "all of us possess knowledge." This "knowledge" puffs up, but love builds up. (Let us rather live out Christ's love, than pretend to be very wise and shout wolf-wolf, if there is not even a puppy of a dog in the area)
2 If anyone imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know.
3 But if anyone loves God, he is known by God. (and this is the kind of importance we should have)
4 Therefore, as to the eating of food offered to idols, we know that "an idol has no real existence," and that "there is no God but one." (Especially not in something created by a ordinary human being)
5 For although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth–as indeed there are many "gods" and many "lords"– (as many people call my pendant or beautiful statue or my Christmas tree – To name just a few)
6 yet for us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist.
7 However, not all possess this knowledge. But some, through former association with idols, eat food as really offered to an idol, and their conscience, being weak, is defiled. (They frighten themselves out of their wits – thinking they are involved in the worship of truly existing beings and their sensitive consciences are burdened with feelings of guilt.)
8 Food will not commend us to God. We are no worse off if we do not eat, and no better off if we do. (The same can be said of the image or pendant etc that I have or do not have)
Therefore, as a child of God, I lose nothing if I have a statue or a pendant or a Christmas tree, or if I do not have one.
What really matters are: What my relationship is with my God and my fellow man.
Because in my life, only Jesus’ Love Law, must control me – and then all the other things that concern my path to Eternal Life, will remain in place.
What Law of Love of Christ am I talking about?
JOH 13:34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.
JOH 13:35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."
What does this "New Commandment" look like?
MAT 22:36-40
36 "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?"
37 And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
38 This is the great and first commandment.
39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets."
As I live out these two commandments, I am fulfilling, so to speak, Jesus' new Commandment of Love that He gave me, His child, for whom He hang on the cross.
That is why my great hero Paul could write:
ROM 13:9 The commandments, "You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet," and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: "You shall love your neighbor as yourself."
If I were to lean on the whole, or parts of the Mosaic Law, I would, as I understand the Word, proclaim in effect, that Jesus did not really fulfil the Law, or at least not the whole Law of Moses – but I read, understand and proclaim that Christ is the end of the Mosaic Law.ROM 10:4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
JOH 1:17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
To then conclude how I understand and proclaim the Word and live it out:
What is an idol?
Nothing, absolutely nothing.
What supernatural power, evil or otherwise, is there in an object that an ordinary human created or that I got from nature?
No power, nothing at all.
Greetings,
Sakkie