You are what you chase...

They went after false idols and became false... {2 Kings 17:15}

There's an old saying that goes, you are what you eat. Moms tend to throw that one out there when their kids prefer Twinkies over vegetables, thinking that somehow the prospect of being broccoli would be better than being golden, spongy, cream-filled goodness. {Clearly this argument didn't get my mom very far!}

But in today's Life Journal reading, when I read the middle of verse 15 and found the words above, it hit me that it's not only the things that we put inside of us that determine who we are, but also the things that we follow.

In the NIV translation, false is translated, worthless. The NASB calls it vanity. No matter how you stack it up, it's not good.

Even after being given strict and direct instructions from God Himself to worship and follow only Him, the Israelites still went off in the other direction, worshiping golden livestock, and every other god they could find from whatever rock they could dig it up under. They always seemed to want more.

How very much like the Israelites we still are today.

Sure, our idols may not resemble cattle, but we follow them nonetheless.

        Money.
        Stuff.
        Entertainment with—at best—questionable morality.
        More stuff.
        Mindless diversions.

And these things that we follow leave us much the same as the things themselves: greedy, empty, hollow, immoral. Not a life anyone would claim to aspire to. And greatly contrasting to the life James talks about in another of today's Life Journal readings...

But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. {James 3:17}

So, the question of the day is, who or what are you chasing after?