Hindrance, Not an Aid to Faith

NOW, of course, I hear objection made constantly to this sort of reasoning by people who say that pictures, images, icons and all the rest, are an aid to our faith. They help us to visualize what God has already said in His Word. This, beloved, will not, we personally believe, stand the test of Scripture. If God had wanted it thus, and if these things were such a great and necessary aid to faith, He certainly would not have waited centuries and centuries before He permitted man to discover them. It is our firm, personal opinion that God wants us to believe His Word without any other evidence or aid, and that all these so-called aids to faith are rather hindrances and a clever ruse of Satan to draw us away from the Word of the living God.

That is why we preach, that is why we broadcast and teach the Word of God, instead of touring the country presenting religious entertainments and sanctified vaudeville. It is with gravest concern that we view the rapidly increasing tendency to crowd the teaching and the preaching of the Word of God more and more into the background in our services and relegate it to a subordinate and unimportant place in many of our meetings. Instead of the Word being the all-important thing, the tendency is to limit it to a brief sermonette, often superficial, shallow and frothy, while most of the time in the service is given over to interminable, wearisome preliminaries, non-essentials and often mere entertainment. The result can be nothing else than a coming generation of frivolous, shallow, superficial Christians who will fall before the first onslaught of the enemy because they do not have the foundation of the Word under their feet. Lot walked by sight, not by faith. We fear the days of Sodom are being repeated with all the appeal to the eye, accompanied by neglect of the Word of God. It is not in vain that the Lord has said:

“Likewise as it was also in the days of Lot . . . Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed.” – Luke 17:28, 30.

Now, the question arises; What are we going to do about it? Listen, beloved, if you share our fears and our misgivings in this matter, you can do one thing: voice your vehement disapproval and insist on more of the Word of God and less of the appeal to the flesh in your own church and in your own services. You can carefully supervise the things which your children are allowed to see and look at in the home. It can be done if you start early enough and have courage to be firm enough. You can pray for a revival of interest in the Word of God and the teaching of the Word of God among believers.

Adapted and modified excerpts from Studies in the Life of Abraham by M. R. De Haan (1891-1964)
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the New King James Version®, NKJV Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.