Tag: God’s character

Digging in Deeper: Exodus 20:14

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“Do not commit adultery.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Humans have a complicated relationship with sex. God created it and made it really good and powerful. It is unquestionably a gift from Him. And when we enjoy this gift, it feels really good. If it doesn’t, you’re probably not doing it right. But God also made it to be enjoyed in a single set of circumstances. It is a gift for marriage. But marriage is hard. And in any given moment, sex feels good whether it happens in a marriage or not. It feels good no matter who your partner is even if you happened to be married. Because of all this, and because of a sinful nature in each of us that is profoundly selfish at its core, adultery is a thing that we do. But it’s not a good thing. At all. So, God made clear that it isn’t a thing we should do. Let’s talk about why this was a significant enough thing for us not to do that God included it in the foundational list.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 20:7

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“Do not misuse the name of the Lord your God, because the Lord will not leave anyone punished who misuses his name.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

I’ve never been a big fan of nicknames that weren’t mere terms of endearment. On the last day of a spring break trip in college, after playing on the beach for several hours with lots of sunscreen everywhere but on the top of my feet, I burnt them to a crisp. They were bright red and I couldn’t wear shoes for days. It was a good thing most people were used to my going barefoot around campus. Some friends tried to give me the nickname “Chief Red Foot” as a joke. I gently, but sincerely spoiled their fun. As a credit to their own character, they accepted that I really didn’t want a nickname and stopped their efforts immediately. I like my name. I’m proud of it. I didn’t want to be known by any other appellation. God feels the same way, but even more passionately. He’s so passionate about it that He made getting it right part of His foundational commands to Israel.e Let’s talk about what He means here and why this mattered so much.

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Digging in Deeper: Exodus 20:1-2

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“Then God spoke all these words: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the place of slavery.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

It’s fun to look up lists of strange laws from around the country. There are all kinds of them. It’s illegal, for instance, to drive blindfolded in Alabama. In Missouri, my home state, bear wrestling is banned. And one more just for fun: in Arizona, donkeys are prohibited from sleeping in bathtubs. Laws and rules sometimes seem totally arbitrary. Yet while that may occasionally be the case, it is far more likely that they have a context in which they made perfect sense at one point. As we at last arrive at the famous Ten Commandments, the foundation for the laws God gave to Israel through Moses, while they are sometimes treated like they are strange and arbitrary, they all have a context. That’s what God starts with here. So, before we talk through the laws themselves, let’s talk about their context and why that matters.

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Morning Musing: 19:23-26

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“Moses responded to the Lord, ‘The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, since you warned us: Put a boundary around the mountain and consecrate it.’ And the Lord replied to him, ‘Go down and come back with Aaron. But the priests and the people must not break through to come up to the Lord, or he will break out in anger against them.’ So Moses went down to the people and told them.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Sometimes as a parent you have to repeat yourself to your kids. I know there are experts who insist otherwise, but some things are important enough you have to say them more than once because you know they’re not going to be fully or properly understood the first time. As we come to the end of chapter 19 here, Moses doesn’t understand why God is so worried about the people’s coming up the mountain. God knows the people better than Moses does. Let’s talk about what’s going on here and reflect again with gratitude on Jesus.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 19:1-2

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“In the third month from the very day the Israelites left the land of Egypt, they came to the Sinai Wilderness. They traveled from Rephidim, came to the Sinai Wilderness, and camped in the wilderness. Israel camped there in front of the mountain.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Here we come at last to a new leg of our journey through Exodus. Everything we have so far encountered has been leading here. No, we are not yet to the Promised Land (and we won’t actually get there on this journey; as far as distance from Egypt goes, this is as far as we’ll get), but we are at the next place where God will reveal Himself to the people in a significant way. More importantly than that, God finally lets the people in on what He is planning with them, on why He did all of this in the first place. We will walk through all of this in the days and weeks ahead of us, but here at the start we encounter something important that I wanted to make sure we didn’t miss. God reveals His character here in a way that mattered to Israel, but which matters even more to us. Let me tell you why.

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