For my wife’s birthday last week, I bought a shirt for her online. She likes it, but called me earlier today to let me know she was going to exchange it because it’s too big.

Exchanging a shirt isn’t a big deal. Some exchanges are though. Here’s how Paul put it in Romans 1:18-25…

The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.

Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

Paul starts out telling us that creation clearly reveals a Creator, but we suppress that truth. We prefer to do our own thing and go our own way rather than submit to the One who created us for Himself. Doing our own thing and going our own way is the essence of sin.

Because God has made Himself plain to us, Paul tells us that we are without excuse. No one will ever have the right to stand before God and say, “I didn’t know.”

The truth is that we did know, but chose to suppress it.

Suppressing the truth leads to futile thinking and foolish, darkened hearts. And this condition leads us to the first exchange:

We exchange the glory of God for images or idols.

You and I were designed to worship and serve. And we get to choose who will be the object of that worship and service. We can choose God or someone or something else. If we don’t choose God, then whatever else we choose becomes our god or idol.

Because God gives us the choice, He also allows us to experience the consequences of our choice. Paul explains that God gives us over to our sinful desires. This leads to another exchange:

We exchange the truth of God for a lie.

We then worship and serve created things rather than the Creator Himself.

Let’s look at how this plays out in our lives.

We choose to not submit to God. We have our own plans, goals and desires that come first. And so we set out living life on our terms. We may even attend church and pick up our Bible now and then, but we have no real intention of surrendering ourselves to God, so that we worship and serve Him only.

But remember–we are designed to worship and serve. Our hearts need an object to be devoted to.

Maybe it’s a result of how we were raised or friends we had in high school or books we read in college, but we find ourselves desiring something. Again, it could be a person, a thing, a feeling. Whatever. Maybe it’s money.

And so money becomes our god, our idol.

That might lead to not giving generously or even worse–being stingy. Why? Because we need our money. To give it away is to give away all it can do for us. Why would we want to give away our god, the thing that makes us feel powerful or happy or secure?

There’s a problem though. We find that we don’t ever have quite enough money because it really can’t deliver all those things it promises. And so we work longer and harder to earn more of it. When our home or 401k loses value, we worry and become anxious.

Keep in mind, we’ve exchanged the truth of God for a lie. Only God can provide true security and happiness. Money can’t, but when money is our idol–we listen to its lies. Money tells us that with enough of it in the bank, we can feel secure. Money tells us that we’ll be happy if we have new jeans, a better television or a newer car.

Maybe money isn’t your idol, but sex is. The sex idol lies by telling us that pornography will make us feel good or that sex with someone we’re not married to will be thrilling. Idols fail to mention the guilt and shame that follow.

A couple days ago, I saw this ad for a Las Vegas hotel in Delta Airlines magazine and snapped a picture with my phone:

The caption at the bottom reads, “Just the right amount of wrong.”

That’s the lie many of our idols whisper.

“Just a little won’t hurt.”

“It’s okay, no one will know.”

“Try it just this once.”

Most of us would recognize a blatant lie. It’s the subtle ones that get us.

Maybe for you it’s not money or sex, but idols come in many shapes and sizes. Shopping. Food. Alcohol. Drugs. Status. Technology. A spouse. A child. A sports team. Our looks. Our reputation.

An idol can be anything. They’re easy to identify. What can you not stop? What could you not do without? What occupies much of your thoughts?

If you can’t stop overeating–food is your idol. You go to it to celebrate when you feel good. You go to it to be comforted when you feel down or stressed. It’s your god and it lies by telling you it can provide the joy, peace and comfort you desire.

Simply trying to eat less or drink less or shop less is not the answer. Those things are symptoms.

Years ago, I owned a personal training gym that was located in a strip mall. Right next door was an office for Alcoholic’s Anonymous. You could always tell when they were having a meeting because you’d smell the cigarette smoke. I’m sure the AA program was helping them avoid alcohol, but many of them had simply exchanged the alcohol idol for a cigarette idol. You’ve probably heard of someone who quit smoking, but gained a lot of weight. They exchanged their cigarette idol for a food idol.

The answer isn’t to simply stop bad behaviors, although it’s certainly good to not smoke or drink too much. What we really need to do is address the heart issue. We need to turn from our idol and turn back to God. The Bible calls that repentance.

We need to worship and serve the one true God, not our idols. Until we address that core issue, we will struggle with wrong behaviors and addictions.

Let’s call our idols what they are: liars. Let’s turn away from them and submit ourselves to God.

Is it easy? No. Idols can have a strong hold on us. Lurking behind everyone of our idols is our enemy, Satan. His desire for you is found in John 10:10…

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy…”

Satan is a thief that has come to steal from you, kill you and/or destroy you. And he doesn’t care which idol we choose to worship and serve in that process, as long as we don’t recognize the truth and submit to God.

God’s desire for us is found in the second part of that verse when Jesus says, “I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.”

We experience a full life when we choose to turn away from our idols and worship and serve God. Until we do that, we will live in bondage to our idols, believing their lies that a full life can be found in created things, not the Creator.