The Work Of Men’s Hands (2 Chronicles 32:19)

 


Monday, August 26, 2024


Psalms 137; 138

2 Chronicles 32:9-23

Romans 14:13-23


The Work Of Men’s Hands (2 Chronicles 32:19)


I have heard many different excuses from many different types of people as to why they would not bend the knee to King Jesus – why people don’t want to be Christian. More often than not, the reason they give officially is just a smokescreen, and if you dig a little deeper, then the true reason comes out in conversation. It can be frustrating when these people are our friends, and heartbreaking when they are our family.


These Assyrians had all the reason in the world to puff themselves up and claim that they could take down the king of heaven. Every other god they had destroyed with ease; what was the difference between those other gods and the God of Israel?


This is the big difference between all the other so-called gods, and the one true and living God: our God is above all other things. There is a dividing line. On one side of this line sits the Creator. On the other side sits everything else: humans, time, ants, demons pretending to be gods, and the dirt under your toenails.


The true God relates to us as a potter relates to clay (Isaiah 45:9, Jeremiah 18:6, Romans 9:20). The broken part of our human nature wants to make a god in our own image; a god we can control and decide over. But God is not like that. We are made in his image, not the other way around. He is not the work of our hands; we are the work of his.


The fact that our Creator has turned our hearts so that we can worship him as he truly is, instead of vainly making a god of our own choosing and worshipping that, is cause for great joy and thanksgiving. It is by the grace of God that our eyes have been opened and our hearts have been turned. And so when we go out with our sword and our trowel to build the kingdom of heaven on earth, and we come across false, so-called gods, we can see them for who they truly are: the works of men’s hands, whereas the God we worship was made by no-one; he is the ultimate Maker of all.


Who do you know and love that is yet to turn to the Lord Jesus? Where is the god of their own making in the lives of those people? What about our true God would draw them to him instead?


Lord Jesus, I was made through, in, and by you. Turn my heart from ever trying to replace you with anything of my own making.

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