Lenten Midweek - 1 (2025)

Commandments 1-3

My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ, this evening we have God’s first 3 commandments given to the people of Israel on the Holy Mountain that Moses was allowed to tread and bring back to the people that God had rescued from the from the Land of Egypt and brought the waters of the Red Sea into the wilderness and there Moses went up on the Holy Mountain to receive these 10 Commands given by God and passed down to His people. They continue on today as the foundation to know God’s will, and what He expects of His people, but they also reveal to us who God is and what He has done for us.

This is the challenge with the 10 Commandments, they are commands, the words you shall, mean you will. So when we read the commandments you will have no other Gods, you will not misuse the name of the Lord your God, and you will honor the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Many mistake the word shall for should, and they have little to no issue with should, because there’s lot of things we should do, and it sounds like God is just giving us a heads up, but you will? That’s a demand, and comes with expectations of your behavior and life.

So these first three drill home the fact that God is over all and is more important than any of us. We could try to say this is made worse by the narcissism of our day, or more challenging than it has been before, but this has been a constant problem for mankind. The first commandment is the one broken most often because before you break any other commandment you are placing yourself as above and knowing more than God.

God warns us away from idolatry from Idolatry not because he hates us, but rather because He is our creator, who knows our purpose, our value, our reason for existing, and he knows what sits behind the other idols. For even the atheist who claims to not believe in God, has a god, something that the trust in and believe in with their heart. We are designed to hold on to and believe in something.

What this commandment means is that we can rely upon God for all that we need. It teaches us that the one we are to turn to in our hour of need is not the fallible or weak things of this world, but rather the Creator of the World. This is especially important when we lose treasures in this life, family, friends, jobs, spouse, or even if we are taken off into wars. We have a good, gracious, and loving God who cares for us.

When we wonder about our purpose, our reason for existence, what’s the meaning of life, and the many questions that we ask, we don’t have to wonder who to turn to. The Lord has revealed himself through His Word, through the Incarnation of Jesus, and by the Resurrection. You shall have no other gods, not only forbids us from idolatry, but also tells us that God is all that we need.

Each of the commandments is built upon this, that we might learn what is good right and proper, for in these commandments we do find what God had intended for us to do in this world. Quite often the world seeks to find its purpose what I am to be doing, and they struggle with this greatly, but in these commandments God directs us, and reminds us of who we are.

This is why God gave us his name, for we are to come before him with our requests, with our concerns, and with all our struggles because God cares about us, and we can lay our anxieties down at the feet of the cross. That’s to use God’s name for Good, that we use it praise, and glorify him, that we sing to Him and rejoice in the many gifts that He has given. Without his name, how would we know who to pray to? We would be praying blindly and hoping someone heard us. But is that how people use it? That we might give thanks to God, and rejoice in the work that Jesus has fulfilled for us?

How often do we hear the Lord’s name taken in vain, and we hear the name of Jesus used not for a plea for mercy, but rather careless expletive? We hear the name in music, in movies, on the streets and even in our homes. On the one hand to use his name in that way refers to Jesus as deity, but it is to speak about God or Jesus and attach their name to something evil, unpleasant, or undesirable. Is that really how we think about God our Creator, or Jesus Christ our Savior who died for us? Yet people do not hallow God’s name on their lips. Let us not be like the world which does not recognize what God has done for us, and the sacrifice that Jesus has made for you. We are to guard our lips from all corrupting and obscene talk for the benefit that rather we may speak purely and encourage one another.

For we have the chance to share the name of God, and the name of Jesus with our neighbors. We don’t have to talk about an unknown force that dwells in the sky, that we just hope is out there. God has revealed himself for God desires mankind to know Him. So we can use it for the glory of God that others may know him as well.

Now the final commandment we have for tonight is that we Honor the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. We grudgingly think of this as oh goodness I have to go to church again, why can’t I sleep in especially when dealing with the Daylight Savings Time! But we forget where this comes from. When God created the World he made everything in 6 days, and he rested on the 7th Day. That’s what the Hebrew word sabbath means, to rest from one’s labor or business. That’s why in the Old Testament they did not labor on that day, but would rather gather together around the word.

This was very different from the world that thought the Jewish people to be lazy, that they would take a full day off from their labors? Who has time for that?? Well they did work the other 6 days faithfully, but resting on the 7th day was given that the people of God might gather together to receive God’s mercy, forgiveness, and his holiness. It was a day to remind us what was really important. God’s grace, His forgiveness and receiving his blessings.

It also was a confession of the trust that they had in the Lord. You did need to labor, and work 6 days out of the week, but then you rested on the 7th day trusting that God would provide for you what you need. It wasn’t just the strength of your hands or how many jobs you can hold down, God built this day of rest in that we might learn to rely upon Him.

For what has God given us? Our body, our mind, our reason, and our all our senses, it is in him that we live and move and have our being. It is not that the power belongs to us. God has given us all of these things, but when we chase after each of them as though they are an end to themselves we lift up the gift, and forget about the giver.

Imagine that if you receive a gift from someone and treat it as though it is something you earned, you deserved, you secured, etc. and ignore the one who gave it to you out of love. Why do we have free time? Why do we have leisure, is it because we deserve it, because we are so spectacular or did God give it to us that we might receive his grace and mercy? The world will want to fill it and try to convince us that many other things will make us happy and content, but if you look at the world you will see that’s not the case.

Make no mistake do work hard, be diligent and faithful in where God has called you and make right use of those gifts. But God gave us a day of rest for a reason, it wasn’t just to spend time on the lake, or to work extra hours, it was to receive the forgiveness of sins which we all need.

This commandment reminds us that God does provide for us, and that we don’t need to constantly be working, but that God has given us what we need. This is why Jesus encourages us and reminds us that the birds of the air do not sow, nor do the lilies of the field spin cloth and yet God watches over them. The Sabbath and resting from our labor is a way that we live that out and are reminded that the physical and material things of this life aren’t the purpose of life.

Rather we have time to come together for the one thing that is needful, salvation, forgiveness, and eternal life as God comes to us. Given all the blessings is it any surprise that Satan seeks to keep us so busy that we brush off church as something that isn’t as important. Let us not fall victim to his wiles, but rather come together and hear the Words of Eternal Life.

These my brothers and sisters in Christ are the first 3 commandments, not only what they demand, but also what God gives us and blesses us. It does mean changing how we think, and how we act, repentance is a changing of one’s mind and reorienting to focus on God’s Word and will. Like any change it feels like a burden at times, but we know God’s love for us, for He did not forsake us in our need, but sent His Son to bear our sins upon the cross. If God did not withhold His only-begotten Son, then what do we have to fear? Let’s us instead fear, love and trust in God above all things. In Jesus name. Amen.