[SPEAKER_00]: So Exodus chapter 20, we're continuing our verse by verse journey through the book of Exodus.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are at the halfway point, or at least we will be after today.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you do have a lot to go.
[SPEAKER_00]: My hope, my plan, I think I shared this last week.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'd like to try to be done by the end of the year.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know that's a tall order, but we're going to try to pack some of these chapters together
[SPEAKER_00]: through the rest of the book, but what we're seeing is we're watching God he's rescuing a nation and some of you your new here maybe you're new to Christianity maybe you're new to the Bible and you're like what do you mean he's rescuing a nation while the people of Israel the Israel lights the Hebrew people they were enslaved to Egypt for 430 years can we just get a show of hands that you agree that that's a long time.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, that a long time, 430 years.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like we're not talking like, all that, you know, what's the big deal?
[SPEAKER_00]: You were slaves for a load of 430 years.
[SPEAKER_00]: Generation after generation after generation, slaves in Egypt to the Egyptians, and God has rescued them from slavery.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he's done miracle after miracle, after miracle, showing and displaying his glory, his power, and his authority over everything in creation.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'd say most importantly, with this day and age in context, he's establishing his authority over the gods of the Egyptians.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Egyptians worshiped many gods.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're talking about like this is,
[SPEAKER_00]: Not just a few, like a handful, we're talking hundreds of gods.
[SPEAKER_00]: For each thing, there's a God of the Sun.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's the frog goddess, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's the different frogs.
[SPEAKER_00]: And each plague was essentially God going toe to toe, saying, I'm better.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this God is nothing to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: The God that's you worship, that you think's gonna come through.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is not a real God and God Almighty, y'all weigh as He declares Him, says, I am who I am to Moses.
[SPEAKER_00]: He comes through and He says, I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: the Lord God Almighty, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And then we've seen him do all of these miracles.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so for the Israelite people, like if there was any question in their mind and is God real, does he love us?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where's he at?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's he gonna do?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like he came through and he showed his glory, his power in
[SPEAKER_00]: intense magnitude towards undeniable, even the Egyptians saw it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And they were, they feared and they trembled and at the tenth plague, when the first born of every household who didn't have the blood of the lamb put on their door, when they died, the Egyptians said, basically, said, I don't know who this guy is, what's going on, but you guys need to get your stuff and get out of here.
[SPEAKER_00]: You guys remember this, then Pharaoh said, go.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so then they go and they're journeying through the wilderness, which is basically where we're at now, a part of their journey in the wilderness, but God is starting to shape them into the people he desires them to be.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right last week we saw God brought the Israelite people to Mount Sinai, it's the mountain of God, it's the mountain that Moses met with God in the burning bush.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of you, if you grew up in church, you remember the story, I mean, or if you're here, right, Moses goes, he sees this bush on fire and it's a bush, it's burning but it's not burning up.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so I guess this thing's not stopping.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like this thing's got a fuel source somewhere.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not being consumed.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he says, I'm going to go up there.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to turn and see what this thing is.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he goes and sees.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in that moment, God says, Moses, Moses.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, he says, come before it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and he says, take off your shoes.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is holy ground.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's this moment.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now they're back there again.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like where it all started with Moses and God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, Moses has led the people out of Egypt to the mountain of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we start to see, we saw last week, we're going to see more of it today, where there's thunder, there's lightning, there's thick clouds of smoke and fire, and there's this trumpet sounding that's just getting louder and louder.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you kind of remember, we're just trying to set the scene, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If we're the Israelites, we've followed Moses this far and we come to this mountain.
[SPEAKER_00]: God sets some parameters, says don't let the people come up to the mountain, but they got to stay where they're at.
[SPEAKER_00]: If they come up here, they're going to have to die.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know it's strict or we're like, man, that's kind of messed up.
[SPEAKER_00]: But God really does set a standard where he's like, my standard is holiness.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I am a fair, just God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you come before me with your sin, right, for him, he's like, it just doesn't match.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you have to.
[SPEAKER_00]: have to die, like the wages of sin is death.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God says, don't let them come near.
[SPEAKER_00]: And mentioned last week, his boundaries is his protection.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, it is his grace.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is his mercy.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're like, well, God, that's not fair.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's messed up.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why can't I go up on the mountain?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why does Moses get to go?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, well, God's like, hey, just trust me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm trying to protect you.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, sometimes we want things that we shouldn't have.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, why do they get to do that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why can't I?
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and we get ourselves into sticky situations, and then you kind of, if you do get into that position that you desired and you find out, like, well, this isn't what I thought it was.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I have my old job heck, you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought it would be funer in this.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you just don't know what you're asking for and God's boundaries are his protection, but the people that are coming before this mountain, there's thunder, lightning, clouds, smoke fire, this trumpet getting loud and louder and louder.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in this moment, God is preparing
[SPEAKER_00]: to meet with his people, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And chapter 19 he says that you, yourselves, you have seen what I did to the Egyptians, right, how I bore you on Eagles' wings and I brought you to myself.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is the setting up of what's about to happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: God's heart behind what we're about to see.
[SPEAKER_00]: God isn't what we're going to see.
[SPEAKER_00]: News flash is he's going to give the law.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, some of us were like, oh, law rules boring.
[SPEAKER_00]: How many of you going up as a kid in your teacher or your parents are telling you all the rules did you guys enjoy that?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, we're like, no, I don't want to, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I know for my kids, you just have too many rules.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like, it's like, my rules are my protection.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, my rules are not here to hurt you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God's gonna give his law.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's going to give his rules, if you will, and he's not giving this just to some random group of people.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's speaking to, we could say, his redeemed people.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you set the scene and think about it, he has already saved the Israelites from Egypt.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hasn't he?
[SPEAKER_00]: Can we just agree on that?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it's from a theological doctrinal standpoint, I want you to see this.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like he has already saved them, and then now he's going to give them a way to live.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think that's important to note because there's people out there who believe that you have to follow every rule, every law.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you can do that, then you'll be saved.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of you maybe grew up in Catholicism.
[SPEAKER_00]: Catholicism, I'm just going to say it kind of bluntly, it's all based off religion and tradition and rules.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you can do these things, then you can be saved, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's all these things you have to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not the gospel.
[SPEAKER_00]: The gospel is God has saved us, rescued us, and now that we're saved, now we can start to live this new life where we want to obey God's laws.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't want to just throw it away.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know there's some Christians today saying, well, Jesus is saved us.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a new covenant.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is true.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is good news as well, but we don't just throw away the law.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, we don't just discard it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Jesus fulfilled it, so who cares?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, Paul says, no, we uphold the law.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus fulfilled it so that we could be saved.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so in this point here in Exodus, they've already been saved.
[SPEAKER_00]: They've been redeemed, if you will.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God is about to teach them now how to live in relationship with Him.
[SPEAKER_00]: uh... a commentator put it this way says grace precedes the law rescue comes before requirement just again another way of saying what i just was saying the grace god's grace is rescuing comes before the law
[SPEAKER_00]: before he requires things of them and what we read here.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the 10 commandments, many of you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sure every one of you have heard of this, at least at some point, if not read it for yourself, or seen the movie, how many of you have seen the movie around was it Easter time that they play it?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is it Easter?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of odd, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, why are we the 10 commandments?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, should we have an Easter movie like the passion of the Christ or something on them?
[SPEAKER_00]: But anyways, I digress, but we see the 10 commandments.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's God's law, his moral law to his people.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is not about earning salvation.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's about revealing God, God revealing his character to his people.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's one of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's about exposing our sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's another reason for the law.
[SPEAKER_00]: So why we don't want to just discard and say, well, who cares about this?
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus has fulfilled it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll know the law is important.
[SPEAKER_00]: It exposes our sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the law points us to Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our mediator, our Savior.
[SPEAKER_00]: The one who has a tone for our sins, right, he fulfills the law.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then in turn, he writes the law on our hearts by his spirit.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so verse one of chapter 20, it says that in God spoke all these words, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Spoke all these words and I just want to pause here.
[SPEAKER_00]: This isn't Moses's words, it's not Moses' idea.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is God speaking.
[SPEAKER_00]: David Gusik, a pastor that I admire, love listening to, and I read his commentary, he says that this was the only time in history that God's, at least, only time that we know of, that God spoke audibly to an entire nation at once.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's times where God speaks to individuals,
[SPEAKER_00]: or maybe a collective group right but then but we're talking to an entire nation we're talking millions of people many commentators theologians they would estimate there's probably about two and a half million people out there in the wilderness I mean and that's an estimate might be more might be a little less but I mean it's a lot of people.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in this moment, God's speaking to the entire nation, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: They didn't just hear this through a prophet or an angel.
[SPEAKER_00]: They hear the voice of God, thundering from the mountain.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what he's about to speak, it's not random instruction.
[SPEAKER_00]: These are his 10 commandments.
[SPEAKER_00]: 10, we can say, foundational truths that show us what it means to live as God's people.
[SPEAKER_00]: I got to call them out of Egypt out of slavery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now he's going to teach them how can you live.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you're going to be this holy nation set apart.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're going to be my treasured possession.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we're like, yes, that's awesome.
[SPEAKER_00]: How do I do that?
[SPEAKER_00]: And God's like, I'm so glad you asked.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is how you be set apart.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is how you be different, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I know for some of us, we just wanna check out where like rules, laws, I don't wanna hear that's boring.
[SPEAKER_00]: But just picture this, if you're in Israelite, you're in slavery, your whole life, your grandparents, your grandparents, your great grandparents, all the way back, 430 years of generations were slaves in Egypt, and now you're free, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: You are enslaved to a nation who served many gods.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, they were just, they're murderous people.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, they're murder babies.
[SPEAKER_00]: I throw them in the Nile.
[SPEAKER_00]: We don't want them anymore.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like stuff like that going on.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now they're free.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like this, I don't think this would be like, oh man, this is a bummer.
[SPEAKER_00]: God, you have so many rules.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why, like, you know, like a little kid, I think they would have been a little excited when God reveals these to them.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we'll talk about them here in a minute.
[SPEAKER_00]: But what we see here, verse two, it says, God speaks, He says, I am the Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you look in your Bible there, all caps, that's the name of God, y'all way.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right before He gives a first commandment, He gives him a reminder again.
[SPEAKER_00]: God is good like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: He'll continue to remind His people as He will continue to remind you and I.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, he's like, hey, I'm the one who got you out of that mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm the one who saved you from your sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm the one who's doing this work and he says that I'm the one who has brought you out of this.
[SPEAKER_00]: He gives him the reminder, I think it's a gracious reminder, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And he's reminding then, I think, as well, I mean, I've delivered you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that would set the precedence for what's going to come next.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, OK, you've done it.
[SPEAKER_00]: What now, God?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's important to note, and again, it's not Moses' ideas, his words.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is God speaking for himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so he's saying, goes on verse 3.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the first of the 10 commandments.
[SPEAKER_00]: says, you shall have no other God's before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Rule number one.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the Lord, I'm Yahweh, God Almighty.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm the one who saved you from the Egyptians.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm the one who's done all of these miraculous things.
[SPEAKER_00]: I provided for you this far in the wilderness, manna from heaven, water from Iraq, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Need I go on?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, I've done it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now listen, how are you gonna be a people set apart?
[SPEAKER_00]: How are you going to be this holy nation a priest to the world?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because their identity was to be a representative of God to the nations.
[SPEAKER_00]: Not just to be like, oh, I'm saved and you're not.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sadly, that's what's happened a lot over history.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you look at the history of Israelites and Jewish people, it's like they're the saved ones.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody else, there's no hope.
[SPEAKER_00]: but that's not the gospel.
[SPEAKER_00]: God has saved us so that we can go and share the news that others may be saved as well.
[SPEAKER_00]: He wants to make us a holy nation, a royal priesthood.
[SPEAKER_00]: The priesthood was the ones who would represent God to the people.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the first commandment he says you shall have no other gods before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the foundation for everything else.
[SPEAKER_00]: God alone
[SPEAKER_00]: When he says that you'll have no other gods before me, it literally means you shall have no other gods in my presence.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so not no other gods, like me first, and then you can have other gods.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's no other gods at all, because he is the one true god.
[SPEAKER_00]: In Egypt, as I mentioned, they had many gods, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: They had the Nile, the Sun, fertility crops.
[SPEAKER_00]: All these things had different gods over them, which they worshiped.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they were false gods.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, the picture, they're coming out of Egypt, where they've been taught, maybe even ordered to worship and serve these false gods all of their life.
[SPEAKER_00]: maybe some of them right giving up their children because Pharaoh said we had to cast our kid into the Nile right which was this act of worship unto Pharaoh.
[SPEAKER_00]: And just imagine now that they're free.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then Yahweh God says it, and they can hear this, right, says that I am the Lord God who saved you, and he says, you shall have no other gods before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know that's like, it's definitely shouldn't be taken lightly, but I think for them it would have been a breath of fresh air.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, we've been oppressed and forced to worship all of these other gods or whole life, and God's like, no, I am the only one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't you think there'd be some sense of relief, like, yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're safety in that where he's saying I am all that you need.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm the one who delivered you, I'm the one who's going to provide free.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'll protect you, I'm the one who's going to get you through tomorrow, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the one and I think there'd be the sense of relief where it's like, okay, I hear that and I can get on board with that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just one God, not a 300 God's.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, and for us today, we might think, well, we don't serve 300 gods, but I mean, we serve the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: You could just, I mean, there's many examples, I think we could go.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's success, we worship success, comfort, control, money.
[SPEAKER_00]: image right John Calvin, he says this, that the human heart is an idol factory.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just make our own idols.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here's kind of something you can think of, if you're like, well, I don't serve other gods, but whatever rules your time, your money, or your thoughts, that's your God.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what you worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, but the thing here, God's saying, only me, no other God's before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so this could be a heart check for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, who do you serve?
[SPEAKER_00]: What do you worship?
[SPEAKER_00]: You're like, why don't worship anything?
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, if you're like, hey, I don't want to, you don't make any time for God, you know, maybe read your Bible, come to church, any of that stuff, but you're like, I don't worship false gods, but you make everything else a priority in God's like, if I have time,
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, you know how many times I've heard that right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, and I don't want to like guilt trip anyone, but like coming out to church, playing like, hey, should come to church.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, if we have time, I'll make it.
[SPEAKER_00]: which I'm like, you're not coming, you know, maybe they do, sometimes.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's fine, I've just come to know that, but it's like, if you have time, just to me, I'm like, how sad?
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to come to Fervent Church, like that's fine, I want to see God build this church, like that this would grow and expand and be bigger than this one day.
[SPEAKER_00]: But like, my heart is, I want you to know Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: I want you to serve and worship the ones you've got.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if that's at the church down the street where you can get the gospel message and you can grow and flourish in your relationship with God, then so be it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But to say, well, I don't have time.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know what I mean?
[SPEAKER_00]: Come on, guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: Every serious show me your schedule.
[SPEAKER_00]: Show me what you did last week.
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you binge watched a whole season of Netflix, but you don't have one hour on Sunday.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now I'm getting up here.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I'm just serious though, and I struggle with it at times, too.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't find time, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, well, what am I doing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, you know, what am I doing that I'm prioritizing over God?
[SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes we'll even, we'll sacrifice God for our family, right, our family is good, but God should come first.
[SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of times we're like, well, I'm busy with all the kids' things.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, I get that.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's like, well, how are we gonna teach our kids to love God and serve God if we're putting God at the end of the list?
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, well, they're like, hey, can we go to church or something?
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, if we have time, and then they grow up to not everyone to go to church, what are you think's gonna happen?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, why do you think that would happen?
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, they weren't taught to care about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: They thought that, well, it's just an optional thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: If we want to, if we have time, and God's saying I should be number one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, whatever rules your time, your money, your thoughts.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that's more likely that's what you serve, what's your worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: The worship is a word to mean that we were giving worth to essentially, right, it's worthy of our time, of our resources.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, worship is a lifestyle.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just up here singing on Sunday morning.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know a lot of us this day and age were like, you know, when a house church and people say, you know, worship was great.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what we mean is like the music, singing, praise was great.
[SPEAKER_00]: But worship is a lifestyle.
[SPEAKER_00]: We worship all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are made to worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: And whether you want to worship Jesus or not, I mean, that's up to you, but whether you worship or not, you're going to worship something, you are worshiping something.
[SPEAKER_00]: God says, you shall have no other gods before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Going on, verse four, he says, you shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath,
[SPEAKER_00]: or that is in the water underneath the earth.
[SPEAKER_00]: You should not bow down to them or serve them for I, the Lord, your God, and a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me but show instead fast love to the thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
[SPEAKER_00]: The second commandment, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: This takes it a bit deeper.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he says, I am the Lord, your God, you shall have no other gods before me.
[SPEAKER_00]: The second similar, and he says that you shall not make any card image, essentially make any idols to worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, he not only forbids false gods, but he forbids false images of gods, but I would even take it a step further of even himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not to make a piece of art and worship it, saying that it's me, because it's not.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, he's saying this.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, this is a moment where he's saying, I mean, we can't.
[SPEAKER_00]: can't put God in a box, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I know we have like pictures, artwork, crosses, things that resemble, you know, God, or maybe they help lead us to worship, but we shouldn't worship something, we worship God, something Moses says, it's in Deuteronomy four, he says, you heard the sound of words, they're hearing his voice, he says, but you saw no form.
[SPEAKER_00]: Which is something that kind of tells us like our faith is for the most part it's word-based based on the word of God Not the image of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now Jesus is God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He came down.
[SPEAKER_00]: He revealed God to us right John 14 the word became flesh 12 to mungus
[SPEAKER_00]: But God's saying here, you shall not have any of these idols in which you worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: But another interesting one, if you can jot it down or turn there with me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah chapter 44, this one's like, it's comical, but it's true.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah 44, and I'm going to start in verse 14.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Isaiah is writing about worshiping idols.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he says this in verse 14, he says he cuts down seater.
[SPEAKER_00]: Or he chooses a cypress tree or an oak tree and lets it grow strong among the trees of the forest.
[SPEAKER_00]: He plants a seeder and the rain nourishes it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So just picture this.
[SPEAKER_00]: I go out there and you're planting trees.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're nourishing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're growing big and great, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And says in verse 15, then it becomes fuel for a man.
[SPEAKER_00]: He takes a part of it and warms himself, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: He puts it on the fire.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's logs.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kindling.
[SPEAKER_00]: He kindles a fire.
[SPEAKER_00]: He bakes bread.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, he makes a God.
[SPEAKER_00]: and worships it.
[SPEAKER_00]: He makes it an idol and falls down before it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Half of it, he burns in the fire.
[SPEAKER_00]: Over the half, he eats meat.
[SPEAKER_00]: He roast it and is satisfied.
[SPEAKER_00]: Also, he warms himself and says, ah, ha, I am warm.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have seen the fire in verse 17.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the rest of it, he makes into a God, his idol and falls down to it and worships it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pray, he prays to it and says,
[SPEAKER_00]: he goes on he says they know not nor do they discern for he has shut their eyes so that they cannot see in their hearts so they cannot understand no one considers nor as their knowledge or discernment to say half of it I burned in the fire I also beg bread on its coals I rose to the meat and have eaten and shall I make the rest of it in a bombination shall I fall down before a block of wood?
[SPEAKER_00]: He feeds on ashes.
[SPEAKER_00]: They diluted heart, has led him astray, and he cannot deliver himself, or say, is there not a lie in my right hand?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's Isaiah saying here, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of this funny scene, but think about like man cuts down a tree half of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: He takes and he uses it for firewood, keep him warm, make food, all those things, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And the other half, he's like, I'm gonna make something super cool, and I'm gonna worship it as my God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Doesn't that sound ridiculous?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it says that he bows down to and says, oh my God, deliver me.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, what is that piece of wood going to do?
[SPEAKER_00]: You just burned it on the fire over there and that what that part's worthless and this over here is going to save you somehow.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this is how humans are hearts are an idol factory.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just want to find something to worship and we're so foolish at times that we will put our trust, our hope and things that we have made
[SPEAKER_00]: No eternal value whatsoever, and Isaiah is saying this.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, man, you're taking created things, and maybe for us, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not a block of wood chiseled into some idol, but let's just think, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Money created things, relationships, success, things that we have, and we worship them.
[SPEAKER_00]: the gift of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's given us, and then we forget about the one who's given it to us.
[SPEAKER_00]: We serve the gift instead of the giver, and God's saying, don't do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: He refuses to share you and me with
[SPEAKER_00]: other things, false God, says he's a jealous God, forget who it was, I've heard it said, I didn't hear this actual interview, but it was at Oprah Winfrey, said something, I can't serve a God who's jealous, like basically like that's so pity and ridiculous, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like if he's if he's going to be like on a high school boyfriend jealous, it's like, no, it's not that he's jealous, like that, it's like he's jealous for you, like he wants you to be
[SPEAKER_00]: his children.
[SPEAKER_00]: He wants to bless you, he wants to protect you, but you got to understand like you have to come under his blessing.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, if you obey my commands, these things will happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't, well, you can't expect things, but he loves us so much, and he goes to all extremes to save us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 7, the next commandment, he says, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God and Vane.
[SPEAKER_00]: For the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name and Vane.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, you might think of this, I think it have, using that God's name as a cussword, which on one hand is interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, when someone, you know, steps are toe, they don't say, oh, Buddha, or, oh, you know, whatever.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, why is our God's name using these situations?
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, I think it's a very, I think it couldn't be clear that Satan's trying to destroy our view of God, our reverence, our respect, our care about God, and really what God's saying here, don't take my name lightly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't carry my name lightly, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: The word, he says, don't take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
[SPEAKER_00]: It means don't lift up, don't carry this just casually.
[SPEAKER_00]: And think about it for us every time we call ourselves a Christian, we're carrying the name of Jesus around with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of my friends, he said this, and maybe some of you can relate.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I mean, I have our fervent church sticker on my truck, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I drive around.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's been a couple of people who've come to church because of that they said, oh, I saw you or your wife driving this truck.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I thought, oh, they look like nice people.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they came to church.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, that's cool.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I told my friend that, he doesn't live here.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's not part of this church.
[SPEAKER_00]: I told him that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he's like, that's why I don't put the church sticker on my car, because he's like, he drives crazy.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can't say that like what like oh, I don't I can't represent Jesus because I know I'm going to misrepresent him So I'm just not going to do it at all, but I thought it was a funny story But I mean in a way though.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like when we bear the name of Jesus God y'all wait got all my like we're wearing the jersey Right and you're representing the the king of kings the Lord of Lords and he's saying don't take his name lightly Right where we will
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, and I've even thought this before, too, and I might have said it, which I shouldn't have, but when you hear someone say, Jesus name, and they're not saying I'm like, oh, are you praying?
[SPEAKER_00]: What are you praying for?
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, they're not, and I don't want to be mean like that, but it's a serious thing that we're doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we gotta carry his name well, it's not something to use lightly.
[SPEAKER_00]: We honor him in Word and attitude and integrity.
[SPEAKER_00]: verse eight.
[SPEAKER_00]: He goes on.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, six days, you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God.
[SPEAKER_00]: On it, you shall not do any work.
[SPEAKER_00]: You or your son or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner,
[SPEAKER_00]: who is within your gates for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth the sea and all that is in them and rested on the seventh day therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Holy, all right, this one's a little bit kind of different if you will, and it's say it's not so much of a rule.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't have any of the gods before we don't make carved images.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't take my name lightly or in vain, but he says in this one, it's an invitation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do find rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, the Sabbath day, Jesus teaches on the Sabbath, he says that the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that might sound confusing to you, but what it means is Jesus, like, hey, I made the Sabbath day for you to have a day of rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, on this seventh day, the seventh days of creation on the seventh day, God rested, but let's just ask this question.
[SPEAKER_00]: Did God need to rest?
[SPEAKER_00]: No, right, what was he doing?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's making a picture an example for us to follow.
[SPEAKER_00]: And even here in Exodus, when he gives this law, he refers back to Genesis chapter one to where he created everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then he rest and he's saying, you need to rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, need to have a day, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where he says, the Sabbath day, it's a day to stop working.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now I know this gets into legalism, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's some people like, hey, the Sabbath day is Saturday, and that's when we go to church, and we don't, it's a sin to go to church on Sunday.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some people believe that, but there's in the New Testament Paul writes, he's like, don't let anybody judge you for when you have your Sabbath day, or what do you say, celebrations, festivals, and feasts, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: So what's he saying?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, well, if you take a Sabbath day on Monday,
[SPEAKER_00]: If we had church on Monday, is that a sin?
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, and I know on Sunday, like, Sundays are Sabbath day, like,
[SPEAKER_00]: post-resurrection, because that's when Jesus rose from the grave, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: That became like the new Sabbath day, if you will, but there's still Sabbath terrients who think that Saturday is the only day.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can worship God, the only day you can rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: The only day you can go to church, and if you go to church on Sunday, you're in sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't believe that, and again, Paul says it in the new testimony, says, fill anyone judge you for what day, but I think the principle is,
[SPEAKER_00]: you need rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think for the Israelite people in this context, a specific people, a specific day, a specific time, they needed boundaries where it's like, you have to do this on this day.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's good.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everybody's saying you have to have a day of rest where you stop working and you remember me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Remember who's providing for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, he roots it back into creation in Genesis, because it says in six days, the Lord made heaven in earth, the sea, all that is in them, and he rested on the seventh day.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this command, I think it's deeply about that we do need rest, you to find, be recharge in Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's also about trust.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, some of you, how many of you can take a day off, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Something like, well, if I take a day off, like I'm not gonna have what I need, or I'm gonna get behind, or whatever might happen, and I understand this very well myself, but like the Sabbath days of day of trust, like, hey, I can take a day of rest.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything's gonna be okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have to keep working, working, working.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanna just sit and trust God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus says this, he's come to me all who are weary, find rest for your souls.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, that's Jesus is our Sabbath.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is our rest and the Sabbath, he points us to Jesus and this would point them to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think something on the note of Sabbath, some of you who struggle with resting, the Sabbath, it's not lazy, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like, hey, I'm gonna trust God.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to say, I'm gonna take a day off.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not gonna answer any emails or whatever it may be.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'll come back tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, one thing I can promise you guys is those emails will be here tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, does it really need to be sent out today?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, oh, man, if I gotta get ahead, like, just take a day off.
[SPEAKER_00]: It'll be fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: It'll be there tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not lazy, it's worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're making time for the Lord, making time to be a recharge.
[SPEAKER_00]: The next verse, first, 12, the next command, and he says, honor your father and your mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: At your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this one, it's like the honor your father and mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that your days may be long, and that you might live a long time because if you don't honor them, if you don't, obey them, basically saying, you're gonna have a shorter life.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're gonna die.
[SPEAKER_00]: But as a command, it starts to bridge the gap, these first four commandments.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's all about God, worship, under him.
[SPEAKER_00]: The next six, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is how we relate with each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is the first one with relating to each other, because it's important to note that it begins with the first human relationship that most of us, I mean, we ever have, our mother and father.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so hey, they're the first
[SPEAKER_00]: Relationship that we know, right, and he says we're to honor our Father and our Mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: For some of us, for some of you that might be hard.
[SPEAKER_00]: You might agree up in a household.
[SPEAKER_00]: and you didn't have a good father or a good mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe you didn't have either one of them, and as someone else who was playing the role of father mother in your household, but I do think the principal remains where it says that we were to honor them to show respect and care for.
[SPEAKER_00]: That doesn't mean that as a child, you do whatever anybody tells you to do, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, good, godly parenting, we're teaching them right versus wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't just do what any adult tells you to do because they're whatever, but the word honor means to value, to respect, to care for.
[SPEAKER_00]: And even if our parents, right, they're, they're not perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those of you who are parents out here, you know you're not perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know for me yesterday, it was a hard day, like of parenting, where it's a call, Lord.
[SPEAKER_00]: like, you know, come back soon and about, you know, in an hour or two, though, because I got to, we know, works some things out.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's just, it's like a hard day.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm not perfect, but I'm like, I want to be better.
[SPEAKER_00]: God help me in this, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I want my kids to be able to honor, honor me.
[SPEAKER_00]: That doesn't mean just do whatever I say, but it's like showing respect.
[SPEAKER_00]: and the command it has a promise, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: That your days may be long, and you could live a long life.
[SPEAKER_00]: As parents, I believe one of our greatest duties.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, number one is to teach them to know Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I also was like, it's to disciple them, like, to be adults.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of my friends he says that he's like, my job is to make you guys be able to survive in the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I thought that was interesting, but it kind of a good way to put it for his kids, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, I need to teach you, because one day you're gonna be on your own.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not gonna be there to tell you how to do it, or to come through, like, I'll be there as much as I can.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, our job raising children,
[SPEAKER_00]: We want them to know the truth, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's right, what's wrong?
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess part of our job in this, and I think if we're doing it well, there's a sense in which I believe our kids can like honor us and respect us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Are they gonna push against us at times?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, they're going to for sure, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: We know that's gonna happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: We push against the things God has for us.
[SPEAKER_00]: When we can honor and respect our parents, he says, there's gonna be, you're gonna live a long life.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like your parents aren't stupid.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're trying to help you, hopefully.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, and ultimately, too, I think there's a principle on this, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: The culture that honors family, God, or Dane family, of the way he intended it, like flourishes.
[SPEAKER_00]: So how God has created it to be, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you honor your father and your mother, right, there's going to be a long life.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's going to be a flourishing there, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: But a culture that would abandon
[SPEAKER_00]: family, which honestly we're seeing a lot of in our day and age, I don't have time to give you a whole sermon on this, but just be aware, like out in the world, like Satan's, I think one of his greatest attacks is on the marriage between a man and woman and on the family.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we have this whole kind of push where it's like, we don't need anybody.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm doing my set, do whatever I want to do, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: When we abandon God's order, I think society collapses upon itself.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's again a longer sermon for another time.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the point remains on your father and your mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 13, he says, you shall not murder my pretty self-explanatory.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, just put yourself in their shoes.
[SPEAKER_00]: They grew up in a culture where they probably saw murder.
[SPEAKER_00]: regularly, maybe daily, but definitely they've seen it in their life, not just like once or twice, but like they've seen, maybe they even threw their home babies in the Nile River because they're just being obedient unto Pharaoh, right, that his murder, right, and God says very clearly, you shall not murder.
[SPEAKER_00]: What's he saying?
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not going to be like the Egyptians.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're not going to be like the world, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, he's calling him to be set apart.
[SPEAKER_00]: And how's he going to be set apart?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like, well, you're going to be different.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I know this seems obvious, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: You shall not murder, like, that should be obvious.
[SPEAKER_00]: But God, I love that he even just states the obvious.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is to protect you, to protect one another, but also I think it's to protect that we are image bearers of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Scripture says that we're created in the image of God, right, man and woman, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And here's the thing, is every person no matter they're background, their ability, where they came from, we're all image bearers to some degree and you gotta hear me out as that God cares about every single one of us and every single person out there.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you say stuff about certain people, it's a particular group, and you got to understand, God died for them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus died for them, too.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was asked at work recently, you know, they know I'm a Christian, one guy in particular, he says, so you're a Christian man.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, what are your thoughts on what's happening in Gaza?
[SPEAKER_00]: This was a few weeks ago, and before, you know, what's happening now, but still, needless to say, there's a lot happening.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to ask some clarifying questions, but what do you mean by what's happening in Gaza, by asking me what's happening in Gaza?
[SPEAKER_00]: Are you really asking me about what I think about Israel?
[SPEAKER_00]: I like just asked me to plain out, but what I said, which I wish I would have said better on my way home, I was like, man, I should have said that.
[SPEAKER_00]: not what I said.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I said it in a simple form.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, I think God cares about everybody.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I said, and I think murder, no matter who it is, is not what God wants.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not his first act.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so I think every life matters.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's basically what I said.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, I wish I would have came back after thinking about he caught me off guard but just like we're all image bears of Christ.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus died for each and every one of us.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those people in Gaza that we don't agree with who are like, yeah, you need to go over there and do something about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like God cares about them too.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so God says here, you shall not murder.
[SPEAKER_00]: She'll not murder.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus takes a deeper and Matthew chapter five.
[SPEAKER_00]: I suddenly like, I've never had, never will.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me ask you this, have you ever hated someone?
[SPEAKER_00]: Been angry at someone, Jesus says in Matthew five, if you are angry with your brother, you have already committed murder in your heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think if we're honest, every single one of us are guilty now, we're like, yep, that was me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yesterday I was angry.
[SPEAKER_00]: So as you've committed murder, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Murder starts with hate, with bitterness, starts with resentment, and murder, like, I mean, it starts in the heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: But how we can start to put this practice or this command into practice, rather,
[SPEAKER_00]: with forgiveness, for giving one another.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what Jesus calls us to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, instead of murdering one another, that's not the answer to our problems.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know I'm TV shows and movies, that's what they do.
[SPEAKER_00]: All you disagree with, just get off with your head.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's like that's not how we handle business.
[SPEAKER_00]: We handle business with God with the Holy Spirit, and God calls us to be loving to forgive one another.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says you shall not murder.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 14, he gives us another commasence.
[SPEAKER_00]: You shall not commit adultery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Right, coming out of Egypt, right, their culture would have been very adulterous, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: I've been a polygamous type of culture, the God says you should not commit adultery.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is guarding the sacred covenant of marriage, is God has designed between a man and a woman.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's saying this is important, it's on his top 10.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, and to commit adultery, Jesus takes this one, a little further and explains it more in Matthew 5, 28.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says anyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery in his heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: What that tells us right about this is adultery doesn't start in the bed.
[SPEAKER_00]: adultery starts in the heart.
[SPEAKER_00]: We live in a world and not just the world of Egypt, but man, our world today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Minimizes commitment, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't get married, it's, why would you commit yourself to one person for your whole life, your whole life?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a long time, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: But God calls us to faithfulness in marriage, shall not commit adultery.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 15, he says, you shall not steal.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, stealing shows, I mean, for one, a lack of trust in God's provisions, right, if you just think about it right, then we go and steal, we're like, well, God, I didn't have enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: You didn't give me, like we're like Adam all over again.
[SPEAKER_00]: The woman you gave me made me do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you didn't give me enough money, Lord, so I went and stole some.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, when we steal, we show a lack of trust in God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when we still were stiny, not only against God, but against another person as well, you're stealing from someone, but really are heart-saying God, you're not giving me what I deserve, so I'll just go and take it myself.
[SPEAKER_00]: David Guzic points out that he says that we can rob God, not by,
[SPEAKER_00]: Not only by taking things or money, but he says, by withholding ourselves, our obedience, and our worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: We steal from God, because God's given you giftings and talents.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of you know it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you're like, I'm not going to serve you God.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're like holding it on a ransom.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm not only if you do this, then I'll do whatever.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then I'll serve it, church, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like David Music says we can rob God by just withholding ourselves our obedience and our worship Paul writes in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 28 on the note of a thief and steal and he says, let the thief no longer steal but rather let him labor so that he may have something to share.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this because this is what Jesus does.
[SPEAKER_00]: He takes someone who was a thief and turns them into someone who's not taking things anymore, but giving away things.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what the gospel can do in our lives.
[SPEAKER_00]: It turns us from our old way of living to the new way.
[SPEAKER_00]: We were thieves and now we're contributors.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 16,
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, this is one where we say all you shouldn't lie, which is true, but this command, it's protecting truth and justice, right, in an ancient world, and even in today, right, a false testimony, especially back then, could get somebody killed.
[SPEAKER_00]: I saw him touch the mountain Moses.
[SPEAKER_00]: God says, you've got to stone him and kill him.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like seriously, like what happens if you said that?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's Moses going to do, Moses is like, man, it's like thunder lighting the mountains on fire.
[SPEAKER_00]: He just told us that if you touch the mountain that were to kill you and your donkey or whatever touch the mountain right, like a false witness is a serious accusation.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, it still is today.
[SPEAKER_00]: Today we have cameras everywhere where it's like, well, let's have proof and let's see, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where we're not going to just say, oh, he said it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it must be true.
[SPEAKER_00]: But today, we break this commandment through gossip.
[SPEAKER_00]: When he starts saying things about people, slander, start saying things right about people that may or may not be true.
[SPEAKER_00]: Exaggeration even is a way of
[SPEAKER_00]: Or maybe even just allowing a false witness or a false lie to be spread about, we just remain silent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Show not bare false witness, our words matter.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't know that, I hope you do now, there's a proverb that says that with our tongue, I can bring life or can bring death.
[SPEAKER_00]: Those are two options.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can speak a life in the people's lives and their world or you bring death.
[SPEAKER_00]: When we bear false witness, when we slander, when we gossip, we're speaking and bringing death into the life of people.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so our words matter.
[SPEAKER_00]: Paul also writes in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 25, he says, speak the truth with your neighbor.
[SPEAKER_00]: Speak the truth with one another.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, for we are members of one another.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, our words, they shouldn't be life-giving.
[SPEAKER_00]: Speaking the truth, and the truth at times will hurt, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Guess if heard that, I'm sure the truth hurts.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes it does.
[SPEAKER_00]: Scripture tells us a faithful friend can be trusted, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: The wounds of a faithful friend can be trusted.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the enemy multiplies kisses or in other words, the enemy tells you what you want to hear.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your friends, your people who care about you, they'll tell you the cold hard truth and say, no, you're wrong, you're dumb, you're an idiot.
[SPEAKER_00]: And you want to have friends like this, just me, you guys like, no, I'm perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't do any of these things stupid or wrong.
[SPEAKER_00]: You need to get yourself some friends that will call you out on stuff, though.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, hey, what are you doing going to that place?
[SPEAKER_00]: Right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, hey, why are you, you know what I mean?
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, there's just, your friends will point out the obvious.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of my friends, I told you this story long ago, I'm sure.
[SPEAKER_00]: But one of my best friends, this is when I was,
[SPEAKER_00]: Coming to Jesus, but I was definitely still enslaved drugs and things, and we go out to eat, we're watching, I don't know, either basketball game or football game, we got wings.
[SPEAKER_00]: They said, Nick, when are you going to stop smoking the devil's lettuce?
[SPEAKER_00]: Marijuana, pot, whatever you want to call it, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: And I just remember it's so plainly today because I mean, he's loving me in that and saying that because it cut right to the heart where I'm like, I know exactly, like, I know I need to give this up, but for me at that point I'm like, I don't know how there's a lot of things I had to learn how it was really I just have to give it all into the Lord and give it up and repent.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I loved him for that, where it's like, he just called out the obvious in my life, just plain as day, didn't sugarcoat it or make it sound like something else.
[SPEAKER_00]: But we need friends who will call out the truth and lead us to the truth, not to be people who bear false witness or leading people astray.
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 17, the time is it, oh my goodness, why didn't anyone tell me?
[SPEAKER_00]: Where's my clock?
[SPEAKER_00]: my goodness guys all right you guys good for a few more minutes hopefully the janitor is too but kids ministry oh my goodness I'm sorry guys you shall not go over you're a lot of time and service
[SPEAKER_00]: Verse 17 says, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife.
[SPEAKER_00]: You shall not covet your neighbor's house.
[SPEAKER_00]: You shall not covet your neighbor's wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey or anything that is your neighbors.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so, this is the last one right, don't covet.
[SPEAKER_00]: What other people have, what is coveted means to desire something that's not yours, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, that's a nice truck.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wish I had that truck.
[SPEAKER_00]: How many of you guys say that when you drive down the road or that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, man.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wish I had that house, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: That's coveting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sorry to break it to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's coveting.
[SPEAKER_00]: What someone else has longing for something God hasn't given to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this, what coveting does it leads us to every other sin.
[SPEAKER_00]: I dole tree, idol tree, adultery, stealing line.
[SPEAKER_00]: But here's the cure for coveting is contentment.
[SPEAKER_00]: And this is a hard one, but contentment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hebrews 13, 5 says, be content with what you have for He himself has said, I will never leave you nor forsake you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus is with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's all that we need.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you know that God is enough, we can stop trying to fill the void with other things.
[SPEAKER_00]: But with that said, I got to make like a hard land.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's like this is emergency landing right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we're gonna pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if my wife comes back up, we'll close in a song of worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: But let's pray.
[SPEAKER_00]: Father God, we thank you for your word.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's exciting and sometimes yeah, we preach too long because it's that good.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm just love it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But Lord, I pray that today that you've spoken to us, you've convicted us of sins and ways that we've gone, astray, things that we've thought weren't really that serious.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe today we've realized that it's actually a big deal to you and I pray that we would repent of these things.
[SPEAKER_00]: That we turn to you that you would forgive us and cleanse us of all of our own righteousness that you would make us born again, that you would refil us, refresh us, give us a right spirit Lord, and that's you would just help us to be the people you want us to be.
[SPEAKER_00]: That we could be a light to the world around us, and we pray these things, and we thank you for all of this in Jesus' name, and we said amen.