100 Bible Verses about Worshipping Idols

Exodus 20:4-5 ESV / 51 helpful votes

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,

Isaiah 42:8 ESV / 29 helpful votes

I am the Lord; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.

Deuteronomy 5:9 ESV / 21 helpful votes

You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

Matthew 6:33 ESV / 17 helpful votes

But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

Mark 16:16 ESV / 13 helpful votes

Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.

Matthew 23:9 ESV / 13 helpful votes

And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven.

Isaiah 45:20 ESV / 13 helpful votes

“Assemble yourselves and come; draw near together, you survivors of the nations! They have no knowledge who carry about their wooden idols, and keep on praying to a god that cannot save.

2 Timothy 3:16 ESV / 11 helpful votes

All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness,

Luke 8:28 ESV / 11 helpful votes

When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell down before him and said with a loud voice, “What have you to do with me, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg you, do not torment me.”

1 Corinthians 10:14 ESV / 10 helpful votes

Therefore, my beloved, flee from idolatry.

1 John 5:21 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Little children, keep yourselves from idols.

Galatians 5:19-21 ESV / 9 helpful votes

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

Deuteronomy 10:12-13 ESV / 9 helpful votes

“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments and statutes of the Lord, which I am commanding you today for your good?

Leviticus 26:1 ESV / 9 helpful votes

“You shall not make idols for yourselves or erect an image or pillar, and you shall not set up a figured stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the Lord your God.

Leviticus 18:22 ESV / 9 helpful votes

You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.

Exodus 20:3 ESV / 9 helpful votes

“You shall have no other gods before me.

Revelation 22:19 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.

Revelation 22:18 ESV / 8 helpful votes

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book,

Colossians 3:5 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.

Romans 16:16 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ greet you.

John 20:17 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”

John 19:41 ESV / 8 helpful votes

Now in the place where he was crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid.

Mark 7:7 ESV / 8 helpful votes

In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’

Matthew 22:37-39 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Matthew 16:18 ESV / 8 helpful votes

And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

Matthew 7:13-14 ESV / 8 helpful votes

“Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few.

Revelation 11:1-19 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Then I was given a measuring rod like a staff, and I was told, “Rise and measure the temple of God and the altar and those who worship there, but do not measure the court outside the temple; leave that out, for it is given over to the nations, and they will trample the holy city for forty-two months. And I will grant authority to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. And if anyone would harm them, fire pours from their mouth and consumes their foes. If anyone would harm them, this is how he is doomed to be killed. ...

Revelation 9:20-21 ESV / 7 helpful votes

The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk, nor did they repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.

James 2:19 ESV / 7 helpful votes

You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder!

John 3:16-17 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Jonah 2:8 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Those who pay regard to vain idols forsake their hope of steadfast love.

Isaiah 44:6-20 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: “I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god. Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me, since I appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come, and what will happen. Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.” All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? ...

Psalm 115:4-8 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see. They have ears, but do not hear; noses, but do not smell. They have hands, but do not feel; feet, but do not walk; and they do not make a sound in their throat. Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.

Psalm 16:4 ESV / 7 helpful votes

The sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply; their drink offerings of blood I will not pour out or take their names on my lips.

Leviticus 20:13 ESV / 7 helpful votes

If a man lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination; they shall surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.

Leviticus 19:4 ESV / 7 helpful votes

Do not turn to idols or make for yourselves any gods of cast metal: I am the Lord your God.

Exodus 34:28 ESV / 7 helpful votes

So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights. He neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.

Exodus 20:12 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

Exodus 20:4 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

Exodus 20:3-6 ESV / 7 helpful votes

“You shall have no other gods before me. “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

Genesis 19:1-38 ESV / 7 helpful votes

The two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed himself with his face to the earth and said, “My lords, please turn aside to your servant's house and spend the night and wash your feet. Then you may rise up early and go on your way.” They said, “No; we will spend the night in the town square.” But he pressed them strongly; so they turned aside to him and entered his house. And he made them a feast and baked unleavened bread, and they ate. But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man, surrounded the house. And they called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them.” ...

Revelation 1:1 ESV / 6 helpful votes

The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John,

Colossians 3:10 ESV / 6 helpful votes

And have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.

Isaiah 44:9 ESV / 6 helpful votes

All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame.

Ecclesiastes 1:8 ESV / 6 helpful votes

All things are full of weariness; a man cannot utter it; the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing.

1 Samuel 15:23 ESV / 6 helpful votes

For rebellion is as the sin of divination, and presumption is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has also rejected you from being king.”

Exodus 20:5 ESV / 6 helpful votes

You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me,

Revelation 21:8 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”

Revelation 9:20 ESV / 5 helpful votes

The rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk,

Revelation 2:14 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But I have a few things against you: you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality.

Hebrews 13:5 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

1 Thessalonians 1:9 ESV / 5 helpful votes

For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God,

Colossians 2:18 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind,

Ephesians 5:5 ESV / 5 helpful votes

For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.

2 Corinthians 6:16 ESV / 5 helpful votes

What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God; as God said, “I will make my dwelling among them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.

1 Corinthians 10:20-21 ESV / 5 helpful votes

No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be participants with demons. You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons.

1 Corinthians 10:7 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Do not be idolaters as some of them were; as it is written, “The people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.”

1 Corinthians 6:9-10 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

1 Corinthians 5:11 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler—not even to eat with such a one.

Romans 1:25 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen.

Acts 15:29 ESV / 5 helpful votes

That you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols, and from blood, and from what has been strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”

John 4:23 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.

John 4:1-54 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Now when Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that Jesus was making and baptizing more disciples than John (although Jesus himself did not baptize, but only his disciples), he left Judea and departed again for Galilee. And he had to pass through Samaria. So he came to a town of Samaria called Sychar, near the field that Jacob had given to his son Joseph. ...

Luke 1:37 ESV / 5 helpful votes

For nothing will be impossible with God.”

Matthew 4:8-10 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’”

Habakkuk 2:18 ESV / 5 helpful votes

“What profit is an idol when its maker has shaped it, a metal image, a teacher of lies? For its maker trusts in his own creation when he makes speechless idols!

Daniel 3:18 ESV / 5 helpful votes

But if not, be it known to you, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the golden image that you have set up.”

Jeremiah 10:1-25 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Hear the word that the Lord speaks to you, O house of Israel. Thus says the Lord: “Learn not the way of the nations, nor be dismayed at the signs of the heavens because the nations are dismayed at them, for the customs of the peoples are vanity. A tree from the forest is cut down and worked with an axe by the hands of a craftsman. They decorate it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so that it cannot move. Their idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field, and they cannot speak; they have to be carried, for they cannot walk. Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, neither is it in them to do good.” ...

Isaiah 46:5 ESV / 5 helpful votes

“To whom will you liken me and make me equal, and compare me, that we may be alike?

Isaiah 44:17 ESV / 5 helpful votes

And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!”

Isaiah 44:9-20 ESV / 5 helpful votes

All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human. Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together. The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house. ...

Isaiah 42:17 ESV / 5 helpful votes

They are turned back and utterly put to shame, who trust in carved idols, who say to metal images, “You are our gods.”

Isaiah 37:19 ESV / 5 helpful votes

And have cast their gods into the fire. For they were no gods, but the work of men's hands, wood and stone. Therefore they were destroyed.

Isaiah 1:1-31 ESV / 5 helpful votes

The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz, which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth; for the Lord has spoken: “Children have I reared and brought up, but they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner, and the donkey its master's crib, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.” Ah, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, offspring of evildoers, children who deal corruptly! They have forsaken the Lord, they have despised the Holy One of Israel, they are utterly estranged. Why will you still be struck down? Why will you continue to rebel? The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. ...

Psalm 135:15-18 ESV / 5 helpful votes

The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of human hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; they have eyes, but do not see; they have ears, but do not hear, nor is there any breath in their mouths. Those who make them become like them, so do all who trust in them.

Psalm 115:8 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Those who make them become like them; so do all who trust in them.

Deuteronomy 31:6-29 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the Lord your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the Lord has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it. It is the Lord who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.” Then Moses wrote this law and gave it to the priests, the sons of Levi, who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and to all the elders of Israel. And Moses commanded them, “At the end of every seven years, at the set time in the year of release, at the Feast of Booths, ...

Exodus 10:1-12:51 ESV / 5 helpful votes

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go in to Pharaoh, for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants, that I may show these signs of mine among them, and that you may tell in the hearing of your son and of your grandson how I have dealt harshly with the Egyptians and what signs I have done among them, that you may know that I am the Lord.” So Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh and said to him, “Thus says the Lord, the God of the Hebrews, ‘How long will you refuse to humble yourself before me? Let my people go, that they may serve me. For if you refuse to let my people go, behold, tomorrow I will bring locusts into your country, and they shall cover the face of the land, so that no one can see the land. And they shall eat what is left to you after the hail, and they shall eat every tree of yours that grows in the field, ...

2 Peter 3:9 ESV / 4 helpful votes

The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

Colossians 2:8 ESV / 4 helpful votes

See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ.

2 Corinthians 6:2 ESV / 4 helpful votes

For he says, “In a favorable time I listened to you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.” Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

1 Corinthians 10:31 ESV / 4 helpful votes

So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

1 Corinthians 10:1-33 ESV / 4 helpful votes

For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ. Nevertheless, with most of them God was not pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. ...

Romans 1:21-23 ESV / 4 helpful votes

For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Acts 19:25 ESV / 4 helpful votes

These he gathered together, with the workmen in similar trades, and said, “Men, you know that from this business we have our wealth.

Acts 19:23 ESV / 4 helpful votes

About that time there arose no little disturbance concerning the Way.

Ezekiel 20:32 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“What is in your mind shall never happen—the thought, ‘Let us be like the nations, like the tribes of the countries, and worship wood and stone.’

Jeremiah 11:12 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry to the gods to whom they make offerings, but they cannot save them in the time of their trouble.

Isaiah 46:6-10 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Those who lavish gold from the purse, and weigh out silver in the scales, hire a goldsmith, and he makes it into a god; then they fall down and worship! They lift it to their shoulders, they carry it, they set it in its place, and it stands there; it cannot move from its place. If one cries to it, it does not answer or save him from his trouble. “Remember this and stand firm, recall it to mind, you transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things not yet done, saying, ‘My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose,’

Isaiah 44:19 ESV / 4 helpful votes

No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?”

Isaiah 44:9-12 ESV / 4 helpful votes

All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human. Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together. The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint.

Isaiah 40:19 ESV / 4 helpful votes

An idol! A craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it silver chains.

Isaiah 30:22 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Then you will defile your carved idols overlaid with silver and your gold-plated metal images. You will scatter them as unclean things. You will say to them, “Be gone!”

Isaiah 2:8 ESV / 4 helpful votes

Their land is filled with idols; they bow down to the work of their hands, to what their own fingers have made.

Psalm 135:15 ESV / 4 helpful votes

The idols of the nations are silver and gold, the work of human hands.

Psalm 97:7 ESV / 4 helpful votes

All worshipers of images are put to shame, who make their boast in worthless idols; worship him, all you gods!

Psalm 96:5 ESV / 4 helpful votes

For all the gods of the peoples are worthless idols, but the Lord made the heavens.

Deuteronomy 27:15 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“‘Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the Lord, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.’ And all the people shall answer and say, ‘Amen.’

Deuteronomy 5:8 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

Deuteronomy 4:15-16 ESV / 4 helpful votes

“Therefore watch yourselves very carefully. Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves, in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female,

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