“Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry……Do I mean then that food sacrificed to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? No, but the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons too; you cannot have a part in both the Lord’s table and the table of demons. Are we trying to arouse the Lord’s jealousy? Are we stronger than he?” 1 Corinthians 10:14, 19-22 NIV https://bible.com/bible/111/1co.10.14-22.NIV

A recent trip to India reveals the poverty of idolatry. A person cannot go 100 yards without a shrine of some kind built on the side of the road for people to pause and offer prayers or gifts for appeasement and blessing. What a burden to have to please literally millions of gods. These are truly demons, for the work of demons is to move the worship of men from the One True God to something else. Most of these idols look demonic, though, which doesn’t necessarily make them so. In America, we acknowledge casually the One True God while worshipping the god of ourselves. This, too, is demonic, for the original temptation by the evil one was to cause us to worship ourselves as equals to the One True God. Yet we are not gods; we know it deep within our souls. We cannot add a day to our lives or stop those we love from dying. We cannot stop hate or even cause love. We are incapable of being gods because we are not gods. We are creations of the One True God, and He alone is to be the center and focus of our worship. The One True God is good and loving, which is fortunate for us because He is merciful, compassionate, and gracious. The One True God has come to the world as a man to die for the rebellion of men against God and was raised from the dead because He is God, proving His sacrifice for men is acceptable to God and that His offer of pardon so we can live forever with Him in His kingdom is legitimate. This God is Jesus, the One and Only God. Worshipping anything or anyone but Him is demonic, foolish, and destructive to ourselves. One God will judge all humanity by His standard, revealed in His Word. This God made us in His image, lived among us as one of us, and promises to come again to live forever with all those who have humbled themselves before Him by worshipping only Him.