Delusion of Grandeur occurs from a mental disorder inside someone’s head while an illusion is a perception interpreted by the senses different from that of reality. Our reality is perceived thru famous people, news, culture, and politics. My spin on this topic is that the famous people within our culture give us an illusion of what is truth. You start to perceive that if you follow in their footsteps you are morally superior. These celebrities or wealthy people within Christianity specifically is perceived to done it well due to their name recognition and wealth.

This topic is problem due to being very closely tied to idolatry. In an earlier blog I discussed in detail how idolatry is discussed in our culture with referencing scripture to back up those claims. The specific form of idolatry is believing that this person got their status by righteous means alone. This illusion is created from overgeneralizing. We attribute success to personal attributes instead of personal actions.

An example of a person action would be branding. Branding is not a moral action. It also isn’t amoral either. When you successfully set yourself apart you stand out in the crowd. When you are not wearing the red stripped outfit that waldo wears it would be even harder to find him. Just because Waldo wears that stripped shirt doesn’t mean that shirt gives him value or morality.

Many leaders in the Christian religious community wear stripped outfits. Those stripped outfits are outlandish claims that go against scripture. They have wealth, fans, and prominence within the Christian sphere of influence, but their teachings are without value. Essentially, they are false teachers. My next blog is going to be about how outlandish claims can get people noticed. Because of their newfound success we follow every word they say even though they are leading us into a path of damnation.

Another Illusion is that people equate crowd size to spiritual growth. This trap is easy to fall into. Also, the opposite is used. Small crowd equals spiritual shrinkage. We should evaluate a church on whether they preach the truth from the word of God. We look at a church’s gimmicks with awe. Praising the gimmicks with wonder and amusement. If the gimmicks don’t further God’s kingdom and only create more church goers, then the gimmicks are pointless. If a church elevates the gimmicks above the bible, then the church becomes pointless.

Many times, people and churches gain their recognition from righteous means. At this point in our reasoning we should slam on the breaks. We should isolate these actions by themselves. After that we should ask why was it righteous? If the answer is “following God’s commandments” we should resume our line of thought. It seems redundant but extremely important. If we don’t get in this habit it becomes very easy to skip this process. Then we assume that the action is right because they are righteous. Therefore, idolatry insures.

If we don’t evaluate actions without the word of God, it becomes very easy to create an Illusion of someone. Beware of the stripped outfit. Well, not literally because that would be silly. If we don’t evaluate every single action or motive with the word of God, our church will be doomed to fail. All we have left is Illusions of Grandeur. God is the only one who should resemble grandeur.