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Hear the words of the prophet: Come, house of Jacob, and let us walk in the light of the Lord. For You have abandoned Your people, the house of Jacob, because they are filled with influences from the east, and they are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they strike bargains with the children of foreigners. Their land has also been filled with silver and gold, and there is no end to their treasures; their land has also been filled with horses, and there is no end to their chariots. Their land has also been filled with idols; they worship the work of their hands, that which their fingers have made. (Isaiah 2:5-8)

Some would say that those words, from Isaiah chapter two, are aptly descriptive of America today. We have our psychic hotlines and New-Age religions, we are entangled in foreign conflicts, and financial corruption. We have enjoyed unprecedented affluence. For horses we have horsepower and for chariots, cars. We certainly have our share of idols – the near-worship of things we manufacture. Those are the obvious things. But there is a far more subtle kind of idolatry that sneaks up on us, even on those who otherwise renounce materialism. If we are not discerning, it can ensnare us.

A few years ago I attended a conference whose theme was L’dor va’dor (“From Generation to Generation”). The focus was on the responsibility to convey the Faith to our children. Biblical truth absolutely needs to be perpetuated. But if you ask me, there are some traditions that I think are better left behind. Our sinful nature sometimes has us holding onto things that have long since served their purposes, and really ought to be let go. They can impede our walk with Messiah, and if we are not discerning, even lead us astray.

2 Kings 18:1-4

Now it came about in the third year of Hoshea, the son of Elah, king of Israel, that Hezekiah the son of Ahaz king of Judah became king. He was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned twenty-nine years in Jerusalem; and his mother’s name was Abi the daughter of Zechariah. And he did right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that his father David had done. He removed the high places and broke down the sacred pillars and cut down the Asherah. He also broke in pieces the bronze serpent that Moses had made, for until those days the sons of Israel burned incense to it; and it was called Nehushtan.

Hezekiah was one of Judah’s greatest kings. From the git-go, he made it his priority to cleanse the land of idolatry. He removed the altars on the high hills and cut down the idolatrous pillars dedicated to Astarte, the female fertility demon. He wasn’t the only king to institute reforms of this kind, but he bears the distinction of going so far as to destroy the actual bronze serpent that Moses himself had made.

What can I compare that to? It was a very real, if embarrassing, part of the early history of the nation Israel. It would be like destroying an important historical artifact from the Revolutionary War that happened to belong to Benedict Arnold. Benedict Arnold was an American army officer who attempted to surrender West Point to the British; and for that he is remembered as a traitor. That may have been a shameful moment in early US history, but Revolutionary War artifacts are rare and costly. True, the bronze serpent represented a grievous chapter in Israel’s history, but it was a visible, tangible link to that history, and as such it held great value.

So why would good King Hezekiah want to destroy such a valuable piece of antiquity? Because over the centuries it had come to be venerated to such an extent that it was now an idol. We actually gave it a name: Nehushtan (which simply means “a piece of brass”). Jewish people were actually burning incense to it – offering worship to it – and that could not be tolerated.

My point is that this is a perfect example of what happens when we fallible and fickle human beings take something good, but something that has long since served its earthly purpose, and make an idol out of it. First, let’s look at the history behind the making of that bronze serpent.

Numbers 21:4-9

Then they set out from Mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom; and the people became impatient because of the journey. And the people spoke against God and Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this miserable food.”

Do you know what they were referring to as “this miserable food”? The manna! The manna God Himself provided them with in the otherwise barren Sinai desert. That’s what they were loathing.

And the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died. So the people came to Moses and said,

“Yeah, okay, we blew it. But we Jews don’t need a middle man, so we’ll pray to God ourselves.” Is that what they said? No! Here’s what they said…

“We have sinned, because we have spoken against the Lord and you; intercede with the Lord, that He may remove the serpents from us.” And Moses interceded for the people. (So much for Jewish people not needing a mediator!) Then the Lord said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent, and set it on a standard; and it shall come about, that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, he shall live.” And Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on the standard; and it came about that if a serpent bit any man, when he looked to the bronze serpent, he lived.

So here’s the story: We were griping and complaining. Fresh out of Egypt, we had become unappreciative; thankless, resentful and forgetful. That generation witnessed firsthand the mighty acts of God, the plagues brought upon Egypt, the parting of the Red Sea, the pillar of fire by night and cloud by day. I suppose we began to take it all for granted; And like children in the back seat of the car on vacation who keep asking, “Are we there yet?” we didn’t appreciate all that God had done for us, and we became bitter. The people began to speak against God and Moses, and the consequence was God’s judgment in the form of poisonous serpents in the camp, biting people, and many died.

Because this judgment was directly from God, I don’t believe the snakes bit people arbitrarily, but rather targeted the complainers. If you were one of the complainers, you got bit. You were judged. And if you got bit, you had two choices:

1) If you didn’t want anyone to know you were one of the “sinners” you could stay in your tent – and die there (and then everyone would know anyway). Or,

2) You leave your tent and walk, crawl, have somebody carry you – whatever you have to do, to get yourself to the center of the camp and look up at the bronze serpent Moses made, and you would survive. Everyone would know that you were one of the “sinners” but you would live (and hopefully repent). I’ll take a little embarrassment over death any day!

It was a tragic, lamentable chapter in our history as a nation, but it was a lesson learned, and for that reason, the bronze serpent was a valuable historical artifact. The problem was, over the centuries, our people frequently turned away from God and began imitating the ways of the pagan nations surrounding us. That included idol-worship. In this particular case, we had taken something good and began to do something very bad with it.

Idolatry can take several forms, but for our purposes today, let’s think of it as disproportionate adulation or attention to things or people; particularly in a way that either diverts our energies or distracts us from our first allegiance to God the Father and Messiah Yeshua.

Unfortunately, it is in our nature to be distracted with ‘stuff’. The Jewish people in the time of King Hezekiah had begun to reverence a piece of bronze. They burned incense to it. Maybe they had built a shrine to it – sort of like what’s been done with the Shroud of Turin. Even if it isn’t the actual burial cloth of Messiah Yeshua, it still has historical value. But it long ago served its earthly purpose. We ought to give our energy, attention and devotion to our living King, not to a piece of cloth He may or may not have been briefly wrapped in.

 

It reminds me of the whole collectibles market. You pay such-and-such a price for a widget. But if that widget was once owned by, or been autographed by, someone famous, it quadruples in value. I understand the attraction of owning something that used to belong to someone famous, but the mystique wears off quickly.

Today we use the term “relic” colloquially to mean something old and run down. But the term “relic” originally referred to an object of religious veneration; especially, an article reputed to be associated with a saint or martyr. A bone fragment from Saint So-and-So is hermetically sealed in a high-tech, secured plexiglass shrine.  A lock of the hair of Saint So-and-So becomes the excuse to build a sanctuary.  This is idolatry of the very same nature as Nehushtan.

Some people idolize other people. Consider what has been done concerning Mary, Miryam, Yeshua’s mother. She was a godly young Jewish girl, who had the singular privilege of giving birth to the Messiah and parenting Him during His youth. She did her job well, and she should be remembered with honor, as she affirmed by the Holy Spirit, “for behold, from this time on all generations will count me blessed.” Blessed – yes! But not adored or enshrined or declared the co-redemptrix of the world – God forbid! But lest anyone think I am singling out Roman Catholics, we evangelicals have our own idols, our own lineup of celebrity pastors and musicians. And like the childish, immature Corinthians of the First Century, we say, “I am of MacArthur,” or “I am of Driscoll,” or “I am of Warren,” or “I am of Bell”.

I came to the Lord in 1981. It was the same year that Keith Green died. Some of you remember his music and ministry. I was a brand new believer, and had never heard of Keith Green prior to that, but anytime anyone mentioned his name, it was almost with an awed hush. I began to listen to his music and he was a truly gifted man, and thank God he used those gifts to glorify his maker. But there was almost a cult following of the Keith Green ministry. More recently, the tragic death of Rich Mullins shook up the contemporary Christian music scene. From what I’ve heard about him, Rich was a really great guy, very unpretentious, who lived modestly and charitably. But anything that goes beyond our remembering him fondly as a servant of God borders on idolatry.

Keith Green and Rich Mullins each died young and each died in tragic accidents. Before they died, they each served the Lord and contributed some beautiful music to the repertoire of our praises. For that we think of them with regard and appreciate their memory. But they each served the purposes God had for them on earth. We dare not make an idol of their memory. The God who made them and who took them home is the only one we should reverence.

I was once rebuked for having the nerve to criticize a well-known evangelist who had written an article condemning contemporary Christian musicians with a very broad brush. The article was flawed in many ways, and I wrote to ask him to re-think his views. He himself is a musician; when he was younger, I’m sure his music was considered ‘contemporary’. So what made his better? The passage of 40 years? A different style? Sometimes we mistakenly presume that something old is automatically sacrosanct. In any case, at that time I was serving an internship with a pastor, and when he and his wife found out that I criticized this televangelist they were livid: “How dare you criticize the Lord’s anointed!” were her words. The Lord’s anointed? A few years later, the man she called “the Lord’s anointed” was arrested for soliciting a prostitute. Let’s be clear about something: the Lord’s Anointed is Jesus the Messiah.

Adulation is defined as excessive praise or flattery. It is one thing to compliment somebody on a job well done. It is proper to give respect where office or station or accomplishment calls for it. But it is quite another thing to begin to speak of any human being with awe and reverence. “Oh, if only pastor so-and-so were still here. Such a great man of God.” And we denigrate the new guy who we compared to the absolutely perfect previous pastor; whom we conveniently forget we gave such a hard time to, which was the reason he left!

When I first became a believer in Yeshua, thirty-three ago, there were not nearly as many Messianic Jews as there are today. At that time I was reasonably certain I was the only one! Of course there has always been a remnant of believing Jews, but for many centuries we were few and far between. For a time, when people would find out I was a Jewish believer they would become so excited, and say things like, “I’ve always wanted to meet one of you!” And I confess that, after a while, I began to like the adulation, and for a while I would actually make it a point to let people know that I was a Jewish Christian. Thankfully, God promptly dealt with my pride.

Nowadays, it seems that there are many, many Jewish people coming to believe in Yeshua. It seems like just about everybody knows somebody who’s a Messianic Jew. We’ve got a couple of our members working at the local JCC, and it isn’t a secret that they’re Messianic Jews. But, we dare not entertain notions of having some sort of ‘celebrity’ status among Christians.

Frankly, some in this movement are in danger of making Yeshua a footnote, and what is paramount in their lives is their own ethnicity. We need to make sure that Jesus is preeminent in all we do and say, and that our identity is rooted in Him, and not in our little particularities. Do you have an identity crisis? Are you practicing MESSIANIC Judaism or for you is it messianic JUDAISM? We ought to have the same attitude John the Baptist had: Messiah must increase; I must decrease.

Idolatry can sneak into our lives quite subtly. It may begin quite innocently. We attach ourselves to a cause or a movement or a group, and in the course of time it occupies a disproportionate amount of our thoughts, our time, our energies. It may be a very good cause or movement or group. There is nothing wrong whatsoever in having a cause or causes we support financially and with our time and energy. It isn’t wrong to have hobbies that give us enjoyment and relaxation. We all need distraction from time to time. It isn’t wrong to have a keen interest in something cultural or ethnic or a love for the arts,

BUT… if the amount of time and energy you give to that something outweighs the time and energy you give to serving Yeshua, you are in danger of making an idol of it. Each of us needs to regularly examine ourselves in this regard. To what extent are you willing to part with whatever it is that holds your disproportionate attention? You may find you have a Nehushtan that needs to be torn down.

• Some people idolize their hometown sports teams
• Some people idolize their ‘toys’ (vintage or custom cars and motorcycles)
• Some people idolize those whose ideologies they agree with (while at the same time demonizing those whose views differ from theirs)
• Some people idolize their own ethnicity (ethnolatry)
• Some people make an idol of a Torah scroll (while ironically, never reading it) It is the words and the message that bring life, not the vellum and the velvet and the silver adornments.

Some people idolize their reminiscences of the past. Nostalgia ain’t what it used to be. “Ah, the good old days. Things were so much better, so much simpler, back then.” True, life may have been simpler, but so was the plumbing, if you get my drift. I’m sure the people of Israel in Hezekiah’s time felt that things had been better in “days gone by”. But if the days gone by were so good, then why did Moses have to make that bronze snake in the first place? We forget that the past had its own problems, and our people had their own idolatries. We are prone to glamorize the past, shrouding our memories of it in a fuzzy halo.

L’dor va’Dor. We certainly do want to pass our faith in Yeshua on to the next generation. But we might do well to jettison some of our baggage, lest they become idolatries of a sort. I fear our own messianic movement has some of its own Nehushtanim. There are certain traditions and practices we might want to think about revisiting.

• Bar/Bat Mitzvahs at age 13 (children today are still very immature at 13)
• Wearing of yarmulkes (there is freedom to do so, but should you?)
• Certain prayers (not all deserve inclusion; I am not a fan of the Aleinu)
• Any practices borne out of a desire to win respect and acceptance from the mainstream Jewish community

The point is, the bronze serpent had long since served its earthly purpose. While it certainly had historical value, it was just a thing. The problem is, it became an idol when we made it an object of adoration and worship, when we ascribed to it the worth that belongs to God alone; when we gave it disproportionate attention and devoted energy and time to it.

Appropriate affection? Absolutely!  Proper respect and honor? Of course! But our adoration, adulation and attention should be directed first and foremost to Adonai. The Creator of the universe ought not share first place in our lives with things and stuff; not even really neat things and stuff. V’ahavta et Adonai Eloheicha b’kol l’vav’cha. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, not just a little of it.

There is a third passage in the Scriptures that refers to the bronze serpent. Let’s have a look at it. Turn to Sefer Yochanan, the Gospel of John, chapter three.

John 3:14-16

“And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up; that whoever believes may in Him have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life.”

The bronze serpent was set up on a stake, and as people looked to it they were saved. Approximately fourteen hundred years later the Holy One of God was put upon a stake, and as we look to Him we are saved. (Slide of Mt. Nebo)

Our ancestors in the wilderness had a choice – to stay in their comfortable little tent, to keep their sin and unbelief hidden – and die in their sin; or to come out in the open, acknowledge their sin, look to the standard and live. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, Yeshua was lifted up, He was crucified. If we insist on living in our tent of unbelief and refusing to acknowledge our sin, we will die in our sin and spend eternity in judgment, apart from the presence of God. If, however, we will come out of our tent and confess our sin and look to the standard – Yeshua – we will live, and spend eternity in the joyous presence of God.

That serpent had to be destroyed because it became an idol. What idols will have to be taken down and dismantled in your life? Perhaps the idol of peer pressure or the desire to be accepted by others. Don’t let Nehushtan have its way with you. Give yourself to Yeshua, and reserve your deepest affection, adulation, attention and devotion for Him.