“You are what you eat.” If that is true, what are we? What if we are the composite of everything we eat? Without question, our diet shapes our health and well-being. Cruciferous vegetables are replacing sugar. Surely this will make me more healthy.
The scriptures say more. “You are what you worship!” Psalm 115:8 and 135:18 both highlight this truth. If we make idols, we will become like those idols. Hosea captures this thought as the Lord addresses his people. When God first found Israel it was like finding grapes in the desert, like early fruit on the fig tree. Abraham started so well. What happened to his descendants? In violation of the first four commandments, they worshiped idols just as the nations around them did. At Peor, the Israelites chose to worship the gods of the Moabites. They yoked themselves to the Baal of Peor.
False gods never fail to fail. The Baal of Peor was a zero without the rim. The Israelites turned from the God who made them to a god somebody else made. When we worship empty, powerless, temporary idols like wealth, power, and pleasure, we become empty and powerless. But when we worship the living God, we come to life. If we are what we worship, what are we? When we worship God we find our identity in him. As we worship the crucified Christ, our lives take on a cruciform shape. To live is Christ, and to die is gain.
