Anyone who has read the Old Testament knows just how poorly the Jews typically acted when it came to the idolatry of serving other gods of the nations around them. So, does the New Testament, including Jesus, still condemn idolatry today? It seems like that should be a silly question. And yet many Christians seem to either selectively or completely ignore what the Bible says along these lines.

Here’s a question for you. Would you or your church be shocked or tolerant if a high official representative of another religion, say Buddhism, or the Church of Satan, among many other possibilities, was invited to a council of leaders in your church to preside over the meeting, impose concepts that weren’t in the Bible to be imposed on your confession, and to ratify your church’s decisions on doctrine? For most Christians the answer would be a resounding no.

And yet, what I want to expose here is that is exactly what happened when early Christian Bishops allowed the pagan emperor Constantine to preside over the Council of Nicaea and ratify their decisions with imperial decrees and edicts to be obeyed on pain of death.

I realize these days that a lot of folks are hesitant to get into deep theological discussions on matters of doctrine. The most popular message today seems to be relationship over religion. That is not a bad goal. However, often enough that seems to imply pushing sound doctrine to the back burner if not off the table completely and certainly makes holding out to right doctrine, “suspect”. Like most falsehoods, there’s a kernel of truth about that attitude. God is extremely graceful to us in this walk and if He were to expect every one of us to have a perfect understanding of every truth and teaching, we’d all be in a world of hurt if not totally lost. Even so, the biblical fact remains, that there are false doctrines out there that are considered heretical and even idolatrous in the Bible. Furthermore, there are sincere pleadings from Jesus Himself, the one we most need a relationship with, for us to not tolerate idolatry in our midst. For example…

“¹⁴But I have a few things against you, because you have there some who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to throw a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality. ¹⁵So also you likewise have some who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. ¹⁶Repent therefore, or else I am coming to you quickly and I will make war against them with the sword of my mouth” (Revelation 2:14-16)

Let’s take a look at that story in the Old Testament. Take note of these four names in this passage, Balak, Balaam (which Jesus referred to above), and Moab and Baal…

“³⁶When Balak heard that Balaam had come, he went out to meet him to the City of Moab… ⁴¹In the morning, Balak took Balaam, and brought him up into the high places of Baal…” (Numbers 22:36, 41).

So, Balak had wanted Balaam to curse Israel because of what Israel had done to the Amorites (see Numbers 21:21-25). And he was thus concerned that the same would happen to his country. So, he wanted Balaam, a non-Jewish prophet, to curse God’s people…

“Balak said to him, ‘Please come with me to another place, where you may see them. You shall see just part of them, and shall not see them all. Curse them from there for me’” (Numbers 23:13).

But Balaam wouldn’t curse Israel because God had told Balaam that they were a blessed people.

It is in this context that God told Balaam…

“God is not a man, that he should lie, nor a son of man, that he should repent. Has he said, and he won’t do it? Or has he spoken, and he won’t make it good?” (Numbers 23:19).

God wasn’t going to change His mind and allow Balaam to curse Israel after He, God, had already blessed him (Israel). But things changed radically after Balaam left. In chapter 25 we are told that…

“¹…the people began to play the prostitute with the daughters of Moab; ²for they called the people to the sacrifices of their gods. The people ate and bowed down to their gods. ³Israel joined himself to Baal Peor, and Yahweh’s anger burned against Israel” (Numbers 25:1-3).

Baal (Hebrews #1167) means “owner, husband, lord”. So, in a manner of speaking, Rev. 2 is saying these false prophets seduce the saints to serve another lord and husband. And that is what happened when the Early Christian Trinitarian Designers (ECTD’s) brought Constantine, an unbaptized, pagan emperor, in to “preside”, or lord over, their councils and impose an unbiblical man-made definition of God upon them and their confession.

This passage is what Jesus referred to when he said, “Balaam…taught Balak to throw a stumbling block before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit sexual immorality.” And it is this type of an act of idolatry that Jesus warned us we must not repeat…or else!

“¹⁵So also you likewise have some who hold to the teaching of the Nicolaitans. ¹⁶Repent therefore, or else I am coming to you quickly and I will make war against them with the sword of my mouth” (Revelation 2:15-16).

Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 10:11 that stories such as this were “written for our admonition, on whom the ends of the ages have come” because “these things were our examples, to the intent we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted. Don’t be idolaters, as some of them were. As it is written…” (1 Corinthians 10:6-7).

Jesus repeated his warning to those who allow false teachers and prophets in their midst to commit sexual immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols by using another example from the Old Testament…

“¹⁹I know your works, your love, faith, service, patient endurance, and that your last works are more than the first. ²⁰But I have this against you, that you tolerate your woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. She teaches and seduces my servants to commit sexual immorality and to eat things sacrificed to idols. ²¹I gave her time to repent, but she refuses to repent of her sexual immorality. ²²Behold, I will throw her and those who commit adultery with her into a bed of great oppression, unless they repent of her works” (Revelation 2:19-22).

Now, I have some sincere and sobering questions for you dear friends out there who want us to believe we should all get along for the sake of reaching the lost as if doctrine isn’t very important. How is it that Jesus could be against someone, even though he knew their love and their faith, if those were the only things he requires? Why didn’t Jesus say, like a lot of preachers and Christians do today, that “love covers a multitude of sins, so it is good that you overlook other people’s shortcomings”? Does what Jesus did say sound to you like Jesus is telling us that we will be excused if we ignorantly or intentionally harbor immoral teachings or those who teach such, for the sake of love and unity?

The book of Revelation is a highly symbolic writing. When these verses say, “sexual immorality”, the spiritual meaning is spiritual harlotry. Let me explain it like this. The Bible tells us that if we have a “relationship with Jesus”, that means we are espoused to Christ (2 Cor. 11:2). Most Christians are familiar with this verse, and the concept, which is also spelled out in Ephesians 5:24-32. Naturally speaking, if you are a woman who claims to have an exclusive marriage, that means, for one, you don’t sleep around with other men, and the same goes for husbands. Spiritually that means, as Christians, we don’t “get in bed with” the gods from other religions. Jesus is the way, the truth, the life, and the only way to the Father. So, if you go messing around with other gods, the Bible calls that spiritual harlotry. So, if you have a relationship with Jesus, and you also go along with other gods, you’ve basically broken the marital covenant you made with Jesus when you became espoused to him.

And if you look closely at what Jesus said in Revelation 2:14 & 20, he isn’t only addressing the ones who are doing or teaching the idolatry, but the ones who tolerate it in their midst as well. Paul spelled out that concept in 1 Corinthians 5. So, if you aren’t familiar with that passage, please find some time to read it before going on. This means, some discernment is necessary on our parts, and also some exclusivity to Christ and his word, if we want to remain, as a body of believers, chaste virgins for Christ. And that requires not just a relationship but keeping the doctrines of other religions out of our relationship with him. Otherwise, the relationship we would be promoting would be like an “open marriage,” which is “a relationship,” it just isn’t a committed and monogamous “marriage” at all.

Having said that, in the next part, I want to address the Trinity doctrine, and how it and its development entirely fits Jesus’ warnings to not go whoring with other gods. And I am going to begin by clearly exposing where the Trinitarian confession, “one substance, three persons” comes from.

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