Burunche’s Blog

Exodus 20:16 “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” (Berean Study Bible)

“NO LIES ABOUT YOUR NEIGHBOR!” (The Message)

Most of us assume that this commandment really applies when we are giving testimony in court. We might remember the false witnesses the high priests produced against Jesus when they were trying to justify his crucifixion. Surely WE would NEVER give a false testimony….or would we?

In the musical “The Music Man,” there is a wonderful song where the neighborhood gossips have gotten together to dish dirt about Marian, the young librarian. The refrain of the song goes, “Pick a little, talk a little, pick a little, talk a little, pick! pick! pick! talk a lot! pick a little more!” All the time these ladies who consider themselves pillars of the community are talking, they are tearing down Marian’s reputation.

Before the days of radio, TV, and the internet and social media, talking about the neighbors was one of the most common forms of entertainment, and the wilder the story the better. These days social media has merely carried that practice to new heights…or lows. This practice can be murderous. Teens have been cyber – bullied into suicide by peers who have spread pornographic photos or wild rumors about them on social media. There is nothing innocent about gossip and lies! And remember that anything leading to murder is also against the will of God. “Do not commit murder” applies to cyber – bullying as well as to anything else leading to the death of someone.

Pontius Pilate asked Jesus, “What is truth?” Manipulation of the news has become so rampant that it is difficult to know where the truth really lies. Some firms make a business of clearing the reputations of people or businesses who have had their good names trashed via the internet on sites such as Facebook and Yelp. Hackers even hack into corporate websites to spread misinformation.

APPLICATION: What does God think about all this? Good question! GOD HATES IT!!! Consider what you are doing if you lie about someone:

1. Lies steal reputations, businesses, jobs, and even families. Those who study advertising have found that people are 5 times as likely to lodge a complaint as they are to praise a business. By extension, that means that people are 5 times as likely to believe a lie about you as they are to believe the truth. Remember God already commanded us not to steal.

2. Lies can lead to murder or to a living death in prison. We have already mentioned cyber – bullying. In recent years, there are those who have suffered in prison for years for crimes that they never committed in the first place. In some cases, the District Attorney may have been running for office and wanted a quick conviction. In other cases, the others being accused might have been politically influential while the one convicted had nobody to speak up for him/her. The advent of DNA analysis and other advanced techniques, plus interested parties who refused to give up, have resulted in reversal of sentences for some who were accused unjustly in the first place. Remember God already commanded us not to murder.

3. Once spoken, lies are difficult or impossible to reverse! The story is told of a pastor who was counseling a church member who was a habitual gossip. The pastor had this person bring in a small feather pillow and then asked his church member to rip the pillow open in the middle of a high wind. Naturally, the feathers went all over the place. “Now,” said the pastor, “collect all the feather.”

“But that’s impossible,” replied the gossiping church member.

“Yes,” said the pastor, “and that’s what happens when you gossip. Once the wild story has gone out, nobody can stop it.”

We must search our own hearts! How many of us enjoy a “good story” about someone else? How many of us are prepared to share wild videos, memes, or other forms of social media accusing people, whether or not the accusation is just? How many of us, if we are found doing something wrong, will try to throw a family member or a coworker under the bus, i.e., shift the blame onto another person, rather than owning up to our failings? Remember that as far as God is concerned, there are no “little sins.” God does not grade on a curve. Sin is sin, and the very fact that you are attempting to find excuses for yourself may indicate that the problem is far bigger and worse than you realize.

PRAYER: Father God, please shine your light on our hearts and help us to see all the different ways in which we have been lying about others. Cause us to be ashamed of those lies and to repent from ever uttering them. And Lord, please heal the situations in which we have lied and help us to stop lying forever. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20:15 “You shall not steal.”

God has delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt; however, they have a long way to go before they will become a holy nation. While adultery was very common in Egypt and was frequently overlooked, theft, on the other hand, was considered a major crime. According to an article on the National Geographic web site entitled “Power flowed from the pharaoh in the ancient Egyptian legal system,” the ancient Egyptians recognized theft as a serious crime. The article states, “When people were convicted of crimes, the penalties depended both on the severity of the offense and their level of involvement. The typical penalty for stealing was returning the stolen object and paying its rightful owner double or triple its value. If someone stole from a temple, however, the punishment was more severe: it could include paying a hundred times the value of the object, corporal punishment, or even death.”

If the Egyptians recognized theft as a major crime, then why is God making a specific commandment about it? Consider the fact that the Egyptians gradually turned the Israelites into slaves. At that point, the Israelites may have felt that stealing things from the Egyptians was a form of guerrilla warfare, of subtly getting revenge on the Egyptians. By the time the Israelites left Egypt, they may have been stealing on a wholesale basis. Once the Israelites began stealing from the Egyptians, they may also have begun stealing from one another as well. God has to put a stop to theft somehow, and this is His opening statement. Later on, God gives far more specific commands regarding theft and its consequences.

APPLICATION: Ask most of us if we are honest and we will immediately answer, “Of course! I’m no thief!” But is that really true? One lady who was coaching a kid’s swimming team told of an irate mother who called her up, complaining that someone had stolen the child’s towel at swim practice. When asked for a description of the towel, the mother had stated that the towel said “Holiday Inn” on it, indicating that this family had stolen the towel during a stay in that hotel!

Businesses that supply pens, paper clips, and other office supplies for their workers find that many of these supplies take legs and walk away. Frequently, workers excuse themselves on the basis that they are underpaid or under – valued and therefore somehow they are justified in taking small things.

Some people commit shoplifting on a large scale. When my husband was working as a security guard in a department store in Memphis, one elderly lady entered in a wheel chair being pushed by her daughter. It rapidly became apparent that the wheelchair and the large bag hanging from it were only a means to stealing as much as possible, while the afghan covering the lady’s legs was also covering a variety of stolen goods!

What harm is there in stealing? Actually, theft hurts the thief and society as a whole. People steal for a variety of reasons, but the underlying principle is that they refuse to trust that God will help them and so they are going to help themselves. The more you steal, the more you diminish yourself.

Theft obviously damages society. In recent years, politicians receiving adequate salaries have found their names on the lists of millionaires and billionaires. In many cases this money has come from political kickbacks, pay-offs, or other unsavory practices. “Public service” has become a bitter joke.

It’s all very well to point fingers at others, but what are you doing? As I write this, I am cringing at the memory of having drunk cans of Ensure from a hospital refrigerator when I was a resident on call many years ago. At the time I saw nothing wrong; now I realize that someone had to account for that and that I was stealing. Ask God to show you if there are places where you have been stealing and have made excuses for yourself. And then ask God’s forgiveness and help to stop doing those things.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you for your commandments! Thank you for loving us so much that you don’t want us to wallow in sin like a pig in mud. Open our eyes to see the places where we have stolen – whether time, money, resources, or anything else. And help us to change so that our actions will please you. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20: 14 “You shall not commit adultery.”

The Israelites have just escaped from Egypt, but they have had 400 years in which to copy the Egyptians and they are still carrying most of the things they learned in Egypt with them.

Charlotte Booth has described marriage practices in ancient Egypt in an article entitled “Love, Sex and Marriage in Ancient Egypt” on the HistoryExtra BBC website. Basically, the Egyptians had all kinds of relationships, but formal marriage was not necessarily common. In general, men and women who wanted to be married simply moved in together. There were trial marriages that only lasted for a year.

Booth continues, “Marriages however, dissolved for a number of reasons, with the most common being lack of children or adultery….. Both men and women committed adultery, and both men and women were able to instigate a divorce due to this… Both men and women could divorce the other, with the man simply saying: ‘I throw you out,’ or the woman saying to him: ‘I am leaving,’ or either spouse claiming: ‘I divorce you.’ The divorce was generally as simple as a wedding, and the woman would move out of her husband’s house, either returning to her father’s home or even to a home of her own. Being divorced held no social stigma and both men and women remarried and many went on to have large families.”

Having just come out of Egypt, the Israelites are undoubtedly still practicing the loose relationships that they observed there. But God wants to mold Israel into a holy nation. Widespread adultery and weak marriages have no place in God’s plan. God wants the Israelites to have strong family units, something that is impossible if adultery is always an option. Spouses need to be able to trust each other and children need a stable environment if they are to grow up feeling secure and loved.

What actually takes place when a couple comes together to have sex? Not only is there an exchange of body fluids, but there is also a spiritual exchange as well. One Christian who was previously caught up in witchcraft testified that his coven concentrated on luring young people into having sex with coven members, knowing that in this way these young people would then become open to joining the coven.

Twenty – six years ago, there was a young man in the community in which we were working who was a faithful Christian and a worship leader in one of the local churches. Our friend was bright and intelligent and we hoped for great things for him. But subsequently this man had several affairs with women from fetish families. Today our friend is possessed by vagabond spirits; he cannot concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes and those who work with him find themselves frustrated.

APPLICATION: Many years later, God warned his people about the dangers of adultery in the 5^th chapter of Proverbs.

Proverbs 5:15 – 23 “Drink water from your own cistern, and running water from your own well. Why should your springs flow in the streets, your streams of water in the public squares? Let them be yours alone, never to be shared with strangers. May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth: A loving doe, a graceful fawn— may her breasts satisfy you always; may you be captivated by her love forever. Why be captivated, my son, by an adulteress, or embrace the bosom of a stranger? For a man’s ways are before the eyes of the LORD, and the LORD examines all his paths. The iniquities of a wicked man entrap him; the cords of his sin entangle him. He dies for lack of discipline, led astray by his own great folly.”

Sadly, these days, adultery is common and those who speak out against it are considered spoilsports, intolerant, or even wicked. But God’s purposes for His people have not changed. Israel was to be a holy nation, not just for itself, but to show the rest of the world what holiness looked like. Sadly, the Israelites failed repeatedly; however, that does not diminish the importance of God’s Commandments.

Families fractured by adultery wind up in trouble. Children may find themselves caught in a tug of war between two parents. Child abuse by a live – in boyfriend or girlfriend can even be fatal. Committing adultery is akin to taking a sledge hammer to a foundation and beating it until it crumbles. Once the foundation is gone, nothing else can stand. And all the time we are trying to find excuses for our behavior, God is watching and sadly shaking His head.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you for loving us so much that you refuse to give up on us, even when we ignore your commandments and try to work around them. Thank you for your Word which has stood for all these years and which continues to act as a standard and as a guide. Lord, help us to examine our lives and to see where we have compromised and then help us to repent. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20: 13 “You shall not murder.”

“Oh, I could just KILL him!” “Some people just need killing!” “You’d better kill that idea!” “He/She is nothing but a killjoy!” “You’re killing me here!”

We have all heard friends or coworkers making remarks referring to killing. Thankfully, most of the time the tone of these remarks is a semi-joking one; however, are such statements a good idea? What does God think about killing?

The first recorded murder in the Bible was the murder of Abel by his brother Cain. The story is told in Genesis 4. v. 2. – 7 describes the beginning of the problem: ” Now Abel was a keeper of sheep, while Cain was a tiller of the soil. So in the course of time, Cain brought some of the fruit of the soil as an offering to the LORD, while Abel brought the best portions of the firstborn of his flock. And the LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering, but He had no regard for Cain and his offering. So Cain became very angry, and his countenance fell.

“Why are you angry,” said the LORD to Cain, “and why has your countenance fallen? If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? But if you refuse to do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires you, but you must master it.”

Abel brought the best portions of the firstborn of his flock while Cain brought “some of the fruit of the soil.” There is no record of God having commanded a blood sacrifice at this point, so Cain’s offering should have been acceptable. What was wrong? From the description it appears that Abel was careful to offer God his very best while Cain evidently just gathered up whatever he had lying around. Perhaps Cain’s offering was even rotting and drawing flies!!! Abel truly worshiped God while Cain had no regard for him. God Himself informs Cain that he has not acted rightly. When God found Cain’s offering unacceptable, Cain did not ask God how he could best please God but became furious with Abel and killed him.

Later on when God is giving the Israelites instructions on how they are to live, He warns them not to engage in quarrels and outlines what will happen to anybody who causes harm to someone else. When the Israelites are about to enter Canaan, God even makes provision for cities of refuge to which those who have killed accidentally can flee and be safe from anyone seeking vengeance. For God to draw these distinctions means that God understands human hearts and knows when accidents might occur.

APPLICATION: It was 3 AM when I was called by a frantic hospital watchman that I should rush to the Casualty Unit. There I found the twenty – one year old son of one of our nurses lying dead on a gurney. The police were there with the son’s friend, a local barber, who was very drunk. A terrible tragedy had occurred. The two young men were drinking heavily and got into an argument. The young barber had just cut someone’s hair that afternoon and still had a pair of scissors in his pocket. In an alcoholic rage, this young man stabbed his friend in the chest, penetrating his heart and killing him quickly. It was only when the young man who had been stabbed collapsed that his friend sobered up enough to call for help. And now one promising young man was dead and a second was under arrest for murder, all because of an alcohol – fueled rage. As I watched, the second young man sobered up and suddenly realized that his friend was dead and that he had killed him.

These days the violent video games have proliferated. Several years ago, one teen in a small Southern town who had been playing “Grand Theft Auto” repeatedly went out and shot a local police officer, someone his family knew well and liked. There was little or no provocation for this act. It was strongly suspected that practicing murder in a video game had led to this tragedy. Airlines train their pilots on flight simulators, so why would violent video games not lead to a disregard for human life and a willingness to kill?

What does God say about vengeance? Deuteronomy 32:35 says, “Vengeance is Mine; I will repay. ” Later on Romans 12:19 God says, “Do not avenge yourselves, beloved, but leave room for God’s wrath. For it is written: “Vengeance is Mine; I will repay, says the Lord.”

When we commit murder, we take over God’s job, one for which we are totally unsuited! And murder, or even thoughts of murder, leave a stain on our own souls that only God can heal, if we will let Him. But the very act of murder involves turning away from God and repudiating His commandments. Galatians 6:7 says, “Do not be deceived: God is not to be mocked. Whatever a man sows, he will reap in return.” Committing murder sets us on a path to our own destruction.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you that you know our hearts far better than we do! Lord, help us to forgive quickly and completely, leaving vengeance to you. And help us to turn away from violent films, violent video games, and other forms of violence that would encourage us to take matters into our own hands and commit murder. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20:12 “Honor your father and mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you.”

God is all about families and their relationships! The Bible describes all kinds of families – good families, dysfunctional families, fractured families, families with murder and incest, families with sexual abuse. Obviously God knows human hearts and he knows how badly things can go wrong in families. All this being the case, why does God give this commandment?

Consider what happens when a baby is conceived. Half of the DNA comes from each parent. That means that as that baby grows, he or she will automatically reflect each side of the family. Through the years, there have been arguments about “Nature vs. Nurture,” the question being which is more important, your DNA or the way you were raised. While both of these contribute, there have been many reported cases in which twins who were separated by birth and raised by different families have wound up with similar jobs, liking similar leisure activities, etc. Heredity is important.

APPLICATION: Given the fact that half your DNA comes from each parent, if you reject one or both of your parents, you are actually rejecting your own body. Yesterday we spoke about stress and the bad health problems stress can promote. Persistent rejection of parents or failure to honor them will definitely bring about stress and result in health problems, including ones that can shorten your life.

“But what if my parents are not good ones?” you ask. This is a fair question. There are some parents who are control freaks or manipulative or abusive or even criminals. Those who work in Child Protective Services know that there are some people who should never have had children in the first. In one small town in the Midwest, a five year old girl was found roaming the streets at all hours. Eventually it was learned that her parents were running a meth lab in their house, endangering their child and themselves, not to mention the entire neighborhood.

We need to go back and re – read this commandment. Notice that the commandment orders us to “honor” our parents. The commandment does not say “love” your parents or even “like” your parents. The commandment also does not say “take abuse from your parents” or “allow your parents to steal from you.”

People who have grown up with abusive parents who quickly fly into rages know that sometimes you have to remove yourself from a situation to protect yourself. And God also knows this. So the big question is this: WHAT IF MY PARENTS HAVE FAILED ME? DO I STILL HAVE TO HONOR THEM AND IF SO, HOW? HOW DO I HONOR MY PARENTS WHEN THEY DON’T DESERVE IT?

When God gave this commandment, He knew that some parents would be horrible. One thing we need to examine is what honor is not. To honor means to give respect, and you can acknowledge someone as your parent without approving of their actions, their character, or their treatment of you. You can honor a parent without liking them.

Here are some ways you can honor your parents, no matter what they are like:

1. Pray for your parents! Pray that they will turn their lives over to God. If they have problems with drugs, alcohol, gambling, or any other addictive behavior, pray that God will soften their hearts with His love and that they will learn to follow Jesus Christ, His Son. Pray that the hurts your parents suffered as children will be healed. Speak healing and positive Scripture over your parents. Never doubt that these proclamations can change their lives!

2. Do not trash your parents. Do not broadcast their sins in public, with your friends, or in any group with which you are associated. Do not make disparaging remarks about your parents, particularly to your children. If your friends/acquaintances insist on bringing up the subject of your parents’ bad behavior, you can simply advise them that you are praying for your parents and you refuse to discuss this further.

3. Do what you can to help your parents without becoming their victim. Some people are incredibly manipulative and view relatives as easy forms of prey. You must set boundaries. Example: If a parent continually runs up big bills buying things on credit and then expecting you to pay for them, you can refuse. If necessary, consult a lawyer and take steps to protect your own spouse and children.

4. What about the parent who tries to use their grandchildren as a weapon? Again, each case must be tailored individually and you may need to consult both a lawyer and a family counselor for advice. One major challenge is the manipulative grandparent who gives a grandchild a secret cell phone and then communicates with them without your knowledge. Such behavior can become a thorny issue, with the grandparent attempting to alienate your child from you. In such cases, you may need to take the stance that “You are my father/mother and I thank God for you having given birth to me. But your behavior makes it difficult/impossible for me to trust you with my child/children.” If necessary, you may have to involve law enforcement. In this case you are not refusing to honor your parents; you are protecting your children.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you that YOU are the perfect parent! But Lord, many of us have problem parents to deal with and honoring them is difficult. Please show us how to honor problem parents while we protect our families. And help us to copy you as our Divine Father, rather than copying the wrong things that our parents did to us. Thank you for loving us and for caring for us and for hearing and answering our prayers. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20:8 – 11 “Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God, on which you must not do any work—neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant or livestock, nor the foreigner within your gates. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth and the sea and all that is in them, but on the seventh day He rested. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart as holy.”

 At first this might seem to be the weirdest commandment of them all! This commandment speaks of God resting, but God is immortal and all – powerful, so surely He doesn’t need to rest! And yet, God lists this commandment right after the one regarding the misuse of His Name. Why?

Throughout all of nature, there are cycles of activity and rest – day and night, summer and winter, times of growth and times of inactivity. When God created the world, He established these patterns, and as part of those patterns, he established Sabbath rest. Does God need to rest? NO! Do WE need to rest? ABSOLUTELY!

God knows us better than we know ourselves! God knows that many people, given the chance, would simply keep working and working and working, giving themselves little time to rest and no time for worship. So God established a seven day cycle in which the seventh day was to be a day of complete rest for everybody in the household, including the servants and the animals. As God continued to teach Moses and the Israelites, the Sabbath also became a day of worship.

How much importance did God attach to the Sabbaths? God ordered the Israelites to remember the Sabbath Day by keeping it holy. God wanted to make sure that at least one day a week, the Israelites would stop their normal activities and focus on Him instead.

How serious was God about the failure of His people to observe the Sabbath? Repeatedly, when God was admonishing the Jews for their failures to follow Him properly, He rebuked them for refusing to observe the Sabbath. In Isaiah 58:13 – 14 God says, “If you turn your foot from breaking the Sabbath, from doing as you please on My holy day, if you call the Sabbath a delight, and the LORD’s holy day honorable, if you honor it by not going your own way or seeking your own pleasure or speaking idle words, then you will delight yourself in the LORD, and I will make you ride on the heights of the land and feed you with the heritage of your father Jacob.” For the mouth of the LORD has spoken. One of the reasons that both Israel and Judah were overrun by invaders was their refusal to observe the Sabbath and their insistence on treating it as just one more day on which to make money.

APPLICATION: How do we observe the Sabbath or do we observe it at all? In recent years, there has been a great deal written about the destructive effects of continued stress on health and emotional well – being. Those who are under perpetual stress may develop all kinds of problems, including depression, allergies, autoimmune disorders, and even cancer. Frankly speaking. our bodies were created to need regular Sabbaths. When we refuse to rest regularly, we are only hurting ourselves.

For years I manned a bush hospital in a remote rural area in Ghana as the only doctor. As much as possible, I tried to keep Sundays as days of some rest, even if it was just sliding into a church service late and getting a long afternoon nap. It was an incredible relief when I gained colleagues and was able to schedule regular times out, including being off some Sundays so that I could truly enjoy worship and rest. Those times when I was forced to operate seven days a week due to emergencies frequently led to my falling sick with typhoid or malaria and being forced to take time off anyway.

How can you keep the Sabbath holy? You need to ask God to show you what He wants you to do. When we are in the U.S., we try not to buy things on Sunday if at all possible and we try to attend church and to rest. Some people must work on Sundays due to scheduling; perhaps God would have you take some other day off as your Sabbath. The biggest thing is to pray and ask God how you can best honor Him. Rest assured that God will open ways and means for you when you ask.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you for your Sabbaths! Thank you for the chance to be quiet, to rest and to restore ourselves. Thank you for the opportunities for worship. Lord, show everyone who reads this the ways you want them to honor you. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20: 7 “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not leave anyone unpunished who takes His name in vain.”

“OMG!!!” As an abbreviation for “Oh My God!” these three letters have become commonly used in text messages and on the internet. But there are two questions that must be asked:

1. IS HE REALLY YOUR GOD?

2. IF HE IS REALLY YOUR GOD, WHY ARE YOU MISUSING HIS NAME? WHY ARE YOU SO DISRESPECTFUL???

We live and work in Ghana, where people have several different names. Names and naming ceremonies are critically important. Children are not named until they are a few weeks old, just to make sure that they will live. Families think long and hard about the names they will give their children. It is quite common for a person to bear a Christian name, a name denoting the day of the week on which one was born, and a traditional name, plus the father’s name in addition. Frequently the traditional name will refer to a well – known proverb. As a Thursday – born female, my Twi name includes “Yaa.” In the north, many names are adapted from Hausa and there the name for a Thursday – born female is “Lamissi.” I also have a Konkomba name that means “God provides.”

When we began working in another part of northern Ghana, someone wanted to give me a traditional name with strange implications and I rejected it. Names can be blessings or curses and I had no desire to acquire a name that had a curse attached to it. If you are not a close personal friend of someone, it is impolite to use a traditional name unless you are in the proper setting. Yes, names are an important matter.

APPLICATION: God takes His Name seriously. When God spoke to Moses through the burning bush, He told Moses,”God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’” (Exodus 3:14) Perhaps God did not give Moses any other name because He knew that as soon as He did, someone would begin swearing oaths by it.

How did the use of God’s name as an exclamation start? It’s likely that in the beginning, people were calling upon God to witness that they were telling the truth. Perhaps in the beginning, calling upon God was actually a form of prayer. But we have become so used to throwing God’s name around that we have no idea how truly evil this practice is.

Imagine this: a female college student is sitting in her dorm room texting her friend and writes “OMG! LOL! ROFL!” Suddenly there is a blinding flash of light and the Angel of the lord appears in the room.

“You called?” asks the angel.

”Oh my God!” exclaims the teen. “Who are you?”

”I am the Angel of the Lord, the representative of the God whose Name you have been using in all your text messages. And you just called on God again.”

“But I thought that was just an expression,.”

“No, God really is the One True Living God, Creator and Master of the Universe, existing before all time and space, dwelling in dazzling and unapproachable light. And every time you use that “OMG” text, you are twisting God’s Name into a piece of rubbish.”

“I had no idea.” By this point, the young lady is trying to find a place to hide because the light from the angel is blinding. “What do I do now?”

“Well,” replies the angel, “are you aware that God has ordered people to be careful about how they handle his Name? And are you aware that God has warned that He will punish people who misuse His Name?”

“N..n..no!” stammers the student.

“Do you know what it means to repent?” asks the Angel.

“Um, to say I’m sorry?” questions the student.

“Well, it’s more than just mouthing words. True repentance means that you must have a change of heart and be grieved over the wrong things that you have done. If you don’t want God to punish you for misusing His Name, you need to repent.”

“But why should I be sorry?” asks the student.

“Do you love your parents and do your parents love you?” asks the Angel.

“Why yes! Of course I love my parents and they love me!”the student exclaims indignantly.

“Well, God loves you far more than your parents can ever love you. And some day your parents will grow old and die, but God will be with you forever. Isn’t a love like that worth some respect?”

“Um, sure, I guess.” Now the student is beginning to wonder about this.

“Why do you think that I have appeared to you today?” asks the angel. “God sent me here. God loves you, and He wants you to know Him so that you won’t misuse His Name any more.”

We’re leaving our college student and her angelic visitor at this point. But the question the Angel posed is for each of us: do we really know God and if we do, why are we misusing His Name? Do we realize that each time we misuse God’s Name, we are opening ourselves up for God to punish us? And do we realize that we have no choice in the means by which God will punish us? We too need to repent.

PRAYER: Father God, forgive us! We have shown no respect for you or for your Name. We have used your name as an exclamation, as a curse, and for that we deserve nothing but punishment. Lord, forgive us. Clean up our speech and help us always to have respect and awe for you. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 20:1 – 6 “And God spoke all these words: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol of any kind, or an image of anything in the heavens above, 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, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing loving devotion to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.”

The 20^th chapter of Exodus is one of the most important chapters in the entire Bible. Here God clearly lays out His standards and explains His reasons.

God begins by reminding the Israelites who He is; God is the One who has delivered them from their slavery in Egypt. Using the ten plagues, God has clearly demonstrated that He is Ruler over all of nature and even over death, and that the Egyptian gods are worthless. As the Deliverer, God deserves all worship. God is fully aware of all the idols, not only those from Egypt but also those from other countries and wants to make it clear that the Israelites are not to make any images of anything, whether in nature or from their imaginations. With God, there can be no exceptions and no compromise!

“ You shall not make for yourself an idol of any kind, or an image of anything in the heavens above, on the earth beneath, or in the waters below.” God knows the human heart better than humans do. Give human beings any leeway, and before you know it, they are off making graven images of the sun, the moon, of stars, etc.

“You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing loving devotion to a thousand generations of those who love Me and keep My commandments.”

APPLICATION: At first this statement seems totally unfair! Why should God punish children and grand children and even great grand children or great great grand children for the sins of the fathers? But God is actually very merciful and He is issuing a realistic warning. Familial sins repeat themselves throughout generations. One prime example is parents who give children alcohol. Recently in our part of rural Ghana, I attended the traditional funeral for the father of a friend. While our friend is a Christian and does not drink, most of the people attending the funeral were drinking heavily. There were five gallon jerry cans of pito throughout the funeral grounds. (Pito is the local beer.) One of the saddest parts of the funeral was seeing the number of children who were sampling the pito and the women who were carrying large amounts of pito back to their homes for consumption there. These children are quite likely to grow up to become alcoholics. And since their parents gave them alcohol as kids, they will do the same thing to their children, thus repeating this terrible pattern. And then when the children are dying of alcoholism, these same families will come begging, “Doctor, advise him/her to stop drinking!”

Multigenerational legacies are no joke! In a story entitled “Multigenerational Legacies-the story of Jonathan Edwards,” Larry Ballard describes two families, one with a heritage of righteousness and the other with a heritage of evil. Quoting Ballard:Jonathan Edwards, was a Puritan Preacher who lived from 1703 – 1758. He was one of the most respected preachers in his day. He attended Yale at the age of thirteen and later went on to become the president of Princeton college. He married his wife Sara in 1727 and they were blessed with eleven children. Every night when Mr. Edwards was home, he would spend an hour conversing with his family and then praying a blessing over each child. Jonathan and his wife Sarah passed on a great, godly legacy to their eleven children.

An American educator, A.E. Winship decided to trace the descendants of Jonathan Edwards almost 150 years after his death. His findings are remarkable, especially when compared to another man from the same time period known as Max Jukes.

Jonathan Edwards’ legacy includes: 1 U.S. Vice-President, 1 Dean of a law school, 1 dean of a medical school, 3 U.S. Senators, 3 governors, 3 mayors, 13 college presidents, 30 judges, 60 doctors, 65 professors, 75 Military officers, 80 public office holders, 100 lawyers, 100 clergymen, and 285 college graduates. How may this be explained? Edwards was a godly man, but he was also hard working, intelligent and moral. Furthermore, Winship states, “Much of the capacity and talent, intensity and character of the more than 1,400 of Edwards’ family is due to Mrs. Edwards.”

Max Jukes’ legacy came to people’s attention when the family trees of 42 different men in the New York prison system were traced back to him. He lived in New York at about the same period as Edwards. The Jukes family originally was studied by sociologist Richard L. Dugdale in 1877. Jukes’ descendants included: 7 murderers, 60 thieves, 190 prostitutes, 150 other convicts, 310 paupers, and 440 who were physically wrecked by addiction to alcohol. Of the 1,200 descendants that were studied, 300 died prematurely.

Ballard concludes: These contrasting legacies provide an example of what some call the five-generation rule. “How a parent raises their child — the love they give, the values they teach, the emotional environment they offer, the education they provide — influences not only their children but the four generations to follow, either for good or evil.” What a challenging thought! If someone studied your descendants four generations later, what would you want them to discover? Do you want an Edwards’ legacy or a Jukes’ legacy? The life you live will determine the legacy you leave! (https://www.ywam-fmi.org/news/multigenerational-legacies-the-story-of-jonathan-edwards/)

PRAYER: Father God, help us! We have no idea how much influence we have over future generations of our families! Lord, help us to bless our children as did Jonathan Edwards and to strive to live righteous lives so that our children will be encouraged to do the same. Thank you that you are the One who helps us to do this. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 19:16 – 25 “On the third day, when morning came, there was thunder and lightning. A thick cloud was upon the mountain, and a very loud blast of the ram’s horn went out, so that all the people in the camp trembled. Then Moses brought the people out of the camp to meet with God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain.

Mount Sinai was completely enveloped in smoke, because the LORD had descended on it in fire. And the smoke rose like the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mountain quaked violently. And as the sound of the ram’s horn grew louder and louder, Moses spoke, and God answered him in the thunder.

The LORD descended to the top of Mount Sinai and called Moses to the summit. So Moses went up, and the LORD said to him, “Go down and warn the people not to break through to see the LORD, lest many of them perish. Even the priests who approach the LORD must consecrate themselves, or the LORD will break out against them.”

But Moses said to the LORD, “The people cannot come up Mount Sinai, for You solemnly warned us, ‘Put a boundary around the mountain and set it apart as holy.’”

And the LORD replied, “Go down and bring Aaron with you. But the priests and the people must not break through to come up to the LORD, or He will break out against them.”

So Moses went down to the people and spoke to them.

Bless Moses’ trusting heart! Even though the Israelites have murmured, complained, and rebelled nearly to the point of stoning Moses, he still believes that they will follow instructions! But God knows human hearts, and God knows that down there in the camp there are already people planning their route to the mountain.

Why are there blasts from a ram’s horn? In a culture in which people herded sheep and goats, the ram’s horn, or shofar was an obvious choice as a means of getting attention and raising alarms. even today, the shofar is blown in synagogues around the world during certain celebrations. In ancient days, anybody hearing blasts from a ram’s horn would naturally stop what they were doing and look to see what the problem was. Here God is using an instrument that the Israelites would recognize to get their attention.

God descends in earthquakes, thunder, fire, and smoke. The entire mountain is shaking, including the ground on which the Israelites are camped. Moses goes to the mountain top and God speaks with him. But God is warning Moses.

“Go down and warn the people not to break through to see the LORD, lest many of them perish. Even the priests who approach the LORD must consecrate themselves, or the LORD will break out against them.”

Huh? God has already ordered Moses to establish a boundary and to get the people to consecrate themselves. It seems that the Israelites don’t take directions much better than did the sheep that Moses used to herd. Evidently by this point, there are priests who approach the Lord. The origin of these priests is unclear, but they too have failed to follow instructions to consecrate themselves. Perhaps the priests figured that since they were already priests, they were special and had no need of cleansing, so they ignored Moses’ warnings.

APPLICATION: How holy are we? We spend most of our days in highly secular situations that are anything but holy. Our speech and our actions may fit our particular situation, but do they honor God? Sadly, most of us must say no.

Honoring God must begin in our hearts and then spread into the rest of our lives. Many of us may have grown up in homes in which there was nobody to model holiness for us. We really are as clueless as the Israelites wandering around the base of Mount Sinai. God has given each of us a longing for Him, which means that deep inside we long to be holy.

Take heart! The same God who disicipled the Israelites into a nation can also teach you how to be holy. If you are willing to give up anything that stands in the way of holiness, God is already prepared to help you!

PRAYER: Father God, we are not holy, and we really don’t even have a clue about how to achieve holiness. You are the One who taught Israel. Please teach us. Cleanse us. And help us to follow hard after you all the days of our lives. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Exodus 19:9 – 14 “The LORD said to Moses, “Behold, I will come to you in a dense cloud, so that the people will hear when I speak with you, and they will always put their trust in you.”

And Moses relayed the words of the people to the LORD.

Then the LORD said to Moses, “Go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow. They must wash their clothes and be prepared by the third day, for on the third day the LORD will come down on Mount Sinai in the sight of all the people.

And you are to set up a boundary for the people around the mountain and tell them, ‘Be careful not to go up on the mountain or touch its base. Whoever touches the mountain shall surely be put to death. No hand shall touch him, but he shall surely be stoned or shot with arrows—whether man or beast, he must not live.’

Only when the ram’s horn sounds a long blast may they approach the mountain. ”

When Moses came down from the mountain to the people, he consecrated them, and they washed their clothes. “Be prepared for the third day,” he said to the people. “Do not draw near to a woman.”

For three months the Israelites have been following God through the wilderness as He has led them by a pillar of cloud by day and protected them by a pillar of fire at night. But now God is taking things up to a higher level; He is preparing to meet with Moses and to speak audibly in the presence of all the people, so that they will thoroughly understand that God is leading Moses.

What causes you to trust somebody? A very wise man once said that trust is something that is difficult to earn, but easy to lose, and once lost, is nearly impossible to regain. God knows that there are many Israelites who are still murmuring against Moses in the quiet of their tents. Until now, God and Moses have met privately, but now God wants to meet with Moses publicly so that people will fully understand how close Moses is to God. God knows there’s a lot of rough stuff that the Israelites are going to have to experience and He wants them to trust Moses implicitly.

In preparation for this meeting, God orders the people to wash their clothes and to allow Moses to consecrate them. What this consecration entails is not clear; however, it’s possible that Moses orders the people to get rid of their amulets and charms and to search their hearts for anything from which they need to repent. Moses adds that they should abstain from sex. Why? Moses wants the people to be focused on God and not on themselves.

God orders Moses to set up a boundary around the mountain so that curious onlookers do not rashly come too close. Anybody who tries to approach the mountain before the ram’s horn blows is to be stoned or killed with arrows; such a person is not to be touched, lest someone else become profaned by touching the offender.

Why all the preparations? When God met with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, He disguised Himself or sent an angelic messenger. There was very little teaching as to how to relate to God or to approach God. But now God is following up on His promises in verses 5 – 6. “Now if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, you will be My treasured possession out of all the nations—for the whole earth is Mine. And unto Me you shall be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ God is endeavoring to teach an entire nation how to be priests and holy. Such an undertaking is massive and demands major demonstrations of power. God is beginning by teaching the Israelites to fear and respect Him.

APPLICATION: Most of us are far too casual with God! We act as if God were some kind of strange comic figure, instead of who he really is, the Lord God, Ruler of the Universe. Someone has said that many people feel the Ten Commandments are only ten suggestions, to be obeyed or discarded at will. Years ago, J. B. Phillips wrote a book entitled Your God Is Too Small. Phillips was right! Most of us are not worshiping God; we are worshiping some little god we have created out of a few of God’s more appealing attributes. When God really shows up in our lives, we don’t recognize Him because we have never really known Him.

In preparation for the meeting on Mount Sinai, Moses consecrated the people. We don’t know what that consecration entailed; however, it’s likely that Moses warned the people to get rid of anything that reminded them of Egypt. Objects that could be burned would be burned. Cult objects that could not be burned must be buried out in the desert where it would be impossible to find them again. Children – and adults – who had been named for Egyptian gods might require new names. And people were to fix their minds on God and not on sex; something that is still a challenge today.

If you knew that God wanted to meet with you, what would you have to eliminate from your life? Guess what? God DOES want to meet with you! Ask yourself if there is anything that is hindering you from meeting with God. And then find a way to get rid of that object or to turn away from that practice.

PRAYER: Father God, we are no better than the Israelites! We have all kinds of stuff in our lives that makes it difficult or impossible to meet with you. And many times we have not worshiped you but have worshiped some pseudo – deity that we have dreamed up. Lord, please come in your strength and your power! Cleanse us! Help us to get rid of the things that are keeping us from really engaging with you and going forward with you. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.