Smashing Idols on the Factory floor of the Heart
Teaching our children to recognize and reject idols before they take root in their hearts.
Growing up, I loved soccer. You could say I was obsessed. My day, my mood, even my sense of identity would rise and fall depending on how my favorite team played. I remember it annoying my parents, but I didn’t think it was that big of a deal until one day in my early twenties, when my team lost the World Cup final.
I, a grown man, crumbled to the ground in tears.
My wife, who was just my girlfriend at the time, thought it would be a good moment to mess with me. She gently picked me up off the floor for an embrace, which I accepted… until I noticed she was wearing the opposite team’s jersey. So I pushed her away. Yes, I really did that. That was the moment I realized soccer had become more than a hobby. It had become an idol.
It’s been almost twenty years since then, and thankfully, things have changed.
Just this past week, my team lost another important game. But this time, I noticed something different. I had a choice. Would I let the result ruin my day, or could I choose joy regardless of the outcome? In that moment, I looked over and saw my son getting upset while watching the same game. That’s when it hit me. This was a moment to help him learn how to smash idols while they are still on the factory floor.
John Calvin famously said, “Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.” In other words, our hearts are always looking for something to worship, something to cling to as ultimate. And it’s usually not God. It can be sports, money, sex, career, popularity, and sometimes even really good things like our kids, our reputation, or our work in ministry.
Tim Keller puts it like this:
“The human heart takes good things like a successful career, love, material possessions, even family, and turns them into ultimate things. Our hearts deify them as the center of our lives, because we think they can give us significance and security, safety and fulfillment, if we attain them.”
That’s the problem. But what’s the solution? How do we actually smash those idols before they take root? And just as importantly, how do we help our children smash the idols trying to take root in their own little hearts?
1. Identify the False God Behind the Good Gift
To explain this, I want to borrow an illustration from Paul Tripp. In his book Marriage, he talks about weeds in a lawn to describe the Christian life. I’ve used this illustration with my own kids when we’ve talked about idols, and it really helped.
At our house, we get weeds in the yard all the time. After helping me pull them a few times, my kids quickly learned it’s easier to pull a weed with short roots than one that’s been growing for a while. It’s the same with idols. The sooner we recognize them, the easier they are to uproot.
So as parents, it’s important we help our children identify the things they may be tempted to idolize. For my son, it’s sports and video games. For my daughter, it’s her grades. These things aren’t bad, but they can quickly become too important.
And we should remind our kids, and ourselves, that idols are often good things we’ve made into ultimate things. That’s why it helps to ask simple but honest questions like:
What do I fear losing most?
What do I run to for comfort or meaning?
These kinds of questions help us, and our kids, spot what’s quietly replacing God as our source of joy and security. Naming the idol is the first step to tearing it down.
2. Replace the Idol with a Greater Love
Tripp’s illustration doesn’t end with pulling weeds. He also talks about planting good seeds. And the same principle applies here. We don’t overcome idols through sheer willpower. We overcome them with worship.
We need to help our kids learn to fix their eyes on Jesus. The goal isn’t just to take something away. It’s to replace it with someone better. We want their hearts to be more captivated by the beauty, sufficiency, and love of Christ than by whatever idol is pulling at them.
Keller says it well:
“Jesus must become more beautiful to your imagination than your idol.”
That means we need to talk about Jesus often. Point our kids to Him in everyday life. Help them see how He satisfies in ways their grades, sports, or friendships never truly can.
3. Practice Rhythms that Reorder Your Loves
Spiritual disciplines aren’t just things we check off a list. They are how God reshapes what we love.
Daily Scripture, prayer, Sabbath rest, and being part of a gospel-centered community are rhythms that slowly but powerfully reorder our hearts. They help us love God more and trust our idols less.
So what kind of seeds can we plant when we are pulling out idols? One simple step we’ve tried as a family is reading passages that show us who Jesus is. Passages like John 10, Colossians 1, or Hebrews 1.
And then we ask questions like:
What about Jesus in this passage is better than what my idol promises me?
Sometimes the conversation is short. Sometimes it’s deeper. But the habit matters. It plants something good in the soil of their hearts, and mine too.
Idols will always be looking for a place to grow. But by God’s grace, we can recognize them early, replace them with a greater love, and build rhythms that point our hearts, and our children’s hearts, back to Jesus.
References
Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion, Book 1, Chapter 11, Section 8.
“Man’s nature, so to speak, is a perpetual factory of idols.”
Keller, Timothy. Counterfeit Gods: The Empty Promises of Money, Sex, and Power, and the Only Hope That Matters. Dutton, 2009.
Quote: “The human heart takes good things like a successful career, love, material possessions, even family, and turns them into ultimate things…”
Quote: “Jesus must become more beautiful to your imagination than your idol.”
Tripp, Paul David. What Did You Expect?: Redeeming the Realities of Marriage. Crossway, 2010.
Illustration of weeds and planting seeds adapted from Tripp’s discussion of spiritual formation in relationships.