What does God's Word say that just might be directly applicable to us in midlife? There is a simple sentence tucked into the first chapter of Romans that provides insight into our lives at every age, but it is especially true at this stage of our lives. Romans 1:25 provides us with a very insightful paradigm for understanding our lives on this side of eternity: "They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator -- who is forever praised. Amen." Because of the worship language in this passage, it is too easy to miss just how comprehensive this insight is. There is far more being said here than just the fact that we tend to serve a whole catalog of God replacements. While it is true that we all tend to have an inertia away from the Creator and toward the creation, there is more being said to us here.
This passage also is alerting us to the fact that there is an innate tendency in each of our hearts to replace the spiritual with the physical. We all do this in many ways. Yet the truth of the matter remains that life can only be found in the Creator. Still how often do we find ourselves seeking to find our lives in the material world, the love of another person, the security in our physical situation or location, or simply in physically experienced pleasure or comfort? Idolatry, in its simplest form, occurs when we replace the worship of God with some physical image or object that we can see or touch. The reasons this is so tempting is fairly obvious. The idol can be seen, touched or somehow physically experienced. We can sit in our plush homes and look around saying, "What a great lives we have." Or maybe we feel this when the lips of the one we love caresses our cheek. Or maybe when we hear the applause of others or experience the glory of physical beauty of certain places on earth. Or maybe when we experience the comfort and joys of a wonderful meal or the physical pleasure or release of a sexual encounter with the one we love. Or maybe it occurs when we experience the affirmation of others on our appearance or perhaps on our job. It can be very tempting to replace the spiritual with the physical.
If sin sets us on a trajectory away from the Creator and toward the creation, then it also sends us away from the spiritual and toward the physical. So appearance trumps character; personal pleasure trumps purity of heart; the love of another trumps the love of God; material things trump spiritual realities; security of situation and location trumps security in the Lord; physical pleasure and comfort trumps the satisfaction of the soul; the present trumps eternity. This inversion of what was meant to be is all around us. And it is probably the most insidious innate danger to life in a fallen world.
We were never wired to live for the glories of what is seen. At best, the shadow glories of this world were meant to point us to the one and only glory really worth living for, the glory of the Lord. There is always a terribly high price to pay for this substitution. It destroys our relationships, it distorts our culture, it scars people, and ultimately it leads to death. The sustaining oxygen found in the glory of God cannot be found elsewhere. When we breathe in the deoxygenated gases of the creation, our lungs end up gasping and our hearts atrophy. It is not so much that the created things are evil as much as that they were never meant to take the place in our hearts that only God can fill. Desire for a good thing becomes bad primarily when it becomes the ruling thing. Creation cannot and will not sustain us. In our distorted vision, we look at the shadow [the creation] and we see life. But the shadow has no life of its own and it can give no life. In the same way, the creation is neither self-starting nor self-sustaining. It always reflects the glory of the Creator because it is completely dependent on Him for its very existence.
The Creator/creature line is the great divide. Nothing on this side of the line is comparable to the Creator. Furthermore, every thing on this side of the great divide depends upon God, who is on the other side, for its very existence and even its ability to continue to exist. Think about it. Behind every single powerful thing stands the God of infinite power. Behind every moment of physical beauty is the God of glorious beauty. Behind every physical wonder is the God of incredible wonder. Above every moment of love there is the God who is the source and very definition of love. Despite all this, our temptation to replace the spiritual glories of the Creator with the physical glories of the creation both greets and grips us every single day. It remains our constant and inescapable struggle.
To be continued ...
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