The Gods of Olympus

When I was in high school, I took a Greek mythology class. There I learned about the magnificent gods of ancient Greece and the culture that bred that mythology. Ancient Greece was a hotbed of culture and thought, and for five centuries it led humanity in the highest state of intellectual and architectural genius.

But their society was also a hotbed of sexual perversion and vice that centered around the gratification and pleasure of man. The twin pillars of Greek society were self-culture and self-enjoyment, and these were, according to the Greeks, the chief aim of human life. The gods of Olympus reigned supreme in those days until their flawed, morally corrupt society came crashing down in the ruins and smoke and rubble of a ruined civilization.

But I submit to you, friends, that in the land today, the gods of Olympus still reign in the hearts of men. We have a culture today that centers around the happiness of man. Madison Avenue gears all its slick marketing efforts to sell goods and services that appeal to the self-indulgent, that pamper the proud, that dress the ego in designer clothes, and that fuel the libido of sinful men and women, hellbent on looking their most fashionable to every excess.

Yes, friends, the gods of Olympus didn't die with ancient Greece. They just moved into new territories where self-culture and self-enjoyment can reign supreme. The gods of Olympus proliferate in our universities.

The gods of Olympus rule over our judicial system. They reign in high places, enrolling the hearts and captains of industry. We place our politicians up on pedestals and bow to them as gods.

Not only do the gods of Olympus run the government of America today, the gods of Olympus have crept into our churches as we have traded them for the living God of the Bible. The modern church elevates man by preaching a man-centered gospel that centers around the happiness of man and uses methodologies that promote humanism in our churches. The gods of Olympus run our denominations.

The gods of Olympus run our churches like the Greek temples operated back then by pandering to man and introducing gods to meet the people's needs. The happiness of man is the main message in our churches today that Jesus is just a means to happiness and contentment. He is held up in our churches today like a glorified Buddha.

He can bring you peace, contentment, and happiness, but God has much to say about cultures that promote false gods and operate on their own glory. The Book of Romans aptly describes them professing themselves to be wise. They became fools and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man and to birds and to four-footed beasts and creeping things.

Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanliness through the lust of their own hearts to dishonor their own bodies between themselves who change the truth of God into a lie and worshiped and served the creatures more than the creator who was blessed forever. Amen. For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature and likewise also the men leaving the natural use of the woman burned in their lust one toward another men with men working that which is unseemly and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was meat and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient being filled with all unrighteousness fornication wickedness covetousness maliciousness full of envy murder debate deceit malignity whisperers backbiters haters of God despiteful proud bolsters inventors of evil things disobedient to parents without understanding covenant breakers without natural affection implacable unmerciful who know in the judgment of God that they which commit such things are worthy of death not only do the same but have pleasure in them that do them yes friends the gods of olympus haven't gone anywhere they are still among us running our sick society and ruining our sleep and churches they hover over us directing and wrecking the american family through hollywood entertainment and polluting our nation and poisoning the minds of our young people and we bow down to these false gods rather than worship and serve the living god of the bible