God and Idols

September 4, 2022

In studying through Isaiah 40-55, we’ve come across several passages that ruthlessly mock the practice of idolatry (40.18-20; 41.6-7; 44.9-20; 46.1-7 in particular). Idols are simply matter. They do not have life. They are blind and deaf, unable to hear, unable to respond, unable to save. Pressingly, though this is drawing from places like Ps. 135.15-18, the people that worship the deaf and blind idols become like them—deaf and blind, unable to hear God, unable to see God, unable to respond to God. Thus God’s instructions in Isa. 6.9-10.

These descriptions are in sharp contrast with God. God sees and hears and responds. God saves. This underlies the proclamation of the Gospel in Isa. 52.7—“Your God reigns.” The hope of Isaiah 52 is that God will quit being inactive like the idols, and will begin working with great power and might, restoring Judah. The promise of Isaiah 52 is that the day of God’s mighty work is at hand. This leads to the invitation in Isaiah 55—“Seek the LORD while he may be found, call upon him while he is near.” God’s restorative work is at hand, so now is the appropriate time to repent, turn from wickedness, and rest in the LORD.

I’m not sure when I realized it, but at some point in reading Isaiah 40-55 it struck me that my God was more like the idols than not. I knew, and I know, that God is at work in the world. I knew, and I know, that God is at work in me. But the idea from Isa. 55.10-11?

For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven, 

and do not return there until they have watered the earth, 

making it bring forth and sprout, 

giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, 

so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; 

it shall not return to me empty, 

but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, 

and succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

Somehow, without ever intending for it to happen, I had limited God’s ability to work on and speak to me in Scripture. Scripture was interesting, and somehow even instructive, but something short of transformative. Books were transformative, ideas were transformative, lectures were transformative, but not Scripture.

It’s a little strange for me to think that the simple act of reading Scripture can be transformative. It’s strange that the Spirit can work through that. It doesn’t always involve “intense Bible study,” or even methodological rigor; it simply requires the active work of the Holy Spirit. Our God is not an idol. He is not dead weight we have to carry about. He is so active that even the simple act of reading Scripture can be an opportunity for his transformative blessing.

—John Coffey