Honor to Whom Honor Is Due

Honor to Whom Honor Is Due

Seventh after Trinity

Collect of the Day: Lord of all power and might, who art the author and giver of all good things; Graft in our hearts the love of thy Name, increase in us true religion, nourish us with all goodness, and of thy great mercy keep us in the same; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Homily Text: Honor thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.

St. Paul exhorts us to give “honor to whom honor is due.” What does that mean? Think of a President you don’t like. In your heart, you probably don’t respect him. But what if you were invited to the Oval Office. How would you conduct yourself? I expect you dress appropriately, speak courteously, and observe White House protocol. In other words, you would honor the office.

The setting of the 5^th Commandment is the family. But the fifth commandment is also relevant to other settings where we are under authority – whether family, work, church, or the civil realm.

Today we will focus on the family relations, asking two questions: (1) What are the duties of parents? (2) What are the duties of children?

1.  What are the duties of parents?

·        Today I must say that it is the duty of parents to be married. When I began my ministry, I would never have thought to say that in a sermon to Christians, but today it must be said. We will not speak of all the disadvantages of single parent homes. But, I will say that it is impossible for unmarried parents, even if they live together, to fulfill their Christian duties to their children.

·        To have a stable and harmonious marriage. Nothing makes kids feel more insecure than conflict and instability in their parents’ relationship.

·        To provide for the common needs of life – food, shelter, clothing, education, and the rest. My kids remember “deprivations” such embarrassment to have to wear Winner’s Choice, the Walmart brand tennis shoes, eating very fast so they could get the seconds, and thinking everyone got shoes out of a family shoe bag. Parents should do the best they can, even if it means personal sacrifice.

·        To bring them up within the life of the church, remembering 4 duties particularly;

o   To bring them to baptism as soon after birth as possible.

o   To teach them to worship, including participating in the hymns and prayers and listening to the reading and preaching of the Word.

o   As soon as the parents and pastor are satisfied that the child has faith and understands the basic meaning of the Lord’s Supper, to bring them with us to Holy Communion.

o   To teach them to respect the church and its pastors. You may have personal concerns about the church or personal problems with the pastor, but children should learn to honor the church and pastor from your words and your example.

·        To provide them a Christian home, which means at least these things:

o   St. Paul instructs parents, especially fathers:

Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4).

Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged (Col. 3:21).

We must be careful not to provoke our children which we can do through favoritism, 

inconsistency, harshness, and withholding love or making it conditional.

o   Rather we must provide them with positive discipline, in the sense of training, and negative discipline in the form of punishment. The writer of Proverbs tells us:

He who loves his son is diligent to discipline him. (13:24).

Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart. Discipline your son, for there is hope; do not set your heart on putting him to death (Proverbs 29:17.18).

o   We must teach them the Christian faith – bringing them up in what Paul calls “the instruction of the Lord.” Moses command to Israel is for Christian parents:

“Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise (Deuteronomy 6:5-7).

o   We must let go of them. God does not give us children to keep them tied to and dependent on us. He entrusts us with them for a time that we might bring them up to be healthy and independent adults.

Now, if you are like me, you may be aware of your failings as a parent. What can you do? Ask the Lord for forgiveness. He will grant it. Ask your children for forgiveness and hope they will grant it.

2.  What are the duties of children?

·        The duties of children are summarized with the word “honor” – “Honor thy father and thy mother.” We should note that the command to honor parents does not distinguish between young children and teenagers, or between minors and adults. It applies in different ways at different ages, but, whatever your age, if you have parents, God commands you to honor them.

·        The primary ways minor children honor their parents are by respect and obedience.

o   The verb “honor” is the same word of the glory of God. In both cases the word means “heavy” or “weighty.” God is “heavy” because he is a Being of infinite significance. We owe God reverence and awe. Parents are “weighty” because God makes them significant in relation to their children. Children must be respectful in attitude, demeanor, and speech. It is a great sin to treat God lightly; it foolishness to treat our parents lightly.

o   Children must obey their parents.

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.  “Honor your father and mother” (this is the first commandment with a promise), “that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land” (Eph. 6: 1.2).

 Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord (Colossians 3:20).

There are no exceptions to the rule of obedience unless parents command children to do what the Lord forbids or forbid them to do what the Lord commands.

o   God shows us in both the Old and New Testaments that not honoring parents is a very serious sin:

Old Testament

Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his mother (Deut. 27:16).

He who does violence to his father and chases away his mother is a son who brings shame and reproach (Prov. 19:26).

The death penalty was prescribed for striking a parent (Ex. 21:15), cursing a parent (Ex. 21:17) and for chronic rebellion (Deut. 21:18-20).

New Testament

St. Paul says that one characteristic of a society that has rejected God and is under condemnation is disobedience to parents (Rom. 1:20, 2 Tim. 3:2).

o   Christian parents should make every effort to be worthy of the respect and obedience of their children. We should make our commands like the Lord’s – “not burdensome.” Unfortunately, even some Christian parents make it very difficult to honor them. But the command to honor parents applies to every child who remains under the care and provision of his/her parents.

·        When we become adults the command to honor parents remains in effect but we no longer show respect by obedience for we are no longer under parental authority.

o   It is a very sad to see the disrespect of some adult children toward their parents. They are scornful toward them and dismissive of their importance. They look on time spent with parents as time wasted.  But the writer of Proverbs says:

Listen to your father who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old (Proverbs 23:22).

o   Someone may say, “But my parents failed in many ways. I have ‘issues.’ It’s very hard to honor them.” That may very well be true. All parents are fallen and fallible human beings. All parents fail in some ways; some parents fail in big ways. That is why one thing we may need to do is to forgive our parents. Sometimes we realize this only when we we’ve done our parenting and then face our own failures. We should include parents when we pray, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” And we should keep in mind the Apostle’s exhortation: “…if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive…" (Col. 3:13).

o   We must honor our parents by caring for them in old age. It may mean helping them with chores they can no longer do themselves, taking them to doctors’ appointments, and not begrudging them time spent with them. In some cases, it may mean helping them materially. Jesus confronted the Pharisees about their failure to do this:

And he said to them, “You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to establish your tradition! For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother’; and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’  But you say, ‘If a man tells his father or his mother, “Whatever you would have gained from me is Corban”’ (that is, given to God) —  then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother, thus making void the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down (Mark 7:9-13).

Honor your father and mother. Jesus did. As a child, he was subject to his parents. One of the last things he died on the cross was to provide for her by committing her to the care of t. John. Honor your father and your mother. It’ one way you honor your Father in heaven and who in Christ adopted you into his family.

Take My Moments and My Days

Take My Moments and My Days

Sixth after Trinity

Collect of the Day: O God, who hast prepared for those who love thee such good things as pass man’s understanding; Pour into our hearts such love toward thee, that we, loving thee above all things, may obtain thy promises, which exceed all that we can desire; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Homily Text: Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God: In it thou shalt not do any work; thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.

A cartoon of two young people walking together captures the place of the 4th Commandment today. One says to the other, “Our grandparents called it the Sabbath. Our parents called it Sunday. We call it the weekend.” We no longer live in a society that treats Sunday as different from other days. There is no difference between Saturday and Sunday. When is the last time you paused and asked, “Is it OK with God if I do this on Sunday?”

Most Christians say they believe in the Ten Commandments. Some get upset when the Commandments are removed from public buildings. But how many Christians live according to the 10 Commandments, including the 4th?  Perhaps we would be more honest if we took the 4th out of the 10 Commandments.

What are we as Christians supposed to do with, “Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour and do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD thy God: In it thou shalt not do any work”?

Let me try answer by asking and answering a few clarifying questions.

First, what was the Sabbath for Israel?

The 4^th Commandment commanded Israel, “Remember the Sabbath day.” “Sabbath” comes from a Hebrew word meaning “to cease” or “to rest.” The Sabbath is a day of rest. Israel must remember it by keeping it holy, setting it apart from the other six. On this day, there must be no ordinary labor. “In it you shall not do any work.” “No work” included everyone – children, servants, and aliens among them. Even the animals got the day off.

But the day was not only a day of rest from work but also a day of rest in worship. The Lord said, “Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation. You shall do no work. It is a Sabbath to the Lord in all your dwelling places” (Leviticus 23:3).

Keeping the Sabbath was a sign of Israel’s special relationship with the LORD, and breaking the Sabbath was a very serious offense:

And the Lord told Moses, “You are to speak to the people of Israel and say, ‘Above all you shall keep my Sabbaths, for this is a sign between me and you throughout your generations, that you may know that I, the Lord, sanctify you. You shall keep the Sabbath, because it is holy for you. Everyone who profanes it shall be put to death. Whoever does any work on it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people…Therefore the people of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, observing the Sabbath throughout their generations, as a covenant forever” (See Exodus 31:12-17).

For Israel, the Sabbath was a day of rest from work, a day for gathering in worship, and a sign of having a special relationship with the LORD.

Second, what did Jesus say about the Sabbath?

One of the ongoing conflicts between Jesus and the Pharisees centered on the Sabbath. What did Jesus do on the Sabbath? Jesus and his disciples went to the synagogue for Sabbath services. But Jesus did or allowed other things the Pharisees thought were not consistent with Sabbath keeping.

One Sabbath Jesus and his disciples were walking on a road that passed through a grainfield. The disciples were hungry, so they plucked some ears of grain and ate the kernels. The Pharisees immediately asked, “Why do you allow them to do what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” Jesus reminded them that on an occasion of great necessity, when David and his men were famished, David as king took the special bread used in the Tabernacle that only priests could eat and fed it to his men. Jesus then made two points. First, he told the Pharisees they had the Sabbath backwards. “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.” God did not make man to fit the Sabbath but made the Sabbath to fit man -  to be a blessing. Second, Jesus said, “The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.” Jesus, as the Son of God, had the authority to determine what is allowed on the Sabbath.

Another Sabbath a man with a withered hand was in the synagogue. The Pharisees believed it was OK to provide medical treatment on the Sabbath if life was in danger; otherwise it must wait till the next day. The Pharisees wanted to see what what Jesus would do. Jesus asked them, “If you had a sheep fall into a pit on the Sabbath would you leave it till the next day or get it out? Don’t you understand that a man if more valuable than a sheep? It is not wrong to do good by showing mercy on the Sabbath.”

Jesus reclaimed the Sabbath to be not a burden but a blessing for man and specifically authorized activities of necessity and mercy on the Sabbath.

Third, is there any connection the Old Testament Sabbath and our Sundays?

Some Christians say there is no connection between the Sabbath and Sunday. Christ fulfilled the Sabbath, so it has nothing to do with us. Other Christians believe there is a very close connection between the Sabbath and Sunday. They call Sunday “the Christian Sabbath” and keep it strictly.

From the beginning the Apostles, very possibly following directions from Jesus, decided that they would not keep the Jewish Saturday Sabbath, but would make one day out the 7 special. What day? Twice we are told in the New Testament that Christians gathered in worship on the first day of the week, or Sunday. Near the end of the first century Ignatius, a martyr for the faith, said that Christians “no longer observe the Sabbath, but dire their lives toward the Lord’s day, on which our life is refreshed by him (Christ) and his death.”

Why would the Apostles make the first day of the week, Sunday, special day rather than keep Saturday, the 7^th day? Because Christ rose from the dead on the first day. Every Sunday would be celebration of the resurrection. Not just Easter but every Sunday is a feast of the resurrection for Christians.

Christians observe a weekly holy day, not on the Jewish Sabbath, but on Sunday.

Fourth, what does the Sabbath teach us about how we observe Sunday.

First, God himself set the pattern for us from the very beginning - life has a rhythm of work and rest.

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them.  And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation (Genesis 2:3).

God made us for work. Work is not a curse. Adam kept and cultivated the Garden. Everyone should work, whether or not it’s for pay, by doing things creative and productive. We should not waste time or be lazy. But everyone should also rest. God did not make us to be slaves to our work, or to find the who significance of our lives in work. One Sundays God calls us away from our work to remember him and that we are his people. When we do not follow God’s pattern, whether by not working, or not resting, we reject God’s plan for us and harm ourselves physically, psychologically, and spiritually.

Second, God has provided us with a day to worship. One thing we can say for sure about Sunday is that the first thing on the list is worship. Everything else should be arranged under the priority of public worship. One of the questions we ought to ask ourselves as we plan our Sundays is, “Will this keep me from worship?” Setting Sunday aside for worship calls for us to manage our time. Suppose you know that you want to take off next Friday and go on a picnic. You would have to figure out what you must accomplish Monday through Thursday so that without being distracted you can enjoy Friday. Similarly, if we are going to keep Sunday as a holy day for worship, we must  manage our time Monday through Saturday, so we can devote ourselves to worship.  

Third, Sunday points us God’s rest and our hope of entering - sharing that rest. That rest for us is not the rest of inactivity and boredom but rest from all the sorrows and frustrations caused by sin and sharing God’s in his rest of joy and delight in his creation. Till that day comes Sunday calls us to rest from the vain effort of trying save ourselves by works. It calls us to rest in Christ and his finished work of salvation for us. 

The writer of Hebrews says, “So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God, for whoever has entered God's rest has also rested from his works as God did from his” (Hebrews 4:9, 10). Some people live frenzied lives trying to be good enough and do good enough to earn God’s salvation. Sunday says, “Christ has done the work of salvation for you. Stop trying to earn it by works. By faith rest in the assurance that Christ has accomplished everything necessary for your salvation.”

Both this Day and this Table call us:

(1) To reorient our lives to God and eternal things.

(2) To gather with God’s people public worship,

(3) to celebrate Christ’s resurrection

(4) and to enjoy a foretaste of God’s eternal rest.  

Taking God Seriously

Taking God Seriously

Fifth after Trinity

Collect of the Day: Grant, O Lord, we beseech thee, that the course of this world may be so peaceably ordered by thy governance, that thy Church may joyfully serve thee in all godly quietness; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Homily Text: Exodus 20:7 Thou shalt not take the Name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his Name in vain.

My maternal grandfather, William Walton Gingles, thought it important to have a “good name.”  A Biblical proverb agrees, “A good name is to be chosen rather than great riches” (Proverbs 22:1). My grandfather wanted to be known for simple virtues – a man who was honest, kept his word, provided for his family, and paid his bills on time. When people heard the name “Willie Gingles,” he wanted them to think, “He’s a good man.”

Protecting his name was important to my grandfather. It is infinitely more important to God. The LORD will not hold guiltless anyone who does not take his name seriously.

11.  The Holiness of the Name

If one of our boys were standing with an axe in hand by a tree I had planted, Susan might have said, “Your father won’t approve of that,” She meant, “Your dad will disapprove, and you’ll be in trouble.” When the commandment says, “The Lord will not hold him guiltless,” it is an indirect way of saying, “Be certain the LORD will hold him guilty who takes his name in vain.”

To understand how important God’s name is to him why he will punish those who misuse it, we need to look at one of those Old Testament stories we might wish were not in the Bible. In Leviticus 24 we find this story.

·         Two men got into a fight. One was the son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian man. The other was the son of two Israelites. And something shocking happened.

·        If we watch much TV or see movies, we likely won’t feel the shock the people of Israel experienced. But the Israelite people were very shocked. What happened?   The Bible says that during the fight the man of mixed parentage “blasphemed the Name, and cursed.” The man attacked God’s name as if he had taken a spear and thrust it through God.

·        What name of God did he use? He blasphemed the name “Yahweh” or, most English translations have it, “the LORD.” You remember when the LORD called Moses to go to Egypt to deliver the people from slavery and lead them to the land he has promised 400 years earlier to Abraham, Moses told the LORD, “When I go and say to your people that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob has sent me to you, they are going to ask, ‘What is his name?’ What am I supposed to say?” The Lord said, “ ‘Tell them I AM has sent me,’ for my name is I AM THAT I AM.” The LORD simply is – the self-existent, eternal, sovereign, unchanging God, who keeps his promises to his people. This is the most personal, self-revealing name of God, the name which he gave his people to use so they could call on him. The name “Yahweh” or “LORD” based on the name the LORD told Moses to use, “I AM THAT I AM.”

·   Later when Moses asked to see the LORD’s glory, the LORD answered: “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The LORD.’” When the LORD passed, he proclaimed: “The Lord, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation.”

·        The significance of God’s name “LORD” is that it stands for the LORD himself and everything he is. To call him LORD is to remember his character and all the works of salvation he has done for his people. His name is the “LORD” and there is no other god.

·        The Israelite people who witnessed the man’s blasphemy were shocked. They knew what he had done was very serious, but nothing like this had ever happened before. They took the man to Moses, but Moses had never handled a case like this one. It was clear the man had broken the Third Commandment, but what were they supposed to do when someone broke the Commandment? They took the man into custody until they could get some clear word from the LORD about what to do.

·        The LORD spoke to Moses with directions for handling this case. The LORD instructed:

“Bring out of the camp the one who cursed, and let all who heard him lay their hands on his head, and let all the congregation stone him. And speak to the people of Israel, saying, ‘Whoever curses his God shall bear his sin. Whoever blasphemes the name of the Lord shall surely be put to death. All the congregation shall stone him. The sojourner as well as the native, when he blasphemes the Name, shall be put to death.’”

·        This was a capital crime against God. This man was executed by stoning. This incident became part of Israel’s case law. The penalty for anyone who took the name of the LORD in vain, whether he was an Israelite, a foreigner, or of mixed ethnicity, was death.

People today who have been brought up to see themselves as victims and God as their therapist and helper. People demand fairness according to their definition of fairness, and they set boundaries even for God. It tempting to look at this incident and say, “That’s not fair. I can’t believe in a God who would have a man executed for cursing his Name.”

But this is the God of the Bible. There is no other God. We can’t have a God made to our specifications. So rather than protest, we should think seriously: To understand that we can’t put God in one category and his name in another. God reveals himself to us and invites us to know him by giving us his name. He tells us what a great sin it is to take his name in vain.

  2.  The Misuse of the Name

The name of God is God – who he is, what he says, and what he does as Creator, King, and Savior. The name of God includes the name of Jesus Christ for he is God in the flesh and has been given the name that is above every name – the name LORD.

We break this commandment any time we trivialize God, when we don’t take him seriously. What are some ways we are tempted to break this commandment?

·        Blasphemy. When we do what the man in Israel did – attack the name of the LORD. When we take the counsel of Job’s wife to “Curse God and die.” We may be tempted to do so when God does something that makes us question either his goodness or power, when we seemingly meaningless human calamities occur, when we face personal tragedies.

·        Careless Use. One of the most common ways we break this commandment is using God’s name without seriousness. It’s one thing to receive a happy surprise, and say, “Thank the Lord!” It another to say, “Oh my God, I can’t believe you did that for me!” It’s one thing to experience frustration and say, “Lord help me figure this out.” It is another to say, “God dammit, I can’t figure this out!” Better to use an earthy word than God’s name.

·        False Swearing. Jesus told us we should so consistently speak the truth that it is not necessary to say in ordinary speech, “I swear to God.” But there are times when it is appropriate to lift up God’s name to add seriousness to what we say. A clear example is if are called as a witness in court and swear in God’s name to speak the truth, knowing it is a great sin to lie. And, if in a serious conversation we say, “Now listen I am speaking God’s truth to you,” it better be God’s truth.

·        Meaningless Worship. We face the real possibility of using God’s name in vain when we worship in God’s name without our minds and hearts engaged - when he speaks to us by his Word, and we don’t listen; when we pray prayers and don’t have a clue what we just said, when we thoughtlessly sing a hymn; when we say the Creed but don’t believe; when we receive the Sacrament without understanding and faith.

Let us not end on the negative. God has given us his name for positive purposes.

·        Worship. Several times we told that Abraham moved to a new place, he built an altar, and called on the name of the Lord. The phrase “call on the name of the Lord” means to worship. Weekly we meet and call on the name of the Lord.

·        Praise. God has given us his name so that we may praise him. “O LORD our Lord how excellent is thy name in all the earth.”

·        Help. God gives us name so that we can trustfully call on him in the day of trouble. The Psalmist wrote: “(I) suffered distress and anguish. Then I called on the Lord.”

·        Salvation. God has given us his name so that we may be saved. “For ‘everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.’”

Now let us follow the example of the Psalmist who asked, “What shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits to me?” and answered his own question: “I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord.”

The God You Can't See

The Unseen God

Fourth after Trinity

Collect of the Day: O God, the protector of all who trust in thee, without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy; Increase and multiply upon us thy mercy; that, thou being our ruler and guide, we may so pass through things temporal, that we finally lose not the things eternal. Grant this, O heavenly Father, for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Homily Text:. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments (Exodus 20:4-6).

If only we could see God. Wouldn’t it be easier it to worship if we could see God?  Any doubts we’ve had about his existence would be resolved. Unbelieving scoffers might be silenced. There seem to be so many advantages if only we could see God.

This desire to see the God we worship is strong in human nature. Throughout history people have carved or shaped images out of stones, wood, and metal and associated them with their gods. Then they direct their worship toward that image.

But the God who spoke to his redeemed people at Mt. Sinai, said, “You shall not make for yourself a graven (or carved) image of anything that is the heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or  in the water under the under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them.” The LORD also gave a reason: “For I the LORD you God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children unto the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to those who love me and keep my commandments.”

1.Israel’s Calf

1.1. After the Lord spoke the 10 Commandments accompanied by power-displaying and fear-inducing signs, the people asked that the LORD would not speak to them directly, but speak to Moses who would then speak to them for God. So Moses approached the mountain, entered the thick darkness, and then climbed the mountain. The first word from the LORD to Moses was:

“Thus you shall say to the people of Israel: ‘You have seen for yourselves that I have talked with you from heaven. You shall not make gods of silver to be with me, nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold (Exodus 20:22,23).

That is significant given what would soon br happening in the camp at the foot of the mountain. Moses was on the mountain 40 ways. The people got anxious and said, “As for this man Moses…we do not know what has become of him” (Exodus 32:1). They had escaped slavery in Egypt, but now what? They were alone in the wilderness, and their leader was gone. They were afraid, and wanted to know the LORD was with them and would lead them, so they went to Aaron and said, “Up make us gods who shall go before us.” They fell back on what they had seen of worship among the Egyptians.

1.2. What were they asking?

Perhaps they were asking to have several gods, like Egyptians had.

But it is also clear they wanted to worship the LORD who had delivered them from Egypt and led them into the wilderness. They wanted some visible form of the LORD who had delivered them from Egypt and to Mt. Sinai – a form of the LORD to put their trust in and before which they could worship.

Aaron, the priest, told them to take off all their gold earrings and bring them to him. Aaron used a graving tool and made a golden calf. It likely was a young bull, an image used by other religions to represent a god of “power without purity” (Packer).

When the people saw it, they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!”

When Aaron heard what they were saying, he built an altar before the calf and issued a proclamation: “Tomorrow shall be a feast unto the LORD.” Aaron wanted to make sure they were not becoming polytheists but worshipers of the LORD. He wanted them to see the calf as a representation of the Lord who had led them to Sinai. The the calf is identified with the LORD. In the calf they see the God who had redeemed and delivered his people from slavery.

The Bible tells the next morning the people got up early and sacrificed offerings on the altar. They then sat down to enjoy a feast – a fellowship meal with their god and one another. After that they “rose up to play.”  They had not only adopted the pagan practice of making an image of their god, but also almost immediately adopted pagan ways of worship. They included a religious orgy as part of their worship. How quickly their religion degenerated from making an image of their god to worshiping their god immorally.

1.3. Forty years later when Moses was preparing the people to enter the Promised Land and knew he would not be going with them, Moses reminded the people of the experience at Mt. Sinai:

Then the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sound of words, but saw no form; there was only a voice. 

Moses knows he will soon die, and he is trying keep the people from making the same mistake they made at Sinai. He reminds them, “You heard the LORD and saw the signs of his presence, but you did not see the LORD. God is so great, so infinite, so holy that there is no form at all that can represent him. Any form you make will dishonor him and conceal his glory.

1.4. Lest we think this is only Moses’ and  an Old Testament emphasis, hear the Apostle Paul writing to Timothy:

God… is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion. Amen 1 Timothy 1:15,16).

We cannot see God, and we break this commandment when we try to represent him with visible images and direct worship toward them.

But where does breaking this commandment begin? It begins in the imagination. When the Israelites made the Golden Calf they had to begin with, “Here is the best way to represent God – he is like a young bull.” We are on the way to breaking this commandment, whenever, instead of looking to the Bible to find out what God is like, we begin with “I like to think of God as…” and then we add “grandfather,” or “therapist,” or “my higher power, or “my best friend,” or as “all loving without judgment,” or as a “feminized picture of Jesus”  - or however we imagine God and make him the God we want rather than the God he is.

2. Judgment

The Lord saw what was going on and informed Moses about it and his holy anger against his people. When Moses came down the mountain close enough to see the calf and pagan worship, he became very angry. He burned up the calf, ground up the remains, sprinkled the dust on water, and made the people drink it. He ordered that a number of them be executed – and 3000 were. And the LORD sent a plague on the people.

Why? Because the LORD is a jealous God. We usually think jealousy in a negative way – it comes from insecurity and neediness, it sees the person as a possession, and is controlling. It is a negative emotion the creates unhealthy relationships.

However, the commandment and other places in Scripture tell us God is a jealous God. In what way? Think of a husband and wife who experience the special love or marriage. They legitimately want that love expressed toward no one but one another. They expect the other person to live according to what they affirmed in the marriage liturgy: to love each other, comfort each other, honour each other, and keep each other in sickness and in health; and, forsaking all others, keep each other only unto to the other, so long as both shall live.

Suppose a man should take a favorite picture of his wife, dedicate a room to her, and set up a shrine around her picture. He spends hours in that room talking to the picture, holding the picture in his hands, and kissing the picture. But he spends no time with his wife, never talks to her, never holds her in his arms, or kisses her. How would a wife feel about that? She would be legitimately jealous about the false way her husband expresses his love.

So the LORD is jealous that having loved us and redeemed us, we should worship only him and worship in a way that is consistent with the reality that he not a God we can see. He is jealous and provoked when we make images of him in our heads or with our hands. God is not a God who can be seen, but he is a God who speaks. He wants us to listen to him.    

How can we see God now? We see him in Jesus Christ, not by trying to imagine what he looked like and directing our devotion to that picture, but by focusing on him as he is revealed in the Bible.  One day Jesus took his three closest disciples, Peter, James, and John, up on a mountain, and there he was transfigured before them – there was a temporary outbreaking of his divine glory. St. Matthew tells us that while the glory was still manifested in Jesus, a bright cloud overshadowed them and God the Father spoke:, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”  Do  you want to see God? Focus on Jesus in his Word and Sacraments. Listen to his Word read and preached. As you receive the bread and wine feed on him in your heart by faith. See God in Christ revealed in Word and Sacrament.