In Judges 18, that is exactly what happens. This guys ends up with a little silver god statue. He makes some other religious stuff, and sets up his own church. He even decides that his kid is going to be the priest. That is, until a better offer comes along. This Levite priest comes into town looking for a place to stay. Micah, the dude with the self-made church, offers to hire him, and provide food and clothing for him. The priest agrees, and they set up a little religion in his home.
If it sounds weird, it's supposed to. At this point in Judges, everything in Israel has fallen apart, and is getting worse by the day. It's a complete mess. So, what does the First Church of Micah-ology have to do with us?
We do the same thing.
Really, we do.
We try to blend our want for control, power, influence, and stuff with our belief in God. We will pick and choose which parts of Jesus we want, and pitch out the rest. Okay, we may not worship a little silver idol, but we worship idols with an apple printed on them. What would happen if you knew that God was telling you to give up your cell phone for a year because it was messing up your relationship with Him? Would you give away your car if God clearly told you to? What about getting off of Facebook for a while?
If you think "No way!" to any of these, then there is your idol. We all have them. They are slowly killing all of us. We have set up our own little religions, and God often sits off to the side of it.
What are the things you allow to get in your way? What are the things you would really, really struggle with getting rid of if God asked you to give them away to someone else, and not replace them? Why? Why are they so important? What does that tell us about ourselves? Do they REALLY matter that much? Or are they just some dumb little silver god in our house?
Over and over the book of Judges says "There was no king in Israel" and that is why everything went to pot. Which begs maybe the ultimate question:
Who, or what, is your king?
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