10 Commandments: No Other Gods
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80’s Band Tears for Fears nailed it in their hit song: Everybody wants to rule the world.
When you rule the world or the state, or the city, or the household, you become the standard.
If you are not the standard, then you point to the standard that you and others will follow.
When it comes to our culture of today, we see that it isn’t just one person, or deity, but everybody wants to rule the world.
Our President wants to tell us how we should live.
The Supreme Court wants to tell us how we should live.
Activists want to tell us how we should live.
Hollywood wants to tell us how we should live.
Religious folk want to tell us how we should live.
Everybody wants to rule the world.
But who actually rules the world and what is really expected of us?
Today we will seek to discover the answer to that very question.
Today we begin our new series on the 10 commandments.
A series on 10 laws, 10 commandments, literally in the Hebrew, 10 words, that have been at the center of biblical life
and worldly controversy for thousands of years.
A series that will seek to reveal the true meaning and purpose behind these laws and help us understand them fuller.
In the process I hope we will uncover the mysteries and controversy that surrounds them.
I want us to look to answer questions that naturally arrive as we wrestle with the implications of God’s rule and reign.
Before we begin, I want to lay before us the road map that we will be traveling.
There are 4 points that I will return to each week as we discover the truth behind each commandment.
Each week we will look at a new commandment. Yet, we will use these same 4 points and seek the understand to each commandment.
Let’s get these 4 points before us right now so that we can be thinking about them as we begin our journey this morning.
1.) Ten Commandments: Reveal God’s Character.
What God calls us to do and be, reveals to us something about who God is.
God’s Character becomes evident in what God prioritizes.
2.) Ten Commandments: Reveal what God requires of us.
The commandments give us a roadmap to what is good, what is right,
it is a standard that we can view ourselves and the world around us through.
3.) Ten Commandments: Reveal our depravity (sin)
The ten commandments will reveal with crystal clear clarity something that is drastically wrong with not just the world,
But what is drastically wrong with ourselves.
4.) Ten Commandments: Reveal our need of a Savior.
The ten commandments will point us, like everything in the old Testament is designed to do, to our need of a Savior.
Someone who can be, what we fail to be.
Someone who is worthy, holy, righteous, that we can trust to navigate this life we have been given.
Each week we will also answer one common misconception about the Ten Commandments.
We will seek to debunk or bring clarity to a myth or opinion that can be brought up when discussing the 10 Commandments
As you can see, we have a lot to explore together.
So let us start with a basic, but big question. What is a commandment?
A command in its most basic definition is an authoritative order.
When it comes to the word biblical commandment, it is a divine authoritative order.
Which brings us to our first myth and common misconception:
If a commandment is a divine authoritative order.
And God is who has set forth these 10 authoritative order.
Then God is a cosmic dictator.
I believe the answer to this, and other questions, will become clear when we break down our first commandment.
So let us jump in.
Open your Bibles or turn them on if that is your preference to the Old Testament book of Exodus.
We will be in chapter 20:1-3.
You may want to bookmark this page because we will be returning to it each week.
And God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. “You shall have no other gods before me.
Our first of the 10 commandments is this: You shall have no other gods before me.
Not only is this the first commandment, this is also the most important commandment of the 10.
Hear me this morning as this is so important.
All commandments funnel through this first commandment and none of the other commandments make sense apart from this one.
If we do not live according to this commandment, form our purpose around this commandment,
and seek the meaning behind this commandment, then there are no reasons to live according to any other commandments.
Because God is our Creator and Sustainer, we are to have no other gods before, or besides, the One true God.
We are not to find our hope, our purpose, our meaning, outside of the one true God.
We are not to worship, to glorify, to honor, anyone or anything above the one true God.
We are not to put any created thing before or beside the Creator.
But doesn’t this turn God into the idea that He is a Cosmic Dictator?
Well, if we look at just the commandment and rip it out of context, you might be on to something.
But let’s look closer at verses 1 and 2 before we make our decision.
And God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
You see, God is declaring something amazing here.
It is not, I am God, thus you will do this.
God is saying, because I am God, because I have rescued you, because you have been saved, because you are now protected and set apart, here is what you shall do.
The Bible does not begin with these words: In The Beginning God said You shall have no other gods before me.
Actually want to see something wild?
God doesn’t say these words until the 70th chapter of the Bible!
Now yes, chapters and verses were not invented and inserted into our Bibles until the 1500s
Chapters and verse numbers are a man-made creation and thus not authoritative.
But they do help us see something very powerful. We see that it isn’t until God revealed Himself more fully that He shares these words.
So, for us to understand the context, it will be helpful to do a brief overview of what has happened to lead up to these commandments.
To do that we must turn to the very first book, the very first paragraph, the very first verse, the very first 4 words of our Bible.
In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Now this is an overview sentence for what Moses is about to tell us about Creation. But it is exactly what we need to know.
In the beginning, meaning when time first began, God created.
Now God is eternal and outside of time.
God is everlasting to everlasting with no beginning or end.
Dylan keeps asking me, Daddy, who created God? or Daddy, when did God become God?
I will keep answering, Dylan, God was never created He is our Creator. He is eternal and always existed!
Dylan’s eyes start to squint and he cocks his head to the side as if straining.
Kaiden looks over at Dylan and say, “Don’t do it Dylan. Your head will hurt, trust me, I’ve tried.”
Everything begins for us with the eternal, uncreated God, bringing forth time.
The one who is outside of time who exists apart from time, creates time and places us in it.
I try, to explain to Dylan that everything we see and know and experience is inside of time.
Everything has a start and an end. Which is what makes God so amazing. He is the only one without a start or an end.
Thus our Creation was not an accident.
It wasn’t a random bang.
It wasn’t dust particles randomly colliding in the vastness of nothing.
It was the spoken word of God.
Thus in the Beginning, God Creates and is the author and authority of that which He has made.
In God’s creative artistry and wonder He creates the heavens and the earth along with His crown creation, Humanity.
Image bearers of God.
God begins His rule and reign by creating everything good and wonderful and amazing and setting forth Adam and Eve.
However it doesn’t take long for the guidelines that God set forth to be broken.
In Genesis 3 we see the Fall of Adam and Eve and we discover sin and the sin nature that then invades Adam and Eve and every offspring.
However in Genesis 3:15 we see God promise that their is hope and there will be one to come to defeat sin and death.
Genesis 4 shows us the further effects of the fall as Cain not only disobeys God but murders His brother.
Genesis 6 brings forth in the wickedness and depravity of our sin nature. We are left wondering how does this end, how do you fix sin.
Could destroying the world and starting over do it? God floods the entire earth but one family.
However, it wasn’t because God was hoping this would fix the sin issue in the world. He knew exactly what would fix the sin nature.
But, we did not.
Even today we think that if we could just do this or that then we can create a utopia.
If even Christians could all get together and build a community and hide away from the world we would finally have heaven on earth.
But, that is not the answer. The flood reminds us of this.
Genesis 11 shows humanity coming together to accomplish their will and desire. Their rebellion against God and their desire to be their own gods is on full display.
If only we can all work together we can have peace and hope and love, but no, that will never happen either. Our Sin nature will not allow it.
God scatters the peoples through creating different languages and it is becoming ever more clearer that mankind cannot be its own Savior.
We then transition in the book of Genesis to the second part which moves the next storyline that will follow.
in Genesis 12 God now chooses a man, a Pagan, out of the Pagan nation, in which He will bless and bring forth His plan.
This would be Abram.
But, would Abram be the cure to the sin nature? No. Abram and his descendants continue to fail.
Abram, who became Abraham didn’t trust in God and on several occasions fell short.
Isaac then comes forth and the same thing happens.
Jacob is next and seems to be getting worse. Jacob then has 12 sons, perhaps his sons would bring forth the solution?
No, just like most siblings, they didn’t all get along and tried to kill one of their sons named Joseph.
But as Genesis continues we see God still moving and bringing about His purpose and His plan even in the midst of all of this.
We see God still blessing and extending an unimaginable amount of grace and mercy as He guides and directs His fallen, broken, and rebellious children.
Genesis ends with God’s chosen family rescued from famine and settled in Egypt.
But we are left hanging.
We are left seeing no immediate solution for the sin the permeates every corner of our being.
We are left wondering what is next and how will this all work out.
It is then that we open the second book of the Bible, Exodus.
Centuries pass and the chosen family of God was fruitful and multiplied.
God continued to bless His people and we see the growth of the people God would use to bring about His plan.
However, Gods plan was in direct conflict with Pharaoh’s plan, the ruler of Egypt at that time.
Pharoah puts the Israelites into forced labor and oppresses them.
Then in a really amazing set of events Moses is chosen by God to lead His people out of captivity into the promised land.
However, Pharoah had other ideas and set forth a showdown.
The self-proclaimed god, Pharoah in one corner and the Creator of Pharaoh and everything in existence in the other corner.
If you haven’t read Exodus I’m pretty sure you have an idea of how that went.
God’s people are rescued from the oppression and given new life and new hope and a new purpose.
Everything was wonderful and amazing and beautiful right?
There was much rejoicing and celebration which turned into complete love and adoration to their God and Savior? Right?
No, there was grumbling and complaining to the point they wish they were oppressed again by Pharaoh!
It is then that we discover that the sin nature did not go away, we just were so focused on God’s power and majesty that we stopped focusing on man’s failures while we stood in awe and wonder of our Sovereign King.
God leads them through Moses to Mount Sinai and establishes the nation of Israel into a covenant with Himself.
God promises to use Israel to display His goodness and glory to the nations and they are to be God’s representatives and priests.
The Israelites celebrate this and then Moses is given the 10 commandments on how they will begin by displaying God’s glory and be a people set apart for the purposes of God.
Which leads us to Exodus 20:1-3
And God spoke all these words, saying, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. “You shall have no other gods before me.
You see, God displays His plan, His covenant promises, His faithfulness, His patience and grace, His love and direction, His rescue and Salvation, BEFORE, He says, You shall have no other gods before me.
Now that we understand the background and the reason for God giving us the first of the 10 commandments.
Let us now answer the a very common argument and misunderstanding when it comes to the 10 Commandments:
The statement that since God gave us the 10 commandments it makes God a Cosmic Dictator.
It is hard to substantiate this argument in light of the last 70 chapters, but lets look at it anyways.
Is God a Cosmic Dictator? In the fullness of the definition, no. But in aspects, yes. Let me explain.
A Dictator is a ruler with total power over a country, typically one who has obtained control by force.
God is Sovereign and has total power over His Creation, absolutely!
But God did not obtain control by force, God obtained it by Creation.
The World is His because He made it and Created it and Sustains it.
The issue with calling God as a Cosmic Dictator is that we look at Dictators as bad and evil. Why?
First Dictators take what is not theirs by force. God did not do this.
Secondly, because of our sin nature, leaders are naturally bent towards selfish and self-serving laws and ideals.
That is why every time we see someone who is a dictator, it is always corrupt and awful.
However, God is the opposite of what we think of when we think of an earthly dictator.
God is our Heavenly Creator who rules and reigns.
I’m reminded of one of my favorite quotes from the Narnia series when speaking of Aslan the Lion.
Aslan who is a representation of Jesus. Scripturally we know that it was Jesus who Created through the Father’s direction.
So, Listen to this exchange by Susan and Mr. Beaver, of the grandness of Aslan and in turn of our God. Mr. Beaver begins by saying:
“Aslan is a lion- the Lion, the great Lion." "Ooh" said Susan. "I'd thought he was a man. Is he-quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion"..."Safe?" said Mr Beaver ..."Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”
When it comes to our God, He is the Cosmic Ruler, the Cosmic King. Is God safe? Of course He isn’t safe.
He’s more mighty and powerful than our imagination can possibly fathom.
While in our greatest thoughts he is fearfully powerful, He is most certainly good.
Not a Dictator in the since that we use the word when thinking of world powers, but a Sovereign King whom rules rightly, justly, and fully.
Which brings us to the first of our 4 points that we will explore each week.
What does this commandment, this divine authoritative order tell us about God.
What does this reveal to us about God’s character?
It reveals that God is God alone.
Thus God is Sovereign and Supreme. God is the eternal everlasting to everlasting.
God has no rival.
It reveals to us that God stands completely apart and “other” than His creation.
What does this Reveal about the Character of God?
It reveals God’s compassion.
It reveals that God does not want you to be deceived, manipulated, or mislead.
Thus displaying God as a protector, a defender, and ultimately a Savior.
This statement really reveals every attribute of God within His own declaration.
He is the Great I AM.
Because of this we are to have no other lesser gods whether created in our mind or created by our hands.
God declares this truth, You shall have no other Gods before me.
After we see what this tells us about God, our next question is what does this mean for us.
What is required of us?
I have it broken down into 3 aspects, let us look at the first one, now.
First, this commandment requires us to know and acknowledge God to be the only true God.
To know means that we have knowledge and understanding that God is the only true God.
We must see through God’s creation and we must see through His revelation that He is God.
Illustration: Tuesday is going to be a really big day for me.
As an astrophotographer I love pictures of deep space and we are going to see the first images of the James Webb Telescope.
The clearest, crispest, most beautiful pictures of deep space every captured will be revealed.
So, at 10:30am, do not call, do not go to hospital, do not decide to have an emergency.
I will be glued to the TV screen.
The only thing that would prevent this from happening is my wife’s equal obsession with sharks.
Which they apparently have not just one week but two weeks of shark shows coming up.
It is a big day because these pictures will display for the first time the creation of God that we have not seen before.
This commandment tells us that we are to see these pictures and see God and God alone’s artistic explosions of color and light.
We see these pictures and we know the incredible mind behind the galaxy’s and nebulas and planets.
But it is not just to know these things in our mind but we are to acknowledge God in our expressions and our speech.
If you see my social media on Tuesday, you will see much to the effect of my acknowledging of the Creator behind the Creation!
We are not just to know that God is the one true God but we are to acknowledge Him as such.
In our heart, in our mind, in our conversations, in our posts, in our work, in our activities, in our hobbies, in our day to day life.
Secondly, this commandment also means that He is more than just the only true God, but that He is our God.
This is where I get even more excited.
This one true God is not just any random impersonal God. This is my God.
This is your God, This is our God.
This one True God is relational and Has not only Created us but is actively in relationship with us.
Illustration: Think about something that you are passionate about that you call your own.
These are my kids, this is wife, this is my baseball team, this is my town.
We have love, joy, passion, excitement, endearment, dare I even say giddy.
Now imagine on what level our heart should explode when we see that this isn’t just a God, isn’t just the God, but this is My God.
Knowing this, experiencing this, engaging in this, will bring about the last requirement of this commandment for us.
Lastly the First commandment means that we are to worship Him and glorify Him as our God.
The knowledge of God brings forth reverence and delight within ourselves.
The acknowledgment of God brings forth excitement and joy when declaring and sharing about God.
The realization of God being our God brings forth awe and wonder.
Which naturally leads to worship and praise of God as our God.
To ponder and engage in complexities and depths of God will not only cause you to worship our God but to glorify our God.
This is what it means for us when God says that we shall have no other gods before me.
This is looking from the angle of what we should do.
However, is this what we always do, every moment, of every day?
Is this at the forefront of our thoughts and on the tip of our tongue in every second and every instance.
Do we bring forth worship and God’s glory in every situation of every breath?
No?
This leads us to our third point: The Ten Commandments reveal our depravity, our sin.
While I certainly get excited talking about knowing and acknowledging God as our God and worshipping and glorifying Him as such.
If I am honest with you, that is not how my day goes.
Sure, I have moments, and praise God I have many moments throughout the days that this is true of me.
But I have many and dare I say many more moments when this is not the case of me. Even days when this is not my thoughts or actions.
This commandment reveals our sin every time we deny God, are not worshiping God, not glorifying God as our One and True God.
This commandment reveals our sin when we do not acknowledge God as our God.
When we give praise and worship to anyone or anything in the way that is reserved for God and God alone.
Illustration: Have you ever, even for a moment, doubted God’s existence.
Have you ever seized up or shied away from talking about God?
Have you ever been embarrassed about God or embarrassed about one might think of you focusing on God?
Have you ever put a created thing as more important than the Creator?
Have you ever been more concerned about what someone might think instead of what God thinks?
Have you ever given the worship and glory that is due to God and God alone to anyone or anything else?
When we do these actions we are breaking the very first commandment.
When we break the commandment we are going against not just a God, not just THE God, but Our God.
It is breaking God’s law that condemns us. It is looking at the law of God that we reveal how sinful we really are.
When gazing upon the laws requirements we see that we are no longer good, we are no longer righteous.
We must agree when Paul pens these words.
no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.”
When we hold the mirror of God’s law up and gaze upon ourselves, the reflection we see is an awful, wretched, creature.
We see an unworthy and shameful shell of what we are called to be and supposed to be.
While I am showing you the reflection that is displayed through God’s law, I am also seeing the same image when I look at myself through God’s law.
I am just as filthy and unclean as the next person.
Matter of fact it isn’t just all of us in this room but everyone in the world.
Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.
We have all turned our backs on God and turned away from bringing forth the worship and glory to the only one worthy of the worship and glory.
Each of us in this room, including myself, is guilty before God.
Each and every person beyond these doors, in this town, state, country, and world, will be judged according to this standard.
Everyone of us will fall woefully short of the standard that is set before us.
Is there any hope? Is there any chance for redemption? Is there any means for Salvation?
Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith.
Remember the Old Testament can be summed up in one word: Anticipation.
The law is no different.
The law has become our tutor, our guardian, our school master, meant to lead us to our Savior.
The law shows us what we cannot do, but shows us what one person did do.
Which leads us to our 4th and final point.
The first commandment Reveals our Need of a Savior.
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
Thus, we need a Savior.
But The God, and most importantly, our God, has made a way.
Though we have sinned and fallen short. Jesus didn’t.
Where we have only had moments of following this first commandment perfectly, Jesus followed it fully and completely.
and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,
God put forth a free gift to us, the most underserving of His earthly creation.
This is a gift of grace. That which we did not deserve, could not earn, and can never pay back.
This gift of grace is given through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
To be redeemed means that a price must be paid in order to purchase and that is what Jesus did.
Jesus paid the penalty of our sin upon the cross in order to purchase our Salvation.
What must you do to receive this gift?
Praise God for the grace given to you and extend the gift of faith upon the only one worthy of your faith. Jesus.
Trust that Jesus did what you could not do on your behalf.
Believe that Jesus paid the penalty that you deserved in your place.
Rest in the finished work of Christ and no longer rely on your own works to achieve God’s standard.
Then we do something radically different.
We look to the law as no longer our downfall but as our joy.
We seek to worship and glorify God not out of fear but now in gratitude.
No longer looking to our inability but through Jesus’s ability.
So, should we still do what the first commandment calls us to do even though we can’t in and of ourselves and Jesus did fully and completely?
Great question: Let’s look to Jesus Himself to answer.
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.
Jesus did not come to abolish the law but to fulfill them and the laws are now completely and perfectly fulfilled in Christ.
Listen to what Pastor and Theologian Kevin DeYoung says:
“We still need the Ten Words handed down at Sinai. Have they been changed in some respects by the coming of Christ? For sure—transformed but not trashed. We can no longer keep the Ten Commandments rightly unless we keep them in Christ, through Christ, and with a view to the all-surpassing greatness of Christ. As new creations in Christ, the law is not only our duty but also our delight. If we want to love Christ as he deserves and as he desires, we will keep his commandments (John 14:15). - Kevin DeYoung
Now that we are free in Christ we get to follow the commandments by following them not out of our own ability but through Christ’s ability and example, resting on His finished work as we get the opportunity to pursue holiness and sanctification.
They are no longer meant to show us how bad we are but point us to how good Jesus is.
We do not follow the commandments out of dread but as Kevin DeYoung says, we get to pursue them out of delight.
Do we still follow this first commandment today? Absolutely. But, with freedom and joy.
The 10 commandments are not meant to remove freedoms but provides freedom.
We are now, in Christ, free to pursue the life that we were designed for and created for.
Are the 10 commandments abolished? No. But they are fulfilled and now pursued in Christ, through Christ, and because of Christ.
I know this was a lot to take in.
My hope is that you leave today seeing Jesus all the more wonderful, our God all the more amazing, and our purpose all the more incredible.
Let us with joy pursue what it means to have no other gods in this light and in this direction.
Then let us dream. Dream of what it would be like for us to pursue this commandment through the finished work of Christ.
What would it look like to pursue the knowledge of God without the condemnation upon ourselves knowing we will never know Him as we should?
What would like look like to acknowledge God without the worry of failure or the shame and regret over our timidness and fear.
What would it look like to not just believe in God as impersonal but to embrace God as our God.
What would our worship look like if we take the same energy and excitement we put towards our favorite sports teams and activities and place our true worship upon God.
Let’s take this week to dream, meditate, explore, and engage in what it would be like to pursue this commandment in light of Christ and in the Freedom of Christ.
Let’s pray.