Charismatic Idolatry: Some Thoughts on Modern-Day Idolatry from a Charismatic Perspective

This statue of Trump was dedicated by a Christian pastor who stated that the statue 'stands as a reminder of the hand of God and His protection over President Trump’s life.' Getty Images. Some of Trumps most loyal followers (worshippers?) are charismatics.

Opening disclaimer: This blog post indulges in some technical analysis of New Testament Greek, but fear not, if you would like to you can easily skip this material and the post will still make perfect sense. For my fellow nerds out there - you're welcome!

The ten commandments (the fancy word for which is the 'Decalogue') begin with the audible voice of YHWH thundering out from the smoke which had consumed Mount Sinai, saying

“I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above or that is on the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject me but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments" (Exodus 20:2-6, NRSVue).

It is instructive that God's summary of his own law begins with a severe prohibition of idolatry. Later Jews, such as Paul the Apostle, seem to have interpreted the Torah and humankind's rebellion against God in terms that elevated the seriousness of idolatry (see Romans 1:22-23 and following). The narrative throughline of the entire Hebrew Bible (that is, the Old Testament) is saturated with YHWH's repeated attempts to woo, lead and discipline his people out of idolatry. This culminates in the exile of the Northern Kingdom of Israel by invading Assyria, and later in the exile of the Southern Kingdom of Judah by invading Babylon. But the love affair between God's people and idolatry and the loving of other gods does not end with the closing of the Hebrew Bible. John ends his first canonical epistle with the tantalizing and seemingly out-of-nowhere command - "Little children, keep yourselves from idols" (1 John 5:21, NRSVue). One could perhaps quibble that when John wrote his epistles in the first century many people did still bow down to and worship physical idols, but we today in the 21st century Western world do not generally do things like that anymore (cut to 2026 at Trump's golf course in Florida where there now proudly stands a 22-foot golden statue of Trump with his first raised high in victory, and perhaps this assumption is more questionable than even our worst nightmares could have predicted, more on this below). Does it then perhaps follow that God's jealous love for and disciplining wrath against his idolatrous people belongs squarely in the past?

            This line of reasoning will not go very far, however, for many reasons, two of which are Colossians 3:5 and Ephesians 5:5. Let's take a look at the surrounding context of each of these.

"Put to death, therefore, whatever in you is earthly: sexual immorality, impurity, passion,  evil desire, and greed (which is idolatry). On account of these the wrath of God is coming  on those who are disobedient. These are the ways you also once followed, when you were living that life. But now you must get rid of all such things: anger, wrath, malice,  slander, and abusive language from your mouth" (Colossians 3:5-8, NRSVue).

"But sexual immorality and impurity of any kind or greed must not even be mentioned among you, as is proper among saints. Entirely out of place is obscene, silly, and vulgar talk; but instead, let there be thanksgiving. Be sure of this, that no sexually immoral or impure person or one who is greedy (that is, an idolater) has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God" (Ephesians 5:3-5, NRSVue).

Notice that in each of these texts Paul renames 'covetousness/greed', that is an inordinate desire for wealth and/or possessions, as 'idolatry.' This brings us back once again to the Decalogue, which ends with YHWH audibly uttering the words "You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, male or female slave, ox, donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor” (Exodus 20:17, NRSVue). We could potentially infer that Paul interpreted the Decalogue to be bookended by prohibitions of idolatry, or perhaps he thought the first two anti-idolatry commandments interpret all eight subsequent commandments.

            Either way, what is interesting for our purposes here is that Paul in these two New Testament texts has not merely stated that covetousness, the tenth commandment, is like idolatry. Paul's Greek does not indicate a simile. In academic terms both of Paul's above statements - "and greed (which is idolatry)" (Colossians 3:5), "one who is greedy (that is, an idolater)" (Ephesians 5:5) - are examples of what is known as a predicate nominative. Daniel Wallace, probably the foremost American koine Greek scholar of his generation, describes this kind of predicate nominative construction in this way, "The usual relationship between the two is that the predicate nominative describes the class to which the subject belongs. This is known as a subset proposition (where S is a subset of PN)" [footnote 1]. Let me try to decipher this academic jargon: Paul's subject (which Wallace labels 'S') in Colossians 3:5 is covetousness the vice, whereas in Ephesians 5:5 his subject is a covetous person. Then, the predicate nominate (which Wallace labels 'PN') is in Colossians 3:5 idolatry the vice, and in Ephesians 5:5 it is an idolatrous person. What Wallace is saying is that the Greek indicates that covetousness as a vice is one example of a larger category of vice, namely idolatry, and that a covetous person is one example of a larger category of sinful people, namely idolaters [footnote 2]. To make this even clearer, I will recast a diagram which I am taking from Wallace but with the language of Colossians 3:5 and Ephesian 5:5 inserted into it:

[footnote 3. These diagrams are copies of Wallace's diagram with different biblical texts inserted into them].

Is this merely an exercise in meaningless, self-indulgent academic gymnastics, or does this analysis allow us to penetrate a little more deeply into Paul's intended meaning in these New Testament texts? As hinted at above, Paul's Greek does not argue that covetousness is similar to or approximating idolatry. He argues that every time we in our comfortable Western lives of convenience and pleasure desire, seek or want more than God wants to give us (note: God does not want people to suffer in poverty in the West or anywhere else, that is not what I am saying here), we are in exactly the same state and class of sinner as those in the days of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego who chose to bow down and worship King Nebuchadnezzar's golden statue (see Daniel 3 and, of course, the golden statue of Trump!). Many of us Western Christians consider ourselves to be walking in holiness, given that we tithe and volunteer at church, are generally 'good people' and try to live in accordance with the Bible. But Paul's rhetoric directed against those in the Roman church who felt secure in their own holiness may need to penetrate our hearts more deeply than we are currently realizing:

'But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast of your relation to God and know his will and determine what really matters because you are instructed in the law, and if you are sure that you are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, a corrector of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of knowledge and truth, you, then, who teach others, will you not teach yourself? You who preach against stealing, do you steal? You who forbid adultery, do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? You who boast in the law, do you dishonor God by your transgression of the law? For, as it is written, “The name of God is blasphemed among the gentiles because of you”' (Romans 2:17-24, NRSVue).  

I am of course in just as much need of this kind of conviction as the next person. But before we get too hellfire and brimstone, let's return to the question posed above - since most of us in the Western world usually do not actually bow down to and worship idols, is idolatry now by default nothing more than an irrelevant, antiquarian concern? Paul's very strong condemnation of covetousness, the only one of the ten commandments which can fester in the human heart without anyone necessarily being able to notice it by external appearances, as idolatry tells us that this is not the case. In fact, we could perhaps say based on Paul's language in Colossians 3:5 and Ephesians 5:5 that any inordinate, misdirected human desire which is contrary to God's will is the sin of idolatry, which is at its heart the loving, worshipping, enjoying, thanking and trusting of any person or thing above God. Saint Augustine the early church father and John Calvin the Protestant Reformer interpreted texts such as Romans 7 along these very lines. Calvin famously contended that "man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols" [footnote 4]. As one final consideration for those interested in the question of idolatry, I recently heard a fellow PhD student in theology (Andrew Noble) give an excellent academic paper within which he argued that, even in the Western world in the 21st century, many of our idols are still very much physical (he pointed to Apple's iPhone as an example of this. For more on this, see Andrew's podcast https://www.whatwouldjesustech.com/).

            But what, you may be wondering, does all of this have to do with the charismatic movement in North America today? And what could be said on this subject from a specifically charismatic (in my case Vineyard) perspective? To the first question the most obvious answer is inevitably the recent dedication by Christian pastors in America of a golden statue of Trump. I do not know if any of those directly involved in this were charismatic Christians, but it is beyond doubt that some of Trump's most diehard followers (or might we say, in light of the rest of this post, worshippers) are charismatics. Specifically within the charismatic movement in North America we could also mention the cult (literally) following of Mike Bickle's devotees, among whom I used to number, who were duped through spiritually abusive 'prophecies' into almost deifying a man who we did not yet know was an un-confessed pedophile. I hesitate to condemn Bickle's former followers as idolaters, given that what most of us experienced at his hands was genuine spiritual abuse for which we were not culpable. But the culture among those dedicated to IHOPKC prior to Bickle's exposure (and for some people even somehow after his exposure) was indicative of a hero-worshipping style faith which was theologically, ethically and spiritually toxic to a serious degree. This problem of celebrity pastors, prophets or apostles is a systemic problem baked into the fibre of some parts of North American evangelicalism and the charismatic movement.

            What could be said in answer to the second question noted above? As a member of the Vineyard movement, I would want to draw attention to what we call 'kingdom theology.' Ever since the days of John Wimber (who we must be careful not to posthumously hero-worship!), Vineyard theology has been centred on the idea that what Jesus primarily came to do in his first coming was to establish 'the kingdom of God/heaven' (the gospels are thick with this language). Vineyard people have therefore historically emphasized that there is no king in the church, the kingdom of heaven or the world other than YHWH. Caesar is not Lord (Greek: kurios), nor is Trump or Putin or the Silicon Valley tech-bros or even our favourite celebrity preacher/apostle/prophet/Christian leader.

            But you may be wondering, it is one thing to state this, but how to we truly live it, deep within our hearts? As we have seen from Paul's language from Romans 2 quoted above, the sinful human heart knows how to deceive itself. I think part of the answer lies once again with a theology of the kingdom - we do not transform our own hearts into the likeness of Christ, who exalts God alone, it is the in-breaking work of the Holy Spirit which does this as we seek him and ask him to keep us from stumbling (see Jude 1:24-25). Our responsibility is to keep on asking, keep on seeking and keep on knocking (see Matthew 7:7-8), and God will visit us by his Spirit in either dramatic or more probably mundane ways to make us people of no king but God alone (see 1 Thessalonians 5:23).

Footnotes

Footnote 1. Daniel B. Wallace, The Basics of New Testament Syntax: An Intermediate Greek Grammar (Zondervan Academic, 2000), 31.

Footnote 2. Daniel B. Wallace, The Basics of New Testament Syntax: An Intermediate Greek Grammar (Zondervan Academic, 2000), 30.

Footnote 3. Daniel B. Wallace, The Basics of New Testament Syntax: An Intermediate Greek Grammar (Zondervan Academic, 2000), 30.

Footnote 4. Jean Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, ed. John T. McNeill, trans. Ford Lewis Battles, The Library of Christian Classics 20–21 (Westminster Press, 1960), 1.11.8.