Moses On The Mountain With The Lord - Part 13 Series

Moses on the Mountain with the Lord - Part 13

(The Ten Commandments - Part 3)

Exodus 20:12-17

Sermon by Rick Crandall

McClendon Baptist Church - September 22, 2010

BACKGROUND:

*When Moses came down the mountain from his fifth meeting with the Lord, he carried something back with him: the Ten Commandments. Tonight we will finish looking at these tablets “written with the finger of God.” (Exo 31:18) (1)

*But please remember that the Ten Commandments and all of God’s commandments hang on the Lord’s two great laws of love.

-Jesus gave them to us in Matt 22:37-40, where:

37. Jesus said to him, ’You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’

38. This is the first and great commandment.

39. And the second is like it: ’You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’

40. On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."

*Every commandment of God hangs on God’s kind of gracious love.

-Anything that God ever asks us to do or not to do can all be traced back to love, so we study the Ten Commandments in the light of Godly love.

*The first 4 Commandments primarily focus on vertical love, that is, our love for God:

-The 1st Commandment in vs. 3: “You shall have no other gods before Me.”

-The 2nd Commandment in vs. 4-6:

4. "You shall not make for yourself a carved image—any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth;

5. you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

6. but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

-The Third Commandment in vs. 7: “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes His name in vain. “

-And the Fourth Commandment in vs. 8: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”

*The first 4 Commandments focus on our vertical love, our love for God.

-But the remaining Commandments focus on our horizontal love, that is, our love for one another. Let’s take a look at them tonight, reading Exodus 20:12-17.

12. "Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the LORD your God is giving you.

13. "You shall not murder.

14. "You shall not commit adultery.

15. "You shall not steal.

16. "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

17. "You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s."

INTRODUCTION:

*A corrupt businessman once told Mark Twain: "Before I die I mean to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. I will climb Mount Sinai and read the Ten Commandments aloud at the top."

*To that Mark Twain replied: "I have a better idea. You could stay in Boston and KEEP them." (2)

*Over 100 years later that’s still excellent advice.

-In the long run we will never regret being obedient to the Lord.

-We will never regret keeping His Commandments.

-So, it’s a good thing to for us study them, and apply them to our lives today.

1. When we do, the first thing we see is that God cares deeply about our homes.

*The Lord cares deeply about our homes.

[1] That’s one reason why the Lord gave the Fifth Commandment in vs. 12. There the Lord said, “Honor your father and your mother.”

*This is rightly so, because parents do so much for their children. Most of them do, anyway.

-Parents are the ones who gladly wipe their bottoms, and don’t really mind too much when their children spit up on them. It’s just “angel juice” you know. (That’s what we used to say.)

-Parents are the ones who walk the floor all night when the children are sick or just cutting teeth.

-Parents are the ones who drive 50,000 miles to carry them to games, plays, parties, recitals, doctors, dentists and more.

-Parents are the ones who struggle with homework, try to steer them through the terrible twos and then through the more terrible teens.

*Good parents are the ones who demonstrate the love of our Heavenly Father to their children. So, God says that we should honor them.

*And all of us children need to honor our parents, while we can.

-I wish that I could do something to honor my parents tonight, but they’re not in this world. Honor your parents while you can.