Martin Luther on Idolatry

Photo Credit: Gabriela Camerotti

From Martin Luther on the topic of idolatry:

"Many a one thinks that he has God and everything in abundance when he has money and possessions; he trusts in them and boasts of them with such firmness and assurance as to care for no one. Lo, such a man also has a god, Mammon by name, i.e., money and possessions, on which he sets all his heart, and which is also the most common idol on earth.

 …So, too, whoever trusts and boasts that he possesses great skill, prudence, power, favor, friendship, and honor has also a god, but not this true and only God…Therefore I repeat that the chief explanation of this point is that to have a god is to have something in which the heart entirely trusts. …Thus it is with all idolatry; for it consists not merely in erecting an image and worshiping it, but rather in the heart.

…Ask and examine your heart diligently, and you will find whether it cleaves to God alone or not. If you have a heart that can expect of Him nothing but what is good, especially in want and distress, and that, moreover, renounces and forsakes everything that is not God, then you have the only true God. If, on the contrary, it cleaves to anything else, of which it expects more good and help than of God, and does not take refuge in Him, but in adversity flees from Him, then you have an idol, another god."

(h/t to Mark Driscoll)