The Second Commandment

Scripture Reading

Will you turn in your Bibles with me to Exodus chapter 20, Exodus chapter 20, Genesis, Exodus, that was real quick getting there, Genesis, Exodus chapter 20. We're going to be looking at the second commandment today, Exodus chapter 20, verses 4 through 6. Exodus chapter 20, verses 4 through 6, page 68, if you're using one of the Pew Bibles.

Prayer for Illumination

You know God's Word. 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 that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them, nor serve them, 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 mercy to thousands, to those who keep my commandments. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word and we pray now that your Holy Spirit would be our teacher, that you would convict us and embed these truths in the foundation of our hearts. In Jesus's name, amen. I had a blessing when I was The younger man, when I first got out of high school, zipped off to the Navy, and we got to do an amazing thing when I was in the Navy.

Sermon

Most of the time, if you get stationed on the West Coast, say in San Diego, you do a WestPAC deployment, so you get to go see all the Asian countries. But if you're stationed in Virginia or Connecticut, something like that, you do all the Mediterranean stuff, and both of them meet in the Persian Gulf. Everybody goes to the Persian Gulf. But in 2006 we got to go on this deployment where there was a hole in the Pacific fleet and so our ship got to go not just through the Mediterranean and through the Red Sea and in the Persian Gulf, but we also got to go through the Indian Ocean and over to Asia. And I was amazed as we pulled into Busan, in South Korea, we took a tour, a few friends and myself, out way out in the boonies and the hills. And as we were there, we didn't really know what we were in for, but they took us on this tour.

And all of a sudden, we came to these mounds, giant mounds that were built up. And outside of each mound were little pots that people would burn incense. And these were the prayers that people were offering up to their dead kings of Korea. And then after we went there, we headed to another place in the hills, this beautiful remote area where we walked around to a Buddhist monastery. where there was temple, and temple, and temple, and temple, and we saw people burning incense, and praying, and meditating. Well, we left Pusan, South Korea, and later we went to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and as we were there in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, I ate some ice cream, and a monkey stole my ice cream, but where I was going was the point. As I was going on this trail, I was hiking up a hill, and there was jungle-type forests on either side of me, but I was walking in a throng of people, hundreds and hundreds of steps up this hill. But at the base of these steps was a 75-foot tall Hindu statue, once again, with incense burning at its feet. And as you got into this cave at the top of the mountain, there was one hole in the ceiling with light streaming down into this cave, and there, in the middle of the cave, was a shrine. with idols that people were sitting there praying to.

And then as we left there and we went to Hong Kong, we were walking through Hong Kong, and you think of Hong Kong as this giant place of commercial activity and financial power in Asia, and there as we walked down the streets trying to find an authentic Chinese restaurant, all along the alleys, censor pots, with incense burning to their ancestors, praying to and for their ancestors. Time and time again, as we went to country after country after country, it became apparent to me that this commandment is still alive and active today. Because we might think we can escape that idolatry, because while we don't live in Asia, but we pulled into Europe, or we would go into American ports, and people would still serve themselves. Their idols were just their commercial activities and things that they wanted to do.

Second Point

Brothers and sisters, God commands us today to worship him the way he tells us to worship him. So we're going to look at a few different ways. There's a few headings for you today as we work through this commandment. The first is the rule. The second is the reason for that rule. And then a warning that comes with this commandment, followed by a promise. And then lastly, our blessing. So what is the rule? The rule is pretty simple.

Look with me at Exodus 20 verse 4. You shall not make for yourself a carved image. or of any likeness of anything that is heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, you shall not bow down to them, nor serve them." You're not allowed to make idols. You're not allowed to make idols.

Now, this was a real thing. Remember, this whole Ten Commandments series is couched within the Joshua series. And as Joshua was standing with the people at the edge of the Jordan River, about to go into the Promised Land, they're there, but they had spent 400 years in Egypt. 400 years watching the idolatry in Egypt. They knew about Horus, who was one of the gods of Egypt, who had a head like a falcon. And then they also knew of Anubis, who was one of their gods, who had a jackal's type head. And they knew what it was like to see the Egyptians say, oh, here are the gods, and they're like this, and so we're going to make an image of them that looks like something that corresponds to their power. And this is a real commandment as God is telling them at Mount Sinai here, you're not going to worship me like you saw them there. You're not going to worship me like you've seen for the past 400 years.

And when you go into the land, which I'm about to give you, You're gonna be tempted with this still. It's an always present problem. When you go into the land of Canaan, you're gonna be tempted to worship the Asherah, just like the Sidonians who you're going to conquer. You're not gonna be able to worship the god of Chemosh. The God of the Moabites has its own idol, and Asherah has her own idol, and Baal has his own idol, and Dagon has his own idol, and all of them look different ways and do different things, and they're sensual. You can see them, and you could bow down, you could serve them, but God is saying, here, you're not gonna worship me that way. You're not going to follow me that way, and sadly, this is exactly what happens.

We know, as we look through the history of Israel, when we go to one of my favorite stories in 1 Kings where there's Elisha, the people have fully given themselves over to the worship of Baal. And as they go and they serve them, I don't know if you remember this story, but Elisha kind of throws down the gauntlet.

He says, all right, let's see who's really the God. Let's see who's really Lord. We'll all go up to Mount Carmel. And you can make a fire, or you can make an altar there, and if Baal answers your prayers and lights the fire and consumes the sacrifice, Baal's God, got it. But if Yahweh does it, then it's just Yahweh. And so they go and they have this competing thing, and the priests of Baal, by the way, these priests are Israelites. These are not foreigners, these are not Canaanites, these are Israelite people, Jewish people, who are the priests of Baal. And they're going and they're praying and they're making themselves frantic, they're cutting themselves for hours and hours, and Elisha just kind of sits back.

You have one of these friends, right, who knows how to taunt people when they're not doing well? Oh, maybe he went and took a nap. Maybe he's in the bathroom. I mean, this is literally what Elisha does. And they do it for all day long. Nothing happens. So what does Elisha say? He says to his servant, go down to the sea, get a bucket, pour it on the altar. Does it again and again and again and again. And Elisha gets on his knees and he quietly prays one prayer to the Lord.

And a great fire goes and it licks up all the water and burns the entire sacrifice and everything. Because Baal was never God. They were tempted to worship Him and they would go and follow Him, but here it's saying, no, the Lord Himself is God and Him alone, we're not allowed to worship Him with idols.

We have one of the amazing stories even after the captivity. One of the things we love to tell our kids about is Daniel chapter 3 with the three amigos. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. These three who would stand up to King Nebuchadnezzar himself and would say, no, we're not going to bow down to your golden idol.

We're only going to worship the Lord, and the king says, all right, then I'm gonna throw you in a furnace. And they say, that's fine, and even if we die, the Lord's still God, and you're a liar. And the Lord saves them from that. They come out of the fire, and they don't even smell like smoke. Because the Israelite people were commanded, your Lord is greater than any idol. Your Lord is the one true God. But people have an honest question from this, right? It seems pretty extensive.

You're not allowed to make an image of anything, neither in heaven above, nor on the earth beneath, nor things under the earth. So does this mean that we're not allowed to make a statue at all? Does this mean that the Statue of Liberty is a sin? Or maybe you have a picture, I think there's someone in the congregation with a stuffed bear in their house. Is that wrong, to have something like that? Well, no. No, right, because what does it say specifically in verse 5?

You shall not bow down to them nor serve them. See, God himself, when he instituted the tabernacle, there were supposed to be carved things in there. Even on top of the mercy seat, on top of the Ark of the Covenant, you had two carved cherubim out of gold and their wings were extended forward and that was to show the throne of God himself. but nothing in the tabernacle, nothing in the temple was ever meant to be divine or worshiped.

But here's the tricky thing. Did people worship those? Let me ask you, do you think it would be possible for someone to take something in the tabernacle or in the temple that was meant to display God's glory and instead worship that thing? Yeah, that's exactly what happened. When we look at the history of Israel, there was a time when the people had disobeyed the Lord, and they were grumbling and complaining, and God sent snakes to kill all of them, or not all of them, but a whole bunch of them, and he tells the leaders to go and make a brass snake, and they fashioned this brass snake, and they put it on the pole, and they walk it through the people, and God uses it, like parts the people, and the people who looked up onto the snake, they didn't die. What'd they do with that snake afterwards? They put it in a tabernacle to be a testimony to God's graciousness. Oh, and we go into the book of First and Second Kings, we find out that people were worshiping that snake, bowing down to that snake.

This is the same thing that happens in Roman Catholic churches. I can't tell you how many weddings we have been to where people were about to take the Lord's Supper, and I cannot tell you how often I have heard priests talk about bowing to the sacraments. because it's literally the body and blood of Jesus.

No, it's the sign and the seal, but it's not, we do not worship the sacraments. We worship the God in heaven alone. See, there's only one object of worship. That's what the first commandment was all about, what we looked at last week. You shall have no other gods before me. It's only God that we're allowed to worship. So the first command is who we worship. The second commandment is how we worship. The second commandment is how we worship. The object of our worship is God. And the consumer of worship is God. First commandment. Our object of worship is God, second commandment, the consumer of worship is God.

Now I wanna say that this is a touchy thing to talk about in modern churches. I was just talking to a man not too long ago, well before I was in the infinite loop of quarantine, where we were sitting down talking and he was talking about coming to one of our church services and how, you know, just how traditional it was and how just, it seemed very non-visual.

And I thought, yeah. Yeah, because see, the thing is, most people want to see worship and they think, what am I getting out of it? Most people come to worship and they say, how do I feel? What am I getting? And things like that. But brothers and sisters, the problem is, you're not the consumer of worship.

We're the ones who give worship to God. And he is the one who receives it. This is why Jesus said, the Lord is seeking those who will worship him in spirit and in truth. Worship is an act of service that we bring to our king. That's why we pray that he'll receive it as a soothing aroma. It is a service we bring to the most high king.

And so the biblical idea of worship honors God. The idea of worship that we get from the second commandment is that it is God who gets to tell us, this is how I want to be worshiped, and not any way that you want to fancy. It's in worship that we honor God. It's in worship that we express our devotion to God. It's in worship that we express our love to God.

But there's internal threats and external threats to this. The external threats were all those other gods kind of out there. Those are external threats, but there's also internal threats. Threats that come up from within the church and threats that come up within our own hearts.

One of those is what would happen. We're at Exodus 20, we just have to turn forward 12 chapters and see what happens in Exodus 32. Do me a favor, go there with me. Just turn over to Exodus chapter 32 and see what happens in Exodus 32. By the way, they're still at Mount Sinai here. The smoke is still there. The lightning is still there. The mountain is still there. But God is talking to Moses and in the midst of that, Aaron does some silly stuff. Exodus chapter 32, look with me at what he says in verse five.

So when Aaron saw it, it being the golden calves he had just made, so when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, tomorrow is a feast to who? Notice it doesn't say a feast to the golden calves. Notice it doesn't say a feast to idols, what does it say? A feast to Yahweh, a feast to the Lord.

See what Aaron had done in Exodus chapter 32 is he had made these paths and it's not that these, we think of idolatry as okay, that means it's another God. But that's not how Aaron thinks of idolatry. That's not how a lot of the Israelites would fail with idolatry. They made these calves to represent God himself. God's got nothing to do with that. Exodus 32, skip down to verse eight. This is God speaking to Moses now. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them.

They have made for themselves a molded calf and worshiped it and sacrificed to it and said, this is your God, O Israel, that brought you up out of the land of Egypt. See, they were saying this is the God who redeemed us. See these calves? This is the God who brought us up. But the problem is that wasn't God. They had made this calf to represent God, but in trying to worship God with a molded image, God's saying, I'm not like that. That's not me. Not made with human hands.

Indeed, this is one of the things that Jesus is saying in John chapter four on the internal threats that happened with the people of Israel is this is exactly what they did. The northern kingdom, they took kind of these pagan practices of the lands around them and they merged them together with the practices of the Jews. And so in Jesus' time, right before Jesus was on the scene, about 100 years before that, there was a temple at Mount Gerizim, the temple for the Samaritans. And it looked really similar to the temple that was in Jerusalem. And they said, we're the ones who worship Yahweh here. But all the smells and bells, everything that with it came from Baal worship.

See, apostates in Israel, they would never say, oh, we don't worship Yahweh. We don't worship the Lord, they would say, yeah, the Lord's my God, right? He's our national God. But we can also have our clan gods and our family gods and we can do all these other things. And the Lord's saying, no, you can't. You don't get to have any other idols. You don't get to make images of me. You don't get to bow down or worship anything else. This is exactly what happens in 1 Kings chapter 10.

We can't go all the way into the depths of this, but there's a man who's risen up. His name is Jehu, and the people have been worshiping God by an idol that was made. One of them was a Dan up in the north, and one of them was Bethel down in the south, these golden calves. Hope that rings a bell. And do you know who they said they were worshiping when the Israelites, when Rehoboam set up those Idols in the North and South, you know who they said they were worshiping? The Lord.

They had exchanged God's glory for a lie. And Jehu was commended because he had destroyed all the Baal worshipers, he had destroyed all the open idols, in 1 Kings 10, 28, God commends him for that, but in 1 Kings 10, 29, he says, but he did not destroy the idols or the calves at Bethel and Dan. We can't worship God however we want, certainly not with idols. Why?

Did you know that we do have one person we can look to, one thing we can see that actually declares the glory of God visually? His name is Jesus. That's what Colossians 1.15 says. It says that Jesus is the icon of the Father. If you want to see the Father, see the Son. See Jesus. Hebrews chapter one, verse three says, Jesus is the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person. This is why when Philip said to Jesus, show us the Father, Jesus said, how long have I been with you? If you've seen me, you have seen the Father. Again, here's one of these internal difficulties, and we're gonna move on here pretty fast to the other stuff. But we can even take the image of Jesus and fashion him for ourselves.

I'll never forget when I was a little boy, I loved my grandpa. My grandpa had a truck. We had a car and then a van, but grandpa had a truck, a brown Ford, and man, he drove his fifth wheel around with that truck, and we would go on vacation to Colorado, and I'd sit in the front seat of that truck, you know, the old bench seats with the 1960s type cushions on them, you know what I mean, the ones that are like really uncomfortable to sit in for more than 15 minutes. But I just loved it. But I remember as I would spend those days in the truck with Grandpa, I would look up and on his visor he had a picture.

And I came to learn that that was the picture he had of what he thought was a common picture of Jesus. But I remember as a little boy, no older than Daniel, sitting in my grandpa's truck, sitting there going, wow, I didn't know if Jesus had white skin and blue eyes like me. Jesus has never had white skin and blue eyes.

He was a Mediterranean man. He was from the Near East. He would have had olive skin and dark hair and brown eyes. He would have looked like any other person, but we want to take pictures of Jesus and we want to make with long flowing hair and looking like he's Fabio or something. But that's not the person who the scriptures portray to us, because he had no comeliness or likeness that we would be attracted to him. But he was afflicted. There's a reason why he was able to slip in and out of crowds, because he looked like any other Jewish guy on the street.

See, even when we make images of Jesus, we can make it in twists. I remember sitting in an advanced American Christianity class when I was in grad school, and we were studying church history, and there was this interesting book they gave us to read, The Color of Christ. Just depictions of Jesus throughout the history of America. And every single one, when people made them, It resembled the person who made it. They couldn't get away from it. Because when we make images of God, we make images of him to look like us. But the problem is that's not how it works. It's not how it works.

So we have idols, we have internal threats, we have idols of our own heart. Man, I can't even get into Colossians chapter 3 verse 5 when it talks about idolatry being fornication and greed and immorality and things like that. We have problems with the idols in our own heart that we could say, when I want to do what I want to do and I don't care about what God wants, we make ourselves an idol, is what Colossians chapter 3 verse 5 says. Calvin on that passage says our hearts are a factory of idols.

We can corrupt the worship of God. We saw that with Nadab and Abihu who bring the strange fire before the ark and God destroys them for it. We can corrupt God's worship just by tradition. This is one of the things that Jesus rails against. In Matthew chapter 15 verse nine he says, but in vain do they worship me, teaching the doctrines and commandments of men. Just following tradition rather than following what God says is a violation of this second commandment.

People can do this even with good intentions. If you wanna have a story to pique your curiosity of people violating the second commandment with good intentions, go look at 1 Samuel 13, verse 11. I'll leave that to you for homework with Saul and what he does there.

But why? This is a big, huge portion, why? Why does God say this? What is the reason for this prohibition? Well, Exodus 20, verse 5 continues. You shall not make for yourselves any carved image, neither any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them. Why? For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.

God has a burning zeal, as a husband would be entirely devoted to his wife, that he would be jealous for her love, and pouring out all of his affection, and wanting her for himself, and not wanting, no wife wants to share, or no husband wants to share his wife with any other. God doesn't want to share his bride, his church, his people, with any idol, any fabrication of their imagination. What is the reason for no idols? Because our God is a zealous God, jealous for His people.

Go read the book of Hosea and see how God talks about His people who will go and will play the prostitute with their idols. God loves His people. He has a burning passion to love them. He says in Isaiah 42 verse eight, I am the Lord, that is my name and my glory, I will give to no other, nor my praise to carved images. God is zealous for his people's love and he is zealous for his own glory. God will not stand by and let some little trinket of a piece of wood or gold represent him. The God who made the heavens.

The God who put the stars in their place. How dare we make him like some little image that we might fashion with our own hands. He made us, we don't make him. And there's a warning that he tacks on to this. For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God. What is the warning? He is a God who is visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me. Fathers, mothers.

How often, especially for those of you who are older than me, how often do your kids do things and you're like, oh man, they picked that up from me, I didn't even have to teach them it. I see the things that are in my children's hearts and I go, I didn't even have to teach them how to be angry, they just knew it because they see me struggling with anger.

They just pick up on who you are and what you do, and this is the same thing. He was telling the people in Israel, if you go and you bow down and you serve idols, it's going to happen with your kids too. You won't have to teach them how to have a heart divided a little bit for the Lord and a lot a bit for the idols in your house. You won't have to teach them that. They're going to know it, and I'm going to judge them. And your children are not going to be able to say to me, but my mom and dad taught me how to do this. No. But Lord will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation, important last clause of that warning, of those who hate me.

When we live lives of idolatry, it passes on to our children, and God says it's a way of hating him. He told us where to love him with all of our heart, mind, soul, and strength. And here he's saying, if you make any other image, you hate me. You hate me. There's a reality to the hereditary sins which each generation will have to answer for.

But thank God it doesn't end there. There's a promise, isn't there? Look with me at Exodus 20, verse 6. But the Lord shows mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments. The word for mercy, there is the word chesed. Covenant loyalty, grace, favor, or as if you might have the King James, it might say something along the lines of loving kindness.

But the Lord shows loving kindness when we love him. Do you love the Lord? I need you to ask yourself an honest question this morning. Do you love the Lord? Do you love him with all your heart or do you love him partially? Do you worship him and serve him alone? If you're honest with yourself, you don't love him perfectly. If you're honest with yourself and you go look at the sins listed in Colossians chapter 3, you'll see pretty fast that your heart is divided. And that every time we sin, we show the Lord, I'm not following his commandments. So what hope is there?

Brothers and sisters, it was Jesus Christ when Satan came and tried to tempt him with loving the world more than his father that Jesus said, no. That when Satan took him up to the highest of the mountains and he showed him all the kingdoms around him and he said, I'll give you all of them, just bow down and serve me.

And Jesus says, no. You shall worship the Lord and serve him only. We serve the Lord only because Jesus Christ fulfilled this law. It was Jesus Christ alone who loved his father with a perfect love. It is Jesus Christ alone who kept all the commandments. And it is Jesus Christ that the apostle Peter at Pentecost says, this good news is for you and for your children.

The promise is 250 times greater than the warning. He's gonna judge three to four generations of those who hate him, but what does it say about those who love him and keep his commandments? A thousand generations. A thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.

How many millions of people have died trusting in Jesus Christ's finished work, and in Jesus have entered into glory, knowing that God's face is shining upon them. because his son worshiped him perfectly, and that Jesus Christ is the one who gave living water, that his people might worship the Father in spirit and in truth, neither on a mountain in Jerusalem or on a mountain in Gerizim, but he would come to an adulterous woman in Samaria, who people would consider a half-breed and you shouldn't talk to, and Jesus came and he said, I'll give you living water.

Come to me and become a worshiper who worships your Father in spirit and in truth. Come to me, the icon of God. Come to me, the express image and brightness of the Father, and I will make you satisfied in the depths of your soul that you might worship God for all eternity in spirit and in truth. It is our blessing to worship God in Christ Jesus.

I'm not going to read all the proof texts of larger catechism to you, but it's simple, the worship that he tells us to do. We have a theology coming up from the second commandment in our church called the regulative principle of worship, meaning we only do in worship what God has commanded us to do. We can't do whatever we want to do because, well, when I invent stuff, or elders invent stuff, or people invent stuff to do, it often leads to not much good. That's why our worship is simple.

If you've ever wondered why, why do we just sit here and listen to a sermon that's seven minutes longer than it's supposed to be? Because God tells us that we need to pay attention to the preaching of the word. Why do we spend such a long time in prayer for missionaries and people and you struggle to stay awake and struggle to keep your mind centered on what's being prayed for? Because God tells us to pray for one another, to pray for those who are persecuted, to pray for our brothers and sisters in need around the world. Why do we sing the Psalms? Because God told us to sing them. Why do we take the sacraments?

Because it was Jesus who commanded his disciples to baptize in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and he instituted the Lord's Supper, and we know it's a perpetual sacrifice, because he said, as often as you do this, you do so in remembrance of me.

We pray, we sing, we go to the word, we take the sacraments, because that's how God wants to be worshiped. That's how we worship. It's how we keep the second commandment. When we worship as he desires us to be worshiped, he keeps our mind fixed on who he is, and not on the smells and bells and the visual, but on who he's declared himself to be.

Closing Prayer

Let's pray. Father, we thank you for this day, and we thank you for your word. God, I pray that you might use this week message heart and fallible message for your glory. Please, Holy Spirit, teach us to worship you in spirit and truth, in purity and in love. In Jesus' name, amen.