Introduction:
We’re in the second of a series of messages on the Ten Commandments. We started last Sunday with a look at what is, in the Hebrew mindset, the First Commandment—a declaration of the ultimate authority of God. It’s found in Exodus 20:1-2: “And God spoke all these words: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” We saw how even though it is not phrased as a command like the others, it still requires a great deal of us. Our world/culture/society is constantly reinforcing our rebellious, sinful natures. It’s going against God’s authority in our lives, telling us a big lie—that it doesn’t matter what we believe, as long as we believe in something. This is untrue. It is a lie that is destructive and dangerous. It does matter what we believe in, what the ultimate authority in our lives is.
We’re going to examine each of the Ten Commandments, but each in light of a bit of “conventional wisdom” that the sinful world tries to convince us is true and beneficial to us. However, God tells us this “wisdom,” in each case, is a lie that is ultimately destructive and dangerous to us.
People have always tried to figure out what God is like.
Today we’re going look at the Second Commandment, and once again, it is the Second Commandment according to the Hebrew tradition. Exodus 20:3-6: “You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.”
A kindergarten teacher was observing her classroom of children while they drew. She would occasionally walk around to see each child’s artwork. She got to one little girl who was working diligently and asked her what she was drawing. The little girl said, “I’m drawing God.”
Her teacher paused and said, “But no one knows what God looks like.”
Without missing a beat or looking up from her drawing, the girl replied, “They will in a minute.”
At the heart of the Second Commandment is the question of what God looks like. Or, more accurately: What is God like? What is his nature? What or who does he resemble? How can we accurately describe him?
I can remember being young and trying to come to grips with this dilemma. All sorts of questions come into your mind when you’re little: If God made us and everything that exists, then who made God? If the universe had a beginning point, then when did God begin? Where does God live? What does God look like? You see, all of our experiences tell us that for everything to which we give a name—especially animate objects, but this is true somewhat even of emotions and abstract ideas—we also attach an image to it in our minds. Yet, with the God we read about in the Bible, we cannot do this.
This is what makes this commandment necessary. At the time God gave the commandment, we must remember that the Israelites were not long out of Egypt, where they had many so-called gods, usually represented by familiar forms. The Nile River flooded each year, fertilizing the fields next to it, assuring good crops to carry the Egyptians through another year. So, maybe the Nile alligator’s form represented the god who controlled Nile River to the Egyptians. In fact, the Egyptians had dozens of these “gods,” who were each supposedly powerful in certain areas of the Egyptians’ existence.
When they left Egypt, the Israelites ran into many other groups of people, who each had their own “chief-god” that they worshipped above all others. This chief-god was their champion when went into battle against another tribe or people group. If they were victorious, they gave the credit to their god—a statue, stone, golden calf, or whatever. That was the order of day—to have a form that represented your god.
Into this state of affairs comes the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He was the God of the Israelites, but claimed he was very different from other people’s chief-gods. For one thing, he was real, not just a statue of stone or wood or metal. Also, he was not contained in any form, not limited by any conventional understanding of what a god was. In fact, he told his people that to think of him in any form at all was to limit him, so it was prohibited.
This is the basis for Second Commandment: God, so unique, so special, so powerful, and so awesome, that to think of him being like anything that we know is wrong. Any idea we attach to any image of him we have in our minds isn’t big enough to describe him! To think of God in any form is to shortchange him and rob him of his divine attributes.
There are false images of God that we cling to.
Back then, people bowed down to statues, calling upon them for help or favors, showing love and adoration to this statue or stone. Now, however, we’re not nearly so blatant about it, but we still have images of God that we cling to when think about him.
Here’s an innocent example: Children, if they are introduced to the idea of God, usually have no choice but to compare God to their parents. To them, God is akin to a super-parent who lives above the clouds. We call God “Father,” as instructed by no less than Jesus, perpetuating this comparison.
I like the story of a little boy listening to his Sunday school teacher tell the children about God—how he is everywhere, never forgetting us. She asked if the class knew this was true. The little boy agreed, and said, “God’s the one that opens the door at the grocery store.” When we’re young, that’s how we think of God. Yet, it is inadequate. Any parent here can easily recall many times that we have been less than a perfect basis for a child’s understanding of God!
Others view God as kindly old grandfather-type—you know, the image of an old man with a white beard. This is the image that is probably in the mind of someone who thinks they cannot imagine a God of love punishing anyone for doing something wrong. To them, God is like a grandparent, or a great-uncle who lives far away. You don’t see him very often, but try to remember him at Christmas on his birthday. You expect to get gifts from him on occasion, but you cannot imagine needing to reconcile with him. He doesn’t mean enough to you for there to be any problem in your relationship with him. You probably have good feelings toward him, but you don’t make too big deal about it. This is a dangerous, false image of God.
There is also the “god of the wet blanket” image. This is held by people who have come to believe that God is just waiting for an excuse to ruin their life. This image bears more resemblance to the Greek or Roman mythological gods than to the God of the Bible. Unfortunately, this image is often held by well-meaning, religious—even Christian—people.
Probably the worst false image of God is what I call the “spiteful Santa Claus” image of the Almighty. It is similar to the distant, kindly relative, but a little different. This is the mindset of those people who live their lives ignoring God when things are going well for them, but they quickly blame him when things go wrong in their lives. They want to have it both ways. They want God there to bless them. Although they don’t give him credit for the happiness they enjoy much of the time, they will quickly blame him for any unhappiness or trouble that crops up in their lives. Their image of God is like Santa Claus—he’s giving gifts out and being a jolly fellow, but occasionally he gets spiteful and mean, raining on their parade for no good reason. This is also a very inaccurate description of God.
During his long career as pastor of New York’s Riverside Church, the late H. E. Fosdick spent many hours counseling students from nearby Columbia University. One evening a distraught young man burst into Fosdick’s study and announced, “I have decided that I cannot and do not believe in God!”
Fosdick said, “All right, but describe for me the God you don’t believe in.” The student sketched out his idea of God. When he was finished, Fosdick said to him, “Well, we’re in the same boat. I don’t believe in that god either.”
Some analogies give us a glimpse of God.
There are many misconceptions about God going around, but there are also many ways to describe his true nature, to be accurate when we talk about him. For example, God describes himself as being jealous in the text. How do we reconcile the picture of jealousy with the image of God in our minds? Isn’t jealousy always wrong?
On the one hand, yes. Think of a marriage. Ideally, the two people in a marriage are secure enough with themselves and with their relationship so that when a husband talks to another woman in a social setting, his wife doesn’t suspect that there is anything wrong going on. It takes more than innocent conversation to bring about suspicion. Unwarranted suspicion arising from jealousy—that type of jealousy is wrong.
On the other hand, there is a wholesome jealousy for the affection and adoration of one’s spouse. All of us want to be the solitary apple of our spouse’s eye. We will not voluntarily share that cherished spot with another. The marriage bond is so special that it cannot tolerate a third person in it. “Two’s company; three’s a crowd.”
It’s the same with God. He wants to be so close to us and so desires to be the sole object of our worship and adoration, that he will not tolerate pretenders to his throne in our lives. This is so important to him that he warns of lasting consequences of infidelity to him. It can ruin several generations in a family if we turn away, yet the bond is so special that the blessing goes much farther when we are faithful to him.
We also get a glimpse of the image and nature of God when we look in the mirror every morning. Genesis 1:27 says, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” We’re made in the image of God! It is true that with some people you wonder if this could truly be the case. But we have to remember that this image of God in us is tainted, distorted by the presence of sin. It’s kind of like looking at ourselves in a fun-house mirror. Still, when people are at their best, when we are obeying the command to “be holy … as God is holy” (Lev. 19:2), then we can get a glimpse of God’s nature, of who really is, when we observe ourselves.
By far the best picture of God given to us, however, is in the person of Jesus Christ. The writer of the Letter to the Hebrews started his book this way: “Going through a long line of prophets, God has been addressing our ancestors in different ways for centuries. Recently he spoke to us directly through his Son…. This Son perfectly mirrors God, and is stamped with God’s nature” (Heb. 1:1-2a, 3a, The Message).
This means that when we read the Gospel accounts, we can learn what God is like by seeing what Jesus is like. We read and see that Jesus was unselfish, to the point of dying for us. Yet, we also see that he was no man’s slave, but gave of his own free will. Jesus was kind, yet he most definitely was not a patsy, having his kindness taken advantage of by people. He was meek, yet we learn he would not compromise his principles for the sake of expediency, nor for personal safety. Jesus was no wimp. He was forgiving, yet demanded repentance, thereby insuring that the forgiveness he gave truly meant something to those who received it.
When we study the life of Jesus, we’re seeing no less than the character, the essence, the image of God put into action. Jesus is the only person, place, or thing that has ever been worthy of being worshipped as God, because he shares the same essence as God. Any other way we picture God is bound to be incomplete, inadequate—unworthy of our adoration or of taking God’s place in our lives.
What do we bow down to?
Someone has said, “Every once in a while, get off the merry-go-round and ask yourself these questions: 1. What am I doing? 2. What should I be doing? 3. What should I be doing next? 4. What should I not be doing?” This is probably valuable advice for all of us, but it is particularly applicable to our study of the Second Commandment.
None of us here—and probably very few people in this county—has any real problem bowing down to stone idols, golden calves, or things of that sort. Yet, we still have “other gods” before the Lord God. We still erect images and devote our lives to them or to their pursuit. Personally, I’m no longer satisfied with the typical observation that “anything can take the place of God in our lives” if we let it. That is true, but it is indistinct and much too easy to ignore. So, I want to mention just a few specific ways that idolatry comes into play in our everyday lives.
When I was younger, I would sometimes read my horoscope in the paper and then try to keep track of what it predicted to see if the things in it ever came true. It didn’t take too long for me to realize that my horoscope always came true and never came true—all at the same time. It was so vague that one could fit all the events of daily life into it, but it gave no specific event that would be foretold in any reliable detail. So, like most, I concluded that type of stuff was a waste of time, but nothing worse.
However, in many ways, things like astrology and superstition are idolatrous. Think about it: When we say that our lives are controlled by things like the movements of heavenly bodies billions of miles away or by black cats crossing our path, the breaking of a mirror, and so on, aren’t we acknowledging that something or someone else beside the Lord God is in control of things?
The Psalm writer said, “The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it” (Psalm 24:1, niv). God calls all people to remember that it was he who created us, who watches over us, who is present in our lives. So when we waste time, breath, and effort paying homage to “other gods” through superstitions, astrology, or other divination, aren’t we violating this commandment? I think so.
How about when we hold certain people like sports stars, entertainers, musicians, and actors in high esteem—so high that they eclipse our desire for God, or for looking to godly and truly great people as earthly role models? Isn’t that idolatry?
You might say, “Oh now you’re just being silly. Nobody bows down to famous people and actually worships them!” This may be true, but if idolatry is the raising up of competitors to the Lord, robbing him of devotion, honor, glory, or esteem due him, then the cult of personality that surrounds many in our culture today qualifies as such. If it steals our hearts away from God, it is idolatry, whether we actually bend our knees or not!
The worst idol is our selfish pursuit of happiness.
There are many more examples of potential idolatry. The sad fact is that any good thing can be taken too far and become idolatrous. However, probably the most dangerous temptation for us lies in the idolization of the “unholy trinity:” me, myself, and I. And this is where I finally bring in the title of this message: “Happiness Is Not the Goal of Life.”
With just a bit of literary license, you could have the second commandment read: “Do not make yourself an idol.” That’s really not too far off. It is amazing the things that we will do that we know to be wrong; but we try to justify them by saying, “They make us happy!” People will pursue the accumulation of things, but in an affluent culture like ours, we find it pretty easy to get all sorts of things. Then we realize they don’t make us happy. So, we concentrate on finding happiness, however we define it.
How many marriages have been ruined in the pursuit of “happiness” by one or both of the marriage partners? How many children have had their lives severely messed up because one or both of their parents were seeking a selfish vision of happiness—”finding themselves” or finding someone who they believed would make them happy? How many people over the centuries have been deprived of the necessities of life because someone who held power over them was pursuing happiness at their expense?
Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying. To want be happy is not wrong, but to worship it is. Happiness is not a god worthy of our devotion. It’s like chasing after the wind. It cannot be caught. Rather, happiness is found when we find real meaning in life and make following God the goal of life. Psalm 97:11 says, “Light is shed upon the righteous and joy on the upright in heart.” Real happiness is found living a life of devotion, of worship, and of service to the Lord God.
A Hassidic rabbi once asked his students, “Where does God dwell?”
They thought the answer obvious: “God is everywhere, of course!”
The rabbi disagreed: “God dwells wherever people let him in.”
Are we letting him into our lives? Or are we worshipping idols?
© Derek Helt
A resource of Christianity Today International
