Wood Idol

Isaiah 43:14-45:10
Ephesians 3:1-21
Psalm 68:1-18
Proverbs 24:1-2

Idol is one of those weird words in our language that changes it's meaning from time to time. It started out referring to little statues that people worship, made it's way on to refer to people of great ability or beauty that were worthy of some sort of celebrity style adoration and now it has morphed again to refer to talent show contestants some of whom have skill some of whom very clearly do not.

Isaiah in today's reading is going back to the first definition and is in great comedy form again. I could try paraphrasing him but it's better just to quote straight.

12 The blacksmith stands at his forge to make a sharp tool,
pounding and shaping it with all his might.
His work makes him hungry and weak.
It makes him thirsty and faint.
13 Then the wood-carver measures a block of wood
and draws a pattern on it.
He works with chisel and plane
and carves it into a human figure.
He gives it human beauty
and puts it in a little shrine.
14 He cuts down cedars;
he selects the cypress and the oak;
he plants the pine in the forest
to be nourished by the rain.
15 Then he uses part of the wood to make a fire.
With it he warms himself and bakes his bread.
Then—yes, it’s true—he takes the rest of it
and makes himself a god to worship!
He makes an idol
and bows down in front of it!
16 He burns part of the tree to roast his meat
and to keep himself warm.
He says, “Ah, that fire feels good.”
17 Then he takes what’s left
and makes his god: a carved idol!
He falls down in front of it,
worshiping and praying to it.
“Rescue me!” he says.
“You are my god!”

18 Such stupidity and ignorance!
Their eyes are closed, and they cannot see.
Their minds are shut, and they cannot think.
19 The person who made the idol never stops to reflect,
“Why, it’s just a block of wood!
I burned half of it for heat
and used it to bake my bread and roast my meat.
How can the rest of it be a god?
Should I bow down to worship a piece of wood?”
20 The poor, deluded fool feeds on ashes.
He trusts something that can’t help him at all.
Yet he cannot bring himself to ask,
“Is this idol that I’m holding in my hand a lie?”

It struck me reading this that there is something of the good side of Richard Dawkins about Isaiah. He is using all of his wit and rhetorical verve to puncture an idea of God that is shallow, stupid and meaningless. If only we Christians were a bit less dumb and gullible sometimes in how we present Christianity to the world then we wouldn't need the likes of Dawkins to come along and expose the emptiness at times of our own rhetoric or the Christian idols that we build for ourselves to replace the living God.