{"id":556,"date":"2013-05-24T10:26:59","date_gmt":"2013-05-24T16:26:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/?p=556"},"modified":"2013-05-24T10:26:59","modified_gmt":"2013-05-24T16:26:59","slug":"root-of-bitterness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/2013\/05\/24\/root-of-bitterness\/","title":{"rendered":"Root of Bitterness"},"content":{"rendered":"

Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Beware lest there be among you a root bearing poisonous and bitter fruit, one who, when he hears the words of this sworn covenant, blesses himself in his heart, saying, \u2018I shall be safe, though I walk in the stubbornness of my heart.\u2019 This will lead to the sweeping away of moist and dry alike. (Deuteronomy 29:18<\/a>\u201319, ESV)<\/p>\n

Idolatry is bitter, and bears poisonous fruit like wormwood. It is \u201ca root of bitterness\u201d we get when we turn away from the covenant and \u201cwalk in the stubbornness of my heart.\u201d When we turn away from His Law, we turn from justice or the fruit of righteousness to bitter wormwood and cast down righteousness to the earth (Amos 5:7, 6:12<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Idolatry is \u201ccheating\u201d on God. We cheat Him with less than whole-hearted commitment. In public, we might claim to be like loyal spouses and do what God says. But when we ignore His Word it\u2019s just like cheating on a spouse. Any thought or action that doesn\u2019t match His Word is idolatry. Or adultery.<\/p>\n

We might comfort ourselves that we are not idolaters because we don\u2019t have a statue in the living room (let\u2019s overlook the crucifix, Christmas tree, Easter eggs and bunnies for now). But idolatry is not limited to actual images. Paul says that covetousness is idolatry (Ephesians 5:5<\/a>). God says the Chaldeans worship their own might (Habakkuk 1:11<\/a>) and Jesus says that Mammon or money (Luke 16:13<\/a>) is a god. And don\u2019t even get me started on American Idol. If we reject His ways and go our own way, even in the smallest thing, it\u2019s idolatry.<\/p>\n

From the book Whole Bible Christianity<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Beware lest there be among you a man or woman or clan or tribe whose heart is turning away today from the LORD our God to go and serve the gods of those nations. Beware lest there be among you … read more<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=556"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":559,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/556\/revisions\/559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wholebible.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}