You Gotta Serve Somebody (or Something)

Why does God give commands in the first place? Do we still need to follow them today?

It is a call to be image bearers .

Any great company has a set of rules that sets them apart from the others, that have a culture that makes others want to buy from that brand. That culture is created by the rules they set for their employees and the atmosphere that they create. What they want from their employees is to reflect that image to the customers who walk through the door. It allows for a consistent experience wherever you go. Whether it is Starbucks, or Southwest airlines (who are known to do things like sing happy birthday to travelers), or one of my favorites is the restaurant Moe’s. Whenever your walk in they say “welcome to Moe’s” to every customer.

As I read in one commentary, "They are a charter of conduct for a people already redeemed. They are a means of understanding God better and as God's people created in His image we obey His laws. “

As God gives his commands to the people, they are at the base of Mt. Sinai and they are hearing the words of the Lord. God is revealing His presence to them. The commands are God’s desire for them to know His character and for them to reveal His character to the nations.

Romans 7:12 says “So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good.” The law is holy in itself because it is a reflection of God’s character. It isn’t just arbitrary rules that God decided to creation

But in what way does the law show God’s character.? In Mark 12:28-31 that there are two central commands in the 10 commandments, and really the entire law.

Love the Lord your God

Love your neighbor as yourself.

These are the two relationships that were in the Garden. Adam was to walk with God, Adam was to love His wife. Every other command that God gives is connected to those two relationships. God and others.

Our obedience is for the sinful world to understand who God is, for the world to see His love through us. We do this in our care for His creation, for people, and in our devotion to Him.

I also want to say...The Ten Commandments are not for us to "judge the personal morality of others", when we do this we are telling the world that to be right with God they must have proper conduct, but we know the Gospel tells us that none of us are able to stand before God apart from the work of Christ. Apart from Christ we are incapable of good works. In fact Paul states that the law was to point out our sin and to show we are unable to keep it perfectly. If we are unable to keep it, why should we expect unbelievers who do not have the Holy Spirit to be able to keep it? One way I hear it was, "To sing out the Ten Commandments and set them up as a standard of conduct for unbelievers or American society in general indicates not only a misunderstanding of the purpose of the Ten Commandments, but of the good news itself". We can make an idol out of the Ten Commandments themselves, thinking that if we offer ourselves to them that we will have a prosperous life and that others must follow them as well without showing them that what they must accept is God's grace. People don't need to accept the Ten Commandments, they need to accept Christ as their Lord and Savior.

In Christ we are called to the nature of the law, not the letter of the law.

What is the difference between the nature of the law and the letter of the law?

Think about when you have two siblings fighting and they are touching each other and annoying each other and one says, “dad, can you please tell Billy to stop touching me”. So you tell your son, “Billy, stop touching your sister”.

What does Billy do? Billy doesn’t touch his sister, he gets as close as possible to touching her without touching her. Which still annoys his sister, you know that this is disobedient to the “nature” of your command but is still being technically obedient to the command.

In Christ we are called to greater faithfulness in view of God’s grace, not to overlook sin.

Jesus states this in many of His commands. He says that whoever hates His brother is guilty of murder. Whoever looks at a woman lustfully is guilty of adultery.

His point is that sin starts in the heart, it starts with our attitude. God isn’t calling us to obedience for obedience sake, He is calling us to be image-bearers, to reveal who God is in creation.

God is calling His people back to His presence - Exodus 20:1-2

Before we get to the commandments themselves God gives a preface. One sentence that prepares them for His commandments. Why does God mention his deliverance of them from Egypt here? What significance does this play in His commandments?

-God is demonstrating that He has been faithful to His covenant to them and that because He has shown faithfulness to them that they should trust that their own obedience will be rewarded.

God is calling us to faithfulness to Him because He has shown His faithfulness to us.

-He is calling them to a type of relationship that was foreign to the ancient world, He is calling them to monogamous worship of Him alone. Even more, that He is deserving of this type of worship, that He is deserving of that type of relationship.

As we have seen throughout Exodus, God has been reminding His people of the Garden and His desire for them to be in His presence. That is His desire for the promised land. Because God’s law is showing us His nature.

We often think of laws as restrictive, we could even see them as arbitrary. But God’s law is not arbitrary, it is showing us what God is like. The law is a re-creation account showing God’s desire to restore our relationship to Him. It is a divine ordering of chaos into the social world we live.

These first two commands give us a great picture of this truth.

To have no other gods before Him is a reminder of the Garden, where Adam and Eve walked with God. They were in perfect relationship with Him. He had priority in their lives over any other relationship. They had harmony.

The second command, to not worship idols is a reminder of our original purpose in the Garden. It says they were to “cultivate and keep”, which a phrase that is used to mean “worship and obey”. God gave them all of creation to enjoy as they served the creator, but now we desire to serve the creation rather than the creator. We used to enjoy the fruits of God’s kindness but now they are the fruits of our own labor.

The first is about who gets priority, the second is about who we serve. We often look at the first two commandments as one and the same, you may not even see a difference. But we are going to see in what ways they are different.

Who get’s priority? - Exodus 20:3

1. God has proven that he is worth of our focus.

-God said to have no gods “before” Him or “in front of”; it can even be seen as “against”. Saying that if you follow them then you are not following me. It is a question of who do we give preference to.

-It is God saying, “why would you look to the other God’s for help when I have shown you that I have power over all creation?

2. God is calling them to something counter-cultural

-God relates to their experience, notice he never states specifically that there aren’t other gods. He speaks in terms they would understand. Because he was already calling them to something counter-cultural. To the rest of the world, only having one God would have sounded ridiculous. We often don’t need to know the whole truth, we just need to understand the main truth.

-When there is a new believer we don’t start with understanding the Trinity, we start with the basics.

-But God has given them every reason to worship Him alone. He has defeated the gods of Egypt, and He wants them to know as they come to Canaan where there will be new “gods” that they should serve Him alone.

He wants them to know that even though others may seem odd to the people you come in contact with, don’t make the mistake of believing you must have other gods, don’t force yourself to fit in where I have called you to stand out.

-We often think that fitting in is best for us, that it will bring us greater success and better relationships. And we are called as believers to live in this world. But where God has called us to stand out we must stand out.

-When Chick-Fil-A was first started by Truett Cathy they began in mall food courts, but he had difficulty initially because when he told them that they wouldn’t be open on Sunday’s they were hesitant that Chick-Fil-A could bring in enough profits to be valuable. But Cathy held strong to his conviction even though from a business standpoint he was told that it was not smart. After all, Sunday is usually one of the most profitable days of the week. Even as Chick-Fil-A grew many wondered “how much more money could they make if they were open on Sunday”? Currently, Chick-Fil-A is the second most profitable fast food chain, only behind McDonald's. That means that they make more money in 6 days then Wendy’s, Subway, or any other chain does in 7 days.

-In a world that prioritizes vacationing to godliness. That prioritizes football on Sunday over being in church or even during the week. That prioritizes their job and money over church. That prioritizes watching Netflix over their relationship to God. We can say “I have to be at this thing” as an excuse not to be involved in church rather than be a reflection of godliness. Why? Because you want to be a part of the world, you don’t want to stand out.

-Now do not hear me wrong, there are many who have no choice but to work on a Sunday, or because they are highly susceptible to something like COVID do not feel safe being at church. But even in this instances we can find ways to be in community and to put our relationship to God before everything else.

-But it is not just a question of who we prioritize, it is also a question of who we serve.

Who do we serve? - Exodus 20:4-6

God uses two words for “idol” here. One that is the basic “idol” and another that is translated as “likeness”. These words are interchangeable but God doesn’t want to leave any loopholes, He doesn’t want them trying to find a way to worship any idol. Thus He specifies even further, everything in heaven, everything on earth, and everything under the earth. He is stating, “don’t worship angels, don’t worship people, don’t worship any living creature”.

Paul makes this same statement clear in 1 Cor. 8:4-6

1 Corinthians 8:4–6 CSB

About eating food sacrificed to idols, then, we know that “an idol is nothing in the world,” and that “there is no God but one.” For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth—as there are many “gods” and many “lords”—yet for us there is one God, the Father. All things are from him, and we exist for him. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ. All things are through him, and we exist through him.

Worship here is to serve, to be a slave to.

What exactly is an idol though?

An idol is an image that you make, that is shaped and fashioned.

This can be in the likeness of any man or animal.

An idol is not just a statue or a picture, but to them it was the very essence of that divine being.

Their lives and culture were centered on their worship of idols.

If you asked someone during this time how they raised cattle the first thing they would bring up is how to properly sacrifice an offering to that god in order to prepare.`

An idol to them was to speak to the gods. Think about if someone 2000 years ago saw you doing a zoom call, they would think you were crazy because you weren’t talking to a real person. They would probably say you were practicing witchcraft.

This is how they viewed worshiping idols, it was a direct line of communication with the god behind the idol.

In a way this is why we wear gear associated with our favorite players, teams, or celebrities. We believe that this brings us closer with that person or with that team. We try and get into their mindset, try to understand why they made a certain decision, we listen to podcasts about things that they have done. We try and get into their psyche.

Even more than this we have superstitions that we perform on their behalf. We wear the same socks, the same jersey, we eat the same food in order to attain favor for them so that we may enjoy the benefits of their reward.

We can do this with something like Star Wars, or Harry Potter, or Disney. We have posters, and action figures, and costumes that we hope will draw us closer to those specific franchises, hoping that we may find joy if we get ourselves close enough to the reality that has been created there.

And you know, this is not very different from the way that they worshipped idols. Because they had their own myths and legends about their gods and their actions. You can think about the Greek gods like Zeus and Hercules, and Achilles. They had stories they told about their victories and adventures and mistakes. We may say this is different because we believe ours to be fictional, but how different is it really? Because even if we know it is fictional, does it bring you happiness sometimes? Have you found yourself crying during a movie, or at a sporting event? Do we follow every aspect of these adventures or over an athlete or celebrities lives in the way that we want to keep to memory?

A Sacrifice to a god was “feeding” their gods to appease them.

If they offered their sacrifice it believed that it indebted that god to act on their behalf.

It was purely transnational in nature, if they sacrificed the relationship would work.

This is also why they would have gluttonous parties or why they would delve into drunkenness. They were enjoying these on behalf of the gods.

We often think that if we sacrifice our times to our jobs, if we give enough money to a campaign, if we just dedicate ourselves to a sport or hobby, that it will bring us happiness.

To serve is to worship, to put faith in, to trust. To worship the idols is to believe that they would bring you satisfaction, peace, stability, and joy.

-Isn’t this how we often believe politics works? That if we give money, if we vote for them, if we argue enough on their behalf that they will be indebted to us? Regardless of the actual details we believe what they say about a policy and how it will benefit us and how it will be food for us. We think that if we vote a certain way that we will have satisfaction, peace, stability, and joy. We think if we put enough service to that cause that we are really serving Jesus.

But Jesus says that we cannot serve two masters. He says this because in our daily lives only one can have our heart, only one can have our complete trust.

4. There were three types of God’s. Personal gods, family gods, and national gods. Their loyalty would be dependent on the problems they faced.

-Often what we are okay giving ourselves to, tells us which God we serve.

-We can have our own satisfaction and enjoyment, we have our family and their success, and then there is our country and the world. Our job is to take care of us personally and allows us to enjoy the things we want to enjoy. Then we have our children’s sports and our children’s grades that we hope to give enough to in order for them to have the success that we want them to have, and then the politicians are the ones who take care of the nation, that bring us peace there.

-Then when there is something big that happens, when our other gods are failing us, we go to the Lord to fix our problem.

But an idol is not just a creation of another god, it can be for God himself. JI Packer mentions this in His book Knowing God. We can worship a specific part of who God is but not all of who He is.

-Notice that all created images are condemned, even of God himself. Because we must worship God in the fulness of His glory, not just a part of His glory. We can create a false image of God by our “own speculation and imagination” and in so doing we can become idol-worshippers.

-This is why statements like "I like to think of God as...judge...simply as a Father" betrays God's character. "Remarks of this kind serve as the prelude to a denial of something that the Bible tells us about God...those who hold themselves free to think of God as they like are breaking the second commandment."

God is jealous for us to serve Him, but this is for our joy.

To be jealous here means that he is demanding exclusively of service. This word is not our typical word for jealousy, like the one used later to describe covetousness. This is a word used only of God. This is a type of jealousy that only God can have. It is relationally based, it is not works oriented. He wants our full attention. It is the type of jealousy a wife may have for her husband's attention another woman seems interested in him. God wants our full attention, he wants us to serve Him and Him alone. He doesn't want us distracted, especially because idols do not deserve our attention.

What does it mean that God "punished the children for the sins of the father"?

-It was not about punishing the children for sins their father committed but it is successively punishing generations that followed in the same sins of their parents. Essentially he says that we cannot use our parents as an excuse for our own continuing in sin when we have His Word to direct us. Each generation will receive the same punishment, because as God says, those generations also hate him.

But on the other hand God will show His loyalty to thousands of generations, He wants His people to remain loyal to Him for eternity and He will continue to show loyalty to them even when they sin.

James 4:1–5 CSB

What is the source of wars and fights among you? Don’t they come from your passions that wage war within you? You desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and wage war. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and don’t receive because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You adulterous people! Don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? So whoever wants to be the friend of the world becomes the enemy of God. Or do you think it’s without reason that the Scripture says: The spirit he made to dwell in us envies intensely?

Our hope is that God shows His lovingkindness to us, and we seek Him, if we worship Him alone we will be found in Him.

1 John 5:1–4 CSB

Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the Father also loves the one born of him. This is how we know that we love God’s children: when we love God and obey his commands. For this is what love for God is: to keep his commands. And his commands are not a burden, because everyone who has been born of God conquers the world. This is the victory that has conquered the world: our faith.

God’s commands were never meant to stifle us, to make life no fun. In fact, they were given to us out of God’s love that we may find true joy in Him, so that we may conquer the world! But we must have faith that He desires joy for us. In the same way He desire the true beauty for Adam and Eve in the Garden, the way He desired for His people to enter the promised land, today He desires for us to enjoy Him eternally.