The 3rd Commandment: Misusing God's Name

Exodus 20:7

Exodus 20:7 ESV

7 “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.

1. What’s in a name?

These days we don’t tend to think that someones name is a defining feature of their personhood. My name means ‘gravelly homestead’, though I’d like to think that isn’t definitive of my personality!

In the Bible - names are very important. For Hebrew’s - the name was almost inseperable from the person - it was their identity.

So when God revealed His name to Moses on Mount Sinai He was inviting Moses to behold His personhood, His identity.

Exodus 3:13–14 ESV

13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ”

“I am who I am, I will be what I will be.” Speaks of His self-existence, His sovereignty over all.

The Divine name, those four Hebrew letters YHWH also referred to as the Tetragrammaton by theologians is considered so holy by many Jew’s that they won’t even say the name outloud. Story of my Hebrew lessons - not YHWH but Adonai.

But in the third commandment God does not forbid the use of His name - but it’s misuse.

You see God has attached His glory to His name - the two are inseperable.

Ezekiel 20:9 NIV

9 But for the sake of my name, I brought them out of Egypt. I did it to keep my name from being profaned in the eyes of the nations among whom they lived and in whose sight I had revealed myself to the Israelites.

God is jealous for the glory of His own name. He wants to see His name hallowed and honoured - especially amongst His own people. We must not take up His name in vain.

But what does it mean to take the Lord’s name in vain?

We take His name in vain when we trivialise it, or co-opt it, or abuse it.

2. Trivialising His name

Gordon Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares - guy keeps calling him ‘mate.’ IM NOT YOUR MATE - It’s Gordon!

God’s name is always to be treated with special reverance and care. We are not to make light of His name. How we treat God’s name really does reveal our true estimation of Him.

 “It is one of the defining marks of Our Time that God is now weightless. I do not mean by this that he is ethereal but rather that he has become unimportant. The vast majority of people consider [God]less interesting than television, his commands less authoritative than their appetites for affluence and influence, his judgment no more awe-inspiring that the evening news, and his truth less compelling than the advertisers’ sweet fog of flattery and lies. That is weightlessness.” - David F Wells

Shallow and irreverant worship is to take the Lord’s name in vain. (Pastor with a train track running through his church).

Profaning His name is trivialising it.

Hypocritical living trivialises God’s name. Josh Buice.

Be careful how you live; you may be the only Bible some people will ever read”

3. Co-opting His name

Others take the Lord’s name in vain by co-opting it for their own purposes.

Some use God’s name to manipulate others - the ‘God told me’ Phenomenom. God told me to tell you...”Get over yourself”. Why do people do this? Why involve God? They do it because it gives their words instant gravitas and it disables criticism. Who are you to argue with God?

Others co-opt God’s name for financial gain; the musician who enters the Christian Music Industry to make a living but doesn’t believe any of what they sing.

The celebrity pastor who uses God’s name to build himself an empire, buy himself extravagant belongings and exalt his own name. This is to take the Lord’s name in vain.

whenever we confuse what we want with what God wants, we take his name in vain - Philip Ryken

4. Abusing His name

To marry God’s holy name with any false religion is to abuse his name. To use it as an incantation or a magic word to manifest whatever you like is to use the divine name in occult worship - this is an abomination.

Acts 19:13–17 ESV

13 Then some of the itinerant Jewish exorcists undertook to invoke the name of the Lord Jesus over those who had evil spirits, saying, “I adjure you by the Jesus whom Paul proclaims.” 14 Seven sons of a Jewish high priest named Sceva were doing this. 15 But the evil spirit answered them, “Jesus I know, and Paul I recognize, but who are you?” 16 And the man in whom was the evil spirit leaped on them, mastered all of them and overpowered them, so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded. 17 And this became known to all the residents of Ephesus, both Jews and Greeks. And fear fell upon them all, and the name of the Lord Jesus was extolled.

To marry God’s name with false doctrine is to abuse his name. God’s name is truth, how can we then attach it to a lie?

To put God’s name to false prophecy is to abuse His name.

Jeremiah 14:14–15 ESV

14 And the Lord said to me: “The prophets are prophesying lies in my name. I did not send them, nor did I command them or speak to them. They are prophesying to you a lying vision, worthless divination, and the deceit of their own minds. 15 Therefore thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name although I did not send them, and who say, ‘Sword and famine shall not come upon this land’: By sword and famine those prophets shall be consumed.

The Lord will not hold him guiltless whoever takes His name in vain. Certainly the world considers God’s name as weightless, will we also?

5. Hallowing His name

Matthew 6:9 ESV

9 Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.

Christ has taught us to pray that His Father’s name would be hallowed, be magnified, be exalted.

How might we do this?

By believing on the one to whom He has given the name above all names, Jesus Christ.

Philippians 2:9–11 ESV

9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

We hallow the name of God by holding fast to the one whom He has sent; Jesus Christ, Lord of Lords and King of Kings.

We hallow the name of God by holding fast to the Lord Jesus Christ in our faith. In our conduct. In our worship. In our doctrine and with our words.