God Repeats What He Is Most Interested In -- Exodus 20:22-23

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, ‘You yourselves have seen that I have spoken to you from heaven. You shall not make other gods besides Me; gods of silver or gods of gold, you shall not make for yourselves.’”
 

This is an interesting passage.  First of all God tells Moses to point out to the Children of Israel that He had already spoken to them directly.  This supports the argument that the Ten Commandments were indeed first given to the Israelites verbally, rather than to Moses.  And then, in this passage, God simply repeats His number one concern – that they do not make other gods besides Him.

Now whereas grammatically one can argue that this means we can “make images of Him” – it does not.  It simply says we cannot make any image of other gods.

God’s greatest desire for us is that He is our only God.  We are not to worship or love or desire any other god.  We are not to rely on any other god, as useless as it may be to do so.  When it comes to our spiritual devotion – it’s all God or nothing of God.  This is one of the most difficult lessons to learn in life.  Sometimes it comes easily, but more often it comes after decades of struggles in a person’s life.  God is not only to be first in our lives, but when it comes to worship and adoration, there is to be no one or no thing that comes second.

As much as He is a “jealous God”, our God does not require us to live a life of isolation with Him alone.  On the contrary, He wants us out in the world as His representatives.  But we do that always mindful of our relationship with Him and our dependence on Him.  The Christian pilgrim’s journey is primarily a voyage of discovery – the discovery of how best to accomplish just that.  It is a tough assignment.  But here’s the good news.  He does not want you to travel that journey of life alone.  He was willing to go with them and now for us, He has provided His Son, Jesus Christ, to travel it with you.

God told the Children of Israel that He was their God and they needed no one else.  He says the same thing to us today.

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