Intro: A gray haired lady, long a member of her community and Church, shook hands with the minister after the service one morning. “That was a wonderful sermon, she told him, just wonderful. Everything you said applied to someone I know.”
What is often missed is that God’s word applies to each of us. If you hear something in the sermon and think it applies to so and so as your mental finger is pointing at them you have three more pointing back at you.
Some have said the Ten Commandments don’t apply to anyone much less someone they know. People think that the Ten Commandments are outmoded, outdated, and just out of style. A wise pastor by the name of Jerry vines said, “We are not past the Ten Commandments we haven’t caught up to them yet.”
So this morning we are going to begin taking a look at the Ten Commandments. Ten Words the world needs to hear. Exodus 20.1 “Then God spoke all these words.”
What happened in the preceding 19 chapters that God was moved to speak all these words?
In the previous 19 chapters we see God interacting with and intervening for Israel. Israel was trapped in slavery in Egypt. They had no possible way of escape and nowhere to go if they did. Under the oppressive hand of Pharaoh the people of Israel cried out to God and he answered their prayers. God sent them a mediator a go between, Moses. He not only heard their prayers he answered them by redeeming them or setting them free from the slavery of Egypt. He set them on a journey through life with Him. It is in this context that God speaks these simple yet profound words.
In ten simple statements God gives His chosen people the guide to live life whole.
Eccl 12.13 In the King James says “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.”
In King James translations many if not all will have duty in italics. This is done because the translators added the word to give a clearer understanding to the translation.
Read it without the word in italics, “Fear God and keep His commandments for this is the whole of man.”
God’s guidelines are the key to living a whole life. God is giving clear guidelines for those that are His people. He is giving a blueprint a recipe for healthy, holy, happy lives. It is not saying you live this way to get to God. He is saying you will live this way if you are whole. If you have been made whole by the precious blood of Jesus Christ here is the pattern that you life will take.
What is the basis of our wholeness? Who God is and what he has done
I. The Basis of the Law
Exodus 1.2 “I am the Lord your God”
A) Who God is
In this I am statement we see that the law is based on God’s character, who He is. He is the creator of the nation of Israel down to the least individual. Before God gives them the righteous regulations for living He tells them who He is. This is the basis of all theology. There is one almighty sovereign God. He is personal, I am the Lord your God. You don’t see in the Old Testament an uninterested, impersonal God. He is the God who draws near.
The God of the Old Testament is the God of the new. First he tells us who He is as the basis of the Law, and then What He has done.
B) What God has done
Exodus 1.2 “Who brought you out of Egypt out of the house of slavery.”
He is a God of action. The great I Am heard the cries of Israel while they were under the captivity and bondage of Israel and acted on their behalf. He sent Moses to carry His message of redemption. “Let my people go.” Jesus still cries out to sin and Satan “let my people God.” He pounded Egypt with plagues. He pummeled the armies of Pharaoh with the waters of the Red Sea. God was saying trust in what I can do and have done. Trust in the blood that was shed for the forgiveness of you sins.
This is the great difference between Christianity and the other religions of the world. All other religions get to their God by what they can do. We get to our God by what He has done.
Before God gave the rule to live by He set the Israelites free from slavery. It is by what God has done His grace that allows you to keep His law. It is what Jesus did His redemptive work on the cross that allows us to live according to God’s righteous regulations.
God showed the Israelites and you and I that He could provide, protect, and prosper His people. He was saying because of who I am and what I have done live this way. I am your highest priority, Take to heart these ten words. Who God is and what He has done is the basis, the bedrock, the backbone of the Ten Commandments. Remove the moral character of a Holy God and you have nothing more than Ten Suggestions. Based on Who God is and what He has done you have the Ten Commandments. These are His credentials where he establishes His right to place moral demands on man.
Now that it is clear the basis, the foundation of the ten words, we will see the basics of the Ten Commandments.
II. The Basics of the Law
Exodus 20.3-11
There are some surprising statistics regarding the Ten Commandments. A Gallup poll was given several years ago and its results revealed 85% of Americans believe the Ten Commandments are still binding today; however, only 15% could name five of them. This is not terribly surprising considering the secular slide our country has had in the past 50 or so years. But what is surprising is what Newsweek once reported about supposed religious folks. Newsweek reported that of people who go to church only 49% of all Protestants and 44% of all Roman Catholics could name 4 of the Ten Commandments.
It is no surprise so many people do not know how to respond to God today!
A) How to respond to God
The Hallmark of a holy, healthy, happy person is a right response to God. What do the Ten words tell us about how to respond to God?
You shall have no other Gods
You shall not make any graven images
You shall not use the name of God in vain
You shall honor the Sabbath and keep it holy.
God speaks to all of us in these Ten Commandments. He is speaking to us in the singular. You. It is a call for response from all of Israel and all of mankind. God desires an exclusive relationship with each and every person. Jesus summarized it this way. Love the Lord God with all your heart, soul, strength, and mind. Love God with the whole person. It is a personal decision to love and accept God, His will, and His way. (My boys and rules)
The Ten Commandments are not merely law they are a response of love.
B) How to respond to man
A proper response to God can and should lead to a proper response to man. Jesus taught the proper response is love. We love our parents by honoring and obeying them. We love our spouses by being faithful to them, we love our neighbors by respecting their property and telling the truth about them and not wanting for ourselves what is theirs.
Keeping the first four commandments is a proper response to God. Love God
Keeping the last six commandments is a proper response to man. Love your neighbor.
What you find in the proper response to both it never says if you feel like it treat God with the respect and reverence that is due to Him for who He is and what He has done. It simply tells us to respond properly to God at all times in all ways.
It is also clear that our proper response to others is not based on their treatment of ourselves or whether they deserve it or not.
A whole person will live a life that is a pattern of right response to God and right response to others. That is the key to a holy, healthy, happy life.
II. The blessing of the Law
Deuteronomy 5.29 “Oh that they had such a heart in them, that they would fear Me and keep all My commandments always, that it may be well with them and with their sons forever!”
It is very clear that for the Christian happiness comes from holiness. As we live in the power of the Holy Spirit by the direction of God’s word it will go well with us and our children and our grandchildren.
Think about how different our world would be today if 100% of all Christians knew and practiced the Ten Words of God out of love, loyalty and reverence for Almighty God.
Would first graders be threatening their classmates with guns? Would child and teenage pregnancy be such a problem?
The moral climate of America and the world gets ever more uncomfortable. The question for us as Christians is are we going to continue to be thermometers taking the temperature of an immoral world? I challenge you that it is time for us to be thermostats setting the cultural moral temperature. That begins by loving God and keeping His commandments. We do not keep His commandments to get to Him; rather we keep His commandments because He got to us.
What do I get out of it you say? It is clear in Deuteronomy 5 that it will go well with you and your children forever!!
Conclusion: Francis Bacon: It is not what men eat but what they digest that makes them strong; not what we gain but what we save that makes us rich; not what we read but what we remember that makes us learned; not what we preach but what we practice that makes us Christians.
Nothing in Exodus 20 is described as commandments or law in exodus 20. However, the powerful words of God command a proper response. The Ten Words are a call to loving, loyal, obedience to God and loving and or loyal treatment of other human beings. How have you responded to God and His moral law?
