Choose This Day Who You Will Serve

 "Then put away the foreign gods that are among you, and incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel." Joshua 24:23

Household gods             The Israel Museum - Jerusalem

I remember with utter fascination the passage in Genesis 31 about Rachael stealing Laban's "household gods" and Jacob's warning her about keeping them.  The idea fascinated me: household gods?  And many years later, while on a visit to the Holy Land, I encountered actual archaeological remains of these "teraphim" at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem. I stood by their case, mesmerized. Why would any of the ancients believe that these little terracotta statuettes would hold any power over them? They seem pretty benign.

In the readings for this Sunday. we discover Joshua warning the people of God's wrath if they would not give up worshiping the gods of their ancestors. So what is it about worshiping other gods?  What's the risk? Well, for starters, God made it clear in the first of Ten Commandments: You shall have no other gods but me.  So we know it is so. And yet, like our ancestors before us, we in the 21st century have plenty of other gods who threaten to draw us away from putting God first. 

Money and power come to mind, but what if we have little of either?  There are still things that seep into our daily existence that may crowd out God.  Innocuous activities like television, the Internet, and going to the gym, while not injurious to the soul, may prove to be lethal to our spiritual souls. 

This week, schedule a time to be alone with God each day; a time for prayer, scriptural reading, and listening. Pay attention to those activities that try to encroach upon your time with God. What are they? 

"Then put away the foreign gods that are among you, and incline your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel." Joshua 24:23