The First Commandment:
You shall have no other gods.
What does this mean?
We should fear, love, and trust in God above all things.
Since we do not set up altars and worship other gods anymore, it is so easy for us to think we are rather faithful to this commandment. Jesus tells us in Matthew that being faithful to the first commandment is more than not worshiping a god of our own making. No, in order to begin to keep this commandment we must love God above anything and everything. According to the 1st commandment God is to be our number one priority. How much attention do we give our wives, husbands, kids, or any of our family members? Jesus tells us that we need to give more love and attention to God than we do anyone else in our lives.
When God gives us a command there are always two sides to that command. The first part of a commandment is the most obvious. God commands us not to do something. The first commandment forbids that we have other gods. More specifically, we are forbidden to esteem anything more precious than God.
Phil. 3:19 “Their end is destruction, their god is their belly, and they glory in their shame, with minds set on earthly things.” This is really best explained by saying with the 1st commandment God forbids us to fear, love, or trust in any person or thing as we should fear, love, and trust in Him alone! Jesus emphasizes this in Matt. 10:37. “Whoever loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.”
The second part of the very same command takes a little more understanding. Not only does God forbid us from doing certain things, but He also instructs us as His people to act in certain ways reflective of who our God is. As God’s holy and redeemed people, we are to fear God as the highest being in our lives. We are to be more concerned about God’s opinion of our lives than other people. We honor Him by how we live and we avoid sinful things that displease Him.
“Matt. 10:28 Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.” We love our God when we cling to Him alone and devote our whole lives to His service. Ps. 73:26 “My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.”
We trust God above all things when we rely on and turn to Him for help in every one of our needs. Ps. 118:8 It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to trust in man. Prov. 3:5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.
Why does God give us the first commandment?
Why does Jesus reinforce the importance of the first commandment?
The first commandment is stressed for our own good. When we fear, love, and trust in the idols of this world, like money, entertainment, pleasure, or whatever suits our fancy these days it is committing idolatry. God’s Word warns us not to be led astray by revealing what we are really doing when we sin against the first commandment.
Rev. 9:20 [They] did not repent of the works of their hands nor give up worshiping demons and idols of gold and silver and bronze and stone and wood, which cannot see or hear or walk.
God is not egotistical or insecure. God does not need our worship, WE NEED HIM!!! It is for our good it is for our benefit that we fear, love, and trust in Him. God gives us this command to protect and keep us from following the devil, the demons, and their lies. God gives us the 1st commandment to save us from being destroyed in the flames of hell!
Love the Lord your God!!!
“Let everyone, then, see to it that he values this commandment great and high above all things. Do not regard it as a joke! Ask and examine your heart diligently [2 Corinthians 13:5]
You will find out whether it clings to God alone or not. If you have a heart that can expect of Him nothing but what is good, especially in need and distress, and a heart that also renounces and forsakes everything that is not God, then you have the only true God. If, on the contrary, your heart clings to anything else from which it expects more good and help than from God, and if your heart does not take refuge in Him but flees from Him when in trouble, then you have an idol, another god.
God will not have this commandment thrown to the winds. He will most strictly enforce it. In order that this may be known He has added (a) a terrible threat and (b) a beautiful, comforting promise. This promise is also to be taught and impressed upon young people
[Deuteronomy 6:7], that they may take it to heart and hold it.
"I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate Me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love Me and keep My commandments. [Exodus 20:5–6]"
These are the people He means when He says,
“those who hate Me” [Exodus 20:5];
i.e., those who persist in their defiance and pride. Whatever is preached or said to them, they will not listen. When they are rebuked, in order that they may learn to know themselves and make amends before the punishment begins, they become mad and foolish. They rightly deserve wrath, as we see daily in bishops and princes now.
But as terrible as these threatening’s are, so much more powerful is the consolation in the promise. For those who cling to God alone should be sure that He will show them mercy. In other words, He will show them pure goodness and blessing, not only for themselves, but also to their children and their children’s children, even to the thousandth generation and beyond that. [40] This ought certainly to move and impel us to risk our hearts in all confidence with God [Hebrews 4:16; 10:19–23], if we wish all temporal and eternal good. For the supreme Majesty makes such outstanding offers and presents such heartfelt encouragements and such rich promises.
Therefore, let everyone seriously take this passage to heart, lest it be regarded as though a man had spoken it. For you it is a question of eternal blessing, happiness, and salvation, or of eternal wrath, misery, and woe. What more would you have or desire than God so kindly promising to be yours with every blessing and to protect and help you in all need?” (Concordia: The Lutheran Confessions.)
God’s richest blessings to you in Christ! The One and only God in whom we fear, love, and trust above all things!
Pastor Lessman
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