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Text: Exodus 20:1-21
This chapter about the ten commandments is groundbreaking in human government. It’s not groundbreaking in the sense that none of these laws was ever known before Moses brings them to Israel. People are living by some of God’s laws from the beginning of time. Murder was wrong when Cain killed Abel and Cain knew it. Adultery was wrong when Abimelech wanted to take Abraham’s wife Sarah and Abimelech knew it. This preamble to the full law of Moses sets forth boundaries and rights of people. To be a nation you need land, leadership, and law.
First commandment
- The LORD begins with this nation that has been well established in bondage, but the LORD wants them to live in liberty. He said having no other gods before me means there are no higher authorities. There are no other voices you listen to besides the LORD. It also means having God as your God looks like obedience to his law.
- God’s boundaries are both upward and outward. You have duties to God and you have duties to your fellow man. These laws form the basis for all other statutes and judgments.
Second commandment
- Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven 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: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
- Here you learn that jealousy is not a bad thing. Envy can be a bad thing, but jealousy isn’t bad. And jealousy isn’t envy.
- This is not about artwork. The priests were told to sew cherubim onto curtains and fashion cherubim on the top of the ark. This is not about artwork. It is about religious worship.
- It is about bowing down to worship things you made with your own hands. By the time the LORD is wearied of the nation of Israel, Jeremiah was telling people you call a rock your father and cut down a tree, carve it out, and then burn incense to it.
- The first rule of the nation is don’t call material things God.
Third commandment
- Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
- So idle words, promising God, and invoking God’s name for effect are all ways people sin with their mouths. The LORD said to the Israelites that He will hold them to their words.
Fourth commandment
- Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it, thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days, the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.
- You’ve just left slavery and now the LORD wants to give you rest.
- The LORD references creation as a literal six days. This is true in every culture I’ve ever heard of. There are only seven named days. The LORD is instituting a cycle of work and rest.
Fifth commandment
- Honor thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
- This is the first commandment with promise, as Paul notes. The LORD told the Israelites if they obey their parents their lives will be lengthened.
- In this case, the words of God are directly related to long life.
Sixth commandment
- Thou shalt not kill.
- This is expanded in the law from accidental manslaughter to purposeful murder. There is an adequate punishment for the range of transgressions here. An accidental death may carry a financial cost to it while murder requires capital punishment.
Seventh commandment
- Thou shalt not commit adultery.
- This is expanded in the law from taking someone’s wife unknowingly to willful adultery with a known married person. And there is adequate judgment for the range of these sexual transgressions.
Eighth commandment
- Thou shalt not steal.
- Again, this is expanded in the judgments from theft of small things to very valuable things. And there is adequate judgment for the range of thefts.
- We’ll see in every case that these ten commandments form the basis for the rest of the commandments. There are degrees just like we have: some are classified as misdemeanors and some as felonies.
Ninth commandment
- Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.
Tenth commandment
- Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor’s.
- So the laws identify sin. This is a clear purpose of nearly any legal code. It identifies transgression.
- Paul said this in Romans 7:7.
