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Warning #8 to the Church- Idolatry
AUTHOR: Ryle, J.C.
PUBLISHED ON: April 9, 2003
DOC SOURCE: CCN
PUBLISHED IN: Sermons

                                Preface

For more than a century, J. C. Ryle was best known for his plain and
lively writings on practical and spiritual themes.  His great aim in all
his ministry, was to encourage strong and serious Christian living.  But
Ryle was not naive in his understanding of how this should be done.  He
recognized that, as a pastor of the flock of God, he had a responsibility
to guard Christ’s sheep and to warn them whenever he saw approaching
dangers.  His penetrating comments are as wise and relevant today as they
were when he first wrote them.  His sermons and other writings have been
consistently recognized, and their usefulness and impact have continued
to the present day, even in the outdated English of the author’s own day. 

Why then should expositions already so successful and of such stature and
proven usefulness require adaptation, revision, rewrite or even editing?
The answer is obvious.  To increase its usefulness to today’s reader, the
language in which it was originally written needs updating.

Though his sermons have served other generations well, just as they came
from the pen of the author in the nineteenth century, they still could be
lost to present and future generations, simply because, to them, the
language is neither readily nor fully understandable.

My goal, however, has not been to reduce the original writing to the
vernacular of our day.  It is designed primarily for you who desire to
read and study comfortably and at ease in the language of our time.  Only
obviously archaic terminology and passages obscured by expressions not
totally familiar in our day have been revised.  However, neither Ryle’s
meaning nor intent have been tampered with.
                                                  Tony Capoccia

All Scripture references are taken from the HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL
VERSION (C) 1978 by the New York Bible Society, used by permission of
Zondervan Bible Publishers. 

                        Warning #8 to the Church

                                Idolatry
                                  by
                              J. C. Ryle
                              (1816-1900)

              “Flee from idolatry” (1 Corinthians 10:14) 

The text which heads this page may seem at first sight to be hardly
needed in our country.  In an age of education and intelligence like
this, we might almost fancy it is waste of time to tell us to “flee from
idolatry.”

I am bold to say that this is a great mistake.  I believe that we have
come to a time when the subject of idolatry demands a thorough and
searching investigation.  I believe that idolatry is near us, and about
us, and in the midst of us, to a very fearful extent.  The second
commandment, in one word, is in peril.  “The plague is begun.”
Without further preface, I propose in this paper to consider the
following four points:

I.  The definition of idolatry.  WHAT IS IT?

II.  The cause of idolatry.  WHERE DOES IT COME FROM?

III. The form idolatry assumes in the visible Church of Christ.
    WHERE IS IT?

IV.  The ultimate termination of idolatry.  WHAT WILL END IT?

I feel that the subject is encompassed with many difficulties.  Our lot
is cast in an age when truth is constantly in danger of being sacrificed
to “toleration,” “love,” and “peace,” falsely so-called.  Nevertheless, I
cannot forget, as a clergyman, that the Church has given little or no
warnings on the subject of idolatry; and, unless I am greatly mistaken,
truth about idolatry is, in the highest sense, truth for the times.

I. Let me, then, first of all supply a definition of idolatry.  Let me
show WHAT IT IS.

It is of the utmost importance that we should understand this.  Unless I
make this clear, I can do nothing with the subject.  Vagueness and
indistinctness prevail upon this point, as upon almost every other in
religion.  The Christian who would not be continually running aground in
his spiritual voyage, must have his channel well buoyed, and his mind
well stored with clear definitions.

I say then, that

      Idolatry is a worship in which the honor due to God in
      Trinity, and to Him only, is given to some of His creatures,
      or to some invention of His creatures.

It may vary.  It may assume different forms, according to the ignorance
or the knowledge–the civilization or the barbarism, of those who offer
it.  It may be grossly absurd and ludicrous, or it may closely border on
truth, and being most superficially defended.  But whether in the
adoration of the idol of Juggernaut, or in the adoration of the Pope in
St. Peter’s at Rome, the principle of idolatry is in reality the same. 
In either case the honor due to God is turned aside from Him, and
bestowed on that which is not God.  And whenever this is done, whether in
heathen temples or in professedly Christian Churches, there is an act of
idolatry. 

It is not necessary for a man formally to deny God and Christ, in order
to be an idolater.  Far from it.  Professed reverence for the God of the
Bible and actual idolatry, are perfectly compatible.  They have often
been done side by side, and they still do so.  The children of Israel
never thought of renouncing God when they persuaded Aaron to make the
golden calf.  “Here are your gods,” they said, “who brought you up out of
Egypt.”  And the feast in honor of the calf was kept as a “festival to
the LORD (Jehovah)” (Exodus 32:4, 5). 

Jeroboam, again, never pretended to ask the ten tribes to cast off their
allegiance to the God of David and Solomon.  When he set up the calves of
gold in Dan and Bethel, he only said, “It is too much for you to go up to
Jerusalem. Here are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt”
(1 Kings 12:28). 

In both instances, we should observe, the idol was not set up as a rival
to God, but under the pretense of being a help–a steppingstone to His
service.  But, in both instances, a great sin was committed.  The honor
due to God was given to a visible representation of Him.  The majesty of
Jehovah was offended.  The second commandment was broken.  There was, in
the eyes of God, a flagrant act of idolatry.

Let us mark this well.  It is high time to dismiss from our minds those
loose ideas about idolatry, which are common in this day.  We must not
think, as many do, that there are only two sorts of idolatry–the
spiritual idolatry of the man who loves his wife, or child, or money more
than God; and the open, gross idolatry of the man who bows down to an
image of wood, or metal, or stone, because he knows no better.  We may
rest assured that idolatry is a sin which occupies a far wider field than
this.  It is not merely a thing in pagan lands, that we may hear of and
pity at missionary meetings; nor yet is it a thing confined to our own
hearts, that we may confess before the mercy-seat upon our knees.  It is
a pestilence that walks in the Church of the Living Christ to a much
greater extent than many suppose.  It is an evil that, like the man of
sin, “that sets himself up in God’s temple, proclaiming himself to be
God” (2 Thessalonians 2:4). 

It is a sin that we all need to watch and pray against continually.  It
creeps into our religious worship unnoticed, and is upon us before we
are aware.  Those are tremendous words which Isaiah spoke to the faithful
Jew–not to the worshiper of Baal, remember, to the man who actually
came to the temple (Isaiah 66:3): “Whoever sacrifices a bull is like one
who kills a man, and whoever offers a lamb, like one who breaks a dog’s
neck; whoever makes a grain offering is like one who presents pig’s
blood, and whoever burns memorial incense, like one who worships an
idol.”

This is that sin which God has especially denounced in His Word.  One
commandment out of ten is devoted to the prohibition of it.  Not one of
all the ten contains such a solemn declaration of God’s character, and of
His judgments against the disobedient: “I, the LORD your God, am a
jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the
third and fourth generation of those who hate me” (Exodus 20:5).  Not
one, perhaps, of all the ten is so emphatically repeated and amplified,
and especially in the fourth chapter of the book of Deuteronomy.
This is the sin, of all others, to which the Jews seem to have been most
inclined before the destruction of Solomon’s temple.  What is the history
of Israel under their judges and kings but a sorrowful record of
repeated falling away into idolatry?  Again and again we read of “high
places” and “false gods.”  Again and again we read of captivities and
chastisements on account of idolatry.  Again and again we read of a
return to the old sin.  It seems as if the love of idols among the Jews
was naturally bone of their bone and flesh of their flesh.  The besetting
sin of the Old Testament Church, in one word, was idolatry.  In the face
of the most elaborate ceremonial ordinances that God ever gave to His
people, Israel was incessantly turning aside after idols, and worshipping
the work of men’s hands.

This is the sin, of all others, which has brought down the heaviest
judgments on the visible Church.  It brought on Israel the armies of
Egypt, Assyria, and Babylon.  It scattered the ten tribes, burned up
Jerusalem, and carried Judah and Benjamin into captivity.  It brought on
the Eastern Churches, in later days, the overwhelming flood of the
Saracenic invasion, and turned many a spiritual garden into a wilderness. 
The desolation which reigns where Cyprian and Augustine once preached,
the living death in which the Churches of Asia Minor and Syria are
buried, are all attributable to this sin.  All testify to the same great
truth which the Lord proclaims in Isaiah: “I will not give my glory to
another or my praise to idols” (Isaiah 42:8). 

Let us gather up these things in our minds, and ponder them well. 
Idolatry is a subject which, in every Church of Christ that would keep
herself pure, should be thoroughly examined, understood, and known.  It
is not for nothing that Paul lays down the stern command, “Flee from
idolatry.”

II.  Let me show, in the second place, the cause to which idolatry may be
traced.  WHERE DOES IT COME FROM?

To the man who takes an extravagant and exalted view of human intellect
and reason, idolatry may seem absurd.  He fancies it too irrational for
any but weak minds to be endangered by it.

To a mere superficial thinker about Christianity, the peril of idolatry
may seem very small.  Whatever commandments are broken, such a man will
tell us, professing Christians are not very likely to transgress the
second.

Now, both these persons betray a woeful ignorance of human nature.  They
do not see that there are secret roots of idolatry within us all.  The
prevalence of idolatry in all ages among the heathen must necessarily
puzzle the one–the warnings of Protestant ministers against idolatry in
the Church must necessarily appear uncalled for to the other.  Both are
alike blind to its cause.

The cause of all idolatry is the natural corruption of man’s heart.  That
great family disease, with which all the children of Adam are infected
from their birth, shows itself in this, as it does in a thousand other
ways.  Out of the same fountain from which “come evil thoughts, sexual
immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness,
envy, slander, arrogance and folly” (Mark 7:21, 22)–out of that same
fountain arise false views of God, and false views of the worship due to
Him, and, therefore, when the Apostle Paul tells the Galatians (Galatians
5:20) what are the “works of the flesh,” he places prominently among them
“idolatry.”

Man will have some kind of a religion.  God has not left Himself without
a witness in us all, fallen as we are.  Like old inscriptions hidden
under mounds of rubbish–like the almost-obliterated underwriting of
Palimpsest manuscripts,* even so there is a dim something engraven at the
bottom of man’s heart, however faint and half-erased–a something which
makes him feel he must have a religion and a worship of some kind.  The
proof of this is to be found in the history of voyages and travels in
every part of the globe.  The exceptions to the rule are so few, if
indeed there are any, that they only confirm its truth.  Man’s worship in
some dark corner of the earth may rise no higher than a vague fear of an
evil spirit, and a desire to appease him; but a worship of some kind
man will have.

[* “Palimpsest” is the name given to ancient parchment manuscripts which
have been twice written over, that is, the work of a comparatively modern
writer has been written over or across the work of an older writer. 
Before the invention of cheap paper, the practice of writing over an
old manuscript was not uncommon.  The object of the practice, of course,
was to save expense.  The misfortune was that the second writing was
often far less valuable that the first.]

But then comes in the effect of the fall.  Ignorance of God, carnal and
low conceptions of His nature and attributes, earthly and sensual notions
of the service which is acceptable to Him, all characterize the religion
of the natural man.  There is a craving in his mind after something he
can see, and feel, and touch.  He is eager to bring his God down to us
own crawling level.  He would make his religion a thing of sense and
sight.  He has no idea of the religion of heart, and faith, and spirit. 
In short, just as he is willing to live on God’s earth, until renewed by
grace, a fallen and degraded life, so he has no objection to worship
after a fashion, until renewed, by the Holy Spirit, it is always with a
fallen worship.  In one word, idolatry is a natural product of man’s
heart.  It is a weed, which like the uncultivated earth, the heart is
always ready to bring forth.

And now does it surprise us, when we read of the constantly recurring
idolatries of the Old Testament Church, of Peor, and Baal, and Moloch,
and Chemosh, and Ashtaroth–of high places and hill altars, and groves
and images–and this in the full light of the Mosaic ceremonial?  Let us
cease to be surprised.  It can be accounted for.  There is a cause.

Does it surprise us when we read in history how idolatry crept in by
degrees into the Church of Christ, how little by little it thrust out
Gospel truth, until, in Canterbury, men offered more at the shrine of
Thomas   Becket, than they did at the shrine of the Virgin Mary, and more
at the shrine of Virgin Mary, than at the shrine of Christ?  Let us cease
to be surprised.  It is all intelligible.  There is a cause.

Does it surprise us when we hear of men going over from Protestant
Churches to the Roman Catholic Church, in the present day?  Do we think
it impossible, and feel as if we ourselves could never forsake a pure
form of worship for one like that of the Roman Catholic Church?  Let us
cease to be surprised.  There is a solution for the problem.  There is a
cause.

That cause is nothing else but the corruption of man’s heart.  There is a
natural proneness and tendency in us all to give God a sensual, carnal
worship, and not that which is commanded in His Word.  We are ever ready,
by reason of our laziness and unbelief, to devise visible helps and
stepping-stones in our approaches to Him, and ultimately to give these
inventions of our own the honor due to Him.  In fact, idolatry is all
natural, downhill, easy, like the broad way.  Spiritual worship is all of
grace, all uphill, and all against the grain.  Any worship whatsoever is
more pleasing to the natural heart, than worshipping God in the way which
our Lord Christ describes, “in spirit and truth” (John 4:23).

I, for one, am not surprised at the quantity of idolatry existing, both
in the world and in the visible Church.  I believe it perfectly possible
that we may yet live to see far more of it than some have ever dreamed
of.  It would never surprise me if some mighty personal Antichrist were
to arise before the end–mighty in intellect, mighty in talents for
government, yes, and mighty, perhaps, in miraculous gifts too.  It would
never surprise me to see such an one as him setting up himself in
opposition to Christ, and forming an Agnostic conspiracy against the
Gospel.

I believe that many would rejoice to do him honor, who now glory in
saying, “We will not have this Christ to reign over us.”  I believe that
many would make a god of him, and reverence him as an incarnation of
truth, and concentrate their idea of hero-worship on his person.  I
advance it as a possibility, and no more.  But of this at least I am
certain, that no man is less safe from danger of idolatry than the man
who now sneers at every form of religion; and that from unbelief to
belief, from Atheism to the grossest idolatry, there is but a single
step.  Let us not think, that idolatry is an old-fashioned sin, into
which we are never likely to fall.  “So, if you think you are standing
firm, be careful that you don’t fall!”  We shall do well to look into our
own hearts: the seeds of idolatry are all there.  We should remember the
words of Paul, “Flee from idolatry.”

III.  Let me show, in the third place, the forms which idolatry has
assumed, and does assume in the visible Church.  WHERE IS IT?

I believe there never was a more baseless fabric than the theory which
obtains favor with many–that the promises of perpetuity and preservation
from apostasy, belong to the visible Church of Christ.  It is a theory
supported neither by Scripture nor by facts.  The Church against which
“the gates of Hades will not overcome,” is not the visible Church, but
the whole body of the elect, the company of true believers out of every
nation and people.  The greater part of the visible Church has frequently
maintained gross heresies.  The particular branches of it are never
secure against deadly error, both of faith and practice.  A departure
from the faith–a falling away–a leaving of first love in any branch of
the visible Church, need never surprise a careful reader of the New
Testament.

That idolatry would arise, seems to have been the expectation of the
Apostles, even before the canon of the New Testament was closed.  It is
remarkable to observe how Paul dwells on this subject in his Epistle to
the Corinthians.  If any Corinthian called a brother an idolater, with
such a man the members of the Church were not to even eat with
(1 Corinthians 5:11).  “Do not be idolaters, as some of them were”
(1 Corinthians 10:7).  He says again, in the text which heads this paper,
“My dear friends, flee from idolatry” (1 Corinthians 10:14).  When he
writes to the Colossians, he warns them against the “worshipping of
angels” (Colossians 2:18).  And John closes his first Epistle with the
solemn injunction, “Dear children, keep yourselves from idols” (1 John
5:21).  It is impossible not to feel that all these passages imply an
expectation that idolatry would soon arise, among professing Christians.

The last passage I will call attention to, is the conclusion of the ninth
chapter of Revelation.  We there read, at the twentieth verse: “The rest
of mankind that were not killed by these plagues still did not repent of
the work of their hands; they did not stop worshiping demons, and idols
of gold, silver, bronze, stone and wood–idols that cannot see or hear or
walk.”  Now, I am not going to offer any comment on the chapter in which
this verse occurs.  I know well there is a difference of opinion as to
the true interpretation of the plagues predicted in it.  I only venture
to assert, that it is the highest probability these plagues are to fall
upon the visible Church of Christ; and the highest improbability, that
John was here prophesying about the heathen, who never heard the Gospel. 
And this once conceded, the fact that idolatry is a predicted sin of the
visible Church, does seem most conclusively and forever established.

And now, if we turn from the Bible to facts, what do we see? I reply
unhesitatingly, that there is unmistakable proof that Scripture warnings
and predictions were not spoken without cause, and that idolatry has
actually arisen in the visible Church of Christ, and does still exist.

The rise and progress of the evil in former days, we shall find well
summed up in the sermon “Peril of Idolatry.”  To that I beg to refer
all Christians, reminding them once for all, how, even in the fourth
century, Jerome complains, “that the false doctrine of images have come
in, and passed to the Christians from the Gentiles;” and Eusebius says,
“We do see that images of Peter and Paul, and of our Savior Himself are
made, which I think to have been derived and kept indifferently by an
heathenish custom.”  There we may also read,

1. How Pontius Paulinus, Bishop of Nola, in the fifth century, caused the
walls of the temples to be painted with stories taken out of the Old
Testament; that the people beholding and considering these pictures might
the better abstain from too much excess in their lives.  But from
learning by painted stories, it came little by little to become idolatry.

2. How Gregory the first, Bishop of Rome, in the beginning of the seventh
century, allowed images in the churches.

3. How Irene, mother of Constantine the Sixth, in the eighth century,
assembled a Council at Nicaea, and procured a decree that images should
be put up in all the churches of Greece, and that honor and worship
should be given to the images.

And there we may read the conclusion with which the sermon winds up its
historical summary, “that the congregation and the clergy, learned and
unlearned, all ages, sorts, and degrees of men, women and children of
whole Christendom, have been at once drowned in abominable idolatry, of
all other vices most detested by God, and most damnable to man, and that
in the space of 800 years and more.”

This is a mournful account, but it is only too true.  There can be little
doubt the evil began even before the time just mentioned by the sermon
writer.  No man, I think, need wonder at the rise of idolatry in the
Early Church who considers calmly the excessive reverence which it paid,
from the very first, to the visible parts of religion.  I believe that no
impartial man can read the language used by nearly all the Fathers about
the Church, the bishops, the ministry, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, the
martyrs, the dead saints generally–no man can read it without being
struck with the wide difference between their language and the language
of Scripture on such subjects.  You seem at once to be in a new
atmosphere.  You feel that you are no longer treading on holy ground. 
You find that things which in the Bible are evidently of second-rate
importance, are here made of first-rate importance. 

You find the things of sense and sight exalted to a position in which
Paul, and Peter, and James, and John, speaking by the Holy Spirit, never
for a moment placed them.  It is not merely the weakness of uninspired
writings that you have to complain of; it is something worse; it is a new
system.  And what is the explanation of all this?  It is, in one word.
that you have got into a region where the malaria of idolatry has begun
to arise.  You perceive the first workings of the mystery of iniquity. 
You detect the buds of that huge system of idolatry which, as the sermon
describes, was afterwards formally acknowledged, and ultimately blossomed
in every part of Christendom.

But let us now turn from the past to the present.  Let us examine the
question which most concerns ourselves.  Let us consider in what form
idolatry presents itself to us as a sin of the visible Church of Christ
in our own time.

I find no difficulty in answering this question.  I feel no hesitation in
affirming that idolatry never yet assumed a more glaring form than it
does in the Roman Catholic Church in this present day.

And here I come to a subject on which it is hard to speak, because of the
times we live in.  But the whole truth ought to be spoken by ministers of
Christ, without respect of times and prejudices.  And I should not lie
down in peace, after writing on idolatry, if I did not declare my solemn
conviction that idolatry is one of the crying sins of which the Roman
Catholic Church is guilty.  I say this in all sadness.  I say it,
acknowledging fully that we have our faults in the Protestant Church; and
practically, perhaps, in some quarters, a little idolatry.  But from
formal, recognized, systematic idolatry, I believe we are almost entirely
free.  While, as for the Roman Catholic Church, if there is not in her
worship an enormous quantity of systematic, organized idolatry, I frankly
confess I do not know what idolatry is.

(a)  To my mind, it is idolatry to have images and pictures of saints in
churches, and to give them a reverence for which there is no warrant or
precedent in Scripture.  And if this be so, I say there is idolatry in
the Roman Catholic Church.

(b)  To my mind, it is idolatry to invoke the Virgin Mary and the saints
in glory, and to address them in language never addressed in Scripture
except to the Holy Trinity.  And if this be so, I say there is idolatry
in the Roman Catholic Church.

(c)  To my mind, it is idolatry to bow down to mere material things, and
attribute to them a power and sanctity far exceeding that attached to the
ark or altar of the Old Testament dispensation; and a power and sanctity,
too, for which there is not a speck of foundation in the Word of God. 
And if this be so, with the holy coat of Treves, and the wonderfully-
multiplied wood of the true cross, and a thousand other so-called relics
in my mind’s eye, I say there is idolatry in the Roman Catholic Church.

(d)  To my mind, it is idolatry to worship that which man’s hands have
made–to call it God, and adore it when lifted up before our eyes.  And
if this be so, with the notorious doctrine of transubstantiation, and 
the elevation of the host in my recollection, I say there is idolatry in
the Roman Catholic Church.

(e)  To my mind, it is idolatry to make ordained men mediators between
ourselves and God, robbing, as it were, our Lord Christ of His office,
and giving them an honor which even Apostles and angels in Scripture
flatly repudiate.  And if this be so, with the honor paid to Popes and
Priests before my eyes, I say there is idolatry in the Roman Catholic
Church.

I know well that language like this jars the minds of many.  Men love to
shut their eyes against evils which is disagreeable.  They will not see
things which involve unpleasant consequences.  That the Roman Catholic
Church is an erring church, they will acknowledge.  That she is
idolatrous, they will deny.

They tell us that the reverence which the Roman Catholic Church gives to
saints and images does not amount to idolatry.  They inform us that there
are distinctions between the worship of “latria” and “dulia,”* between a
mediation of redemption, and a mediation of intercession, which clear her
of the charge.  My answer is, that the Bible knows nothing of such
distinctions; and that, in the actual practice of the great bulk of Roman
Catholics, they have no existence at all.

[*”latria” and “dulia” are two Greek words, both meaning “worship or
service,” but the former being a much stronger word than the latter.
The Roman Catholic admits that the worship of “latria” may not be given
to saints, but maintain that “dulia” may be given.]

They tell us, that it is a mistake to suppose that Roman Catholics really
worship the images and pictures before which they perform acts of
adoration; that they only use them as helps to devotion, and in reality
look far beyond them.  My answer is, that many a heathen could say just
as much for his idolatry–that it is well-known, in former days, they did
say so–and that in Hindostan many idol-worshippers do say so at the
present day.  But the apology does not help.  The terms of the second
commandment are too stringent.  It prohibits “bowing down,” as well as
worshipping.  And the very anxiety which the Roman Catholic Church has
often displayed to exclude that second commandment from her catechisms,
is of itself a great fact which speaks volumes to a candid observer.

They tell us that we have no evidence for the assertions we make on this
subject; that we found our charges on the abuses which prevail among the
ignorant members of the Roman Catholic Church; and that it is absurd to
say that a Church containing so many wise and learned men, is guilty of
idolatry.  My answer is, that the devotional books in common use among
Roman Catholics supply us with unmistakable evidence.  Let any one
examine that well known book, “The Garden of the Soul,” if he doubts my
assertion, and read the language there addressed to the Virgin Mary.  Let
him remember that this language is addressed to a woman, who, though
highly favored, and the mother of our Lord, was yet one of our
fellow-sinners–to a woman, who actually confesses her need of a Savior
for herself.  She says, “My spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Luke
1:47).

Let him examine this language in the light of the New Testament, and then
let him tell us fairly, whether the charge of idolatry is not correctly
made.  But I answer, beside this, that we want no better evidence than
that which is supplied in the city of Rome itself.  What do men and women
do under the light of the Pope’s own countenance?  What is the religion
that prevails around St. Peter’s and under the walls of the Vatican? 
What is Romanism at Rome, unfettered, unshackled, and free to develop
itself in full perfection?  Let a man honestly answer these questions,
and I ask no more.  Let him read such a book as Seymour’s “Pilgrimage to
Rome,” or “Alford’s Letters,” and ask any visitor to Rome if the picture
is too highly colored.  Let him do this, I say, and I believe he cannot
avoid the conclusion, that Romanism in perfection is a gigantic system of
Church-worship, Sacrament-worship, Mary-worship, saint-worship,
image-worship, relic-worship, and priest-worship–that it is, in one
word, a huge organized idolatry.

I know how painful these things sound to many ears.  To me it is no
pleasure to dwell on the shortcomings of any who profess and call
themselves Christians.  I can truly say, that I have said what I have
said with pain and sorrow.

I draw a wide distinction between the accredited dogmas of the Roman
Catholic Church and the private opinions of many of her members.  I
believe and hope that many a Roman Catholic is in heart inconsistent with
his profession, and is better than the Church to which he belongs. I
believe that many a poor Italian at this day is worshipping with an
idolatrous worship, simply because he knows no better.  He has no Bible
to instruct him.  He has no faithful minister to teach him.  He has the
fear of the priest before his eyes, if he dares to think for himself.  He
has no money to enable him to get away from the bondage be lives under,
even if he feels a desire.  I remember all this, and I say that the
Italian eminently deserves our sympathy and compassion.  But all this
must not prevent my saying that the Roman Catholic Church is an
idolatrous Church.

I would not be faithful if I said less.  The Church of which I am a
minister has spoken out most strongly on the subject.  The sermon on
“Peril of Idolatry,” and the solemn protest in our own Church of England
writings, which denounces the adoration of the Sacramental bread and wine
as “idolatry to be abhorred of all faithful Christians,” are plain
evidence that I have said no more than the mind of my own Church.  And in
a day like this, when some are disposed to secede to the Roman Catholic
Church, and many are shutting their eyes to her real character, and
wanting us to be reunited to her, in a day like this, my own conscience
would rebuke me if I did not warn men plainly that the Roman Catholic
Church is an idolatrous Church, and that if they will join her they are
“joining themselves to idols.”

But I will not dwell any longer on this part of my subject.  The main
point I wish to impress on men’s minds is this–that idolatry has
decidedly manifested itself in the visible Church of Christ, and nowhere
so decidedly as in the Roman Catholic Church.

IV.  And now let me show, in the last place, the ultimate termination of
all idolatry.  WHAT WILL END IT?

I consider that man’s soul must be in an unhealthy state who does not
long for the time when idolatry shall be no more.  That heart can hardly
be right with God which can think of the millions who are sunk in
heathenism, or honor the false prophet Mahomet, or daily offer up prayers
to the Virgin Mary, and not cry, “O my God, when shall the end come of
these things?  How long, O Lord, how long?”

Here, as in other subjects, the sure word of prophecy comes in to our
aid.  The end of all idolatry shall one day come.  Its doom is fixed. 
Its overthrow is certain.  Whether in heathen temples, or in so-called
Christian Churches, idolatry shall be destroyed at the second coming of
our Lord Jesus Christ.

Then shall be fulfilled the prophecies:

“The idols will totally disappear” (Isaiah 2:18). 

“I will destroy your carved images and your sacred stones from among you;
you will no longer bow down to the work of your hands” (Micah 5:13).

“The LORD will be awesome to them when he destroys all the gods of the
land. The nations on every shore will worship him, every one in its own
land” (Zephaniah 2:11). 

“On that day, I will banish the names of the idols from the land, and
they will be remembered no more,” declares the LORD Almighty. I will
remove both the prophets and the spirit of impurity from the land”
(Zechariah 13:2). 

In a word the 97th Psalm will then receive its fulfillment: “The LORD
reigns, let the earth be glad; let the distant shores rejoice.  Clouds
and thick darkness surround him; righteousness and justice are the
foundation of his throne.  Fire goes before him and consumes his foes on
every side.  His lightning lights up the world; the earth sees and
trembles.  The mountains melt like wax before the LORD, before the Lord
of all the earth.  The heavens proclaim his righteousness, and all the
peoples see his glory.  All who worship images are put to shame, those
who boast in idols–worship him, all you gods!”

The second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ is that blessed hope which
should ever comfort the children of God under the present dispensation. 
It is the guiding star by which we must journey.  It is the one point on
which all our expectations should be concentrated.  “For in just a very
little while, ‘He who is coming will come and will not delay'” (Hebrews
10:37).  Our David shall no longer dwell in Adullam, followed by a
despised few, and rejected by the many.  He shall take to Himself His
great power, and reign, and cause every knee to bow before Him.

Till then our redemption is not perfectly enjoyed; as Paul tells the
Ephesians, “You were sealed for the day of redemption” (Ephesians 4:30).
Till then our salvation is not completed; as Peter says of Christians,
“who through faith are shielded by God’s power until the coming of the
salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time” (1 Peter 1:5). 
Till then our knowledge is still defective; as Paul tells the
Corinthians: “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we
shall see face to face.  Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even
as I am fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12).  In short, our best things
are yet to come.

But in the day of our Lord’s return every desire shall receive its
fulfillment.  We shall no more be pressed down and worn out with the
sense of constant failure, feebleness, and disappointment.  In His
presence we shall find there is a fullness of joy; and when we awake we
will be satisfied with seeing His likeness (Psalm 16:11; 17:15).

There are many abominations now in the visible Church, over which we can
only sigh and cry, like the faithful in Ezekiel’s day (Ezekiel 9:4).  We
cannot remove them.  The wheat and the weeds will grow together until the
harvest.  But a day comes when the Lord Jesus shall once more purify His
temple, and cast forth everything that defiles.  He shall do that work of
which the doing of Hezekiah and Josiah were a faint type long ago.  He
shall cast forth the images, and purge out idolatry in every shape.

Who is there now that longs for the conversion of the heathen world?  You
will not see it in its fullness until the Lord’s appearing.  Then, and
not till then, will that often misapplied text be fulfilled: “In that day
men will throw away to the rodents and bats their idols of silver and
idols of gold, which they made to worship” (Isaiah 2:20). 

Who is there now that longs for the redemption of Israel?  You will never
see it in its perfection till the Redeemer comes to Zion.  Idolatry in
the professing Church of Christ has been one of the mightiest stumbling
blocks in the Jew’s way.  When it begins to fall, the veil over the heart
of Israel shall begin to be taken away (Psalm 102:16).

Who is there now that longs for the fall of Antichrist, and the
purification of the Roman Catholic Church?  I believe that will never be
until the winding up of this dispensation.  That vast system of idolatry
may be consumed and wasted by the Spirit of the Lord’s mouth, but it
shall never be destroyed excepting by the brightness of His coming
(2 Thessalonians 2:8).

Who is there now that longs for a perfect Church–a Church in which there
shall not be the slightest taint of idolatry?  You must wait for the
Lord’s return.  Then, and not till then, shall we see a perfect Church–a
Church having neither spot nor wrinkle, nor any such thing (Ephesians
5:27)–a Church of which all the members shall be regenerate, and every
one a child of God.

If these things be so, men need not wonder that we urge on them the study
of prophecy, and that we charge them above all to grasp firmly the
glorious doctrine of Christ’s second appearing and kingdom.  This is the
“light shining in a dark place” to which we shall do well to take heed. 
Let others indulge their fancy if they will, with the vision of an
imaginary “Church of the future.”  Let the children of this world dream
of some “coming man,” who is to understand everything, and set everything
right.  They are only sowing to themselves bitter disappointment.  They
will awake to find their visions baseless and empty as a dream.  It is to
such as these that the Prophet’s words may be well applied: “But now, all
you who light fires and provide yourselves with flaming torches, go, walk
in the light of your fires and of the torches you have set ablaze.  This
is what you shall receive from my hand: You will lie down in torment”
(Isaiah 50:11).

But let your eyes look onward to the day of Christ’s second advent.  That
is the only day when every abuse shall be rectified, and every corruption
and source of sorrow completely purged away.  Waiting for that day, let
us each work on and serve our generation; not idle, as if nothing could
be done to check evil, but not disheartened because we see not yet all
things put under our Lord.  After all, the night is far spent, and the
day is at hand.  Let us wait, I say, on the Lord.

If these things be so, men need not wonder that we warn them to beware of
all leanings towards the Roman Catholic Church.  Surely, when the mind of
God about idolatry is so plainly revealed to us in His Word, it seems the
height of infatuation in anyone to join a Church so steeped in idolatries
as the Roman Catholic Church.  To enter into communion with her, when God
is saying, “Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her
sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues” (Revelation
18:4)–to seek her when the Lord is warning us to leave her–to become
her subjects when the Lord’s voice is crying, “Escape for your life, flee
from the wrath to come;” all this is mental blindness indeed, a blindness
like that of him, who, though forewarned, embarks in a sinking ship–a
blindness which would be almost incredible, if our own eyes did not see
examples of it continually.

We must all be on our guard.  We must take nothing for granted.  We must
not hastily suppose that we are too wise to be ensnared.  Those who
preach must cry aloud and spare not, and allow no false tenderness to
make them hold their peace about the heresies of the day.  Those who hear
must have the belt of truth buckled around their waist, and their minds
stored with clear prophetical views of the end to which all
idol-worshippers must come.  Let us all try to realize that the last days
of the world are upon us, and that the termination of all idolatry is
hurrying on.  Is this a time for a man to draw nearer to the Roman
Catholic Church?  Is it not rather a time to draw further back and stand
clear, lest we be involved in her downfall? 

Is this a time to whitewash Rome’s manifold corruptions, and refuse to
see the reality of her sins?  Surely we ought rather to be doubly jealous
of everything of a Romish tendency in religion–doubly careful that we do
not hint at any treason against our Lord Christ–and doubly ready to
protest against unscriptural worship of every description.  Once more,
then, I say, let us remember that the destruction of all idolatry is
certain, and remembering that, beware of the Roman Catholic Church.

The subject I now touch upon is of deep and pressing importance, and
demands the serious attention of all Protestant Churchmen.  It is vain to
deny that a large party of clergy and laity in the present day are moving
heaven and earth to reunite the Protestant Church with the idolatrous
Roman Catholic Church.  The publication of that monstrous book, Dr.
Pusey’s “Eirenicon” and the formation of a “Society for Promoting the
Union of Christendom,” are plain evidence of what I mean.

The existence of such a movement as this will not surprise any one who
has carefully watched the history of the Church during the last forty
years.  The tendency of Ritualism has been steadily towards Rome. 
Hundreds of men and women have fairly and honestly left our ranks, and
become Catholics.  But many hundreds more have stayed behind, and are yet
nominal Christians within our midst.  The pompous semi-Romish ceremonial
which has been introduced into many churches, has prepared men’s minds
for changes.  An extravagantly theatrical and idolatrous mode of
celebrating the Lord’s Supper has paved the way for transubstantiation. 
A regular process of unprotestantizing has been long and successfully at
work.  The poor old Church stands on an inclined plane.  Her very
existence, as a Protestant Church, is in peril.

I hold, for one, that this Roman Catholic movement ought to be steadily
and firmly resisted.  Notwithstanding the rank, the learning, and the
devotedness of some of its advocates, I regard it as a most mischievous,
soul-ruining and unscriptural movement.  To say that reunion with Rome
would be an insult to our martyred Reformers, is a very light thing, it
is far more than this: it would be a sin and an offense against God!
Rather than be reunited with the idolatrous Roman Catholic Church, I
would willingly see my own beloved Church perish and go to pieces. 
Rather than become Roman Catholic once more, she had better die!

Unity in the abstract is no doubt an excellent thing: but unity without
truth is useless.  Peace and uniformity are beautiful and valuable: but
peace without the Gospel–peace based on a common church government, and
not on a common faith–is a worthless peace, not deserving of the name. 
When Rome has repealed the decrees of Trent, and her additions to the
Creed–when Rome has recanted her false and unscriptural doctrines–when
Rome has formally renounced image-worship, Mary-worship, and
transubstantiation–then, and not till then, it will be time to talk of
reunion with her.  Till then there is a gulf between us which cannot be
honestly bridged.  Till then I call on all Christians to resist to the
death this idea of reunion with Rome.  Till then let our watchwords be
“No peace with the Roman Catholic Church!  No communion with idolaters!”

Jewell well says in his Apology, “We do not decline concord and peace
with men; but we will not continue in a state of war with God that we
might have peace with men!  If the Pope does indeed desire we should be
reconciled to him, he ought first to reconcile himself to God.”  This
witness is true!  Well would it be for the Church, if all her leaders had
been like Jewell!

I write these things with sorrow.  But the circumstances of the times
make it absolutely necessary to speak out.  To whatever quarter of the
horizon I turn, I see grave reason for alarm.  For the true Church of
Christ I have no fears at all.  But for the Established Protestant
Churches, I have very grave fears indeed.  The tide of events seems
running strongly against Protestantism and in favor of Rome.  It looks as
if God had a controversy with us, as a nation, and was about to punish us
for our sins.

I am no prophet.  I know not where we are drifting.  But at the rate we
are going, I think it quite within the verge of possibility that in a few
years the Protestant Church may be reunited to the Roman Catholic Church. 
Protestantism may be formally repudiated.  A Romish Archbishop may once
more preside over the former Protestant Churches.  Mass may be once more
said at Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s.  And one result will be that
all Bible-reading Christians must either leave the Established Protestant
Church, or else sanction idol-worship and become idolaters!  God grant we
may never come to this state of things!  But at the rate we are going, it
seems to me quite possible.

And now it only remains for me to conclude what I have been saying, by
mentioning some safeguards for the souls of all who read this paper.  We
live in a time when the Roman Catholic Church is walking amongst us with
renewed strength, and loudly boasting that she will soon win back the
ground that she has lost.  False doctrines of every kind are continually
set before us in the most subtle forms.  It cannot be thought
unseasonable if I offer some practical safeguards against idolatry.  What
it is, where it comes from, where it is, what will end it–all this we
have seen.  Let me point out how we may be safe from it, and I will say
no more.

(1)  Let us arm ourselves, then, for one thing, with a thorough knowledge
of the Word of God. 

Let us read our Bibles more diligently than ever, and become familiar
with every part of them.  Let the Word dwell in us richly.  Let us beware
of anything which would make us give less time, and less heart, to the
perusal of its sacred pages.  The Bible is the sword of the Spirit; let
it never be laid aside.  The Bible is the true lantern for a dark and
cloudy time; let us beware of traveling without its light.  I strongly
suspect, if we knew the secret history of the numerous secessions from
our Church to that of Rome, which we deplore–I strongly suspect that in
almost every case one of the most important steps in the downward road
would be found to have been a neglected Bible–more attention to forms,
sacraments, daily services, primitive Christianity, and so forth, and
diminished attention to the written Word of God.  The Bible is the King’s
highway.  If we once leave that for any side road, however beautiful, and
old, and frequented it may seem, we must never be surprised if we end
with worshipping images and relics, and going regularly to a
confessional.

(2)  Let us arm ourselves, in the second place, with a godly jealousy
about the least portion of the Gospel. 

Let us beware of sanctioning the slightest attempt to keep back any jot
or tittle of it, or to throw any part of it into the shade by exalting
subordinate matters in religion.  When Peter withdrew himself from eating
with the Gentiles, it seemed but a little thing; yet Paul tells the
Galatians, “I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the
wrong” (Galatians 2:11).  Let us count nothing little that concerns our
souls.  Let us be very particular whom we hear, where we go, and what we
do, in all the matters of our own particular worship.  We live in days
when great principles are involved in little acts, and things in
religion, which fifty years ago were utterly indifferent, are now by
circumstances rendered indifferent no longer.  Let us beware of tampering
with anything of a Romanizing tendency.  It is foolishness to play with
fire.  I believe that many of our perverts and seceders began with
thinking there could be no mighty harm in attaching a little more
importance to certain outward things than they once did.  But once
launched on the downward course, they went on from one thing to another. 
They provoked God, and He left them to themselves!  They were given over
to strong delusion, and allowed to believe a lie (2 Thessalonians 2:11). 
They tempted the devil, and he came to them!  They started with trifles,
as many foolishly call them.  They have ended with downright idolatry.

(3)  Let us arm ourselves, last of all, with clear, sound views of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and of the salvation that is in Him. 

He is the “image of the invisible God,” the “exact representation of His
being,” and the true preservative against all idolatry, when truly known. 
Let us build ourselves deep down on the strong foundation of His finished
work upon the cross.  Let us settle it firmly in our minds, that Christ
Jesus has done everything needful in order to present us without spot
before the throne of God, and that simple, childlike faith on our part is
the only thing required to give us an entire interest in the work of
Christ.  Let us not doubt that having this faith, we are completely
justified in the sight of God–will never be more justified if we live to
the age of Methuselah and do the works of the Apostle Paul–and can add
nothing to that complete justification by any acts, deeds, words,
performances, fastings, prayers, attendance on ordinances, or anything
else of our own.

(4)  Above all let us keep up continual communion with the person of the
Lord Jesus! 

Let us abide in Him daily, feed on Him daily, look to Him daily, lean on
Him daily, live upon Him daily, draw from His fullness daily.  Let us
realize this, and the idea of other mediators, other comforters, other
intercessors, will seem utterly absurd.  “What need is there?” we shall
reply: “I have Christ, and in Him I have all.  What have I to do with
idols?  I have Jesus in my heart, Jesus in the Bible, and Jesus in
heaven, and I want nothing more.”

Once let the Lord Christ have His rightful place in our hearts, and all
other things in our religion will soon fall into their right
places–Church, ministers, ordinances, all will go down, and take the
second place.

Except Christ sits as Priest and King upon the throne of our hearts, that
little kingdom within will be in perpetual confusion.  But only let Him
be “all in all” there, and all will be well, Before Him every idol, every
Dagon shall fall down.  CHRIST RIGHTLY KNOWN, CHRIST TRULY BELIEVED, AND
CHRIST HEARTILY LOVED, IS THE TRUE PRESERVATIVE AGAINST RITUALISM,
ROMANISM, AND EVERY FORM OF IDOLATRY.

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