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| − | ==The FIRST Commandment== | + | ==The SECOND Commandment== |
| − | <p> You shall have no other gods before me." <br> | + | <p>"You shall not make unto you any graven image, or 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 jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of those who hate me; and showing mercy unto thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Exodus%2020.4-6" data-reference="Exodus 20.4-6" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Exodus 20:4-6</a>.<br> |
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| − | Exodus 20:3<br>
| + | <strong>I. You shall not make unto you any graven image.</strong><br> |
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| − | This commandment is addressed to each person in particular, because the commandment concerns everyone, and God would have each one take it as spoken to him by name. Though we are forward to take <em>privileges </em>to ourselves—yet we are apt to shift off <em>duties </em>from ourselves to others!<br> | + | In the first commandment worshiping a false God is forbidden; in this commandment, <strong><em>worshiping the true God in a false manner </em></strong>is forbidden.<br> |
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| − | We come now to the commandment, "You shall have no other gods before me." This may well lead the van, and be set in the front of all the commandments, because it is the foundation of all true religion. The <strong>sum </strong>of this commandment is, <em>that we should sanctify God in our hearts, and give him a precedence above all created beings. </em>There are two branches of this commandment:<br> | + | "You shall not make unto you any graven image." This does not forbid making an image for <strong>civil </strong>use. "Whose is this image and superscription? They say unto him, It is Caesar's." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Matt%2022.20" data-reference="Matt 22.20" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Matt 22:20</a>, <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Matt%2022.21" data-reference="Matt 22.21" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">21</a>. But the commandment forbids setting up an image for <strong>religious </strong>use or worship.<br> |
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| − | 1. That we must have God for our God.<br> | + | "Nor the likeness of anything," etc. All ideas, portraitures, shapes, images of God, whether by effigies or pictures, are here forbidden. "Take heed lest you corrupt yourselves, and make the similitude of any figure." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.15" data-reference="Deut 4.15" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 4:15</a>, <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.16" data-reference="Deut 4.16" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">16</a>. <em>God is to be adored in the heart, not painted to the eye!</em><br> |
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| − | 2. That we must have no other God.<br> | + | "You shall not bow down to them." The intent of making images and pictures is to worship them. No sooner was Nebuchadnezzar's golden image set up—but all the people fell down and worshiped it. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Dan%203.7" data-reference="Dan 3.7" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Dan 3:7</a>. God forbids such prostrating ourselves before an idol. The thing prohibited in this commandment is image-worship. <em>To set up an image to represent God, is debasing him. </em>If anyone should make images of snakes or spiders, saying he did it to represent his prince, would not the prince take it in disdain? What greater disparagement to the infinite God than to represent him—by that which is finite; the living God—by that which is without life; and the Maker of all—by a thing which is made?<br> |
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| − | <strong>1. We must have God for our God.</strong> It is manifest that we must have a God, and "who is God save the Lord?" 2 Sam 22:32. The Lord Jehovah (one God in three people) is the true, living, eternal God; and him we must have for our God.<br> | + | <strong>[1] To make a true image of God is impossible.</strong> God is a spiritual essence and, being a Spirit, he is invisible. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/John%204.24" data-reference="John 4.24" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">John 4:24</a>. "You saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spoke with you out of the midst of the fire." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.15" data-reference="Deut 4.15" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 4:15</a>. How can any paint the Deity? Can they make an image of that which they never saw? "There is no depicting the invisible." Ambrose. "You saw no similitude." It is impossible to make a picture of the soul, or to paint the angels, because they are of a spiritual nature; much less can we paint God by an image, who is an infinite, untreated Spirit.<br> |
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| − | <strong>[1] To have God to be God to us, is to ACKNOWLEDGE him as God.</strong> The gods of the heathen are idols. Psalm 96:5. And "we know that an idol is nothing" (1 Cor 8:4); that is, it has nothing of Deity in it. If we cry, "Help, O Idol," an idol cannot help; the idols themselves were carried into captivity, so that an idol is nothing. Isa 46:2. Vanity is ascribed to it, we do not therefore acknowledge it to be a god. Jer 14:22. But we have this God to be God to us, when, "from the heart" we acknowledge him to be God. All the people fell on their faces and said, "The Lord he is the God! the Lord he is the God!" 1 Kings 18:39. Yes, we acknowledge him to be the only God. "O Lord God of Israel, who dwells between the cherubim, you are the God, even you alone." 2 Kings 19:15. Deity is a jewel that belongs only to his crown.<br> | + | <strong>[2] To worship God by an image, is both absurd and unlawful.</strong><br> |
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| − | Further, we acknowledge there is no God like him. "And Solomon stood before the altar of the Lord; and he said, Lord God of Israel, there is no God like you." 1 Kings 8:22, 23. "For who in the heaven can be compared unto the Lord? Who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the Lord?" Psalm 89:6. In the Chaldee it is, "Who among the angels?" None can do as God; he brought the world out of nothing; "And hangs the earth upon nothing." Job 26:7. It makes God to be God to us, when we are persuaded in our hearts, and confess with our tongues, and subscribe with our hands, that he is the only true God, and that there is none comparable to him.<br> | + | <strong>(1) To worship God by an image, is absurd and irrational</strong>; for, "the workman is better than the work," "He who has built the house has more honor than the house." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Heb%203.3" data-reference="Heb 3.3" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Heb 3:3</a>. If the workman is better than the work, and none bow to the workman, how absurd, then, is it to bow to the work of his hands! Is it not an absurd thing to bow down to the king's picture, when the king himself is present? It is more so to bow down to an image of God, when God himself is everywhere present.<br> |
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| − | <strong>[2] To have God to be God to us is to CHOOSE him. </strong>"Choose this day whom you will serve: but as for me and my house we will serve the Lord." That is, we will choose the Lord to be our God. Josh 24:15. It is one thing for the <em>judgment </em>to approve of God—and another for the <em>will </em>to choose him. True religion is not a matter of chance—but choice.<br> | + | <strong>(2) To worship God by an image, is unlawful</strong>; for it is against the homily of the church, which runs thus: "The images of God, our Saviour, the Virgin Mary, are of all others the most dangerous; therefore the greatest care ought to be had that they stand not in temples and churches." So that image-worship is contrary to our own homilies, and affronts the authority of the Church of England. Image-worship is expressly against the letter of Scripture. "You shall make no graven image, neither shall you set up any image of stone—to bow down unto it." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Lev%2026.1" data-reference="Lev 26.1" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Lev 26:1</a>. "Neither shall you set up any image; which the Lord your God hates." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%2016.22" data-reference="Deut 16.22" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 16:22</a>. "Confounded are all those who serve graven images." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Psalm%2097.7" data-reference="Psalm 97.7" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Psalm 97:7</a>. Do we think to please God by doing that which is contrary to his mind, and that which he has expressly forbidden?<br> |
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| − | Before choosing God for our God, there must be <strong>knowledge</strong>. We must know him before we can choose him. Before anyone chooses the person he will marry, he must have some knowledge of that person; so we must know God before we can choose him for our God. "Know the God of your father." 1 Chron 28:9. We must know God in his attributes—as glorious in holiness, rich in mercy, and faithful in promises. We must know him in his Son. As the face is represented in a looking-glass, so in Christ, as in a transparent glass, we see God's beauty and love shine forth. This knowledge must go before choosing God. Lactantius said, "all the learning of the philosophers was without a head, because it lacked the knowledge of God."<br> | + | <strong>[3] Image worship is against the practice of the saints of old.</strong> Josiah, that renowned king, destroyed the groves and images. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/2%20Kings%2023.6" data-reference="2 Kings 23.6" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">2 Kings 23:6</a>,<a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/2%20Kings%2023.24" data-reference="2 Kings 23.24" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">24</a>. Constantine abrogated the images set up in temples. The Christians destroyed images at Baste, Zurich, and Bohemia. When the Roman emperors would have thrust images upon them, they chose rather to die than deflower their virgin profession by idolatry; they refused to admit any painter or sculpture into their society, because they would not have any carved state or image of God. When Seraphion bowed to an idol, the Christians excommunicated him, and delivered him up to Satan.<br> |
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| | + | <strong>Use one.</strong> The Church of Rome is reproved and condemned, which, from the <em>Alpha </em>of its religion to the <em>Omega</em>, is wholly idolatrous! Romanists make images of God the Father, painting him in their church windows as an old man! They also make an image of Christ on the crucifix. And, because it is against the letter of this commandment, they sacrilegiously blot it out of their catechism, and divide the tenth commandment into two. Image worship must needs be very impious and blasphemous, because it is giving the religious worship to the creature, which is due to God only. It is vain for Papists to say, they give God the worship of the heart, and the image only the worship of the body; for the worship of the body is due to God, as well as the worship of the heart; and to give an outward veneration to an image, is to give the adoration to a creature which belongs to God only. "My glory will I not give to another." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Isa%2042.8" data-reference="Isa 42.8" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Isa 42:8</a>. |
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| | '''To Continue [[(The SECOND Commandment)|Click Here]]''' | | '''To Continue [[(The SECOND Commandment)|Click Here]]''' |
 January's featured article
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The SECOND Commandment
"You shall not make unto you any graven image, or 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 jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of those who hate me; and showing mercy unto thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Exodus%2020.4-6" data-reference="Exodus 20.4-6" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Exodus 20:4-6</a>.
I. You shall not make unto you any graven image.
In the first commandment worshiping a false God is forbidden; in this commandment, worshiping the true God in a false manner is forbidden.
"You shall not make unto you any graven image." This does not forbid making an image for civil use. "Whose is this image and superscription? They say unto him, It is Caesar's." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Matt%2022.20" data-reference="Matt 22.20" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Matt 22:20</a>, <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Matt%2022.21" data-reference="Matt 22.21" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">21</a>. But the commandment forbids setting up an image for religious use or worship.
"Nor the likeness of anything," etc. All ideas, portraitures, shapes, images of God, whether by effigies or pictures, are here forbidden. "Take heed lest you corrupt yourselves, and make the similitude of any figure." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.15" data-reference="Deut 4.15" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 4:15</a>, <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.16" data-reference="Deut 4.16" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">16</a>. God is to be adored in the heart, not painted to the eye!
"You shall not bow down to them." The intent of making images and pictures is to worship them. No sooner was Nebuchadnezzar's golden image set up—but all the people fell down and worshiped it. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Dan%203.7" data-reference="Dan 3.7" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Dan 3:7</a>. God forbids such prostrating ourselves before an idol. The thing prohibited in this commandment is image-worship. To set up an image to represent God, is debasing him. If anyone should make images of snakes or spiders, saying he did it to represent his prince, would not the prince take it in disdain? What greater disparagement to the infinite God than to represent him—by that which is finite; the living God—by that which is without life; and the Maker of all—by a thing which is made?
[1] To make a true image of God is impossible. God is a spiritual essence and, being a Spirit, he is invisible. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/John%204.24" data-reference="John 4.24" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">John 4:24</a>. "You saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spoke with you out of the midst of the fire." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%204.15" data-reference="Deut 4.15" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 4:15</a>. How can any paint the Deity? Can they make an image of that which they never saw? "There is no depicting the invisible." Ambrose. "You saw no similitude." It is impossible to make a picture of the soul, or to paint the angels, because they are of a spiritual nature; much less can we paint God by an image, who is an infinite, untreated Spirit.
[2] To worship God by an image, is both absurd and unlawful.
(1) To worship God by an image, is absurd and irrational; for, "the workman is better than the work," "He who has built the house has more honor than the house." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Heb%203.3" data-reference="Heb 3.3" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Heb 3:3</a>. If the workman is better than the work, and none bow to the workman, how absurd, then, is it to bow to the work of his hands! Is it not an absurd thing to bow down to the king's picture, when the king himself is present? It is more so to bow down to an image of God, when God himself is everywhere present.
(2) To worship God by an image, is unlawful; for it is against the homily of the church, which runs thus: "The images of God, our Saviour, the Virgin Mary, are of all others the most dangerous; therefore the greatest care ought to be had that they stand not in temples and churches." So that image-worship is contrary to our own homilies, and affronts the authority of the Church of England. Image-worship is expressly against the letter of Scripture. "You shall make no graven image, neither shall you set up any image of stone—to bow down unto it." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Lev%2026.1" data-reference="Lev 26.1" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Lev 26:1</a>. "Neither shall you set up any image; which the Lord your God hates." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Deut%2016.22" data-reference="Deut 16.22" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Deut 16:22</a>. "Confounded are all those who serve graven images." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Psalm%2097.7" data-reference="Psalm 97.7" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Psalm 97:7</a>. Do we think to please God by doing that which is contrary to his mind, and that which he has expressly forbidden?
[3] Image worship is against the practice of the saints of old. Josiah, that renowned king, destroyed the groves and images. <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/2%20Kings%2023.6" data-reference="2 Kings 23.6" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">2 Kings 23:6</a>,<a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/2%20Kings%2023.24" data-reference="2 Kings 23.24" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">24</a>. Constantine abrogated the images set up in temples. The Christians destroyed images at Baste, Zurich, and Bohemia. When the Roman emperors would have thrust images upon them, they chose rather to die than deflower their virgin profession by idolatry; they refused to admit any painter or sculpture into their society, because they would not have any carved state or image of God. When Seraphion bowed to an idol, the Christians excommunicated him, and delivered him up to Satan.
Use one. The Church of Rome is reproved and condemned, which, from the Alpha of its religion to the Omega, is wholly idolatrous! Romanists make images of God the Father, painting him in their church windows as an old man! They also make an image of Christ on the crucifix. And, because it is against the letter of this commandment, they sacrilegiously blot it out of their catechism, and divide the tenth commandment into two. Image worship must needs be very impious and blasphemous, because it is giving the religious worship to the creature, which is due to God only. It is vain for Papists to say, they give God the worship of the heart, and the image only the worship of the body; for the worship of the body is due to God, as well as the worship of the heart; and to give an outward veneration to an image, is to give the adoration to a creature which belongs to God only. "My glory will I not give to another." <a href="http://biblia.com/bible/kjv1900/Isa%2042.8" data-reference="Isa 42.8" data-version="kjv1900" target="_blank">Isa 42:8</a>.
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Does the Bible teach that God is a “Trinity”—three persons in one being? Most professing Christians answer “yes.” Although long the litmus test of traditional
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What role if any did the teachings of the Qur'an play in the 9/11 attacks? What does Islam really teach? What about Jihad? Should Christians try to befriend our Muslim neighbors and share the gospel? If so, how? The title is Understanding Islam: A Christian Perspective. I would like you to watch it for free. Please forward this to all your friends!
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Guest speaker James Walker of the Watchmen Fellowship
Free Video & Profile: Only six shopping days till Armageddon? The Mayan Calendar ends next Friday and the media is giving major coverage to a growing number of "doomsday preppers" getting ready for what they fear may be the "end of the world as we know it" next week on December 21, 2012.
I think they need to be getting ready for another end-times "false alarm." Apparently, the Mayan couldn't even predict the demise of their own civilization -- much less ours. Nevertheless, thousands around the world are holding their breath, waiting for next Friday. Even some on Christian Television, such as Jack Van Impe, cannot resist the temptation of date-setting. So what is a proper Christian approach to true Bible prophecies and end-times teachings in light of all the false prophets today?
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