YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS (Outline)
EXODUS 20:1-6 - February 27, 2005 - LENT 3
INTRO: Whom do you love? Or maybe better in today’s society is the question: What do you love? The world around us very often has us placing an extreme value on the things of this life rather than peo-ple. Either question reminds us that our first and true love may be misplaced from time to time. Even the teachers of the law during the time of Jesus had a hard time concentrating on their most important love. The church leaders came to Jesus asking him what is the greatest commandment? Jesus’ answer: "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength" (MARK 12:30). It was a simple answer but very difficult to follow. Today’s text gives us sim-ple directions, but they can also be very difficult to follow. The very words of God in our text will serve as our theme: YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS. Luther’s 1st commandment explanation states:
I. FEAR GOD ABOVE ALL THINGS
A. This text takes place 3 days after the children of Israel crossed the Red Sea on dry ground.
1. God brings them to Mt. Sinai and has them stop their early journey. God will speak to them.
2. Mt. Sinai is covered with a cloud of thunder, lightning, fire and smoke. Moses ascends.
B. The Lord speaks in verse 3. Israel was to have no other gods and worship only the Lord God.
1. Verse 4a. Israel lived for generations in a pagan society in Egypt. False gods were many.
2. Verse 4b. The Lord God desired his peoples’ fear, love, and trust. Unbelievers would suffer.
C. Our loving Lord still desires our complete devotion today. Our Lord God is jealous for our worship. Very simply the Lord tells us why. "I am the LORD; that is my name! I will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols"(ISAIAH 42:8). Amidst the many gods of this world there is still only one true God. That true God is the Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – our God!
D. How do we fear our God above all things? Do we come to church scared and full of fear because our Lord is just waiting to punish us? NO! We come to worship the Lord our God with a sense of awesome fear and wonder. We come to worship to hear and learn how our Lord God still loves and cares for us in spite of all of our sins. In God’s holy word we discover how to fear God above all things. "Teach me your way, O LORD, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name" (PSALM 86:11). When we walk in God’s truth with an undivided heart we fear God above all things.
TRANS: YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS as we fear God above all things, walking in truth.
II. LOVE GOD ABOVE ALL THINGS
A. The Lord God wants to impress on Israel and God’s people of today the importance of these words.
1. Verse 1. These are the words of God: not an angel, nor another messenger.
2. To Moses and then Moses to Israel: And God spoke all these words!
B. Verse 2. The Lord God Almighty reminds his Moses and his people of his great love for them.
1. A few days earlier Israel stood trapped: the Red Sea on one side, Pharaoh’s army on the other.
2. God delivered the Israelites. God destroyed Pharaoh’s army. All of this out of divine love.
3. The Israelites very clearly saw how much the Lord loved them. Their response = love God.
C. When ever you and look closely at the Lord we see his love. God’s love is not a self-serving love. God’s love is divine and meant for the eternal benefit of mankind. In our earthly lifetime we can only be-gin to understand in a very limited way the limitless and undeserved love of God for sinners. "And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him"(1 JOHN 4:16). We are able to love God above all things simply because of his great love for us.
D. We learn from the example of Jesus what true love really is. Our Lord Jesus Christ gave up the per-fection of heaven to live on earth. Jesus gave up his throne to be put to death on the cross --- for us, be-cause of our sinful thoughts, words, and actions. Now that is love. We respond with lives of love for him who first loved us. "Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God"(EPHESIANS 5:1,2).
TRANS: YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS. We love God above all things, walking in love.
III. TRUST GOD ABOVE ALL THINGS
A. To trust God above all things would be a great challenge for the children of Israel.
1. Before Moses came back down from Sinai the people made the golden calf and worshipped.
2. After so long in the cloud of fire and smoke they did not think Moses would ever return.
B. They wandered in the wilderness 40 years but God’s people never went hungry. There was manna.
1. When they grumbled and complained the Lord provided quail until they became sick of it.
2. The Lord provided water from a rock. Verse 6. The Lord showed his love to his people.
3. God’s people showed their trust in God whenever they walked in obedience to the Lord.
C. Again, the question: whom or what do we love or trust? The world in which we live does not empha-size loving and trusting in God above all things. Rather we might put our trust and confidence in our-selves, in our friends or family, or other experts in this world. Over time we have come to realize that our trust, when not place in God, is misplaced. This misplaced trust and confidence is a very detrimental dis-traction! "No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money"(MATTHEW 16:13). Jesus used Money as the word of distraction but we also understand how self-trust can easily distract us.
D. Maybe, just maybe, like the Israelites we have had to wander a long time before clearly understanding the valuable truth of trusting God above all things. How often we have wandered and how often the Lord our God have brought us back to him that we would not be lost. We are saved purely and freely by grace. Not one of us can pay for one single sin. Not one of us can earn heaven or live lives worthy of God’s for-giveness. Instead God paid the price through the precious blood of Christ, his Son, our Lamb of God. This, humanly speaking, doesn’t seem to add up. We want to do something to save ourselves. But the Lord our God has done it all. No wonder we are to place our trust and confidence in our God above all other things. "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight" (PROVERBS 3:5,6).
CONC.: Our God is an awesome God. There is no other God like the Triune God! Every false god in this world rules with fear. The followers of false gods live in fear of the vengeance that their god might carry out against them. Not so with Christians, rather than vengeance you and I have forgiveness. Rather than punishment in some unspeakable place our Lord freely provides us with heaven. It is fitting that the Lord begins his most important guidelines for believers with the powerful words: You shall have no other gods. By showing us his great love God gives us the motivation to fear, love and trust in him above all things. We happily agree with the prophet Micah who writes: "Who is a God like you, who pardons sin and forgives the transgression of the remnant of his inheritance? You do not stay angry forever but delight to show mercy"(MICAH 7:18). Again, there is no other god like our God, our Lord loves to show mercy – a character trait that is even contrary to our own sinful nature. Understanding all this, can we do any less than to fear, love and trust in the only true God above all things? Amen. Pastor Timm O. Meyer
LENT 3 readings (ILCW – A): ISAIAH 42:14-21: EPHESIANS 5:8-14: JOHN 9:1-7,13-17, 34-39
