{"id":41565,"date":"2015-02-23T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-02-23T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/broken-people-praying-to-broken-buddha\/"},"modified":"2015-02-23T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2015-02-23T00:00:00","slug":"broken-people-praying-to-broken-buddha","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/broken-people-praying-to-broken-buddha\/","title":{"rendered":"Broken People Praying to a Broken Buddha"},"content":{"rendered":"

Pastor\/author J.R. Vassar writes about ministering in Myanmar (Burma) and coming upon a broken Buddha:<\/p>\n\n

\n

One day we were prayer walking through a large Buddhist temple, when I witnessed something heartbreaking. A large number of people, very poor and desperate, were bowing down to a large golden Buddha. They were stuffing what seemed to be the last of their money into the treasury box and kneeling in prayer, hoping to secure a blessing from the Buddha. On the other side of the large golden idol, scaffolding had been built. The Buddha had begun to deteriorate, and a group of workers was diligently were repairing the broken Buddha. I took in the scene. Broken people were bowing down to a broken Buddha asking the broken Buddha to fix their broken lives while someone else fixed the broken Buddha.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

\n

The insanity and despair of it all hit me. We are no different from them. We are broken people looking to other broken people to fix our broken lives. We are glory-deficient people looking to other glory-deficient people to supply us with glory. Looking to other people to provide for us what they lack themselves is a fool's errand. It is futile to look to other glory-hungry people to fully satisfy our glory hunger, and doing so leaves our souls empty.<\/p>\n\n<\/blockquote>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3385,3524,3527,3861,4028,4061,4062,4064,4166,4206,4207,4798,4885,5305],"tax_ctp_topics":[388],"class_list":["post-41565","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-adoration","tax_ctp_tags-brokenness","tax_ctp_tags-buddhism","tax_ctp_tags-emptiness","tax_ctp_tags-fullness","tax_ctp_tags-glorifying-god","tax_ctp_tags-glory","tax_ctp_tags-glory-of-god","tax_ctp_tags-honoring-god","tax_ctp_tags-idolatry","tax_ctp_tags-idols","tax_ctp_tags-religion","tax_ctp_tags-satisfaction","tax_ctp_tags-worship"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"\nBroken People Praying to a Broken Buddha - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/broken-people-praying-to-broken-buddha\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Broken People Praying to a Broken Buddha - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Pastor\/author J.R. 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