More than 500 years before Jesus’ arrival, while the Jews were exiled to Babylon (around the time of Daniel and the book of Lamentations), a boy named Confucius was born near the bustling Chinese city of Qufu (pronounced chew-foo). Confucius grew up in probably a middle-class home, by today’s standards, and later became a civic leader and teacher.

Confucius spoke out about moral and political matters, and numerous quotable proverbs are attributed to him many centuries later. Interestingly, I am not aware of any writings in which Confucius claimed to be deity, but after his death in 478 B.C., his home in Qufu was consecrated as a temple, and emperors and others began journeying there to offer sacrifices in his memory. Today, followers of Confucianism span throughout the far and middle east.

I had the opportunity to visit Qufu in the mid-90s, and the grounds are breathtakingly beautiful with mature trees, intricate architecture and ancient relics. What struck me the most, and the reason I’m sharing this story with you today, was the Cemetery of Confucius. His tomb is still there, and I would assume that it still contains his remains. When people go to the Temple of Confucius to pray and offer sacrifices (meat, treasures, etc.), it saddens me to think that the object of their worship was just a man. Granted, he was apparently a profound speaker and highly respected man of his time, but still, Confucius was just a person.

It’s easy for many of us to distance ourselves from ideas like Confucianism because it seems foreign to us. That’s how “those people” in mysterious, far corners of the globe worship. But, it is really that far-fetched from our American culture today? Think about the people who we tend to idolize: athletes, musicians, actors … and that doesn’t even include material “gods” like our cars, smartphones and purse collections. Not such a foreign concept, after all, is it?

2 Thessalonians warns us not to be swayed by false gods or let our worship become distracted by things of this world. On a similar note, Romans 12:1-2 reminds us that we should offer God a sacrifice, but not one that we might deliver to a shrine. God wants our day-to-day lives to be treated as a sacrifice to him. We don’t have to take gifts to God at a fancy altar to appease him; he wants our worship as part of our personal relationship with him.