Idolatry is a terrible sin in both the Old Testament and in the New Testament.
The apostle Paul even tells us that those who practice idolatry will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. (I Corinthians 6:9-10)
So it is important for us to understand what it means, to commit idolatry.
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In the Old Testament: Practicing idolatry
And Aaron said unto them, Break off the golden earrings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me.
And all the people brake off the golden earrings which were in their ears, and brought them unto Aaron.
And he received them at their hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool, after he had made it a molten calf: and they said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.
And when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made proclamation, and said, To morrow is a feast to the Lord.
6 And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, and brought peace offerings; and the people sat down to eat and to drink, and rose up to play.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves: They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.
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In the Old Testament, there are 47 verses forbidding the creating of graven images and forbidding the bowing down to graven images. (Search: graven image and graven images)
The dictionary defines "graven image" as follows: a carved idol used as an object of worship (Oxford Dictionary)
A few verses of scripture concerning graven images is as follows:
Leviticus 26:1 Ye shall make you no idols nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall ye set up any image of stone in your land, to bow down unto it: for I am the Lord your God.
Deuteronomy 4:16 Lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image, the similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female,
Deuteronomy 12:3 And ye shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their groves with fire; and ye shall hew down the graven images of their gods, and destroy the names of them out of that place.
II Chronicles 34:7 And when he had broken down the altars and the groves, and had beaten the graven images into powder, and cut down all the idols throughout all the land of Israel, he returned to Jerusalem.
Psalm 97:7 Confounded be all they that serve graven images, that boast themselves of idols: worship HIM, all ye gods.
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Graven images in the New Testament churches today:
A Baptist woman called me and invited me to come to her house where she had set up a "memorial" to Jesus on her bookcase. (I did not go there. We do not worship Jesus by things that we can see. We worship Jesus by doing the Word of God.)
If you can see images with your natural eye, those images are idols when they are associated with worship of God.
Jesus said: John 4:23-24 But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship HIM. God is a Spirit: and they that worship HIM must worship HIM in spirit and in truth.
I once visited a small Assembly of God church and immediately noticed they had hung on the wall a photo of a long haired man in a robe. It is a photo people often use to represent Jesus.
I called the pastor and told him this type of thing should not be hung in a church for it is fleshly and false and leads people to worship in the flesh and even in lies. (There are no such things as photos of Jesus or of Mary or of Paul.) To represent such in a church or in a home in a religious context is to try to conjure emotions which people think to be religious while they are emotions of the flesh of man. Not only are they deceptive and evil, but they have no power of God as does the Word of God.
The likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in the air,
The likeness of any thing that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the waters beneath the earth:
And lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, even all the host of heaven, shouldest be driven to worship them, and serve them, which the Lord thy God hath divided unto all nations under the whole heaven.
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I've often seen movies where individuals build religious types of alters and shrines in their homes, using photos or wooden or stone images representing what they consider Biblical people. Usually they will light candles around these and hang wooden crosses and I suppose they bow down before these man made objects and think themselves to be somehow worshipping God.
These are as the graven images which God forbids in the Bible.
These are as the graven images which God forbids in the Bible.
Church buildings often have stained glass windows with images of humans inserted in the glass to give what they think to be religious; causing fleshly feelings, not of God. Often these figures are put there to represent Mary, Jesus, or one of the apostles.
This too is evil, trying to use the fleshly things to somehow make the person feel what they assume to be a religious emotion but it is only of their own flesh and is actually ungodly.
This too is evil, trying to use the fleshly things to somehow make the person feel what they assume to be a religious emotion but it is only of their own flesh and is actually ungodly.
Stone images of humans are also put inside church buildings and some people bow down and recite words to these images.
Crosses and medallions representing dead religious people are often thought to have special powers when they are only images created by man having no power.
It is the Word of God spoken to us by the Holy Spirit that has power when we properly do that Word.
It is the Word of God spoken to us by the Holy Spirit that has power when we properly do that Word.
All these visual things are to try to bring a power into religion and they foster superstitions of men and forms of witchcraft which they use to try to bring things like blessings and good luck.
I often see football players or baseball players cross themselves for luck. But when they do this and miss the extra point, then what? (They never seem to consider this.) Nor do they realize these things are not in the Bible at all but have been made up by fleshly men to make people feel religious and are in fact "idols" which control themselves for if you observe such you become afraid not to do such therefore the act, the idol, controls you.
We must not put up images made by the hands of men in our homes or in our religious type settings.
All these things are forms of idolatry.
The apostle Paul says:
I Corinthians 6:9-10 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate (homosexuals), nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.
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