They feared the Lord and served their own gods. 2 Kings 17:33.
Who are they who, while they profess to fear the Lord, yet serve their own gods?
All those of you who have not heartily and practically renounced the ownership of your possessions and given them up to God.
It is self-evident that if you have not done this, you are not serving God. Suppose a gentleman were to employ a clerk to take care of his store, and suppose the clerk were to continue to attend to his own business, and when asked to do what is necessary for his employer, who pays him his wages, he should reply, “I really have so much business of my own to attend to, that I have no time to do these things;” would not everybody cry out against such a servant, and say he was not serving his employer at all, his time is not his own, it is paid for, and he but served himself?
So where a man has not renounced the ownership of himself, not only in thought, but practically, he has not taken the first lesson in faith. He is not serving the Lord but serving his own gods.