This is most clearly answered by scripture: "Meanwhile the people got to see that Moses was taking a long time about coming down from the mountain. So the people congregated themselves about Aaron and said to him: “Get up, make for us a god who will go ahead of us, because as regards this Moses, the man who led us up out of the land of Egypt, we certainly do not know what has happened to him.” At this Aaron said to them: “Tear off the gold earrings that are in the ears of YOUR wives, of YOUR sons and of YOUR daughters and bring them to me.” And all the people began tearing off the gold earrings that were in their ears and bringing them to Aaron. hen he took [the gold] from their hands, and he formed it with a graving tool and proceeded to make it into a molten statue of a calf. And they began to say: “This is your God, O Israel, who led you up out of the land of Egypt.”" (Ex 32:1-4) We all know that worshiping the calf was wrong, because that was clearly idolatry. The detail that many seem to miss, is who they thought they were worshiping. The scripture continues: When Aaron got to see this, he went to building an altar before it. Finally Aaron called out and said: "THERE IS A FESTIVAL TO JEHOVAH TOMORROW.” So on the next day they were early in rising, and they began offering up burnt offerings and presenting communion sacrifices. After that the people sat down to eat and drink. Then they got up to have a good time. (Ex 32:5, 6) Using objects in worship to God is not a new thing. It comes up in scripture a few times, despite the commandment that specifically states: "You must not make for yourself a carved image or a form like anything that is in the heavens above or that is on the earth underneath or that is in the waters under the earth. You must not bow down to them nor be induced to serve them" (Ex 20:4; Commandment #2) As they say, those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it.

Christianity is a religion of paradoxes, its the only religion not setup by a prophet of God, Paul did after Jesus had gone, the word Christian does not appear in the original bible as Jesus came to put the Jews on the correct path not to create another religion for the pagans and who wrote the Bible? Jesus couldn’t and there is no Book of Jesus either. It's the only religion that has pagan roots as most of it rituals and festivals are. The Cross seems to have struck a cord with people despite it being a common instrument of capital punishment by the Romans.

Because the cross is a memory, a symbol, a reminder of what Jesus went through. Seeing a cross with the model of Jesus on the cross is simply a reminder of what Jesus did for each of us. in the early days, the reminder was a fish drawn in the sand. time allows things to get more complicated. so it has with the church and the bumper sticker. Christians worship an ungraven image. basically they worship a word. it starts with a G ends with a D has an O in the middle. They worship God. an ungraven meaningless word...that is also a symbol of a name no one knows.

A statue of Jesus on the cross is an image but not a "graven image" and we worship the risen Jesus and not His image. Do you have pictures of your loved ones? Have you ever looked at the picture of someone while talking on the phone to them? Statues and pictures of people we love are not idols. Statues and paintings of Jesus and the saints are just like pictures of the people we love and respect. The King James Version of the Bible states in Exodus 20:4: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth" Why were the Jews commanded not to make graven images? Graven images were the standard method of pagan worship. They were representations of false gods. This is a very clear command. However God commanded the Jews in Exodus 25:18 and 1 Chronicles 28:18–19, "And thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, of beaten work shalt thou make them" And in 1 Kings chapter 7 Solomon made bulls and other images out of precious metals. It seems obvious that the Jews did not worship the cherubims and Solomon did not worship the bulls he had made. These images did not violate the command of God. Therefore, an image not made for worship is acceptable. In Numbers 21:8-9, "And the LORD said to Moses, "Make a saraph and mount it on a pole, and if anyone who has been bitten looks at it, he will recover." Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole, and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent looked at the bronze serpent, he recovered." And in John 3:14-15, Jesus says in correlation, "And just as Moses lifted up the [image of a] serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life." How can a statue of our Lord Jesus Christ dead on the cross be considered an idol to a false god? A crucifix is the message of the Gospel without words held up for all to see, a visual reminder of the sacrifice of Jesus, no different from a painting, a play, or a movie. How can a nativity set set up in your house to constantly remind you and teach your children of God's love for us be idolotry? We do not worship statues but the almighty God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. With love in Christ.