For many of us, growing up in the Christian faith, we were always taught that there was one true God. One true God who created and ruled over the universe and the people in it. One true God who loves and forgives everybody, no matter what the sin. One true God who is so beyond anything else on this worldly earth, that we can’t always comprehend who God is and what he does. We are taught to not worship or create idols or false gods, instead, we are guided to God for all of our problems and praises, not a god for health and a different god for friendship. Up until now, everything I have described explains Monotheism. In other words, Monotheism is the belief in only the one true God (YAHWEH) (Strauss 124.) If we break down the word monotheism, we get mono= one + theism= God (Google 9.5.16).
(Image from Google Images)
During Jesus’ life, many people strayed from believing and following the one true God, and instead would worship many gods and idols. The belief in multiple gods is referred to as polytheism (Anonymous 2002). If we break down polytheism, we get poly= many +theism= god (Google 9.5.16).
(Image from Google Images)
If we take a look at the world during Jesus’ life, Judaism was very prevalent, but living in the Greco-Roman world, Greek culture was also very popular. Among the statues, language, and other cultural aspects spread through Hellenization, were the multitude of greek gods. This made it easy to fall into polytheism, even when the followers of Judaism were given instructions to obey and worship only one God.
Just like today, living out faith was difficult and confusing for many people during Jesus’ life, but God made it very clear throughout multiple places in the Bible about following one God. Below are just some places within the Bible that command us to follow only the one true God.
- Deuteronomy 4:35
- Psalm 83:18
- Isaiah 44:6
- 1 Corinthians 8:6
- Exodus 20:3-5
Life of Christ 