Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, even Jesus. (Hebrews 3:1)

Herein is an excerpt from: Andrew Murray, The Holiest of All: An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews. You can listen free to The Holiest of All at Librivox

Consider Jesus! This is the central thought of the verse, and of the passage of which it is a part, as it is indeed of the whole Epistle to the Hebrews. It is the one aim of the writer to persuade the Hebrews that, if they but knew aright the Lord Jesus as the faithful, compassionate, and almighty High Priest in heaven, they would find in Him all they needed for a life such as God would have them lead. Their life would be in harmony with their faith, in harmony with the life of Him whom their faith would apprehend.

Consider Jesus! is indeed the keynote of the Epistle to the Hebrews. The word consider, from the root of the Latin word for Star, originally means to contemplate the stars. It suggests the idea of the astronomer, and the quiet, patient, persevering, concentrated gaze with which he seeks to discover all that can be possibly known of the stars which the object of his study are. And Jesus, who is God, who became man, and perfected our human nature in His wonderful life of suffering and obedience, and now dwells in heaven to communicate to us its life and blessedness—oh, what reason there is for saying, Consider Jesus. Gaze upon Him, contemplate Him. For some increased knowledge of the stars what devotion, what enthusiasm, what sacrifices are ofttimes witnessed. Oh, let the study and possession of the Son of God waken our devotion and our enthusiasm, that we may be able to tell men what beauty and what glory there is in Jesus.

Holy brethren! Thus the Hebrews are now addressed. In the previous chapter the word brethren had been used twice. He is not ashamed to call them brethren. It behoved Him to be made like unto His brethren. The sacred name is now applied personally: Christ’s brethren are brethren in Christ. And the heart of the writer warms to them personally, as he seeks to urge them to what with him is indeed the one aim of the Epistle—Consider Jesus.

Holy brethren! He that sanctifieth, maketh holy, and they who are sanctified, made holy, are all of one. We saw how holiness is the common mark of Christ and His people: their bond of union, and the great object they both aim at. One of the great mysteries the Epistle is to reveal to us is that our great High Priest has opened the way for us into the Most Holy Place or the Holiest of All. In Hebrew it is the Holiness of Holinesses. There we have boldness of access, there we are to have our dwelling encircled by the holiness of God. We must know that we are holy in Christ; this will give us courage to enter into the Holiness of Holinesses, to have God’s holiness take complete possession, and fill our whole being.

It is Jesus who makes holy: it is we who are to be made holy: what more natural than that the thoughts should be coupled together: holy brethren, consider Jesus. Holy brethren! partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus! What is elsewhere spoken of as a holy calling is here named a heavenly calling. That does not only mean a calling from heaven, or a calling to the heaven, whence the call proceeds. No, there is much more in it. Heaven is not only a place, but a state, a mode of existence, the life in which the presence of God is revealed and experienced in its unhindered power. And the heavenly calling is that in which the power of the heavenly life works to make our life heavenly.

When Jesus was upon earth the kingdom of heaven was nigh at hand; after He had ascended and received the kingdom from the Father, the kingdom of heaven came to this earth in power, through the descent of the Holy Spirit. Christians, at Pentecost, were people who by the new birth entered into the heavenly kingdom or state of life. And the kingdom entered into them. And they were partakers of a heavenly calling, because the spirit and the life and the power of heaven was within them. It is to such men the invitation comes. Holy brethren! partakers of the heavenly calling! consider Jesus! If you would know what it is to be holy and to live holy, consider Jesus who makes holy! If you would know the privileges and powers that belong to you as partakers of a heavenly calling, consider Jesus! He is God, the King of heaven! He is Man who has ascended to heaven as your Priest and Saviour, has opened it for you, and can communicate its life and blessedness.

Oh, consider Jesus! set your heart on Him; He will make you holy and heavenly. There is more than one of my readers who mourns that he knows so little what it is to live a holy and a heavenly life. Listen, God’s word speaks to you—Holy brethren, partakers of a heavenly calling! consider Jesus! This is your weakness: you have looked at yourself and your own strength; you have not studied Jesus! This will be your cure: each day, each hour, consider Jesus, and in Him you will find all the holiness and the heavenliness you need.

1. In the latter part of the Epistle all the glory of Jesus as He entered heaven, and opened it for us, as He became a minister of the heavenly sanctuary, and leads us to dwell in the Father’s presence, will be opened to us. But let us even now, from the commencement, hold fast the truth that the knowledge of Jesus seated in heaven is the power of the heavenly calling and the heavenly life.

2. Do not think that you know all that can be told about Jesus. Believe that there are wonders of heavenly joy to be revealed to you if you know Him better: His divine nearness and oneness with you, His ever-present indwelling to succour and lead you, His power to bring you into the Holiest of All, into the Father’s presence and love, and to keep you there, will be revealed.

Chapter excerpted from Andrew Murray, The Holiest of All: An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews (New York: Anson D. F. Randolph & Company, 1894), 103–106.

The following page is written by Jerry Bridges of Nav Press, one of the greatest contributors to solid Christian teaching on Sanctification and other great doctrines.

“Are there any among the vanities of the Gentiles that can cause rain? or can the heavens give showers? art not thou he, O LORD our God? therefore we will wait upon thee: for thou hast made all these things”—Jeremiah 14:22.

In September 1985, an earthquake struck Mexico City killing some 6,000 people and leaving more than 100,000 homeless. A friend of mine wanted to use the event to teach his young children a simple science lesson, so he asked them, “Do you know what caused the earthquake?” He planned to answer his question with a simple explanation of fault lines and shifting rocks in the earth’s crust. His seismology[13] lesson quickly turned into a theological discussion, however, when his eight-year-old daughter replied, “I know why. God was judging those people.”

Though my friend’s child had jumped to an unwarranted conclusion about God’s judgment, she was theologically correct in one sense. God was in control of that earthquake. Why He allowed it to happen is a question we cannot answer (and should not try to), but we can say, on the testimony of Scripture, that God did indeed allow it or cause it to happen. All of us are affected by the weather and the forces of nature at various times to one degree or another. Most of the time we are merely inconvenienced by weather—a delayed airplane flight, a cancelled Fourth of July picnic, or something else on that order.

Frequently some people somewhere are drastically affected by the weather or the more violent forces of nature. A prolonged drought withers the farmer’s crop, or a hailstorm destroys it within an hour. A tornado in Texas leaves hundreds homeless, and a typhoon in Bangladesh destroys thousands of acres of crops. Whenever we are affected by the weather—whether it is merely an inconvenience or a major disaster—we tend to regard it as nothing more than the impersonal expression of certain fixed meteorological or geological laws. A low pressure system settles over my hometown, bringing a huge snowstorm and closing our airport the day I am to leave for a ministry engagement. Forces within the earth continually bend its crust until one day it snaps, causing a major earthquake. Whether it is trivial or traumatic, we tend to think of the expressions of nature as “just happening” and ourselves as the “unlucky” victims of whatever nature brings forth. In practice, even Christians tend to live and think like the deists…who conceived of God as the One Who created the universe and then walked away to leave it running according to its own natural laws.

But God has not walked away from the day-to-day control of His creation. Certainly, He has established physical laws by which He governs the forces of nature, but those laws continuously operate according to His sovereign will. A Christian TV meteorologist has determined that there are over 1,400 references to weather terminology in the Bible. Many of these references attribute the outworking of weather directly to the hand of God. Most of these passages speak of God’s control over all weather, not just His divine intervention on specific occasions. Consider the following Scriptures:

“He directeth it under the whole heaven, and his lightning unto the ends of the earth…For he saith to the snow, Be thou on the earth; likewise to the small rain, and to the great rain of his strength…By the breath of God frost is given: and the breadth of the waters is straitened. Also by watering he wearieth the thick cloud: he scattereth his bright cloud:  And it is turned round about by his counsels: that they may do whatsoever he commandeth them upon the face of the world in the earth. He causeth it to come, whether for correction, or for his land, or for mercy” (Job 37:3, 6, 10-13).

“Who covereth the heaven with clouds, who prepareth rain for the earth, who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains…He giveth snow like wool: he scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes. He casteth forth his ice like morsels: who can stand before his cold? He sendeth out his word, and melteth them: he causeth his wind to blow, and the waters flow” (Psa 147:8, 16-18).

“When he uttereth his voice, there is a multitude of waters in the heavens, and he causeth the vapours to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings with rain, and bringeth forth the wind out of his treasures” (Jer 10:13).

“And also I have withholden the rain from you, when there were yet three months to the harvest: and I caused it to rain upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another city: one piece was rained upon, and the piece whereupon it rained not withered” (Amo 4:7).

Note how all these Scriptures attribute all expressions of weather—good or bad—to the direct controlling hand of God. The insurance companies refer to major natural disasters as “acts of God.”

The truth is, all expressions of nature, all occurrences of weather, whether it be a devastating tornado or a gentle rain on a spring day, are acts of God. The Bible teaches that God controls all the forces of nature, both destructive and productive, on a continuous, moment-by-moment basis. Whether the weather is nice or bad, we are never the victims or even the beneficiaries of the impersonal powers of nature. God, who is the loving heavenly Father of every true Christian, is sovereign over the weather, and He exercises that sovereignty moment by moment. Complaining about the weather seems to be a favourite American pastime. Sadly, we Christians often get caught up in this ungodly habit of our society. But when we complain about the weather, we are actually complaining against God, Who sent us our weather. We are, in fact, sinning against God (see Num 11:1).

Not only do we sin against God when we complain about the weather, we also deprive ourselves of the peace that comes from recognizing our heavenly Father is in control of it. Alexander Carson said,

“Scripture represents all physical laws as having their effect from the immediate agency of Almighty Power. . . .Christians themselves, though they recognize the doctrine of divine Providence, are prone to overlook it in practice, and consequently to be deprived, in a great measure, of that advantage which a constant and deep impression of this truth is calculated to give.”

Whether the weather merely disrupts my plans or destroys my home, I need to learn to see God’s sovereign and loving hand controlling it. The fact is, for most of us, the weather and the effects of nature are usually favourable. The tornado, the drought, even the snowstorm that delays our flight are the exception, not the rule. We tend to remember the “bad” weather and take for granted the good. However, when Jesus spoke about the weather, He spoke about the goodness of God: “That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust” (Mat 5:45).

And in some cases he sends destructive weather such as hail: Joshua 10:11 As the Amorites retreated down the road from Beth-horon, the LORD destroyed them with a terrible hailstorm from heaven that continued until they reached Azekah. The hail killed more of the enemy than the Israelites killed with the sword.

Though God sometimes uses the weather, and other expressions of nature, as an instrument of judgment (see Amos 4:7-9), He most often uses it as an expression of His gracious provision for His creation. Both saint and sinner alike benefit from God’s gracious provision of weather. And, according to Jesus, this provision is not merely the result of certain fixed, inexorable physical laws. God controls those laws. He causes His sun to rise, He sends the rain… We as Christians need to stop complaining about the weather, and instead learn to give thanks for it. God, our heavenly Father, sends us each day what He deems best for all of His creation. What about the natural disasters that occur frequently in various parts of the world?

Many sensitive Christians struggle over the multitude of large-scale natural disasters around the world—an earthquake in one place, famine in another, typhoons and floods somewhere else. Thousands of people are killed, others slowly starve to death. Entire regions are devastated, crops are ruined, homes destroyed. “Why does God allow all this?” we may ask. “Why does God permit all those innocent children to starve?”

It is not wrong to wrestle with these issues, as long as we do it in a reverent and submissive attitude toward God. Indeed, to fail to wrestle with the issue of large-scale tragedy may indicate a lack of compassion toward others on our part. However, we must be careful not to, in our minds, take God off His throne of absolute sovereignty or put Him in the dock and bring Him to the bar of our judgment.

While working on this chapter, I watched the evening news on television one night. One of the top stories was about several powerful tornados that swept across central Mississippi killing seven people, injuring at least 145 more, and leaving nearly 500 families homeless. As I watched the scenes of people sifting through the rubble of what had been their homes, my heart went out to them. I thought to myself, “Some of those people are undoubtedly believers. What would I say to them about God’s sovereignty over nature? Do I really believe it myself at a time such as this?…Why bring God into chaos and suffering such as this?” But God brings Himself into these events. He said in Isaiah 45:7, “I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.”

God Himself accepts the responsibility, so to speak, of disasters. He actually does more than accept the responsibility; He actually claims it. In effect, God says, “I, and I alone, have the power and authority to bring about both prosperity and disaster, both weal and woe, both good and bad.” This is a difficult truth to accept as you watch people sift through the rubble of their homes or—more to the point—if you are the one sifting through the rubble of your home. But as the late Dr. Edward J. Young commented on Isaiah 45:7, “We gain nothing by seeking to minimize the force of the present verse.” We must allow the Bible to say what it says, not what we think it ought to say.

We obviously do not understand why God creates disaster, or why He brings it to one town and not to another. We recognize, too, that just as God sends His sun and rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous, so He also sends the tornado, or the hurricane, or the earthquake on both…God’s sovereignty over nature does not mean that Christians never encounter the tragedies of natural disasters. Experience and observation clearly teach otherwise. God’s sovereignty over nature does mean that, whatever we experience at the hand of the weather or other forces of nature (such as plant diseases or insect infestation of our crops), all circumstances are under the watchful eye and sovereign control of our God.

To find out more on the doctrine of Providence click here.

Excerpted from Trusting God by Jerry Bridges copyright 1988. Used by permission of NavPress, www.navpress.com. All rights reserved. Jerry Bridges: Bible teacher, staff member of The Navigators Collegiate Ministries, guest lecturer at several seminaries, conference speaker, and author of The Pursuit of Holiness, The Practice of Godliness, Trusting God, The Gospel for Real Life, and others. Jerry went home to the Lord in 2016. To see his contribution to Christian literature see Wikipedia.

“And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” — John 12:32 KJV

On this weekend, while the world of Christian faith surrounding us celebrates Easter, it is fitting that we spend a few quiet moments here considering a text from the Gospel, the Biblical record of the life of Christ.

Jesus left heaven to live where we do, share the daily life of a fellow human, and ultimately offer Himself as our substitute, so that we might experience His world where righteousness and freedom ultimately dwell.

Many of us go about our daily routine without much thought about how we can go to be with God. We are so accustomed to life as we know it that we scarcely recognize how much evil has become intertwined with just about everything.

But Jesus came to offer us something better. That could only happen through his death. Just as a transplanted organ often is possible only when the donor dies, so Salvation, and it’s outcome, living forever, required the death of its donor — Jesus.

Jesus must be lifted up both as sacrifice and as a witness that there is something much better than the little trinkets that we prize so much. And we MUST remind ourselves and others that Jesus is our hope, our promise and our redeemer.

So, in our own life, we need that constant reminder that Jesus has to be an unashamed theme of our thoughts, our conversation and our only hope of salvation each day.

John demonstrates elsewhere that people who embrace parts of faith can, at the same time, completely forget, that without Jesus, we have nothing. That’s it. Period.

So once again, I need Jesus. I need to stick close to Him. To ask the question throughout my day — “What would Jesus do here, with this challenge, I’m facing?” That’s how I make Jesus real.

And when Jesus is lifted up, He promises that He’ll do the drawing. Let’s lift up Jesus. In our neighbourhood. In our family. Where we work. The adventure can be ours.

Source: Pastor Mark Johnson

“My dear friends, I was doing my best to write to you about the salvation we share in common, when I felt the need of writing at once to encourage you to fight on for the faith which once and for all God has given to his people. For some godless people have slipped in unnoticed among us, persons who distort the message about the grace of our God in order to excuse their immoral ways, and who reject Jesus Christ, our only Master and Lord. Long ago the Scriptures predicted the condemnation they have received.” —Jude 3,4 GNT

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about our spiritual diet. What we choose to consume, that which we avoid.

Tucked away in the back of your Bible, right next door to the Revelation, is a really short book — Jude, just a short chapter long. And yet, how densely filled with things we need to think about. Especially now.

The days we are living in are not a time for a ‘soft gospel’ approach to Scripture, God or how to live. The storms that swept the south last night, the spiralling costs of food, hostilities between nations and neighbours are signs that the end of all things is just before us.

I fear that too many people of faith aren’t hearing and grasping the things that are going on around us.

I’m not a conspiracy theorist. I simply read the news that’s available to me on my laptop with my Bible open beside it. The world has gone bonkers. Irreligious people are busy building their Babels. The disasters and human response were both foretold in Scripture. No one needs to act surprised.

But just as at the birth of Christ people were pinning their hopes for the future on all the wrong stuff. So, today, the masses are wilfully ignorant of what’s next. But you and I can know where we are in the stream of things. Think of the Bible as a road map, necessary to each of us as we are about to travel an unknown road.

“To him who is able to keep you from falling and to bring you faultless and joyful before his glorious presence— to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, might, and authority, from all ages past, and now, and forever and ever! Amen” — Jude 24, 25 GNT

Why not join me in reading all of Jude TODAY? Important words for an important time.

Source: My good friend Pastor Mark Johnson’s weekly wisdom presented in Facebook.

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4:8–9. 

Eight words are used for the things that should fill the Christian’s thought-life. As they are ‘taken into account’ (as the Greek word translated think means), they will shape attitudes and direct words and actions.

They are the things that are true and honest, worthy and noble, just and right, pure and holy, lovely and beautiful, admirable and pleasant to hear about. Excellent was the best word that classical Greek ethics had for virtue.

Here we have the thought of what is worthy of praise and commendation. Putting this into practice, in other words, living by what they know and acknowledge, would result for the Philippians in the kind of life that Paul had sought to model (Philippians 3:17). Not only would the peace of God be found, but also his unfailing presence (2 Corinthians 13:11; 2 Thessalonians 3:16).

Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?—unless indeed you fail to meet the test! (2 Cor 13:5-7)

The following is from David Clarkson (c. 1621-1686), a Puritan who assumed the pulpit of John Owen: ¹

This material was written in the mid-1600s, so admittedly, the language is somewhat archaic English but well worth persevering in the reading as it is very effectual to personal soul searching. (2 Cor 13:5-7)

A long list of self-examinable insights is available here to assess our life to see how sincerely we love and follow him, as we prepare for eternity in His Spirit.

For this ye know, that no whoremonger, nor unclean person, nor covetous man, who is an idolater, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.—Ephesians 5:5 A covetous man—and the like may be understood of the rest—is an idolater…Not only the covetous but the unclean are idolaters. The apostle, who here makes covetousness to be idolatry, also counts voluptuous persons to be idolaters, where he speaks of some who make their belly their God (Phil 3:19).

“The lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life” (1John 2:16), i.e., pleasures, riches, and honours, are the carnal man’s trinity, the three great idols of worldly men, to which they prostrate their souls. Indeed, every reigning lust is an idol; and every person in whom it reigns is an idolater. And giving that to them which is due only to God, they as a result of this become guilty of idolatry…

That this may be more evident, that covetousness, uncleanness, and other lusts are idolatry, let us consider what it is and the several kinds of it. Idolatry is…to give that honour and worship to the creature due only to God (Rom 1:25)…Now when this worship is made common, communicated to other things, whatever they are, we hereby make them idols and commit idolatry. Now this worship due to God only is not only given by heathens to their false gods; and by papists to angels, saints, images, etc.; but also by carnal men to their lusts. For there is a twofold worship…due only to God, internal and external:

1. External, which consists in acts and gestures of the body. When a man bows to or prostrates himself before a thing, this is the worship of the body. And when these gestures of bowing, prostration are used, not out of a civil, but a religious respect, with an intention to testify divine honor, then it is worship due only to God.

2. Internal, which consists in the acts of the soul and actions answerable thereto. When the mind is most taken up with an object and the heart and affections most set upon it, this is soul worship; and this is due only to God. For He being the chief good and the last end of intelligent creatures, it is His due, proper to Him alone, to be most minded and most affected. It is the honor due only to the Lord to have the first, the highest place, both in our minds and hearts and endeavors. Now according to this distinction of worship there are two sorts of idolatry:

1. Open, outward idolatry, when men, out of a religious respect, bow to or prostrate themselves before anything besides God. This is the idolatry of the heathens and part of the idolatry of papists.

2. Secret and soul idolatry, when the mind and heart is set upon anything more than God; when anything is more valued, more intended; anything more trusted, more loved, or our endeavors more for any other thing than God. Then is that soul worship, which is due only to God… Hence, secret idolaters shall have no inheritance in the kingdom of God. Soul idolatry will exclude men out of heaven as well as open idolatry. He that serves his lusts is as incapable of heaven as he that serves or worships idols of wood or stone. Before we come to confirm and apply this truth, it will be requisite to make a more clear discovery of this secret idolatry…In order thereunto, observe, there are thirteen acts of soul worship…:

1. Esteem. That which we most highly value we make our god. For estimation is an act of soul worship…Worship is the mind’s esteem of a thing as most excellent. Now the Lord challenges the highest esteem, as an act of honor and worship due only to Himself. Therefore, to have a high esteem of other things, when we have low thoughts of God, is idolatry. To have a high opinion of ourselves, of our parts and accomplishments, of our relations and enjoyments, of riches and honors, or those that are rich and honorable, or anything of like nature, when we have low apprehensions of God, is to advance these things into the place of God, to make them idols and give them that honor and worship which is due only to the divine Majesty. What we most esteem, we make our god. If other things are of higher esteem, ye are idolaters (Job 21:14).

2. Mindfulness. That which we are most mindful of we make our god. To be most remembered, to be most minded, is an act of worship which is proper to God, and which He requires as due to Himself alone (Ecc 12:1). Other things may be minded; but if they be more minded than God, it is idolatry—the worship of God is given to the creature. When ye mind yourselves, mind your estates and interests, mind your profits or pleasures more than God, you set these up as idols in the place of God. When that time, which should be taken up with thoughts of God, is spent in thoughts of other things; when God is not in all your thoughts; or if He sometimes be there, yet if other things take place of Him in your thoughts; if when ye are called to think of God—as sometimes every day we should do with all seriousness—if ordinarily and willingly you make these thoughts of God give place to other things, it is idolatry. If either you do not think of God or think otherwise of Him than He is—think Him all mercy, not minding His justice; think Him all pity and compassion, not minding His purity and holiness; think of His faithfulness in performing promises, not at all minding His truth in execution of threatenings; think Him all love, not regarding His sovereignty—this is to set up an idol instead of God. Thinking otherwise of God than He has revealed Himself or minding other things as much or more than God is idolatry.

3. Intention. That which we most intend we make our god, for to be most intended is an act of worship due only to the true God. For He being the chief good must be the last end. Now the last end must be our chief aim, i.e., it must be intended and aimed at for itself; and all other things must be aimed at for its sake…in a subserviency to it. Now, when we make other things our chief aim or main design, we set them up in the stead of God and make them idols. When our chief design is to be rich, or great, or safe, or famous, or powerful; when our great aim is our own ease, or pleasure, or credit, or profit and advantage; when we aim at, or intend any [thing] more, or anything so much, as the glorifying and enjoying of God; this is soul idolatry…

4. Resolution. What we are most resolved for we worship as God. Resolvedness for God, above all things, is an act of worship which He challenges as due to Himself alone. To communicate it to other things is to give the worship of God unto them and so to make them gods. When we are fully resolved for other things, for our lusts, humours, outward advantages, and but faintly resolved for God, His ways, honour, service…; when [we] resolve presently for other things, but refer our resolves for God to the future—“Let me get enough of the world, of my pleasure, of my lusts, now; I will think of God hereafter, in old age, in sickness, on a deathbed”—these are idolatrous resolutions. God is thrust down, the creatures and your lusts advanced into the place of God, and that honor which is due only to Him you give unto them. This is unquestionable idolatry.

5. Love. That which we must love, we worship as our god; for love is an act of soul-worship…To love and to adore are sometimes both one…That which one loves, he worships. This is undoubtedly true, if we intend hereby that love which is superlative and transcendent; for to be loved above all things is an act of honour and worship, which the Lord challenges as His due in peculiar (Deut 6:5). In this the Lord Christ comprised all that worship which is required of man (Mat 22:37). Other things may be loved, but He will be loved above all other things. He is to be loved transcendently, absolutely, and for Himself. All other things are to be loved in Him and for Him. He looks upon us as not worshipping Him at all, not taking Him for a God, when we love other things more or as much as Himself (1Jo 2:15)…Love, whenever it is inordinate, it is an idolatrous affection.

6. Trust. That which we most trust we make our god; for confidence and dependence is an act of worship, which the Lord calls for as due only to Himself. And what act of worship is there which the Lord more requires than this soul-dependence upon Him alone? “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart” (Pro 3:5). He will have no place there left for confidence in anything else. Therefore, it is idolatry to trust in ourselves, to rely upon our own wisdom, judgments, parts, accomplishments. The Lord forbids it (Pro 3:5)… To trust in wealth or riches. Job disclaims this and reckons it amongst those idolatrous acts that were punishable by the Judge (Job 31:24-28). David joins this and the disclaiming of God together (Psa 52:7); and our apostle, who calls covetousness idolatry, dissuades from this confidence in riches as inconsistent with confidence in God (1Ti 6:17).

To trust in friends though many and mighty. He fixes a curse upon this as being a departing from, a renouncing of God, an advancing of that [which] we trust into the room of God (Psa 146:3)…“It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes” (Psalm 118:8-9)…The idolatry of this confidence is expressed, in that the true God is laid aside. Trust in the creature is always idolatrous.

7. Fear. That which we most fear we worship as our god, for fear is an act of worship…He that does fear, does worship that which is feared, which is unquestionable when his fear is transcendent. The whole worship of God is frequently in Scripture expressed by this one word fear (Mat 4:10 with Deut 6:13); and the Lord challenges this worship, this fear, as due to Him alone (Isa 51:12-19). That is our god which is our fear and dread (Luk 12:4-5). If you fear others more than Him, you give that worship to them which is due only to God, and this is plain idolatry…

8. Hope. That which we make our hope we worship as god, for hope is an act of worship…and worship is due only to God. It is His prerogative to be the hope of His people (Jer 17:13; Rom 15:13). When we make other things our hope, we give them the honor due only to God. It is a forsaking of the Lord the fountain and advancing of broken cisterns into His place (Jer 2:13), hereby worshipping them as God…Thus do the papists openly, when they call the virgin mother, the wooden cross, and saints departed, their hope. And thus do others amongst us, who make their prayers, their sorrow for sin, their works of charity, or any acts of religion or righteousness, their hope, when men expect hereby to satisfy justice, to pacify God’s displeasure, to procure heaven. Nothing can effect this, but that which is infinite—the righteousness of God. And this we have only in and from Christ. He is therefore called our hope (1Ti 1:1), our “hope of glory” (Col 1:27). Those that make their own righteousness the foundation of their hope, they exalt it into the place of Christ and honor it as God…

9. Desire. That which we most desire, we worship as our god; for that which is chiefly desired is the chief good in his account who so desires it. And what he counts his chief good, that he makes his god. Desire is an act of worship…, and to be most desired is that worship, that honor, which is due only to God. To desire anything more or so much as the enjoyment of God is to idolize it, to prostrate the heart to it, and worship it as God only should be worshipped. He only should be that one thing desirable to us above all things, as to David (Psa 27:4)…

10. Delight. That which we most delight and rejoice in, that we worship as god; for transcendent delight is an act of worship due only to God. And this affection in its height and elevation is called glorying. That which is our delight above all things, we glory in it; and this is the prerogative which the Lord challenges (1Co 1:31; Jer 9:23-24). To rejoice more in our wisdom, strength, riches, than in the Lord, is to idolize them. To take more delight in relations, wife, or children, in outward comforts and accommodations, than in God, is to worship them, as we ought only to worship God. To take more pleasure in any way of sin, uncleanness, intemperance, earthly employments, than in the holy ways of God, than in those spiritual and heavenly services wherein we may enjoy God, is idolatry…

11. Zeal. That for which we are most zealous, we worship as god; for such a zeal is an act of worship due only to God. Therefore, it is idolatrous to be more zealous for our own things than for the things of God—to be eager in our own cause, and careless in the cause of God; to be more vehement for our own credit, interests, advantages, than for the truths, ways, honor of God; to be fervent in spirit, in following our own business, promoting our designs, but lukewarm and indifferent in the service of God; to count it intolerable for ourselves to be reproached, slandered, reviled, but manifest no indignation when God is dishonored, His name, Sabbaths, worship, profaned; His truths, ways, people, reviled—this is idolatrous…

12. Gratitude. That to which we are most grateful, that we worship as god; for gratitude is an act of worship…We worship that to which we are most thankful. We may be thankful to men, we may acknowledge the helpfulness of means and instruments; but if we rest here and rise not higher in our thanks and acknowledgments; if the Lord be not remembered as Him without whom all these are nothing; it is idolatry. For this the Lord menaces those idolaters (Hos 2:5, 8). Thus when we ascribe our plenty and riches to our care and industry; our success to our prudence and diligence; our deliverances to friends, means, and instruments, without looking higher, or not so much to God as unto these, we idolize them—sacrifice to them—as the prophet expresses it (Hab 1:16). To ascribe that which comes from God unto the creatures is to set them in the place of God and so to worship them…

13. When our care and industry is more for other things than for God. No man can serve two masters. We cannot serve God and mammon, God and our lusts too, because this service of ourselves, of the world, takes up that care, that industry, those endeavors, which the Lord must have of necessity, if we will serve Him as God. And when these are laid out upon the world and our lusts, we serve them as the Lord ought to be served, and so make them our gods. When you are more careful and industrious to please men or yourselves, than to please God; to provide for yourselves and posterity, than to be serviceable unto God; more careful what you shall eat, drink, or wherewith [you may] be clothed than how you may honor and enjoy God; to make provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts thereof, than how to fulfill the will of God; more industrious to promote your own interests, than the designs of God; to be rich, or great, or respected amongst men, than that God may be honored and advanced in the world; more careful how to get the things of the world, than how to employ them for God; rise early, go to bed late, eat the bread of carefulness, that your outward estate may prosper, while the cause, and ways, and interests of Christ have few or none of your endeavors, this is to idolize the world, yourselves, your lusts, your relations, while the God of heaven is neglected. And the worship and service due unto Him alone is hereby idolatrously given to other things… He that makes Christ his chief aim, if at length he finds Him Whom his soul loveth, this quiets his heart, whatever he want, whatever he lose besides. He counts this a full recompense for all his tears, prayers, inquiries, waitings, and endeavors. From “Soul Idolatry Excludes Men out of Heaven,” in The Works of David Clarkson, Vol. II, reprinted by The Banner of Truth Trust.

^{1 David Clarkson (c. 1621-1686): Puritan preacher and author. Colleague of John Owen and successor to Owen’s pulpit. Born in Bradford, Yorkshire, England.}