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Sunnyside Baptist Church Michael Dirrim
If you feel like you're not going to know the answers, then you can go ahead and open your Bibles to where the answers are. But I'm not going to tell you where the answers are. We're going to engage in a study.
And the title of the study is this, Ten Words About Christ. The phrase ten words is also a word called the Decalogue. It's a way of talking about the Ten Commandments. So we're going to talk about the Ten Commandments in the light of who Jesus Christ is.
How are we to understand that? This is a good test case for how we read the Bible as a whole. And a good opportunity for us to understand what does it mean to obey God's Word? And what does it mean, we sang a song today, Take Time to Be Holy.
What does it mean to be holy? So that's what we're going to do. And beginning tonight, we're going to look at the study as a whole, the Ten Commandments as a whole. Where they're located in the Bible, why it's important, what they mean to our everyday lives, and so forth.
And then I'd like to take each commandment on its own and run the same process. I think it will be enriching as we think about these Ten Words About Christ. So that's the goal. So if you know where the Ten Commandments are located, and you have two opportunities to find it, then you can look over there and be ready for all the trivia.
Let's begin with a word of prayer. Father, I thank you for the opportunity. I pray you bless our time together. I pray that you bless our study and that we would glorify you and glorify Christ. And we pray these things in Jesus' name.
Amen. Amen.
So, let's start with just, when do we normally hear about the Ten Commandments? When you're a child? So we think of the Ten Commandments, found it in children's literature, and teaching children in Sunday school and home school and so on, right?
Where else? Where else do we normally hear about the Ten Commandments? If you want to get your tackles up, try to get rid of the Ten Commandments in a public space. Now we're ready for a fight. That happened a great deal, didn't it?
That was prior to the other monuments being torn down. It was really just kind of anti-monument. But I take it personally, right, because it's Holy Scripture. There are a lot of other places in state property, state buildings, federal property, federal buildings where the Ten Commandments are kind of chiseled in.
And they're still there. They did the cost-benefit analysis and like, well, it's going to take too much money to get rid of it. If it's something hanging on a wall, it doesn't cost us any money. We'll take it down if these five people are upset or whatever.
But there was a lot of controversies in public life about the Ten Commandments. And the people who said, okay, we'll take them down, considered very much traitors. And those who fought to keep them up, very much heroes and so on, right?
So that wasn't so long ago that that was kind of the talk of the town, at least in Baptist life. Where else do we hear about the Ten Commandments? Anybody have ever watched Way of the Master or read some of the Ray Comfort's works and watched Kirk Cameron at work and evangelizing on the streets as Jesus did with the rich ruler?
If you think you're good, just compare yourself to the Ten Commandments, and then you realize you're not good. A sinner in need of a Savior. Yeah, Charlton Heston. The comedian Dave Barry said Charlton Heston had a forehead so big he could write the Ten Commandments on them.
But it was a movie, right? You hear about it in church. We also find it in art. Mike Goulet in here. He showed me a picture. Somebody commissioned him to make a very nice Ten Commandments set out of high-quality wood, and he was showing me what he did.
He was commissioned to make it for somebody because they're going to hang it up on their wall. We have a huge bit of stained glass there in the auditorium. It shows the Roman numerals 1 through 10, reminding us of the Ten Commandments.
What's in the middle of those Ten Commandments up there on the cross? We're going to talk about that. Why is the cross in the middle of the Ten Commandments? Why is that significant? What does it mean?
Ten words about Christ. So they seem to have a place. They get talked about a lot. I find it's interesting that the phrase Ten Commandments gets used about all sorts of things. The Ten Commandments of airplane safety.
The Ten Commandments for parenting. They don't say nine or eleven. They just say Ten Commandments. They look at it as kind of a turn of phrase, a popular saying, a great way of talking about principles and wisdom, and so on.
So, the second question is this. What importance do the Ten Commandments have? What do you think about the Ten Commandments? What role they should have in church life, family life, civil life, and so on.
Of course, all the scripture was written to be read out loud, so it's a good practice. We try to teach our kids not to steal from one another. It's really pithy, right? Thou shalt not steal. How else is it important?
How else does it be used? A moral measure, how we practice our life. But it's a good way to be used as a basis for civil law. Construction of a legal system. Something of that history in our own country, don't we?
Yes.
You can use it for evangelism. People are familiar, aren't they not, with that phrase, Ten Commandments? As people think about it, sometimes when we're thinking about the Ten Commandments, as we're trying to understand what role the Ten Commandments have in our lives, in the lives of the society in which we live, our family, it's right for us to just think about it in terms of, well, it's scripture, is it not?
It's God's holy word. How does God's holy word, what kind of impact is the Bible supposed to have for our society, and for our families, and for our churches, and so on? Sometimes we're thinking about the Ten Commandments, obviously it's God's word.
It's profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness. It's good for telling us what's true, where we're wrong, how to get right, how to live God's way. Paul says the scriptures, Old Testament scriptures, were sufficient for Timothy to understand the gospel and to come to faith in Jesus Christ.
So definitely helpful in evangelism and so on. In all of this, why isolate the Ten Commandments? Why, pun intended, carve them out of the rest of all these important, everything in the Bible is important, right?
But why carve it out, why set it aside, and look at it on its own, and then ask specific questions about it? It's been done a lot, hasn't it? The Ten Commandments, set out on its own. And of course, we're going to...
But just how familiar are we with the Ten Commandments? Just how familiar are we with the Ten Commandments? Well, let's see. This is where the trivia comes in. Let's see how awake we were this morning.
I'll give you a hint, the first commandment is that thou shalt not steal. Okay? So what is the first commandment? High school boys, you've been called out.
Number one.
Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. No other gods before me, right? So let's just do this. Very good, no other gods.
All right, very good.
Sharp young men in the young men's class. Exodus 20, and God spoke all these words saying, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Did you notice how the Ten Commandments starts?
How often do you see that on the tablets? They're rounded too. I don't know why they're rounded. Is that because of the movie? What if they were a rectangle? I mean, just, you know, but they're rounded.
Everybody knows all those Ten Commandments, those rounded top, gothic, two tablets there. But this part is usually not on the stone tablets, is it? Well, the Lord's talking to who?
Who's he addressing?
He's talking to the Israelites at Mount Sinai. He's forging a covenant with them, isn't he? He's saying, here's how this is going to work. Oh, descendants of Abraham, I'm keeping my promises to Abraham.
You're his descendants.
Here we go.
Descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We're the children of Jacob, the tribes of Israel. Okay, so here we go. I'm making a covenant with you, and here's how we're going to roll. Number one. But before we get to number one, remember who I am.
I'm the Lord your God. Not only did I make you, I brought you up out of Egypt. I rescued you. Now, he says, you shall have no other gods before me. That's important for the Israelites to know, especially since they were just in Egypt, and there were all kinds of gods down there, and they're in the wilderness heading for a land where there's all kinds of gods in that land.
He says, you shall have no other gods before me. All right, what's number two?
Almost.
If you're Catholic, yes. Okay, so if you're wanting hand symbols, there's some really great mnemonic devices, hand symbols. Laurie DeForest taught tag this. Was it last year? No cutting out something, creating a graven image.
Very good. You all know those. A lot of you know. So, no idols. Now, it's like, well, isn't that the same thing? Well, they're related, aren't they? Pretty closely related, but they are significant. You can have a false god, but not make an idol of him, right?
You can worship a false god without possessing, buying, or making an idol of that god. That is possible. So, there is this. Well, doesn't that cover it? Doesn't this rule cover that rule? Perhaps in some way, but this is a necessary specification.
The Roman Catholics put both these together as the first commandment. And then the last commandment, the tenth commandment, they split off into two. So, they still have ten commandments, but they say, and the tenth commandment, we'll get to there.
You'll see that there is a little bit of a split. When you read it out loud, there is a symmetry between the first two commandments and the last commandment that folds out into two parts. It's interesting, though.
So, no other gods and no making idols to bow down and worship and pray to. Don't try to make an image of God to worship.
What does he say?
You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them nor serve them.
Now, this carved image thing, you can be a sculptor. That's not what's being forbidden. If you want to make a sculpture of a dolphin, go right ahead. As soon as you bow down to it, you're in trouble. That's what God is saying.
He's not saying don't make art because the Israelites made lots of art, often in honor and glorifying to God. But as soon as you bow down to worship it or serve it, that was the prohibition. That's the prohibition.
Do not bow down to them or serve them or, shall we say, venerate them. Don't do that either. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing my mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments.
Who's he talking to, by the way? He's talking to Israel. He's talking about how this covenant is going to work. What is he saying to Israel here? Just remember that I'm a jealous God. And just remember that I will visit punishment, judgment, disaster upon your great-grandchildren for your sins.
Welcome to the old covenant. This is in the Ten Commandments. Do we see that on those tablets that we read that are up on walls? We don't see that, do we? We're all cool with don't bow down to idols. This other part, man, I don't know what to do with that.
It doesn't really fit very well with how we do church. They're not suggestions. They're commandments God is saying to Israel, this is how we're going to do things. Now, let's think about, just real briefly, before we move on to the next commandment.
What is one of the promises of the new covenant that we find in Jeremiah about the sins of fathers and the effects on children? What's one of the promises of the new covenant? Yes, it has been said that the fathers eat sour grapes and the children's teeth are set on edge.
There's a variation of that in the South. I'm going to slap you so hard your grandchildren are going to feel it. Now, this arrangement in the old covenant, we see it. During the days of good King Josiah, who turned everything around and things were great, God said, well, we're going to delay judgment.
But after the days of good King Josiah, the judgment is still going to come because of the sins of Manasseh, who's been long dead. In other words, he's going to visit the disaster that this other generation has incurred.
Welcome to the old covenant. Now, in the new covenant, it doesn't happen. That's the promise, one of the differences in the new covenant. So, when we read the Ten Commandments, how familiar are we with the Ten Commandments?
They are to those that God brought up out of Egypt, whom he released from Egypt. Any of you all been a slave in Egypt?
Nope.
I'm not saying that these are not still morally, factually true. They are, but let's just…. Who are these two? Who did God write them to? What is he talking about? He's setting out the covenant that he is making with Israel.
Here's how it's going to work. Third commandment, what's the third commandment? Of course, this involves profanity, but the idea is bearing, carrying around the name of God in vain. It says, the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
All right. What's the fourth commandment? Sabbath.
Keep Sabbath.
Later on, we'll read in the Exodus and Deuteronomy, the Sabbath was considered the sign God made with Israel at Sinai. Remember the sign of the covenant that God made with Abraham was circumcision? The sign of the covenant that God made….
The sign of the Sinaitic covenant was the sign of the Sabbath. You have to keep the Sabbath. If you didn't keep the Sabbath, you were breaking covenant with God. It's very, very important. So what does he say about this?
Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall do no work. You, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates.
For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.
Okay?
Now, on the stone tablets, number four is there.
Alright?
Remember the Sabbath day, keep it holy. When's the last time you obeyed the fourth commandment as it is written? Yes, sir. Got to get your medicine. Yep, got to get your medicine. Blue laws. Throughout the Dominion of Canada and throughout these United States, there was lots of localized, regionalized blue laws about what could and could not be open on Sunday, what you could and couldn't do on Sunday.
Interesting fact. None of the blue laws ever said you couldn't pick up sticks. First guy to violate the Sabbath in the Bible got killed because he was picking up sticks and never manifested any of these blue laws that we've had in our societies.
When's the last time anybody actually obeyed the fourth commandment as it is written? Not as it is imagined, not as it is acclimated, but as it is written.
Yeah.
And it was a sign of what covenant? The covenant that God made with Israel at Sinai.
The Old Covenant.
Sign of the Old Covenant.
Okay.
What about the... Push the button, open the elevator.
In orthodox Judaism, in strict, strict Judaism, if you push anything... Fifth commandment? Another good thing to bring up during parenting sessions, right? Honor your father and mother. That's on the list.
Let's read the whole thing. Honor your father and your mother that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God has given you.
What land was that?
It was the land of Canaan, right? Between the Mediterranean Sea and beyond the Jordan, heading towards the Euphrates, the Fertile Crescent, part of the Levant, Palestine.
South of certain mountains, north of other ones. The Holy Land. So, honor your father and mother that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God has given you. Now, God promised any of you the land of Canaan that he's talking about right here?
No?
Just how familiar are we with the Ten Commandments?
Right?
Now, honoring father and mother is great. Yeah, those two, obviously. But read the whole thing. And then we have some short, pithy, get-her-done kind of statements. Number 6, number 7, number 8. Do not what?
Do not murder.
What's next?
What's number 8?
Okay, so do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal. And then what is number 9? Against your neighbor. Against your neighbor. You're at war with your enemy? Lie the heck out of the tomb. It's good warfare.
When God's at war with somebody, he deceives them. The midwives were at war with Pharaoh, protecting the babies. They lied to Pharaoh, and God blessed them. Abraham was at war with those who would kill him and steal his wife, so he lied.
And God blessed him, gave him all sorts of stuff. Do not bear false witness against your neighbor. If you lie, okay, this is good for children, siblings, spouses. If you lie to somebody in your family, you're saying, I'm at war with you.
If we lie to one another in the church, what are we saying? We're saying we're at war with you. If that's not true, then, of course, there's more than one lie going on there, so do not bear false witness against your neighbor.
Corrie Ten Boom lied to the Nazis.
Great job.
Not your neighbor. They're trying to kill your neighbors, your enemy, so lie to them. And then number 10, and we'll take it in two parts. And so it's do not covet neighbor's house. And then do not covet what else?
Anything else that you're not. But notice the list. The list includes all that is living that belongs to your neighbor. There's the space in which your neighbor lives, conducts his household economy, but then there's everything living that belongs to your neighbor.
Your wife, his wife, his male servant, his female servant, his ox, his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's. Anything else? Like this, because often in Jewish literature, things are set up in parallels to make a point.
At the heart of everything is do not murder. Satan was a murderer from the beginning. He brought death into the world. As all men sin, first crime after the fall was what? Cain murdering Abel. Why did God send the flood?
Because the violence had filled up the earth. Example, Lamech. Example, all sorts of examples of violence. But when the flood came, afterwards, what did God say about this rapture and killing and violence?
He said, if man sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed. We're going to put a stop on this. God is the giver of life. Nobody else gets to take it. We find this at the heart of everything. On either side, we have concerns about family.
Do we not? How do children relate to parents? And how do husbands and wives relate to one another?
Correct?
You see a concern about life first. Do not murder. And then concerns about family. This is the very heart of what God is trying to say to his people Israel as he's revealing his character to them in these propositional commandments.
I am the Lord, therefore here's how you are to live. Based upon who I am, this is how you're supposed to live. And here at the heart of it, we have the matter of life and the matter of family. What's at the heart of what we fight for as Christians today?
What's under attack?
Family.
Issues about life, correct? Abortion, euthanasia, so on and so forth. Family and life here at the center. Now, either side of here, do not steal and keep the Sabbath. What's the connection? What did God tell Israel about the Sabbath?
Six days God worked. He produced. He made things. And then the seventh day he rested. You're going to have that same pattern in your life. You're going to work six days and then you're going to do nothing on the seventh day.
Why?
It's going to be harder to do nothing than to do something. But you're not going to do anything on the seventh day.
Because God is your provider, not you.
God is your provider, not you. You have to let your fields rest on the seventh year. You've got to let your slaves go every seventh year. You've got to return all the property every seven sets of seven, the 49th in the year of Jubilee.
You've got to rest. You know, you're not your main provider. God is. That's the lesson of the Sabbath. You don't provide for you. You're not. God is. Well, you see how that relates to stealing?
Two things I ask of you, Lord. Please don't let me be full and rich so that I think I don't need you or be too poor so I steal and profane the name of my God. So, again, keeping Sabbath is trusting God with provision.
I don't have to farm every seventh year. I don't have to work every seventh day. I'm going to trust God. Stealing, same temptation, same issue.
Different manifestations. Are these parallel? Don't lie about God and don't lie about your neighbor.
Don't bear his name falsely. Don't bear your neighbor's name falsely. Don't be false about God. Don't be false about your neighbor. See how those parallel? And we have these related commandments here and here.
No other gods and no idols, a more specific rendering about this issue. And we have do not covet your neighbor's house nor anything inside the house.
So the idol is a shape of the God and the house is the shape of a family. But then there's the actual household, the real life of the household, and the real actual who God is.
So every single one of these parts of the Ten Commandments set in parallel, and they tell us about who God is and how he wants his people to live in reflection of him as he's making this covenant with Israel.
Laced throughout the Ten Commandments are very specific instructions related to the covenant that he's making with Israel. But at the very least, as we look through, we're seeing something of the character of God and his orderliness and how he's organizing the life of the people of Israel.
So we're also going to take a look a little bit more even at Deuteronomy switches some things down here on the commandment about coveting. Deuteronomy's account in chapter 5 starts off with not your neighbor's house, but your neighbor's wife as a separate category, and then anything else that your neighbors.
So how does that work? Remember that Paul said that the woman is the glory of a man.
Where does he get that from? Well, there's a parallelism going on here. The weightiness or the image of God versus God himself, the image of the glory of the man versus everything else that the man possesses.
So Deuteronomy has a similar lesson. Now, what we're going to do next time is that we're going to take these commandments and we're going to go back to Genesis. And then we're going to go forward in the life of Israel to the arrangements God made with David and the kings of Israel.
And we're going to see how these things connect. And then we're going to see how the Ten Commandments as a whole, as the law, summarizing the law, are fulfilled in Christ. So that's the goal. This session is just getting familiar with the Ten Commandments, remembering what they were, remembering all the details about them, seeing how they're set in their arrangement.
And the next time we're going to see how they fit within the whole storyline of the Bible. So we're making our way towards what impact and connection they have with our lives today. Any questions or thoughts as we close?
That's what he told Israel. Yeah, he said because God rested, because he rested on the Sabbath, because he rested, he said, you, Israel, you're going to rest every seventh day, the Sabbath day, for all your generations.
So it was every day you, Israel, in the Old Covenant. That's next week. Actually, that's next week, and then when we do our lesson on the Sabbath, we're going to explore that. Yeah, because, again, trying to take it as a whole first, big picture, and then I want to walk through every single one of the commandments.
Okay, it is valuable to know the Ten Commandments. How valuable is it? These are ten words about Christ, and we're going to find out how.
All right, let's go to the next word. Actually, doxology. See, I'm out of rhythm.
