Written By Titus Kitchen

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome back to Tuesday Talks with Titus.  You guys let me know in the comments below if you want me to keep on saying that. I have been saying that for a long time.  And if you want me to change it up a little bit, let me know. And before I get into today's podcast, I do want to mention...

I just got back from a tech rehearsal, for fiddler on the roof,  and I may or may not have a little bit of stage makeup on my eye. I tried to clean it the best I could, but I wanted to let you know that's the only reason I have eyeliner. But today we're going to be talking about a little bit of a harder topic for us to swallow even as Christians.

So. The question that I'm gonna ask y'all to think about or yeah, mostly to think about who or what is keeping you from God? Before I say more, this episode is something that all Christians need to hear, not just the messed up ones, which is all of us anyway. So whatever your answer was just now, or even if you're still thinking about it, whatever takes place, whatever is keeping you from God, that is a little "g" god in your life.

That is the thing that you are choosing to worship.  And that's harsh, but it is true. So, it does sound bad to say that you're worshipping something other than the holy God who created you...doesn't it? Well, it does sound bad to say that you're worshipping anything else than the holy God who created you and bought you with his redeeming blood. 

But That's because if we have anything in place of God, it is wrong or, in other words, an "idol". It's not okay. And so today, we're talking about one of the bigger idols in our lives, and that's ourselves. When we focus on us it distorts our view. It changes things for us. It makes us different when we focus on ourselves rather than God.

So, as we get started, let's go back to the "Big Ten", the Ten Commandments, specifically the first one, "You shall have no other gods before me" (Exodus 20:3). Then, jumping to the New Testament, let's look at Matthew 23 verse 12.  "For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted." This verse is saying that when we think we are high and mighty, we'll be humbled. And that can be a really rude awakening. Like I said last episode, it's like a bucket of cold water when God says wake up and when we're humbled. 

It's gonna be a pretty good bucket of water. A pretty cold one, too. And so, when we have humility, we'll be exalted. So that's the thing. It's like  When we exalt ourselves, we're giving ourselves the praise. We are giving ourselves what God deserves. And when we focus on God, and when we give Him the praise, we will be exalted ourselves...but since God should get all of the praise when we are "exalted" we just reflect that back towards God because it if weren't for Him we wouldn't even be here.  

It is cool to think about being exalted as we're humbled, but make sure your heart's not in it just to be exalted. Because then you're still trying to be high and mighty. So, as some of you know, I just said a minute ago, I was in Fiddler on the Roof with Hometowne Arts Troupe. This post was written during tech week, and I'm recording it on the second day of tech week.

And so, it's pretty hectic right now, but I wanted to get the recording done because this is an important message. One of the lines that reminded me of what I was talking about today was the line that the character Hodl says to the character Perchik. , and by the way,  one of my friends who's in this musical with me does listen to my podcast sometimes.

So, hello, Lian.  But to get back on track...Her line was incredible to hear and it made me think of this entire episode. The line is after Perchik says that he's a good teacher, I'm a very good teacher, to Tevye, the main character's kids, but Hodl says, "I heard that the rabbi who must praise himself has a congregation of one."

That is a great example of being humbled. You know, that's one of the things all the girls there with me in that scene, I was  Motle tailor, but all the girls have to laugh at that. And what I do is just do an ooooh burn face, but not like an actual, you know, I can't say ooooh burn, 'cause that's not in the script.

But, I was just like, Ooh...and then, then once I started thinking about it, I was like, Oh, this really works for my podcast. So. The rabbi who must praise himself has a congregation of one. He's praising himself instead of praising God. So, when we think of ourselves more highly than others, it distracts us from God. It makes us focus on ourselves instead of on God.

And so I've seen what it does when people mix Christianity with idols, with self-idolization, with pride. So, I saw this post the other day, and I've seen it before... I'm gonna do air quotes on the word pastor because I do not believe a pastor who leads their flock into destruction...I do not believe that he can be truly called a good teacher. So I barely believe they deserve the name pastor. I looked up a couple of articles, And it was called. The Sparkle Creed, which is so, you know, I feel like that speaks for itself.

But here it is, and I want to specify because I don't want somebody to walk in right now and be like, Why is he reading that creed? He doesn't truly believe that, does he? I don't. But this is what the quote is. "I believe in the non-binary god.  whose pronouns are plural. I believe in Jesus Christ, their child, who wore a fabulous tunic and had two dads and saw everyone as a sibling child of God."

So, that's something that's really strange to see. And this is only part of this blasphemous creed. I have every right to call it blasphemous. I know some of you might think that's harsh. But that is blasphemy to call God a non-binary God. And to say that Jesus had two dads. He had a Heavenly Father and an earthly father.

That does not mean they were two dads. Nor does that mean they were married. So, that's not okay.  You don't want to read the rest of that stuff. Trust me. Just trust me. If you really want to look up the sparkle creed, it exists. But what happens? This is what happens when we focus on ourselves and our political agenda or our own personal beliefs.

And we let that mix in. We let that mix around with the so-called truth, and then it becomes what's not true. So when we mix Christianity, It makes me think of mixing yogurt, just some Greek yogurt, with mustard. It ruins it, and it's not good. It doesn't taste good, nor does it look good or sound good. So, mixing Christianity with self-idolization is a bad idea.

It looks bad, it tastes bad, and it will be bad. So, when we focus on our own political, personal, etc. beliefs, that's just gonna mess with our brain. We need to focus on what is right...not what we think is right.  We'll often focus on what we personally believe instead of looking at what the Bible says, which we should be doing as Christians in the first place.

It's like spraying your eyes with something that'll leave you blind or at best with blurred vision. It's like spraying your eyes with chlorine. Let's say chlorine or bleach. Spraying your eyes with bleach will leave you blind if you do not get medical care immediately. And it, it's gonna sound harsh, but it's stupid to spray bleach in your eye.

And I believe most of you would agree that that's stupid. Do you spray bleach into your eye and not immediately get medical attention? I mean, spraying it there in the first place is stupid. But not going to the hospital to get your eyes fixed is even more stupid. And so, what happens is it leaves you blind.

That is exactly what it's like when we are focusing on idols and our personal beliefs; instead of focusing on what God says, it blinds us. It makes us not want to look at the Bible, or at best makes us look at the Bible through our eyes instead of God's. It makes us want to focus on our own beliefs and it does not work. It does not look right. It leaves us blind.  It leaves us blind to things that are right in front of us. To that which is actually true.

The things that God has given to us. We live in a generation that tells us to do what makes us happy. I mean I live in a generation where there is a month celebrating pride. That, to me, that's not okay. I mean, I can't think that taking what God specifically tells us not to be...prideful and making it a whole month.

And I know, some people are like, well that's actually gay pride, LGBTQIA+ pride. But it's having pride about that. It's not just like I have pride in my country or my family. That's not the same thing with the LGBTQIA.+  So, Disney, Disney tells us to do what makes us happy. It tells us to follow our hearts and we'll look and feel great.

Remember, I did an episode on that, Follow Your Heart. But, listen, I have a problem with hearing "Do what your heart leads you to do". Cause your heart's stupid.  In fact, Jeremiah 17:9 says "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick; who can understand it?" Like I said in Follow Your Heart, Your heart is gonna lead you this way, and then it'll lead you that way. It'll just leave you lost. So, plenty of the things that we do, that we follow our heart for, It'll give us temporary pleasure...but when we exalt our ideas and thoughts above God's, it will ultimately leave us empty. 

Let me ask you a question. What will give you lasting joy? Joy is so much better than pleasure, may I add. What will give you lasting joy is giving up on the idea that we are number one and keeping our hearts and minds focused on Christ. He's done everything for us and we should be focused on Him and not anything else, let alone our ideas. 

As we move on, we're gonna go to Romans 1, 21 through 23. "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 the images made to look like mortal human beings, birds, animals, and reptiles."

Even now, people are people are worshipping sticks.  People can be worshipping sticks.  And you know what's worse, in my opinion? Worshipping yourself. So, we as humans gravitate toward things we like or the way we think, things that meet our worldly desires...Sinful desires, which is why we tend to turn away from God. And the thing we forget about sin is that it promises a moment of pleasure...but that's it!

It will give you a moment, a moment of pleasure. That's, but that's only temporary and you will feel sad after that. So, let me put it in this saying that I've heard all over. I looked it up on Google, and I could not find who originally said it. Many people have claimed to do so, we're just gonna say that it is a pretty long, long-going saying.

But, the saying goes, "Sin will take you further than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay." Ain't that the truth? I mean, beware of that. Listen, sin will always promise something and then once it lives up to that promise, it's got you.

You're stuck.  The part of this statement that I really want to change personally, and some might disagree with it, but I want to change the part that is, "Sin will cost you more than you want to pay." I want to change to, "Sin will cost you more than you can pay."  We can't pay for it, which is why we get the consequence of the death penalty in hell.

So, we're all headed for hell. I'm talking about eternal death, which the Bible describes as not only eternal separation from God, which in itself would be awful, to not have God at all, like even if you're not a Christian, God is still moving in your life, you just don't see it, and so when we go down to hell, God's gone. 

He's no longer there. He's not with you. You're eternally separated from him. And to make it even worse, hell is a place of literal torment. The Bible describes it as a lake of fire and gnashing of teeth and many, many other things that are terrible. There is going to be a punishment for all those sins and that punishment, that cost, is more than you can pay. 

But guess what? Instead of having us pay for the crimes we are guilty of, Jesus died in our place and defeated death. Idolatry, in any sense, tells you that there is a better way, an easier way, a more fun way, but idolatry kills us.  It makes us blind, even though we claim to see.

I forget where I was reading it, but there was a verse I was reading that said all that I was about to say. It makes us blind even though we claim to see. It makes us paralyzed, yet we can move. It makes us deaf, even though we can hear. It makes us lifeless, even if we look alive. It kills us, even though we're still living.

We can still wake up to what's right in front of us. All we have to do is put those idols aside. Most of the idols we worship are for our pleasure. Have you ever heard of the Death Scroll? I've heard of it a lot of times and I'm guilty of it personally. It's where you get stuck watching reel shorts or tiktoks and you don't know what's going on around you. You're just in an eternal scroll up, just scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. 

And then you realize it's midnight when you started scrolling at 10:00 AM. Not saying that that was a personal experience, but it could be for some of you. I like that being called a death scroll because it really is; you're just lifeless to this idol.  Your phone.

You're lifeless to it.  And so, let me just ask you this.  When was the last time you were that focused on God? That you didn't even care about what was going on around you? That you were reading the word and you were with God and totally lost track of time? Listen, I'm talking to myself, too. I haven't had that moment in a long time and I should.

I wish. I need to try. We all need to try a little harder to make God the priority instead of TikTok. Instead of Reels. Instead of Shorts. They're easy to get sucked into and I've watched too many of them.  But the better thing is to focus on God more than that. That would be incredible. Do you know how good that would be for your spiritual health?

I have heard studies that scrolling on TikTok, shorts, and reels can affect your actual brain. It can cause or contribute to depression and anxiety. It can cause those things just by being on your phone all day. But with God,  you'll flourish,  you'll become better, and you'll understand the world a little bit better.  So, I want to challenge you and me. 

To get in a "life scroll" quote unquote. I'm not talking about scrolling on your phone unless you're getting on the Bible app, in which case there's a life scroll for you. So get on a life scroll with God. Keep reading the Word.  I'm about to do my quiet time right after this before I go to bed.  Maybe if I'm not feeling tired, I should just turn over and find a couple of verses.

I need to read. Maybe you do too  So I challenge you to do that.  I want to thank you guys so much for listening, I also want to thank you guys so much for all the follows. I've been getting on Facebook and Instagram and all that. If you can, please subscribe to YouTube, please subscribe to whatever you haven't yet.

It really helps me. Leave a review, that also very much helps me. And...  If you would like to read the blog version of that, check out www.TuesdayTalksWithTitus.com.  Our next episode will come out pretty soon here. So, thank you guys so much for listening, and we will see you next time.

Goodbye!