Nigeria

I read an article yesterday about Pentecostal Christians smashing family idols. Some of these idols are hundreds and even thousands of years old. They hold cultural and historical signifigance and the government is upset. They are upset enough to start fining people that are destroying these idols.

Why are these Christians making news? For years Muslims destroyed these idols and without making the AP or Reuters wire. Why were the Muslims destroying the idols? It is because they unequivocally believe in one God and that they must destroy anything that is an idol.
Unfortunately, many colonial attempts at Christianity were founded not on the uncompromising truth of the Christian God, but on syncretism and over eager "missionaries" who sought easy conversion vs. true Christianity.

Now we have these Christians finally standing up and doing like Gideon did and destroying family idols. The government stated that the people could not separate themselves from their past, but I know that Jesus preached, "He whom the Son sets free is free indeed." So even though we cannot rewrite our history, we can separate ourselves spiritually.

The act of destroying these idols is then an outpouring of Christian belief. If taking to the extreme conclusion we can justify the destruction of things like the Buddha statue in Afghanistan. I am decidedly on the side of these Christians. They own the idols and are destroying something that they own because they feel it is a spiritual neccesity.

This is a sensitive subject because it could end in a dark age of ancient religious art which helps us see how religious subjects are depicted throughout history. The key is personal discretion. God gave us free will, but he also put us under authority.

Your thoughts...