True Worship

Announcements

Books - We have some free books available in the foyer - anyone is welcome to take some home. If you would like to take a box, we’d be glad to help you: just let us know. Today is the final day, so make sure you look through the boxes this morning.

Fellowship Meal - July 6 is a big night for Wednesdays at Crestview. It’s a meal night. We’re going to feast on BBQ Ribs! We’re also having Red Potatoes, Corn on the Cob, and Homemade Ice Cream. This is going to be delicious! Come join us at 6:30 on July 6th!

Men’s Bible Study - After we eat, we’re starting something new: we’re going to have Bible studies for the Men and Women on Wednesdays. The Men will scurry away to the Choir Room and do a study on the Henry Blackaby and Claude King book “Experiencing God.” This is a terrific study. If you want to be a part, you can go ahead and order your book now - they are about $6-8 on Amazon used and about $14 new. If you have some difficulties, let me know and we’ll get you squared away.

Women’s Bible Study - The ladies have their own Bible study, too. They’ll stay in the the Fellowship Hall and begin a study through the book “Matchless” by Angie Smith. (Ask Carrie or Ferol if they want to give more info)

Reading: Deut 5:8-10

Deuteronomy 5:8–10 ESV

8 “ ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. 9 You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 10 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

Pray

Last week we looked at the first commandment of the Decalogue: that we should have no other gods before God. We saw how peculiar God is - there is no one like him. We considered how God is preeminent over his creation - both in his existence and in his importance. We also saw that he is possessive of his people and his glory. All these lead us to love, worship, and serve God alone.

The first commandment deals primarily with the object of our worship. God is the only One worthy of our worship. He demands our exclusive loyalty, and he is in fact the only one to whom we should give our loyalty.

Now as we approach the second commandment, we recognize that the commandment we consider this morning flows directly from the first. Just as there is no substitute for God’s person, there is also no substitute for his form, nor for the means he has prescribed to worship him.

God’s unique nature demands of us exclusivity in our manner of worship. The One who alone is worthy of our worship has told us the way in which we are to worship, as well as which ways we are forbidden from worshipping.

What Does the Second Commandment Reveal about God?

God Cannot Be Represented by Created Things

Look carefully at Deuteronomy 5.8:

Deuteronomy 5:8 ESV

8 “ ‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.

When most of us hear this commandment, we think of something like this:

Cult Image of Artemis

Our first thought is usually centered on statues and idols. We’re not to make those things. And this commandment does say that. But why? Why can’t we just make some statues or some figures that can help us visualize the invisible God we worship? Why can’t we use some physical objects as proxies for our worship?

Because of God’s nature - God is not physical. There is no physical thing that can replicate him. More than that - there is no physical thing that even makes a close analogy. Anything good in our world reflects something of God, but it is so tainted and marred that it’s hard to see any resemblance.

That’s especially true of us: people were created, male and female, in God’s image, but our sinfulness makes that image all but impossible to find. So if we, the sons of Adam and daughters of Eve that we are, do not come close to representing God, how much less can a carved stone or some animal, or even a natural phenomenon like a storm or the stars in the sky? These are all created by God and are under his control. None of them will do when we are looking for God. Because God is so different from his creation, nothing in his creation can represent him well enough to use in worship. But there is a more important reason than even this:

God Is Jealous

This seems strange: why would God call himself jealous? Isn’t jealousy a bad thing? But God does call himself jealous:

Deuteronomy 5:9 ESV

9 You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

Multiple times in the OT God is called jealous. According to TDOT, the seven times the adjective is used are all in reference to God (TDOT XIII, 48ff.). All of the instances combine the idea of jealousy/zeal with God’s demand to be worshipped alone. Look at Exodus 34:14:

Exodus 34:14 ESV

14 (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God),

Not only is God jealous (adjective), God names himself “Jealous!” Gerhard von Rad, an OT scholar, says this:

If jealousy is a critical element of the name of Yahweh, apart from any description of his nature or attributes, our attention must turn at once to the relationship between Yahweh and his worshipers. It is characterized by an intolerant demand for exclusivity: it is Yahweh’s will ‘to be the only God for Israel, and … he is not disposed to share his claim for worship and love with any other divine power. (OT Theology, 208).

The biblical idea of God’s jealousy seems to relate to his character being recognized for who he is. If God is the only one worthy of worship, then worship of another is out of the question. It is robbing God (cf. Micah 3:6) of his rightful due. More than that, it is a fundamental denial of reality. It cheats both God of his due of worship, and us from fulfilling our requirement of worship.

Creating an image through which we attempt to worship God is tantamount to worshiping the image rather than the Creator of the object being used. To worship the stars, birds, beasts, weather, etc. is to worship the created rather than the Creator, even if we try to merely employ the image as a representative of God. There can be no object of worship except the only one worthy - God himself. He is too jealous for us to do otherwise. And that jealousy drives his response to our actions in two ways:

He Punishes Sin

Deuteronomy 5:9 ESV

9 You shall not bow down to them or serve them; for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

God’s jealousy is directly connected to his wrath toward sin. God will not be mocked, derided, scorned, or even misrepresented. God punishes the sins of those who hate him. He is jealous for genuine worship, so he will not let sinfulness pass by him without a full measure of judgment.

Deuteronomy 32:16–21 ESV

16 They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger. 17 They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded. 18 You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth. 19 “The Lord saw it and spurned them, because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. 20 And he said, ‘I will hide my face from them; I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness. 21 They have made me jealous with what is no god; they have provoked me to anger with their idols. So I will make them jealous with those who are no people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.

He Shows Steadfast Love

Deuteronomy 5:10 ESV

10 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

What Does the Second Commandment Require of Us?

We Must Worship God according to His Commands

No False Gods

No False Representations of God

We are also not to represent God with any physical form. The problem here is that nothing CAN represent God, so any attempt we make will only diminish his glory. But there’s also another tendency: we tend to worship what’s in front of us. The thing we can look at and touch tends to become the thing we focus on, and what we focus on tends to become what we will worship. Isaiah shows the utter nonsense of idol-making:

Isaiah 44:9–20 ESV

9 All who fashion idols are nothing, and the things they delight in do not profit. Their witnesses neither see nor know, that they may be put to shame. 10 Who fashions a god or casts an idol that is profitable for nothing? 11 Behold, all his companions shall be put to shame, and the craftsmen are only human. Let them all assemble, let them stand forth. They shall be terrified; they shall be put to shame together. 12 The ironsmith takes a cutting tool and works it over the coals. He fashions it with hammers and works it with his strong arm. He becomes hungry, and his strength fails; he drinks no water and is faint. 13 The carpenter stretches a line; he marks it out with a pencil. He shapes it with planes and marks it with a compass. He shapes it into the figure of a man, with the beauty of a man, to dwell in a house. 14 He cuts down cedars, or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest. He plants a cedar and the rain nourishes it. 15 Then it becomes fuel for a man. He takes a part of it and warms himself; he kindles a fire and bakes bread. Also he makes a god and worships it; he makes it an idol and falls down before it. 16 Half of it he burns in the fire. Over the half he eats meat; he roasts it and is satisfied. Also he warms himself and says, “Aha, I am warm, I have seen the fire!” 17 And the rest of it he makes into a god, his idol, and falls down to it and worships it. He prays to it and says, “Deliver me, for you are my god!” 18 They know not, nor do they discern, for he has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, and their hearts, so that they cannot understand. 19 No one considers, nor is there knowledge or discernment to say, “Half of it I burned in the fire; I also baked bread on its coals; I roasted meat and have eaten. And shall I make the rest of it an abomination? Shall I fall down before a block of wood?” 20 He feeds on ashes; a deluded heart has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself or say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”

When we create false representations of God, they will ALWAYS end up becoming false gods.

No False Worship of God

Guide Me, O Thou Great Jehovah (Hymn 682)

Play the video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahm7j4lLl5U

I’m pretty sure the guy with the beer isn’t worshiping - no matter what the lyrics say. We’re not usually that brazen, but sometimes our worship is an act. False worship is not a recent invention: God condemns Israel of false worship through the prophet Isaiah:

Isaiah 29:13 ESV

13 And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men,

And when the Pharisees accuse Jesus’ disciples of not following the hand-washing tradition, Jesus quotes that same verse (cf. Matthew 15:8; Mark 7:6)

Worship is one place you can’t “fake it ‘til you make it.” Our worship must be genuine.

But it also must be sanctioned. God has set some clear guidelines for worship. When the woman at the well wanted to discuss the appropriate place of worship, Jesus focuses instead on the proper method of worship:

John 4:21–24 ESV

21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me, the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.”

You cannot worship God falsely. That’s not true worship. True worship requires both spirit and truth - both the presence of God and the proper recognition of God. Just as you cannot have a substitute for God, you also cannot substitute God’s approved methods of worship.

We Must Be Jealous for God

In Numbers 25, Israelites were involved in all kinds of idolatry - worshiping and sacrificing to the gods of Moab. One even dared to marry and bring in a Midianite wife directly in front of Moses and the congregation of Israel. Phinehas, the grandson of Aaron, went and killed the man and his Midianite wife, stopping a plague running rampant throughout the Israelite camp. Then God says this of Phinehas:

Numbers 25:11 ESV

11 “Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back my wrath from the people of Israel, in that he was jealous with my jealousy among them, so that I did not consume the people of Israel in my jealousy.

Now being jealous for God may not always be that violent, but we must be jealous for God. We should see offenses against him as offenses against us. We should stand up when God is being mocked. His glory should be our motivation. Like David standing up to Goliath, we must be jealous for God - not for ourselves, mind you - seeking to honor him by doing the right thing in every circumstance.