LAW HOMILY: "Complaining His Name In Vain"

The Third Commandment and the Meaning of Taking God’s Name in Vain

Every week we look at the law of God because we want to understand what God says to his people. And as we've noticed over the weeks and months and year and something that we've been doing this, that each of the 10 commandments really do represent so much.

All of the law can be summarized in these 10 commandments. And there's plenty room for us to explore the depths of each of these 10 oceans to find where we fall short of following God. Today we're in the third commandment and that is Exodus 20, verse seven.

I will read it, then we'll explore another aspect of its meaning. It says, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes his name in vain.

Now, when God carved his covenant into these two tablets of stone, he was etching far more than wrote commands. He was revealing himself. He was revealing his name. He was declaring his character in thunder that was rumbling at the top of Mount Sinai.

This was a hallowed revelation where men and women and children were to revere, adore and lift high the name of Yahweh with great joy. And yet we creatures made from the dust, rescued by grace, adopted into his family by his mercy, dare to drag his name through our daily complaints like pearls through the muck.

The third commandment is often misunderstood as a kind of moral muzzle against profanity, a prohibition against certain four letter words and flippant exclamations. But the command goes so much deeper than that.

It forbids the taking of the name of the Lord in vain, not merely speaking in rage, but speaking about his name with a kind of emptiness, vacuous nothingness. This command condemns not only blasphemy on our tongues, but also thanklessness in our tone.

This command is against both the curse words and the hollow hallelujahs, against joyless religion, against prayers that mutter mindlessly and against sermons that drone on with no point and against Christians who grumble in the shadow of the cross.

To take God's name in vain is to wear his name as a badge while living as though it was nothing. Here's an example in the Old Testament. The Israelites, they looked at the Ark of the Covenant. You'll remember that's the golden box with the great lid on top of it, which is called the mercy seat.

And with the golden poles that were supposed to be what they used to carry it. And these two cherubim like figures that sat on the top of it, which was supposed to communicate reverence and fear and awe.

And yet they carried it into battle as if it was a good luck charm. And God allowed them to be destroyed because they took his presence as a trifle thing, as a good luck charm. And how often do we do that?

When we speak in such ways that make it seem like that the reality of who God is has not penetrated the craggy parts of our heart. Where we look at our situations in life and we say, we say, gosh, I wish I had another outcome.

Do you realize what you're saying when you do that?

When you look at your life and you say, I wish I had a different situation, you're looking at God who hand chose that situation to give you by providence.

And you're saying, I know more than you.

You're taking his name in vain. Every murmur is a blasphemy. This is why scripture says in everything give thanks for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus, 1 Thessalonians 5, 18. Gratitude is not a suggestion.

It's not even a good posture. It's a command for you. It's God's will for you because it says something about your heart. The heart that praises is saying Yahweh, you're in control and I will trust you.

The heart that grumbles is saying, I know better than you. And what a blasphemy it is for us to look at the living God and to say such things.

We all do it.

Every single one of us, probably today. But let us mindfully recognize that when we do it, it's a great sin. We're taking God's name in vain and let us repent. As flippantly as we do it, let us even more so intentionally repent and ask the Lord to help us by his spirit to be a content, grateful, joyful, happy people.

Amen?

Let's pray.

Reverence for God’s Presence and a Prayer for Gratitude

Lord, when Moses came into your presence, you told him to take off his sandals because the place that you were inhabiting was made holy by your presence. The entire nation of Israel watched as your fiery presence consumed Nadab and Abihu for their treachery.

When you came down and descended upon the mountain of God, the people cried out in fear. When the disciples saw you pull back the veil of reality, they pressed their faces into the earth because your glory was so beautiful to them, it was dangerous.

Lord, let us not be people who've become so fat and diabetic on grace that we don't recognize what it is that's happening. The fact that you live inside of our hearts and not in a remote temple somewhere thousands of miles away is an unbelievable grace.

The fact that a single Adam, if we could even speak to him, speaks so foolishly of your presence in us, doesn't rip us to shreds, is a grace beyond grace. Lord, help us to remember how much grace that we've been given.

Help us to remember when we suffer or when we don't get our way or when things happen that frustrate us or when people that we care about disappoint us. Help us to remember that you, God, never disappoint.

You have given us such grace, such mercy, such love, such providence. And Lord, I pray that it would turn our hearts from grumbling to gratefulness. Lord, would you help us, would you forgive us as we fall short of these things?

And Lord, by your spirit, would you help us grow in these things as well? It's in Jesus' name we pray, amen. All throughout the scriptures, God forgives us. And if he didn't, we'd have no hope. The only reason we're here today, the only reason that we can go to sleep at night without the haunting awareness of our depravity is the grace of God.

Look at what it says in Isaiah 45, 21 through 22. Declare and set forth your case. Indeed, let them consult together. Who has announced this from old? Who has long since declared it? Is it not I, the Lord?

And there is no other God besides me, a righteous God and a savior. For just a moment, those two things can kind of seem at odds because if God is righteous and we are not, then how is he in relationship with us?

If not for the fact that he is savior. There is none except me, he says. Turn to me and be saved. All the ends of the earth, for I am God and there is no other. Turn away from your commitment to self-sufficiency.

Turn away from your commitment to pull yourself up by your spiritual bootstraps and turn to God, the only one who can rescue us, amen?

Amen.

So as we do that, let us stand.