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God prohibits our making or having images in a context of worshipping Him. However, man, in his unbelief, prefers a visible god to the Invisible One. Images are a sure sign of false religion and are widely used in nominal Christendom. Whereas images are seen as enhancing worship, God sternly commanded the children of Israel to destroy them, which tells us how odious to God and dangerous to man images are.
The Lord Jesus Christ came to give us life, not empty and deceptive representations. In the beginning He sent out His disciples and apostles, who, being raised as Jews and knowing the Law, didn’t use images, and likewise they taught the Gentiles to abstain from the “pollution of idols.” Paul said to the men of Athens, a city full of idols (which are a product of men making God in their own image):
“Then being offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like gold or silver or stone, engraved by art and man’s imagination. Truly, then, God overlooking the times of ignorance, now He strictly commands all men everywhere to repent” (Acts 17:29-30 MKJV).
True faith is knowing God as He is, not as men imagine Him or His attributes to be, which they express in images, as with the golden calf, representing strength. The latter is the works of men (cults), the paths of the destroyer. The former is the Rock on which His Church is built. We cover this topic, with more explanation and practical examples, in Religious Images, Icons, and Likenesses.
“The images of the nations are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but no voice, they have eyes, but they do not see; they have ears, but no hearing; and there is no breath in their mouths. Those who make them are like them; and so is everyone who puts his hope in them” (Psalms 135:15-18 BBE).
Consider the alternative to keeping images: Instead of focusing on dumb and powerless idols, worship the Invisible God. When you do so, He will reveal Himself to you and you’ll be on the path to becoming like Him, the Living Creator.