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July 8, 2008
Exodus 11:10
Exordium: The line between good and evil seems to be getting more and more blurred all the time. That fulfills the prediction of the Bible “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil.” (Isaiah 5:20A)
Yet it is not easy for us to make distinctions between good and evil. We may feel arrogant or proud or even be accused of those attitudes when they are not true of us at all. Yes, it has become hard to draw lines in this culture and still remain loving and kind. Yet somehow we need to recover that grace and that determination.
Explication: But in this Scripture before us God draws a line in the sand. The sand is the sand of Egypt. He says (in Exodus 11: 7) “…that you may know that the Lord does make a difference between the Egyptians and Israel.” Not an imaginary line like what might mark a border between two places, but a real line deep into human life.
He is saying that on one side there will be a great cry-in the land of Egypt such as has not been heard and never again will such a lament be heard. It is the loudest wail that any nation has ever known.
But among the people of Israel, not one dog will bark or even move its tongue on the way to growing and barking. In the East every town and village has its pack of dogs who roam the streets at night looking for something to eat, and barking at any thing that disturbs the night.
But on this night all will be utter tranquility because of God’s hand upon His own people. It is not that everyone is asleep; they are rather very busy scurrying around with their belongings ready to make a huge transition out of Egypt and across the desert to the land that God will show them.
Exodus 20:17
June 15, 2008
Exordium: We have come to the last of the Ten Commandments. This is the summing up of all that has gone before. And yet it is different from all the others. They focused on outward actions-this Tenth Command goes to the inner life of the person.
Explication: I want us to think differently now about these Ten Commands. Not so much as rules, (Thou shalt not), but rather as pictures of what the life of the people of God will look like: as they worship, as they speak, as they rest on His day, as they obey authority, as they preserve life, and marriage and property.
This is a picture of God’s will, his plan for you-but everything starts with your heart.
I.GOD WANTS OUR HEARTS MORE THAN OUR CORRECT BEHAVIOUR
Like the prodigal and the elder brother story in Jesus’ words. The father delighted in the son who had come home from the far country, who was humble enough to take a role as a servant. But the elder brother did not please his father. This son said to his father. “I have served you and never neglected any command of yours.” His behavior had been perfect but his heart was not with the father, as evidenced by the fact that he could not rejoice when his errant younger brother came home.
What God is saying in this commandment is echoed in Proverbs 23:26, “My son give me your heart.” The heart is the very center of your being. It stands for your core of personality, the secret place where decisions are made, agreements are formed with the self, with God, and with others.
It is the place that God wants to engage in you. The heart is who you are, when every thing is stripped away. That is what God wants. That is the inner spring that motivates and energizes you. That is your soul. That is what He wants in this Command.
II. GOD WANTS TO KEEPYOUR HEART PURE FROM DISTRACTION
God calls coveting a distraction, a deep desire for something other than what God has provided for us. It is a deep root of longing, yearning for something or someone. It is really a rival to God-that thing you are coveting. It is taking God’s place in your life. That is why the Bible calls covetousness “idolatry”; making a god out of the object of your desire. Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:16
Interpretation of the Ninth Commandment
June 8, 2008
Exordium: This Commandment deals with our speech-our language. How serious that is because your speech is you, the way you talk represents who you are!
Explication: Your communication is not only important to you, but it is valued by God. He cares about each person’s name and He guards our names with this Commandment. He values every person’s word and will hold each one accountable. He values truth and will protect it by this commandment.
He hates lying-we may forget that because we have become careless about lying. Some have said that our culture is in love with the lie. The slogan seems to be “Lie now- Pay later.”
Our speech has an important place in God’s plan for building His kingdom and His rule over all things. Let’s look deeper at the foundation of the Ninth Commandment “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.”
This Command of God seems to be founded on three pillars:
Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:15
The Eighth Commandment
June 2, 2008
Exordium: Restoring a Commandment of God to its original luster is like finding something old and neglected and cleaning it and polishing it to look beautiful and useful once more. An old pan or a dish or a shell for the beach-a piece of tarnished silver, making it bright again, has a good feel to it.
We are not the first ones to find God’s law and rediscover its deep and lovely meaning. It happened in Old Testament History when Josiah and his people were cleaning the temple they came upon the Holy Law and rejoiced as they restored it to its rightful place in their life.
Explication: The Eighth Commandment, “thou shalt not steal” has gotten very tarnished. It falls toward the end of the Ten Commandments and may be deemed less important than the others.
It has been dulled by compromise
Corroded by carelessness
Its lack of luster comes from a lack of conscience
It has been forgotten through filching
Rusty from routine neglect
But I propose to you today that we restore the splendor of these four words-that it may shine again as a beacon to young and old. That’s what happened when the Holy Spirit visited Wales. Tools that were taken from the mines were returned; the judges had nothing to do for there were no more thefts. The police had no work so they formed quartets and went into the streets to sing to the people.
The Eighth Commandment is essential for our life together. Without it we shall sink into the horror of dishonesty on every side. May it never be!
But what is the splendor we are trying to restore- what does it look like? It is so brief and obvious that it hardly seems splendid? Yet it is, underneath the dust and the neglect. What is its splendor? Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:14
The Seventh Commandment
May 18, 2008
Exordium: Last week we saw how God had flung a fiery ring around life with the Sixth Commandment, “You shall not kill.” In fact, we derived part of our Church’s vision from a positive look at that commandment of God.
Today as we approach the Seventh Commandment we see that God is safeguarding the source of life in marriage and the family. He puts His protective mantle around the relation between husband and wife and children with these words, “You shall not commit adultery.”
Explication: God being all wise does more than one thing with every action of His. God took this Commandment and expanded it through the lips of His dear Son, the Lord Jesus Christ in His earthly ministry.
Listen to His words from the Sermon on the Mount. ”You have heard that it was said of those of old, you shall not commit adultery. But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it for you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and cast it from you, for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish than for your whole body to be cast into hell.” (Matthew 5: 27-29)
Jesus was not saying that a look is the same as the act. But rather the look is the root or the beginning of the act. It can easily lead to the act but the act is a far more serious and heinous a crime than the look. (ref. James 1:15)
Exodus 20:13
The Sixth Commandment
May 11, 2008
Exordium: A year has passed since you took the courageous step of calling me to work with you for the glory of God and the building of His Kingdom. Now it is time to cast a vision as to where we go from here.
Our goal has been to worship God together rightly. We are still learning that and that commitment does not change. What I am proposing this morning is not a replacement but an extension of the worship into the world.
After Isaiah’s great experience of worship recorded in chapter six of his prophecy when the presence of God filled the temple and humbled and overwhelmed him, there was a question from God, “Whom shall I send and who will go for me?” Whereupon Isaiah answered “Here am I, send me.” He was being called out of the temple worship experience into a place where people in need were waiting. That is what happened on the Day of Pentecost. They were worshipping Christ and prying to Him, when the Holy Spirit sent them into the streets to meet human need.
That is the direction of the vision…out of the “Upper Room” into the streets of the City. This is even so in the life of the Lord Jesus. He and Peter, James and John were with Him on the Mount of Transfiguration along with Moses and Elijah. It was a glorious moment and Peter would have stayed there if he could, but the Master took them back down into the valley where a boy was in desperate need of Christ’s healing power.
Explication: Why the Sixth Commandment as the occasion? Because this word from God centers on life–our life and the life of others. “You shall not kill”. “You shall do no murder”, as some translations have it.
The Reformers taught on the Commandments too, and when they did they were careful to point out the positive as well as the negative aspects of the Commandment. Not only “don’t do this”, but instead “do this”. I want to do that too. So today we will major on the positive aspects of this great word from God.
Negatively, the command calls us not to murder others or ourselves, and not to indulge in hidden murder, which is a built upon anger, envy, hatred, or desire for revenge. The Lord Jesus brought us back to these dangerous emotions as preludes to murder itself. They are dangerous in the life of the church or in society, wherever they are. James tells us that this is where wars come from.
Normally one would expound all these negative acts with severe warnings, but today I want to play side B, which is the positive meaning of the Sixth Commandment. I want to take a fresh look at this command with you. Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:12
The Fifth Commandment
May 4, 2008
Exordium: I have suggested to some of you that you sit down together with ice cream or a favorite dessert and let the Dad ask the question, “Who are we as a family? What is important to us?” That is another way of asking, “What are the core values of our family?”
Then if you list the qualities that define your family, I am sure that respect would be high on the list, along with words like safety, fun, no abuse verbal or physical, and hospitality. But that word respect would be uppermost. Where does it come from?
Explication: The Fifth Commandment, the beginning of the second half of the ten, is sometimes called the second table of the Law. The first table had to do with our duties toward God, and now the second half sets forth our duties to each other.
That is how Jesus summed up the commandments. “Love the Lord thy God with all they heart, mind, soul and strength and” (now comes the second table) “and thy neighbor as thyself.”
The starting place for loving others is our own family. That’s why God gives us this commandment. “Honor your father and mother that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God gives you.”
Number five is the heart of the commandments, because it is at the heart of life.
LET ME SEE IF I CAN ILLUSTRATE THIS COMMANDMENT
First Illustration: A Medical Student
This young man in another city was a student in the Medical College. He came to me one day with the desire to join the Church. After we talked a while and I could see his real love for Christ and the Scriptures, I asked him if he had his father’s permission to do so. He explained to me that there was a rift between them and it would be very hard for him to do so. I pressed the matter with him and he agreed to try. In going to his father, he did not receive permission but he did apologize for his distance and there was a beginning of healing. About 6 months later, his father gave him permission to join the church, explaining that he wanted to rotate off the church’s board before his son’s name came up requesting transfer. Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 8-12
April 27, 2008
Exordium: The Fourth Commandment has been given bad press. The Adversary wants you to resent it, perhaps despise it as negative, to ignore it, to forget it as obsolete and irrelevant to modern life.
But the commandment remains in spite of all the attacks made upon it. And when the prophet Isaiah sings about it, he gives us by the spirit a proper attitude towards it. Call the Sabbath a delight.
Explication: The Command is both positive and negative. The positive is the most important and God puts it first. “Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it holy.” The word “remember” does not mean merely memory, but to celebrate it–commemorate God’s goodness in giving it to us.
God has hallowed it, that is, He has set it apart from the other days. It is unique, not ordinary, not just another day. God has put a holy luster on it–a kind of halo around it as His prized possession. It is to be cherished and made sparkling each week as it returns.
There are prohibitions in the Command of course, because God wants practical signs of our keeping it holy to Him, that is, a difference in our lives because we are His people, from others in the way we keep His day. He wants to be able to see how we actually carry out His will on this day He made.
Isaiah wants us to see the day as a delight to our eyes. Think of the delight of a child in Christmas morning or in a birthday party with gifts and cake. Or family dinner that honors that child. Think of Sunday in that way and it will not be hard to keep it.
How do we delight in the Lord’s Day?
I. DELIGHT IN HIS CREATION
The Mediaeval Christians knew how to live. They celebrated what God had made as the seasons turned round and round. God is good, life is good because God has made it and they rejoiced in the returning of the Lord’s Day each week. Their rejoicing found its culmination in the feast of the Corpus Christ – the body and blood of the Saviour because He had become man and entered into their daily lives and given Himself for them and their salvation. God has filled life with hope, songs and joy. Let us also delight in God’s ways with us. Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:7
April 20, 2008
Exordium: In the beginning, before there was a world, a star, a man or a woman, there was God. Eternally there, eternally the same; full of love among the three persons of the Trinity who lived in perfect fellowship within the nature of the One true and Living God.
He was in a nameless kind of majesty. There was no need of a name. He lived in perfect self-sufficiency, in perfect self-existence, in matchless glory!
But He took a name when He had created the world and a people upon it to whom He had given the gift of language, a name they could understand and use.
A name is a connection with others, it is given as a gift, an invitation to be known and perhaps loved.
Explication: All this was in the heart of God when He answered Moses’ question, When I come to the children of Israel and say to them, “the Lord God of your fathers has sent me to you”, and they say to me. “What is His name?”, “what shall I say to them?”
His answer was: “I AM WHO I AM.” “Say to them, I AM has sent me to you.”
That is the One who is there, who is eternally the source of all being and all life, the One who makes possible all other beings.
What an act of love that God should take a name that we could grasp and love and use to know Him! And He put a “fence” around the good gift of His name, the way the power company puts a fence around its transformers with a sign written in red, “Danger- High Voltage.” That is, “be careful in this vicinity”.
There is something very important here. God is not saying don’t use my name, don’t touch it, though some have interpreted it that way. But I think it means it must be used in exactly the right way. Used wrongly, there are serious consequences that might include death.
I. WHAT’S IN THIS NAME? Read the rest of this entry »
Exodus 20:4-6
April 13, 2008
Exordium: All of us bring problems into the service of worship. Different kinds of problems, financial, family, job, singleness, marriage, illness, employment. We come hoping to find help in the presence of God and His people.
And that is good, because in the midst of worshipping God He often comes to us and shows the decision we need to make or the comfort we need to receive, or the courage we need to go on.
How often as some one gone out from the worship room and said, “thank you I got the answer I was looking for”. When asked what helped them, they would not really be sure, but somehow in worshipping God there was help and blessing.
Explication: This morning our theme is the Second Commandment, “Don’t make for yourself an image of me or of anything and use it in worshipping Me.” That seems irrelevant to the problems we bring to church with us. Or is it?
Take the experience of King Hezekiah recounted in 2 Chronicles 29 and 30. He was the son of Ahaz who tried everything he could think of to solve his problems as king and nothing helped.
But that became an object lesson to the new King. Hezekiah, 25 years old when he assumed the throne of Judah, has been called the greatest king since David and Solomon. We read that he walked in the ways of David. He is the “golden boy of Chronicles”, someone to learn from.
Hezekiah was more than a king; he was shepherd to his people, a pastor to his kingdom. When he came to reign it was one of the most critical periods in Judah’s history. Assyria the mighty juggernaut of the East was about to swoop down upon tiny Judah and other small kingdoms round about and swallow them up. Since Assyria was the most brutal and ferocious nation of its day, there was terror in the hearts of the people of Hezekiah’s kingdom.
His father Ahaz had not looked to God is such times. But Hezekiah did. He returned to the golden days of Judah – when the king and the people looked to God for help and worshipping Him aright came first.
As a pastor to his people, how wise he was! So often in the Church if we have a financial problem we try to raise money. Or if we have a unity problem we preach about unity, or if we have a numbers problem we try to get the numbers up. Or as Reformed people we might form a committee. But not Hezekiah, he turned all those solutions to his problems down and set out to restore worship to its rightful place and practice.
What a model for the church today! Get worship right. And there is no better place to study than in the Second Commandment. This command is not about worshipping the wrong God but about worshipping the right God in the right way. What is this command of God saying to us this morning?
RIGHT WORSHIP IS ESSENTIAL TO GOD AND TO HIS CHURCH Read the rest of this entry »
