Sermon Tone Analysis

*Christ in the Old Covenant*

*Commandment Two, Week Three*

 

 

Much of this week’s sermon depends upon material from the last two weeks – if you missed those weeks I would encourage you to go to gbcmenifee.sermonaudio.com

and download the audio.

READ Exodus 20:2-6

The first commandment forbids worshipping other gods.

The second commandment certainly forbids worshipping other gods with idols, but more specifically, the second commandment forbids trying to worship the true god, Yahweh, by using idols.

Israel did it in Exodus 32 when they made this calf to worship Yahweh.

Jeroboam did it when the kingdom divided, and he made idols for the worship of the true God.

Last Sunday evening we considered Jehu, who drove out the idolatrous worship of Baal, yet allowed the idolatrous worship of Yahweh to continue.

This morning we’ll consider four ramifications or applications of the second commandment, and then consider how the second commandment relates to Christ, and to our Christ-likeness.

RELIGIOUS ART

I don’t want to spend much time on this, but the second commandment does give us reason to be a little cautious about religious art that tries to give us a portrait of Jesus or the Father.

You remember what we learned from Deuteronomy 4: Israel did not see any form or likeness on Mt.

Sinai, so they were not supposed to use any forms or likenesses to worship God.

It’s one thing to try to draw David or Moses – but what about when you start to try to draw Jesus?

Or make a statue of Jesus, a crucifix?

Or portray Jesus in a movie?

Or paint God the Father, like on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel in Rome?

Is it possible that in doing those things we could communicate wrong things about God, just like Israel did when they tried to worship him with idols?

If we’re talking about a children’s book that shows Jesus in the boat with the disciples, that is one thing.

But when the picture is a close-up of Jesus’ face, like a portrait of Jesus, we may need to be cautious.

When an actor portrays Jesus in a movie, we may need to be cautious.

Even if the only words in the movie are words of Scripture, the actor playing Jesus still communicates a lot through his physical appearance and through the nonverbals: the attitudes, the facial expressions, the tone of voice.

There is certainly room for disagreement about exactly how this applies; you don’t have to go home and tear up your children’s Bible story books, but it is appropriate for us all to be aware of the second commandment and be careful about using visual portraits of the Father or Jesus.

SEPARATION

TURN TO Deuteronomy 7.

There is a second application here about guarding your heart through personal separation.

We can oversimplify and say that there were three stages on the path of idolatry:

Stage 1: worship the true God the right way

Stage 2: worship the true God using idolatrous ways

Stage 3: worship false gods using idolatrous ways

Stage 2 never seemed so bad to Israel – why is it a big deal to use pagan practices to worship God?

TURN TO, READ Deuteronomy 7:25-26 uses the word “snared” – do not go after those idols, or you will be snared by them.

This is the word for a trap for a bird, the whole point is that the bird doesn’t see it until it is too late.

So don’t mess around with idols – they are not something to play with – because they can be a snare, a trap, for your heart.

In Deuteronomy 4 God used the phrase “drawn away.”

First you get snared, then drawn away from God.

So God instituted a measure of prevention.

It was mentioned in verse 25, but we can see it more clearly if we go back and READ Deut.

7:1-6.

Completely rid the land of any vestige of those idols, left you be ensnared and drawn away by them.

The principle here is separation: you make a separation between yourself and those idols, so that you will not be ensnared and drawn away.

We do not live in the promised land where we can drive out the idolaters; but there is a principle here that we can apply.

It’s a principle of separation: when we are honest about those things that are a particular temptation to us, we will then be willing to create some distance between ourselves and those things.

For a simple example, suppose someone has a problem with using their money wisely – they are tempted to covetousness and materialism, and getting into debt trouble.

Well that person probably shouldn’t get their exercise by walking laps at the mall!

The Bible often illustrates sin as adultery: if a married lady starts going on dates with other men, she’s likely to commit adultery.

Sometimes we go on dates with sin, and then we’re surprised when we commit spiritual adultery.

Instead of saying “I’m tough enough, I can take the temptation,” we should follow the principle that we see illustrated here, and make the separation, don’t date sin, lest our hearts be drawn away.

Prov.

4:23 /With// all diligence guard your heart/.

WORSHIP

In one sense, the second commandment is about worship.

Idols are a means of worship, and Exodus 20:5 says /You// shall not worship them or serve them/.

Idols are a terribly inadequate way to worship God, deaf dumb helpless molten metal or carved wood can’t begin to portray the glory of God.

Idolatrous methods are inadequate for God’s majesty.

So the second commandment calls for worship of God that is appropriate for His holy majesty.

Remember that last week we traced the appeal of idolatry.

Everybody was doing it, so Israel stuck out if they didn’t.

Idolatry was convenient and easy; it was tangible, it was flashy or glamorous at times; it was sensual; it involved a lot of parties and fun.

Who’d want to miss out on that?

And so from the very beginning, right there at Mt. Sinai, Israel was tempted to break the second commandment and try to integrate the world’s worship methods into the worship of the true God.

That is still a temptation today: to try to incorporate some of the world’s methods into the worship of the true God.

We’ll worship the true God, but we’ll make worship convenient and easy.

We’ll take a survey to find out what you like, and we’ll design a worship service for you to enjoy instead of for God to be honored; we’ll make it flashy and glamorous; we’ll incorporate a lot of fun; and possibly even subtle sensuality.

And people will like it, and people will get saved, and we’ll have big churches!

And it works!

If you incorporate the world’s practices into the worship of the true God, people like it.

But the principle here in Exodus 20 is that God will not be worshipped in worldly ways.

This is exactly what we saw in Deuteronomy 12:4 – you shall not act like this toward the Lord your God – He would not be worshipped by Israel in the ways that the pagans worshipped their idols.

His worship is to be distinct, so that it distinctly communicates His uniqueness, His holiness, His greatness.

This is obviously a principle that must be factored in to church worship decisions.

Every church has to face these hard questions about determining a philosophy of worship and then deciding how much of popular culture to incorporate into their worship.

This week I was contacted by a pastor who described himself as “theologically conservative, culturally liberal.”

Which simply means that his church will try to incorporate the culture into their worship in every way possible without actually sinning.

Our church is not culturally liberal – and let me substitute another phrase: culturally progressive.

Churches generally fall into one of two categories of philosophy: they are culturally progressive or culturally cautious.

A culturally progressive church wants to use whatever is popular in the culture as much as possible without actually sinning.

For the sake of reaching people for Christ, they strive to keep up with what is culturally popular.

I call our church “culturally cautious.”

Popular culture is largely driven by unregenerated people, who are trying to make life work their own way; and so instead of quickly embracing whatever is popular in the culture, we are pretty cautious about taking what is popular in the culture and bringing it into our worship.

A culturally progressive pastor would feel it is very important for him to stay current on all of the movies and TV shows.

To be relevant, to be understood by the culture, he would watch the same things the world watches, and then pepper his sermons with illustrations from those movies and TV shows.

If you don’t do that, he would say, you will never have any chance to make any kind of impact as a preacher, because you will be so irrelevant.

You won’t be speaking the language of the culture.

A culturally progressive church music program would always be pursuing innovation, seeking to use worship music that keeps up with whatever is currently popular in the broader culture musically.

As you can tell, our church is not culturally progressive.

We are not concerned about worshipping God in ways that keep up with the trends of popular culture.

Instead we are a culturally cautious church: not cautious about being out in the culture for evangelism; but cautious about bringing popular culture into the worship of God.

We believe that preaching is relevant when it proclaims the eternal truths of God, not when it follows the latest trends in Hollywood.

We believe that you make a difference by being different, not by adding more of the same.

We believe that in the church people should find a refreshing alternative to the world, not a copy of the world.

Does this mean that our church does everything right, and every other church is messed up?

Of course that’s not what I’m saying.

There are hard questions here, and each church is responsible to consider what they can do that will most reflect God’s fame and accurately portray God’s character.

But this is one of the central meanings of the second commandment: God is telling them “Don’t worship Me the way the nations worship the things they worship.

Don’t worship Me in a way that may snare you with the things of the toward the world.

Do worship me in a way that is appropriate for my holiness, that appropriately communicates my majesty.”

THE CENTRALITY OFTHE WORD

God forbade idols to represent Him because they presented a distorted view of Him.