Who is My God?

“Who is My God?” is a necessary question to let us reevaluate our beliefs and confirm whether our faith is based from the words of the Bible or just mere traditions inculcated in us from birth. Did we ever once asked ourselves if what we believe in is the will of God?

The Bollywood movie PK is a satirical comedy drama movie released in 2014. It spoke about organized religion, and though the movie did not intend to hurt any religious organization or sect, it is still a bold move to open the minds of viewers and question religious practices and traditions and reflect upon them.

In the movie, the protagonist nicknamed PK, who was an alien from another planet, said that there are two kinds of God. The first is the God who created the heavens and the earth, whom he emphasized as the true God we must revere. The second is the God perceived and created by men. While searching for his remote to return home, he was informed that only God could assist him. And he so desperately tried to seek God in different religions – Sikhism, Jainism, Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity. He prayed and prayed to all kinds of images and followed all their rituals, but it was all in vain. Indeed, it must have been very frustrating. One prophet justified such rituals are necessary to put hope in the hearts of people in suffering.
Ultimately, he came to the realization that the gods conceived by humans are not the true God and Creator.

In this world, there are so many religions that believe in many gods and worship their images, and many people blindly follow and put their trust in such images. However, God, who created the heavens and earth, severely rebuked those who worshiped other gods and images.

The Israelites Made Other Gods

The Golden Calf

When God (Jehovah) gave the first among the ten commandments, He said, ‘I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt…You shall have no other gods before me’ (Ex.20:1-3). However, when Moses was a long time in Mount Sinai, 40 days and 40 nights without eating or drinking, they thought he had died, so they demanded Aaron to make gods for them. They made a golden calf and said, “These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”, and the next day they made a festival and worshiped and sacrificed burnt offerings to the golden calf. By doing so, they received the wrath of God and on that very day, about three thousand of the people died. Because of the sin of worshiping the golden calf, God struck the people with plague. (Ex.32:1-35)

The Bronze Snake

During the exodus, the Israelites constantly grumbled against God in the desert. Though God freed them from the slavery of Egypt and promised them the promised land Canaan, they spoke against God and Moses, saying, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!” So God sent venomous snakes and many were bitten and died. They repented and God gave them a way to be saved. God commanded Moses to make a bronze snake and put it up on a pole so that anyone who is bitten can look at it and live (Num.21:4-9). However, the Israelites were foolish to think that the bronze snake had the power to save them and so worshiped the bronze snake for 800 years until the time of King Hezekiah (2 Kings 18:3-4). Here, King Hezekiah realized that the bronze snake is nothing but an idol made of bronze, and broke it into pieces. It is written in the Bible that by doing so, he did what was right in the sight of God. What pleased God is not the worship of the bronze snake but the faith of King Hezekiah who realized God’s will and broke the bronze snake.

Jeroboam Made Golden Calves and Instituted Different Feast

1 Kings 12:28‭-‬33 After seeking advice, the king made two golden calves. He said to the people, “It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem. Here are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.” One he set up in Bethel, and the other in Dan. And this thing became a sin;… Jeroboam built shrines on high places and appointed priests from all sorts of people, even though they were not Levites. He instituted a festival on the fifteenth day of the eighth month, like the festival held in Judah, and offered sacrifices on the altar… On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a month of his own choosing, he offered sacrifices on the altar he had built at Bethel. So he instituted the festival for the Israelites and went up to the altar to make offerings.

The sin of Jeroboam led Israel to commit a great sin and, consequently, to destruction. They worshiped other gods and followed the practices of the nations and the practices that the kings of Israel introduced, even though God continued to warn them, “You shall not do this.” The Israelites persisted in all the sins of Jeroboam so the Lord was very angry with Israel and removed them from His presence (2 Kings 17:7-23)

You Shall Not Worship Other Gods

God gave the first of the ten commandments to the Israelites. Since God brought them out from the land of slavery with His mighty hand, God commanded them not to have other gods before Him (Exodus 20:1-3). However, there were many false prophets who enticed people to worship other gods, inciting rebellion against God who brought them out of Egypt. God commanded His people not to listen to them, but show no mercy and put them to death (Deuteronomy 13:1-11).

Idolatry Forbidden

The second among the ten commandments, “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or in the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them…” (Exodus 20:4-5)

Again and again, God warned His people about idolatry.

Deuteronomy 4:15-19 “You saw no form of any kind the day the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the fire. Therefore watch yourselves very carefully, so that you do not become corrupt and make for yourselves an idol, an image of any shape, whether formed like a man or a woman, or like any animal… And when you look up to the sky and see the sun, the moon and the stars… do not be enticed into bowing down…

To whom shall we compare God or count Him equal? Though some pour out gold and hire a goldsmith to make it into a god, and worship it, it can not move,it cannot speak, though they cry out to it, it cannot answer, it cannot save them from their troubles (Isaiah 45:5-7). For the Lord, who created the heavens and the earth, is the true God, the living God. When he is angry, the earth trembles and the nations cannot endure his wrath.

So God will pour out judgment on all the other gods, gods who did not make the heavens and the earth, they will perish from the earth and from under the heavens. For they are a fraud, and they do not have breath in them. They are worthless, just images made out of stone or wood (Jeremiah 10:10-14)

Corruption of the Early Church

As the early church grew significantly and nobles and royals entered the church, the church became more secularized and started to deviate from the teachings of Christ. In 321 A.D., the Sabbath was abolished and Sunday worship was made into law. The Roman Emperor Constantine called the first day of the week, ‘the venerable day of the sun’ (The History of Christianity by Tim Dowley, p.140). From then on, all Christians have kept Sunday worship. To them was fulfilled the prophecy of Ezekiel:

Ezekiel 8:16 He then brought me into the inner court of the house of the Lord, and there at the entrance to the temple, between the portico and the altar, were about twenty-five men. With their backs toward the temple of the Lord and their faces to the east, they were bowing down to the sun in the east

According to Cairns (Christianity Through The Centuries, p.112), in 325 A.D., the Passover was abolished at the Council of Nicaea, convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine, and instituted Christmas in 354 A.D. as the birth of Jesus. The Passover is the feast of God in which God appointed as the day of judgment for other gods (Exodus 12:12). When the kings Josiah and Hezekiah did not keep the Passover, they did not know that they were worshiping other gods. But when they kept the Passover, their eyes were opened to see that the temple of the Lord was filled with idols, and they destroyed all the other gods in keeping with God’s commands (2 Kings 23:21-25; 2 Chronicles 30:1-31:1). Whenever the Israelites do not keep the Passover, they were invaded by idols and other gods. In the same way, idols and other gods started to enter the church as the church abandoned the Passover. And thus, the observance of Christ’s birth on December 25th was a cunning scheme by Satan to lead people into worshiping the sun god, whose birth had traditionally been commemorated on the 25th of December. In 431 A.D. cross reverence began in the church and the Council of Ephesus laud it down as an article of faith that Mary is really and truly the mother of God. Moreover, the doctrine of Mary’s perpetual divinity was emphasized by the Lateran Council in 649 and by the Sixth Ecumenical Council of Constantinople in 680 (Encyclopedia Americana, 1951).

Like the Israelites, the Christians of the Early church conformed to the standards of the nations and instituted laws and fortified traditions from pagan practices. Examples are the sun imagery and symbols used in and by the church came from sun worship; and the worship of Mary and the child came from the Babylonian worship of Semiramis and Tammuz, to name a few. These practices have now been deeply embedded in the hearts and minds of people that they are not troubled whether or not they are keeping the words of God written in the Bible. They embrace all kinds of lies to justify their practices and find comfort in them. The whole world, pagans and Christians alike, are committing all kinds of idolatry. The remnants who will be saved, too, would be in terrible danger if they worshiped other gods. That’s why Jesus is to come a second time to teach the truth of the New Covenant to lead them to God and to put God’s laws in their hearts and minds, so that they will become the saints worthy to enter the kingdom of heaven.

Jeremiah 31:31‭-‬34 “The days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when I will make a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah. It will not be like the covenant I made with their ancestors when I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt, because they broke my covenant, though I was a husband to them, ” declares the Lord . “This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord . “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people. No longer will they teach their neighbor, or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’ because they will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,” declares the Lord . “For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more.”

Those who keep God’s laws, the New Covenant, in the last days, will know God, the Creator. They will be careful to keep God’s laws and will be able to recognize the idols and other gods which they have unknowingly worshiped for years, and will detest them and reject them. They will follow the Lamb wherever He goes. They will be the faithful ones who know and worship true God and keep God’s commands until the end.