Upagupta and Mara

I first heard about the story of Upagupta a few years ago during a Dhamma talk by Ajahn Sujato. Somehow there is something magical about this story that it is always in my mind from the first day I heard from Ajahn Sujato until today.

The story goes like this....

Upagupta is basically a Sarvastivada monk, born a few hundred years after the Buddha passed away (Parinibbana). He is one of the most famous Sarvastivadian monk, well known for his ability in teaching the Dhamma as well as his magical power. One day, Mara became jealous of Upagupta (probably because of Upagupta, many people became enlightened, and these people became outside the jurisdiction of Mara), and decided to distract and manage to do so for three consecutive times. In the last time, Mara, using his magical power, created a performance just besides the place Upagupta teaching the Dhamma. As the result, many people became distracted and started to enjoy the performance instead of listening to the teaching given by Upagupta. After the performance, Upagupta then went to Mara and offered a flower garland. Mara became very happy, thinking that he is able to win not only his disciples, but also Upagupta himself, decided to accept the flower garland. However, as soon as the flower garland touched the Mara's body, the flower garland suddenly became dead snakes, dead dogs and skulls sticking to Mara's body. No matter how hard Mara tried to disengage himself from these disgusting things, he failed to do so.
And then suddenly, the Mara thought of the Buddha (that has passed away for hundreds years by then). Mara taught that comparing the Buddha with his disciple, Upagupta, the Buddha was so much more compassionate. No matter how much Mara tried to do so many terrible things to the Buddha, The Buddha never did such a disgusting things.
Mara after that then conceded defeat and said that he would do any things if Upagupta agreed to release him for all these disgusting things. Upagupta, knowing that he has managed to make Mara realized the Buddha's compassion, agreed to do so.
Upagupta then asked Mara to transform himself to become the Buddha. It is because Upagupta was born hundreds years after the Buddha and never saw the Buddha's physical body but always been wanting to see the Buddha (Mara on the other hand, saw the Buddha many times). Mara agreed with condition that Upagupta should not pay respect to him, because no matter how much similar he is to the Buddha, he is after all not the Buddha, but Mara the evil one himself. Upagupta agreed to do so. But when Mara transformed himself to become the Buddha, Upagupta then pay respect by bowing to the Mara. Upon questioning by Mara, Upagupta simply replied that he was not paying respect to Mara, but the Buddha himself!

This is a very fascinating story to me. Just as the Buddha is symbol of Deathless, Mara is the symbol of Death (and probably in particular the Death of spirituality).
Traditionally, this story is used as a teaching that Buddhists do not paying respect to statues (Mara), but rather Buddhists pay respect on the Buddha, particularly the quality of the Buddha that we wanted to have.

However, my questions to all Buddhists are.

1. How many of us are in fact worshiping Mara in the form of Buddha's statue, and how many of us are really worshiping the Buddha? Although the action from outside is different, the difference are huge. On one hand, one is paying respect the bringer of light, to the path to the Deathless, while on the other hand, one is paying respect to the Death, to the Mara himself!

2. How do we know when we are paying respecting to the Buddha's statue, are we really paying respect to the Buddha, or are we paying respect to the Mara?

3. Why Buddhists created the Buddha's statue at the first place? Is this because they longed so much for the Buddha and refused to believe that the Buddha passed away (Mara)? Or is it because they wanted to find  places to remind them the positive qualities of the Buddha (Buddha)?