Before I left for the World Race I was participating in a weekly bible study every Thursday. In that study we were going through the book of Exodus. I have heard that story many times growing up, seen it acted out in cartoon movies such as Prince of Egypt, and used in lessons about salvation all the time of how we are like the Isrealites being freed from slavery. Nearing the time for me to leave, we were really digging into how many times the Isrealites turned to their idols. How they took their gold jewelry and threw it in the fire to make an idol. After all the things God had already done for them, they still turned to these materialistic things to worship and to go to for things they needed. When we hear this story we think it’s so silly. How could they see God so easily and yet still turn their back on Him? How could they put their hope into gold? Studying Exodus during this study around impacted me in a much bigger way. I was very intrigued at the Isrealites and what it might have been like to be that deep into the temptation of idolatry.
Usually when lessons are given about idolatry they always ask, “now what materialistic items in your life do you make an idol?” Usually its our phones, or our televisions, sometimes our jobs, and maybe even food or family. Really anything can become an idol if you are putting it in a place to satisfy a need that you can only receive from the Lord. We all know the Lord gives us all things, so many things can easily become an idol.
Although I still believe this is a very good take-away from this lesson and regularly take a step back and see where you put any type of investment in your life. It ties in with what I referred to in my blog, “Radical Abandonment.” Seeing what things bring you comfort, love, peace, or happiness that you can truly only get from God. However, the Lord showed idolatry to me in a whole different way once I got to Nepal. I had never actually seen the act of idolatry in religions such as Buddhism. It was mind blowing to me how many rituals and routines there are to worship this pile of gold that they formed to look like some sort of creature or person. It was crazy how many gods there are, each for something different. Such as Sheva, the god of death and destruction.
On the first day once we got to where we were doing ministry for the month, we hiked up to where the temple for the god of fertility was. It was quite a hike up this mountain. But people went there every morning to pray for fertility in their families. We, however, went up to worship our God on the mountain at the foot of the entrance to the temple, declaring that it was the Lords’ place. We then went up into the temple where a woman was giving so many offerings and praying for so long. My squadmate Kyle asked me to join him in a prayer walk around where this woman was being led in prayer by the priest and making these offerings. I was so lost at what to think, how was I supposed to help these people? And of course it is nothing I do, but to remember that their hearts are in the Lords hands. The Lord told me that she just needs love, these people just need to see the love the Lord brings to us.
My heart soon started to break, for the woman I saw that day at the temple for fertility and every temple we went to after that. The woman wasn’t meaning to act in this sin, she just wanted a baby so badly and this is the way she knew to have one. We visited many temples while we were in Nepal. We simply went to the Lord in prayer as we walked and stepped into the authority we are gifted with, giving us confidence that things were being shifted in the spiritual realm as we walked. But watching the people, so determined to get to the temple daily to pray for something they were in dire need of and really they were getting further away from the One that would actually bring it to them.
Nepal was supposedly the birthplace of Buddha. While we were there the biggest holiday for Buddhism occurred. It seemed like literally everyone goes to the temple that day to pray. They make a festival out of it and people are up from before sunrise, into the next day, getting drunk, smoking marajuana, and standing in a line to have only a couple minutes in the temple. We evangalized on the busses going to the festival, knowing we could be beaten or even arrested for sharing the name of Jesus. The festival filled the highway! They closed it off for this festival and it was filled with people. We got off the bus and entered the sea of so many lost souls. That was a big lesson the Lord used to teach me that it truly is all in His power, I’m just allowing Him to guide me to be His hands and feet and to speak through me to the hearts that are ready to hear about Him.
Another major lesson the Lord taught me through visiting the temples was to be eternally grateful for the home and Christian environment I was born in. Any person can be born into a Buddhist or Muslim family. The religion is very generational, and I am so thankful I was taught the truth since I was born. I am also so thankful to have gotten to hear the testimonies of those we were working with that were raised in these religions and are now some of the most on fire people for the Lord. It really shows the importance of seeking your own faith and beliefs. Because religion is passed onto generation to generation, we are all chosen people to work for the Kingdom of God. I was chosen to be born and raised hearing about our Lord Jesus Christ and I must use that gift to reach those that are lost looking to other gods. Those who are tiring themselves everyday when really it’s already done for them. The people spin prayer wheels every day in the belief that their sins will be erased when they spin them as they pray to these gods. Jesus has done everything for us, all we have to do is simply accept Him into our lives and with that even more blessings follow. It is just such good news isn’t it?!
Here I am, I was raised in the church learning about this truth daily, and yet it took 21 years for it to truly be engrained in my head how blessed my life truly is. The protection the Lord has laid over His daughter. And how simple the Lord makes it for us to be saved and blessed beyond all measure!
