Day Four Of The 10th Annual End Of Summer Fast & Detox: What Have You Made an Idol Out Of?

Identifying What Has Taken God's Place In Your Heart

I won’t lie, today was my hardest day yet. Let me let you into my business.

I’m not eating from sunup to sundown, and yesterday at work, I accidentally bit into a burger. I immediately spit it out after the second bite. Since that happened before sundown, I felt so guilty that I didn’t eat when the sun went down, and I ended up dozing off.

Some mornings during this fast, I’ve been eating first thing in the morning, but today I had a very long night and ended up oversleeping. So I didn’t eat this morning either. I’m running off about four and a half hours of sleep, and honestly, I’ve been moody all day.

I found myself praying continuously. Today felt like a literal fight with my flesh.

There were moments when I told myself, “I’m just going to eat. God is going to have to forgive me.” I wanted to scroll because I had so much downtime, and scrolling is usually what I do when I want to escape.

Plus on days that feel overwhelming, I normally lay on my couch, do absolutely nothing, and watch TV. All of which I cannot do right now. That has made today extremely difficult.

I’m so grateful that God’s strength and covering have gotten me through. I won’t lie and say I wanted to, but I forced myself to sit down and read Genesis. As I was reading, I started thinking about idols.

Growing up, I remember hearing about the Ten Commandments, and one of the things that always stood out to me about Christianity was the conversation around idols.

For a long time, I thought idols were connected to witchcraft or literally worshiping another god. Exodus 20:3–5 says, “You must not have any other god but me. You must not make for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of anything in the heavens or on the earth or in the sea. You must not bow down to them or worship them…”

On the surface, I used to think, As long as I’m not physically bowing down to another god, I don’t have any idols. The older I got, the more I realized that idols aren’t just statues. An idol can be anything that takes first place in your heart and begins competing with God for the central role in your life.

As humans, we have the ability to make an idol out of almost anything, even good things.

Your dreams.

Your career.

Your accomplishments.

Your relationships.

Your desire to be married.

Your desire to have children.

Your appearance.

Your money.

Your plans.

Your pride and ego.

Social media.

Your phone.

Even something like ChatGPT.

Anything can become an idol when it starts receiving the attention, dependence, identity, or priority that belongs to God. This is why I want you to really explore your heart today.

What have you made an idol out of?

Genesis actually gives us an interesting picture of this.

In Genesis 31, Rachel takes her father’s household idols with her when she leaves. There was literally something she carried with her that represented another source of security or worship. While most of us aren’t carrying around physical idols today, we can still carry things in our hearts that we have placed too much trust in.

Sometimes the idol isn’t something we worship intentionally.

Sometimes it’s something we run to before we run to God.

That’s where I want you to go today.

What do you run to when you’re overwhelmed?

What do you run to when you’re lonely?

What do you run to when you’re disappointed?

What do you run to when you need validation?

Do you cling to relationships?

Do you immediately pick up your phone?

Do you scroll?

Do you shop?

Do you drink?

Do you turn to food?

Do you obsess over your career?

Do you try to control everything?

Do you run to your own plans instead of asking God what He wants?

I’ll speak from experience. I have made my plans an idol over God time and time again. I can get so focused on what I think my life should look like that I forget to ask God what He wants my life to look like.

Maybe that’s your idol too. Maybe it’s not that you don’t love God. Could it be that you’ve become more attached to your version of the plan than you are to trusting Him with the plan.

An idol is anything that begins competing with God for your heart, your attention, your dependence, or your obedience. So today, I want you to name yours.

If you truly feel like there is nothing taking God’s place in your life, ask Him to reveal it to you. Sometimes we don’t see our idols until God puts His finger on them. If you’re willing to be honest, He will show you.

Ask yourself, 

What things have I figured out on my own?

What parts of my life have I kept hidden from God?

What do I run to before I run to Him?

What am I afraid to lay down?

What am I struggling to surrender?

That last question is important, because sometimes the thing we have the hardest time giving to God is the very thing we have made too important.

What Is Distracting You?

For those of you who are detoxing with me, I also want you to take a look over your life.

Look over the last quarter.

Look over this year.

What has been your biggest distraction?

Is it how you thought your life was supposed to look by now?

Is it an activity that no longer serves you?

Is it social media?

Is it tv?

Is it constantly thinking about what’s next instead of being present where you are?

Is it dreaming about the life you want but never actually getting the ball rolling?

What is your biggest energy sucker? Right now, we’re detoxing and silencing the noise, but next week, the noise is going to be back.

The notifications will come back.

The responsibilities will come back.

The temptation to scroll will come back.

The distractions will come back.

If you haven’t been honest about what has been keeping you stuck, it’s going to be very difficult to move differently in this next season.

So today, I want you to write down three things that have been sucking your energy. I’m not going to tell you to go cold turkey on everything, because you’re human. Sometimes we start off strong, try to completely eliminate something, and eventually fall right back into the same trap.

Instead, create a plan. 

Maybe instead of watching hours of TV every day, you give yourself a two hour limit.

Maybe instead of scrolling social media every night, you put your phone away from your bed so you can actually get quality sleep.

Maybe you schedule time to rest instead of allowing rest to turn into procrastination.

I’ll be honest: I am a do nothing connoisseur. I love laying on my couch and doing absolutely nothing. And rather than pretending I’m going to completely remove that from my life, I’ve learned that I need to schedule it. If I know I have a day where I can rest and do nothing, then on the other days, I’m more motivated to actually get things done because I know my rest is coming.

I also spend way too much time scrolling on TikTok. So I had to set a timer on my phone for an hour a day because I can look up and realize I just wasted so much time scrolling.

That’s the point. I don’t want you to leave this fast and detox thinking you have to become a completely different person overnight. I want you to become more aware.

Think about the things you gave up during this fast and detox.

Did you realize how much you depended on them?

Did you realize how much time they were taking?

Did you realize how often you used them to escape?

If the things you gave up aren’t necessarily your biggest distractions, be honest about what is.

Then make a plan.vYou don’t have to change everything at once.

Sometimes getting better by 1% each day, one step at a time, creates more sustainable change than trying to completely reinvent yourself overnight.

Today isn’t just about identifying what you need to stop doing. It’s about identifying what has been taking up space that God wants back.

So take some time today.

Get quiet.

Ask God to search your heart.

And when He reveals something to you, don’t run from it.

Lay it down.

Give it back to Him.

Let Him have His rightful place in your life again.

Until we are willing to lay our idols down, they will continue competing for a place in our hearts that belongs to God. Sometimes the thing keeping you stuck isn’t that you don’t know where you’re going. It’s that you haven’t identified what you keep carrying with you.

Today’s Prayer

My God, I thank You. I thank You for revealing to us where our hearts have been and for showing us the places where we fall short. I ask that You would remove anything in our lives that has taken Your place. Take Your rightful place in our hearts and in our lives. If there is anything pulling our attention away from You, I pray that You would reveal it and give us the strength to release it. Continue to work in Your people. Search our hearts, and if there is anything in us that does not align with You, I pray that You would remove it. Thank You for being a loving Father who corrects us, teaches us, and continues to draw us closer to You.

In Jesus’ name, amen.

Worship song below.