Love God And Love Your Neighbor : 5th Commandment Series

Intro

Open your Bibles to Exodus chapter 20 today as we continue our Summer Series entitled “Love God , Love your Neighbor” We are examining the 10 Commandments—God’s moral law—while focusing on Jesus is summary of the commandments found in the New Testament Gospels. The commandments teach us about God identity.

They also serve guide us, to correct us, to protect us and most importantly, point us to our need for a Savior.

God sent Jesus to fulfill the law by keeping it perfectly for us. And His life and words help us bring more clarity to God’s commands. It is through the biblical record of Jesus’ life we see the truest meaning and depth of God’s commands. Jesus summarized the commandments when He was asked this question.

“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. (Matthew 22:36-39)

Jesus teaches us here that the 10 commandments are easily understood as “Love God” and “Love Your Neighbor." So we have taken the first four commands and focus them on our love and worship to God

and then we take commandments 5-10 and focus them on our mission. We will aim at mission attributes, rather than commands for us not to sin. Since Jesus teaches us that these are about loving others, and not just internal struggles against sin. This will allow us to teach us how to love others for the sake of the gospel.

Today we come to the 5th commandment. In a sermon is entitled: Mission: Starts with Family

If you're able we stand as we open up God's word today? I pray that you will hear the word of the Lord.

Exodus 20 verse 1-12

READ FROM THE BIBLE

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 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, or that is in the water under the earth. 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 the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

“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.

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner 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 holy.

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. (Exodus 20:1-12)

PRAY

The big truth is: One reason Jesus is our perfect Savior is because he was a perfect child.

Mission begins in the home. Gods plan for preserving the family calls for keeping the fifth amendment:

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. (Exodus 20:12 ESV)

When God gave Moses the law he wrote it down on two tablets. The first tablet of the law consist of the four commandments that govern our response to God. The second tablet consist of the six commandments that govern the way we are to treat one another. God’s moral law shows us our human relationships cannot be separated from our relationship to God, but there is a distinction and they have this unique order. Our love for God comes first. So God gives us the first four commandments teaching us to love Him above all other relationships. While the last 6 command us to love our neighbor. In teaching us how to treat one another, God starts with our families. For God to place the family in the top of the “Love your neighbor” list shows just how important it is to Him. Loving our neighbor starts in the home. The family is been under attack since the garden. It is no coincidence that Satan waited until Adam had a wife before he slithered on scene.