Welcome to this week's posting of the Weekend Sermon. Thank you for reading the blog. I really appreciate it. I hope and pray that everyone is doing well.
I made some progress this week on implementing my plan to get more involved in ministry. I will post more about this in the future. I am currently finishing up a book, and I have an idea for another book. It is my hope to get both of these published as writing is an important ministry area for me.
In prayer this week, please pray for those in Texas who are dealing with flooding again. It just keeps raining down there. Please pray for the safety of those in that area. Also, continue to pray for the end of the Zika virus. I haven't heard anything more about what is happening with Ebola in West Africa, so I hope and pray that that is now under control.
Let us continue to focus our prayers for peace on Syria this week. That country really needs help. Let us also pray for the message of the love of Jesus to reach many people around the world. Pray for Albania and Kosovo this week.
Today, we begin our new series on the Ten Commandments. As I mentioned last week, we will be going back and forth between two series of messages for the next few weeks.
Let's begin by looking back at how the Ten Commandments came to be in the first place. For a long period of time, the Hebrews were slaves in the land of Egypt. God raised up Moses to lead the people and to tell Pharaoh to let the people go. After several plagues and the events of Passover, the Hebrew people were set free. On their way across the desert to the land of promise, God had the people stop at Mount Sinai in order to receive the law.
Moses ascended the mountain where he met with the Lord. God gave Moses the Ten Commandments written on two stone tablets.
These are not the only laws that were given to Moses by the Lord. There are over 600 laws in the Pentateuch. Many of these concern the laws of sacrifice, laws for priests, laws for festivals etc. The most essential laws that God wanted the people to follow are found in the Ten Commandments.
All of the Ten Commandments except one are repeated in the New Testament. Jesus Himself mentions some of the commandments. We will examine each of the commandments and see how each relates to us in a contemporary context.
When God gave the commandments to Moses He began by saying, "I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me."
This is the first of the commandments. God wanted to make it clear that He had done a great and good thing for the Hebrew people. God expected the people to honor Him and worship Him as the only true and living God. They were to give their allegiance and worship to none other.
The first commandment is predicated on the fact that people would believe in a supreme being in the first place. Atheism was virtually nonexistent in the ancient world. There were a multitude of gods that people believed in. This is certainly not the case today in the Western world.
The number of people who claim to be atheists is on the rise in North America and in Europe. Here in the Unites States and in Great Britain, there are now a number of books that have been published by prominent atheists denouncing God and those who believe in God.
There is also another trend in the Western world that I refer to as practical atheism. By this I mean that many people live in such a way that they deep down must not believe that there is a God who they will have to answer to one day. They might not just come right out and say there is no God, but their actions demonstrate their lack of belief.
Over the course of Christian history, philosophers and theologians have attempted to give rational proofs for the existence of God. Just as many philosophers have criticized the proofs given for God's existence.
I have always believed that trying to prove that there is a God to someone is impossible. It is a matter of faith based on God's revelation of Himself. Some people will not believe no matter what you try to say to them
The way that I see it, when I look at the beauty, majesty and complexity of the world, I see a mighty hand behind creation. I see Jesus, and I believe that He is the full revelation of the God who created all things. He is God come in the flesh so that we might see Him and believe.
In this first commandment, God revealed that He alone is God. The God who delivered His people from the land of Egypt is the only God to be worshiped. All other gods are false gods, and we are not to associate with them
So, how does all of this apply to us today. First of all, we who are followers of Jesus need to make sure that we are not living in a way that it appears that we really don't believe in God. Jesus has given us commandments and teachings which we are to follow. If we really and truly believe in Him, we will seek to do what He wants us to do. This also applies to sin in our lives. If we really believe that there is an all knowing God who is watching us, how can we just continue to sin as if we don't think that He knows all about it.
As believers, we need to live lives of holiness and goodness and love that demonstrate that we truly believe in the Lord and that we believe that there is a world to come. We need to live in such a way that we demonstrate that we want to please the God of Heaven and Earth.
Also, as followers of the Lord, I believe that this commandment clearly tells us that we should not dabble in other religions. There is only one true God worthy of our worship. It troubles me greatly when I see Christian ministers join in services with representatives of other religions as if we are all worshiping the same God. Nothing could be further from the truth.
There are several different religious practices from eastern religions that have crept into the church today that I believe Christians need to be very careful about. Meditation with mantras, yoga, and certain holistic healing practices all have their roots in eastern religions that are contrary to the Scriptures. Some of them are actually derived from worship practices. Only the true and living God is to be praised and worshiped,
This commandment also should cause us to stop and think about whether or not we do have something in our lives that we place above our allegiance to God. We may not have an actual idol or another god from another religion, but anything that we place above our relationship with Jesus Christ is our god.
For some this may be the pursuit of money or material possessions. For others, fame, prestige and power have become god. Others place human relationships over a relationship with the Lord.
These are just a few of my thoughts on the meaning of this first and very important commandment. This week, try to think about how this first commandment applies in your own life.
Next week, I will post a message in our series on the lessons God has taught me through the animals he has brought into my life. The following week, we will examine the second of the Ten Commandments. On Monday, I will post the verses. On Wednesday, there will be a book review. May God bless you all. Amen.
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