Do not set up any wooden Asherah pole next to the altar you will build for the LORD your God, Sermons
I. GOD WISHES TO IMPART TO MEN HIS OWN FEELING TOWARDS IDOLATRY. (Ver. 22.) To be like God is the summit of every good man's ambition. This is God's intention also. But the attainment can only gradually be made. We must have God's thoughts rooted in us; we must cultivate similar feelings; we must cherish similar purposes or we cannot be like him in character. Idolatry corrupts the soul and generates death. To know and worship God leads up to richest life. II. EXTERNAL AIDS TO IDOLATRY MUST BE CAREFULLY AVOIDED. A stone which is a stumbling-block to a child has no peril for a strong man; for the sake of the young and the weak, the stone should be taken out of the way. It is wise and noble to abstain from self-indulgences which will imperil the piety of others. A shady grove would be pleasant enough for worshippers in the scorching climate of the East; nevertheless, if it shall tend in the least measure to lure the ignorant into idolatry, we will forego the pleasure. This is Godlike, to deny self in order to bless others. If umbrageous groves make my weak brother to offend, I will endure the noontide heat so long as life shall last. Our mental tastes, our love of the beautiful, our desire for pleasure, - all must give way to honest endeavor for the moral elevation of the race. III. GOD'S FATHERLY KINDNESS IS EXPRESSED IN THESE PLAIN PRECEPTS. We might reach these wise maxims as reasonable deductions from moral principles; yet they come to us clothed with irresistible authority, when they appear as the revealed will of God, A twofold light blends to point out the path of human conduct, viz. the light of conscience and the light of Scripture; yet these twin rays emanate from the selfsame sun. - D.
Thou shalt not plant thee a grove. I. IDOLATRY IS ENTICING. This on many accounts.1. By its prevalence. In some form or other it is the most popular religion in the world. Men bow down to the idols of luxury, ambition, pleasure, and avarice. "For all people will walk everyone in the name of his god" (Micah 4:5). 2. By its use. We naturally forsake God and cling to sin. Evil inclination leads to wrong choice, and men choose darkness rather than light. II. IDOLATRY IS TREASON AGAINST GOD. God is the sum of all moral qualities, the proprietor of all resources, and the giver of all existences. What more rational than to worship Him? Nothing belies God nor degrades man like the worship of images and statues. III. IDOLATRY MUST BE UTTERLY FORSAKES. We must neither join the worshippers nor sanction the worship. Plant no grove of trees, for truth loves light and reproves darkness. (J. Wolfendale.) Neither shalt thou set up any image Thus imagery is forbidden — even religious imitation and attempted reproduction of things Divine and inexpressible. We are prone to do something to show our handiwork in God's sanctuary; it pleases us to try to add something to the circle; it delights us to run one rim of gilt around the refined gold which burns with the image and superscription of God. We are told not to interfere; we must keep our hands off everything. We must learn to stand still; sometimes to do everything by doing nothing; and we must learn to rebuke our inventive faculty and become learned in the utterance of simple prayer. God will have His altar untouched: He will have human attention undistracted by any human devices. The altar is to stand alone in its simple dignity — most adorned when unadorned. There must be no attempt to link true religion and false religion, inspired worship and idolatrous worship, groves humanly planted and altars Divinely built. The Lord will have a time for Himself, and place for Himself, a gift for Himself, an altar for Himself. Why for Himself? Because He is the Lord, and because He means to train the human mind and heart without distraction towards the highest sublimity of law. Who will not set up his reason against the altar, and delight because his religion is rational? — as well hold up a candle to the sun, because all fire is of the same quality; because there is but one fire in the universe, and that is God. The sun says, Thou shalt not light a candle in my presence. We do it, but the candle is literally of no service in the presence of the midday sun. Jesus Christ is the Light of the world — the Sun of the great firmament of the soul — and He alone can light the space that is to be illumined. Who will not throw the little flower of self-approval upon the altar, saying, I am not as other men: I fast, I pay tithes, I do not practise extortion: I am not as the publicans are? The Lord has forbidden all groves and all images and all distractions. Only one man is permitted near the altar; only one soul is heard in heaven. His name? — the broken-hearted sinner!(J. Parker, D. D.). People Levites, MosesPlaces Beth-baal-peor, EgyptTopics Altar, Asherah, Ashe'rah, Beside, Build, Grove, Holy, Kind, Makest, Plant, Planted, Pole, Shrine, Sort, Thyself, Tree, Trees, Wood, YourselvesOutline 1. The feast of the Passover9. of weeks 13. of tabernacles 16. Every male must offer, as he is able, at these three feasts 18. Of judges and justice 21. Asherah poles and images are forbidden Dictionary of Bible Themes Deuteronomy 16:21-22Library The Age of the Apostles (Ad 33-100)The beginning of the Christian Church is reckoned from the great day on which the Holy Ghost came down, according as our Lord had promised to His Apostles. At that time, "Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven," were gathered together at Jerusalem, to keep the Feast of Pentecost (or Feast of Weeks), which was one of the three holy seasons at which God required His people to appear before Him in the place which He had chosen (Deuteronomy xvi. 16). Many of these devout men there converted … J. C. Roberston—Sketches of Church History, from AD 33 to the Reformation Whether Six Daughters are Fittingly Assigned to Gluttony? Whether Pride Should be Reckoned a Capital vice? The Passing and the Permanent Obedience The Second Commandment Appeal to the Christian Women of the South The Life and Death of Mr. Badman, Deuteronomy Links Deuteronomy 16:21 NIVDeuteronomy 16:21 NLT Deuteronomy 16:21 ESV Deuteronomy 16:21 NASB Deuteronomy 16:21 KJV Deuteronomy 16:21 Bible Apps Deuteronomy 16:21 Parallel Deuteronomy 16:21 Biblia Paralela Deuteronomy 16:21 Chinese Bible Deuteronomy 16:21 French Bible Deuteronomy 16:21 German Bible Deuteronomy 16:21 Commentaries Bible Hub |
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