The
First Commandment
Adapted From: Ten to Grow On By Sandra Klaus
·
Review:
o
How
many commandments are there? 10
o
The
10 Commandments are found in the Old Testament and many are repeated in the New
Testament. In the New Testament, the 10
Commandments are summed up in how many simple commands? 2
o
What
are they?
§ Love the
Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind.
§ Love your
neighbor as yourself.
o
What
is the purpose of the Ten Commandments for us today? They help us please him
and make us and those around us happy.
·
Read
Exodus 20:1-3
·
What
is the first commandment? You shall have no other gods before me.
·
This
means that nothing should be more important to us than God. We shouldn’t worship God and anything
else. We shouldn’t worship God and
money. We shouldn’t worship God and
people’s opinions of us. We shouldn’t
worship God and buddah. We shouldn’t
worship God and… you fill in the blank.
·
We
should only have our eyes set on the one true and living God who created heaven
and earth. No one came before him and no one will outlive him. No one and nothing is greater than our
God. He deserves our worship and love.
·
Honoring,
worshiping and loving God is the key to keeping the other 9 commandments. If you truly have your eyes and heart focused
on God, it makes not doing or doing the other 9 commandments so much easier.
·
Why
would we ever let anything become more important in our lives than God? Maybe we get distracted and forget about
God. Maybe we get mad at God and stop
listening to him. Maybe we start looking
at the things around us or the people around us, and those things and people
become more important to us than God.
o
Money
o
Work
o
Fun
o
Sports
o
Friends
o
Bad
behavior
·
Sometimes
we just choose to do what we want to do, no matter if it’s right or wrong, and
that has now become more important than what God wants. When we choose to do our own thing despite
knowing what God says about it, then we are putting ourselves before God. In essence, we are the “other god” that we
are putting ahead of God in our own life.
·
The
First Commandment clearly says that we should have no other gods before HIM,
which means that NOTHING should be more important than God in our lives. The
more we think about God, pray to God, listen to God, read His words in the
Bible, and worship him by telling him in prayer, song, and our actions how
wonderful He is, the easier it is to put him first.
·
I’ve
had a rough couple of weeks and I haven’t been gung ho chipper gal ready to
take on the world. This morning I
realized that I had been trying to fix everything in my life on my own. Yes, I’ve been praying and reading my Bible,
but I’ve been “doing” the work of trying to figure everything out myself. This morning I literally kneeled down with my
face to the ground and just told God how wonderful He is and that I wanted Him
to be in control. I had become my own
god by trying to fix everything myself.
I had failed at following the First Commandment! So, I told God I was
sorry. Guess what? God forgave me. Just like he does every time I mess up. The Ten Commandments exist not as a measuring
stick to see how well you are doing and whether or not you’re going to heaven
or hell. As we discussed last week, the
Ten Commandments exist now to help us please God and make us, Him and those
around us happier. Today has been a much
better day than any day of the past
two weeks. Praise Jesus!
·
What
things have you made “other gods” in your life?
Bible Drill:
I John 2:15
Deuteronomy 6:5
Joshua 24:24
Joshua 22:5
Matthew 22:37
Mark 12:30
Luke 16:13
Deuteronomy 11:1
Deuteronomy 5:7
Luke 10:27
Joshua 23:11
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