Have No Idols (2 of 10)
Series: The Ten Commandments
Joe Alain
Exodus 20:4-6
The second message in a series of ten sermons on the Ten Commandments.
''4 You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to thousands who love me and keep my commandments.'' Exodus 20:4-6
Harold Best in his book, ''Unceasing Worship'' describes worship as the continuous outpouring of all that we are in light of a chosen God. Being created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26), all human beings continuously worship, even atheists. The opposite of Christianity is not atheism but idolatry. It's not that people who are not Christians do not worship, they just worship (give first place to) idols of their own making. This commandment really has to do with our worship. The question is, ''Who or what do we worship?''
In this second commandment is a call not only not to worship any other god, but to not worship the true God in the wrong way. You can be sincere in your worship but be sincerely wrong. Because we have God's revelation to us, we don't' have to wonder how to worship God and we don't get to choose how we will worship Him. We are to worship the true God as he has revealed Himself to us, ''in spirit and in truth.'' To the woman who he met at the well in Samaria and who he was having a conversation about worship with, Jesus said, ''23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth'' (Jn. 4:23-24).
So worship is a spiritual activity and it is to be carried out in ''truth,'' or reality. Above al ...
Series: The Ten Commandments
Joe Alain
Exodus 20:4-6
The second message in a series of ten sermons on the Ten Commandments.
''4 You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to thousands who love me and keep my commandments.'' Exodus 20:4-6
Harold Best in his book, ''Unceasing Worship'' describes worship as the continuous outpouring of all that we are in light of a chosen God. Being created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26), all human beings continuously worship, even atheists. The opposite of Christianity is not atheism but idolatry. It's not that people who are not Christians do not worship, they just worship (give first place to) idols of their own making. This commandment really has to do with our worship. The question is, ''Who or what do we worship?''
In this second commandment is a call not only not to worship any other god, but to not worship the true God in the wrong way. You can be sincere in your worship but be sincerely wrong. Because we have God's revelation to us, we don't' have to wonder how to worship God and we don't get to choose how we will worship Him. We are to worship the true God as he has revealed Himself to us, ''in spirit and in truth.'' To the woman who he met at the well in Samaria and who he was having a conversation about worship with, Jesus said, ''23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth'' (Jn. 4:23-24).
So worship is a spiritual activity and it is to be carried out in ''truth,'' or reality. Above al ...
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