The first four commandments.

The 10 commandments are all about relationships. The first four deal with our relationship with God. They are the first four and the most important because if you get these right then the others will follow and make sense. The remaining six commandments refer to man’s relationship to each other. Man has reduced these ‘laws’ into rules too many times. The difference between a law and a rule is that a rule can be followed by choice whereas a law is a principle that cannot be broken. You cannot break the law of gravity for example.

1. You shall have no other Gods. This is importatant because if there is more than one god none are God. This puts God and the universe and our existence in proper order. The God who created us is the one who loves us for He created us for love. He proved this love by becoming a man like us and sacrificing himself in order to reconcile the broken relationship between man and Himself, broken because of man’s sin. The law? God will be God no matter if we choose to recognize it. If we choose to operate under God’s law then our relationship will be beneficial.

2. You shall make no idols. The importantce of this is often missed. No ‘thing’ is to be represented as God’s image or likeness. Why? God created us in His image and likeness. No thing could come close to representing who or what God is. Only mankind in its proper relationship to God could reflect His reality. This was shown in the Person of Jesus Christ, the fullness of God in man. A promise remains for all mankind that we should become like Jesus. This was and continues to be our true destiny. The law is that we are made in God’s image. There is no altenative. If we choose to exhalt a thing, an image or other representation higher than man, the pinnicale of God’s creation we only reduce ourselves to increasing insignifcance.

3. You shall not take the Lord your God’s name in vain. There is power in a name. The name represents the person and the power of God is in His name. Those who ‘take His name’ would do best to also live by His name. To take His name, be called a beliver, a Chistian or other representation of one who follows God, and not live accoding to that name is truly a waste and in fact a falsehood. Those who take His name and do not live by it are called hipocrites. The law is that God’s name reflects His power, this cannot be changed. The vanity (waste) is to live in this world being made in God’s image and not engaging in a reationshiop with Him.

4. Remember the Sabbath, to keep it holy. God rested after the sixth day of creation with a heavenly ‘it is finished and it was very good’. Man was the capstone of God’s creation and he could make no better. Man was fashioned and placed on the earth in an idyllic state, the garden. There was activity but no work, or ‘sweat of the brow’. That came as the result of sin as the curse. But with the curse came a promise of that a rest would come. That rest did come, in the God/man Jesus Christ. He fulfilled the law completely. The law is that this world will not ever be perfect until after God has completely judged and removed sin. There remains a rest to come for those in Jesus Christ but we no long have to work through sacrifice and offerings to keep our relationship to God in proper order. Jesus’ death and resurrection cemented that law. Now we only need to maintain a right relationship with God by faith.