WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.639 We're in a series on Sunday evenings looking at the Ten Commandments. 00:00:04.639 --> 00:00:09.820 God calls them the Ten Words here in verse one, and we're doing them one by one every 00:00:09.820 --> 00:00:11.220 single Sunday. 00:00:11.220 --> 00:00:13.240 And tonight we're on the second commandment. 00:00:13.240 --> 00:00:14.240 We read it. 00:00:14.240 --> 00:00:15.740 It was verse four to six. 00:00:15.740 --> 00:00:18.019 It's all about worship. 00:00:18.019 --> 00:00:20.760 This command I should say. 00:00:20.760 --> 00:00:26.900 Now at St. Columbus we have a confession of faith that the leaders subscribe to, the West 00:00:26.899 --> 00:00:31.359 Westminster Confession of Faith, and in it there's a larger catechism, and in the larger 00:00:31.359 --> 00:00:36.519 catechism the larger catechism takes every single one of the commandments and asks two 00:00:36.519 --> 00:00:39.439 questions of every single one of them. 00:00:39.439 --> 00:00:45.480 It asks what is forbidden in this commandment and why, and then it asks positively what 00:00:45.480 --> 00:00:47.560 is being commanded here. 00:00:47.560 --> 00:00:52.320 So the catechism, the authors of it in the 17th century thought that in every single 00:00:52.320 --> 00:00:56.399 one of the commandments it's not just something being forbidden even though it is negative. 00:00:56.399 --> 00:00:59.519 There's also positive things being commanded. 00:00:59.519 --> 00:01:03.119 So it's a helpful frame for a sermon outline. 00:01:03.119 --> 00:01:05.719 So let's do it. 00:01:05.719 --> 00:01:09.319 What is forbidden in the second commandment and why? 00:01:09.319 --> 00:01:13.359 What is being implicitly commanded and why? 00:01:13.359 --> 00:01:16.319 And then how can we grow in our obedience? 00:01:16.319 --> 00:01:20.439 Now there's lots of things to talk about with this commandment that I'm not going to. 00:01:20.439 --> 00:01:22.480 So I'm not going to talk tonight about the sacraments. 00:01:22.480 --> 00:01:28.079 Some of you people who are interested in that will know why you're interested in it. 00:01:28.079 --> 00:01:31.240 And I'm not going to talk tonight about images of Christ of Jesus. 00:01:31.240 --> 00:01:33.320 We just don't have time. 00:01:33.320 --> 00:01:37.000 So we'll have to lay that aside, but I'd love to talk to you afterwards about it if you'd 00:01:37.000 --> 00:01:38.000 like. 00:01:38.000 --> 00:01:42.200 But let's think about first what is forbidden in this commandment and why. 00:01:42.200 --> 00:01:47.480 Now command number one, I'm the Lord your God and I brought you out of the land of Egypt 00:01:47.480 --> 00:01:52.920 on Eagle's wings, he told us in chapter 19, don't have any other gods before me. 00:01:52.920 --> 00:01:57.600 So Derek looked at command number one last week and it means that God alone is God. 00:01:57.600 --> 00:01:58.800 He's the real God. 00:01:58.800 --> 00:02:03.439 There is no other God except God, the God of the Bible. 00:02:03.439 --> 00:02:07.920 And they had been living in a land of Egypt where Egypt had tons of gods, all sorts of 00:02:07.920 --> 00:02:08.920 gods. 00:02:08.920 --> 00:02:14.159 And every ancient Near Eastern people group is organized around a pantheon or polytheism, 00:02:14.159 --> 00:02:15.680 lots and lots and lots of gods. 00:02:15.680 --> 00:02:18.080 And so this is addressing that directly in command one. 00:02:18.080 --> 00:02:20.920 There is only one real God. 00:02:20.920 --> 00:02:24.960 Don't have any other things that you treat as gods before the real God. 00:02:24.960 --> 00:02:26.599 All right, that's command one. 00:02:26.599 --> 00:02:33.760 Command two, God not only cares about true belief that he is the real God, but also about 00:02:33.760 --> 00:02:35.879 true worship. 00:02:35.879 --> 00:02:38.920 So you can't just approach God any way you want. 00:02:38.920 --> 00:02:41.800 That's what the second command really is all about. 00:02:41.800 --> 00:02:46.160 The Egyptians approach their gods in tons of different ways. 00:02:46.160 --> 00:02:47.640 They've just come out of slavery in Egypt. 00:02:47.640 --> 00:02:49.439 They've seen that. 00:02:49.439 --> 00:02:51.200 You can't approach modern person. 00:02:51.200 --> 00:02:55.600 You cannot approach the living God any way you want to. 00:02:55.600 --> 00:03:00.600 Because when you approach God on your terms, not his terms, you're actually constructing 00:03:00.600 --> 00:03:03.800 a God, not approaching the real God. 00:03:03.800 --> 00:03:05.960 That's really the heart of this second commandment. 00:03:05.960 --> 00:03:08.040 Now there's an assumption here. 00:03:08.039 --> 00:03:14.199 And the assumption when he tells us how to worship, don't make any carved images. 00:03:14.199 --> 00:03:17.319 That's the wrong way to approach the true Lord. 00:03:17.319 --> 00:03:18.319 There's an assumption. 00:03:18.319 --> 00:03:23.560 And the assumption is you could frame it as we frame it in our century. 00:03:23.560 --> 00:03:28.680 What makes us human beings different from the animals? 00:03:28.680 --> 00:03:34.239 And in our age, people will say, of course, it's that we have the capacity to master a 00:03:34.239 --> 00:03:36.199 controlled nature. 00:03:36.199 --> 00:03:41.719 We have the capacity for scientific and cultural and technical advancement. 00:03:41.719 --> 00:03:43.799 We can build an iPhone. 00:03:43.799 --> 00:03:48.159 And that makes us drastically different from the animals all around us. 00:03:48.159 --> 00:03:51.039 Now the Bible says that's true. 00:03:51.039 --> 00:03:52.519 That is one of the ways that you're different. 00:03:52.519 --> 00:03:56.319 But the more fundamental way that you are different, that human beings are different 00:03:56.319 --> 00:04:03.120 than the animals, and it's right here in the second commandment, is that we are homo-religiosus. 00:04:03.120 --> 00:04:05.759 We are religious humans. 00:04:05.759 --> 00:04:09.679 That's the most fundamental difference between us and everything else in the world, is that 00:04:09.679 --> 00:04:13.719 we are fundamentally, our human nature is to be religious. 00:04:13.719 --> 00:04:19.159 And so as soon as human beings are born and society starts to get formed in shape, as 00:04:19.159 --> 00:04:24.560 soon as people can think and can feel, they start to worship. 00:04:24.560 --> 00:04:26.399 We will worship anything. 00:04:26.399 --> 00:04:30.079 We'll worship anything we can see, anything we can touch, anything we can't see. 00:04:30.079 --> 00:04:31.939 We are fundamentally religious people. 00:04:31.939 --> 00:04:32.939 We have to worship. 00:04:32.939 --> 00:04:34.079 We need to worship. 00:04:34.079 --> 00:04:35.740 We can't help but worship. 00:04:35.740 --> 00:04:37.439 It's who we are. 00:04:37.439 --> 00:04:42.600 Really the question of our age, the sociologists have started to say this more and more and 00:04:42.600 --> 00:04:48.639 more, but the question of our age is not how do you fit religion in a scientific age, but 00:04:48.639 --> 00:04:52.480 how do you fit science in a religious age? 00:04:52.480 --> 00:04:56.519 And the reason we ask it like that is because whether it's the Iron Age or Bronze Age, 00:04:56.519 --> 00:05:01.079 Stone Age even further back, or the Industrial Age or the Scientific Age, religion is more 00:05:01.079 --> 00:05:03.000 fundamental. 00:05:03.000 --> 00:05:06.759 Religion is more important to human beings than any of it, no matter what age we live 00:05:06.759 --> 00:05:07.759 in. 00:05:07.759 --> 00:05:11.959 Now, we see this because every single ancient Near Eastern culture, like Egypt, where they've 00:05:11.959 --> 00:05:20.639 just come from, is organized around very visible objects of public religion. 00:05:20.639 --> 00:05:23.759 So there are going to be temples in ancient Egypt. 00:05:23.759 --> 00:05:29.160 And everybody knows that that temple is the centerpiece of their life. 00:05:29.160 --> 00:05:31.040 Everything is structured around the temple. 00:05:31.040 --> 00:05:36.920 But all the way to the New Testament, Paul goes up, Marcel in Athens, and he sees that 00:05:36.920 --> 00:05:43.200 religious objects are the fundamental thing that everybody structures their life around. 00:05:43.200 --> 00:05:45.320 He says, I see that you are very religious. 00:05:45.320 --> 00:05:46.320 That's the thing Paul says. 00:05:46.320 --> 00:05:51.320 I see that you are religious people, just like everybody else that's ever existed. 00:05:51.320 --> 00:05:55.280 And I see that you have a statue right here at the center of your city to the unknown 00:05:55.280 --> 00:05:59.040 God, that that is the thing that gathers you. 00:05:59.040 --> 00:06:03.480 The God that, in case you missed one, here's the one that you know you've missed, the unknown 00:06:03.480 --> 00:06:04.480 God. 00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:09.360 You see, he's saying everybody's religious and we all actually structure our lives around 00:06:09.360 --> 00:06:11.480 something that we worship. 00:06:11.480 --> 00:06:12.960 And it's always been that way. 00:06:12.960 --> 00:06:16.120 It was just that in the ancient world and in the pre-modern world, it was much more 00:06:16.120 --> 00:06:18.200 visible. 00:06:18.200 --> 00:06:21.120 Temples were the mark of the city center. 00:06:21.120 --> 00:06:23.960 And it's really always been that way for all of human society. 00:06:23.959 --> 00:06:32.359 Now you can see why then in verse four that God addresses the form of worship by referring 00:06:32.359 --> 00:06:35.439 to these three orders of existence. 00:06:35.439 --> 00:06:40.039 You shall not make for yourself a carved image to worship God or any likeness where? 00:06:40.039 --> 00:06:45.079 That is in heaven above, earth beneath, or the water under the earth. 00:06:45.079 --> 00:06:47.919 So he talks about this three tiers of existence. 00:06:47.919 --> 00:06:52.199 And the reason he does that is because he's saying in the ancient mind, there are three 00:06:52.199 --> 00:06:54.039 domains of creatureliness. 00:06:54.039 --> 00:06:58.599 The heavens where the birds live, the earth where the animals live, and the seas and the 00:06:58.599 --> 00:07:02.639 waters underneath the earth where the monsters, the sea creatures live. 00:07:02.639 --> 00:07:10.759 And he's saying that in Egypt, in Babylon, in Rome, in Greece of the first century, they've 00:07:10.759 --> 00:07:17.759 taken creatures and birds, animals, trees, flowers, plants, and they've taken them and 00:07:17.759 --> 00:07:20.240 put them in the temples. 00:07:20.240 --> 00:07:25.079 And they've taken them to the markets and the priests have blessed them. 00:07:25.079 --> 00:07:27.960 And you can go buy one and you can take it to your house. 00:07:27.960 --> 00:07:30.120 And you can form a shrine at your house. 00:07:30.120 --> 00:07:35.800 And you can use it as a mediation point for communicating with and getting benefits from 00:07:35.800 --> 00:07:36.800 the divine. 00:07:36.800 --> 00:07:42.759 This is the normal order of life for almost every human being in all of history. 00:07:42.759 --> 00:07:46.960 Now you can come to this and say, oh boy, you know, I don't struggle with that. 00:07:46.960 --> 00:07:48.519 I don't struggle. 00:07:48.519 --> 00:07:54.479 I don't ever find myself in the marketplace looking for icons made of whales to put in 00:07:54.479 --> 00:07:57.560 my home to mediate the divine. 00:07:57.560 --> 00:08:04.319 But it's very important to know that this actually is the default position of humanity, 00:08:04.319 --> 00:08:08.159 that most human beings have gone this way throughout all the years. 00:08:08.159 --> 00:08:12.000 Now you say that's not something I struggle with, but is it? 00:08:12.000 --> 00:08:13.000 Is it? 00:08:13.000 --> 00:08:18.319 So even in the midst of Christianity, we can begin to drift. 00:08:18.319 --> 00:08:20.439 This happened many, many times throughout the centuries. 00:08:20.439 --> 00:08:26.639 In some sense, the Reformation had a big emphasis on the fact that even Christians can drift 00:08:26.639 --> 00:08:32.799 towards worshiping God through images of birds or creatures or whatever else it might be, 00:08:32.799 --> 00:08:36.080 any creaturely thing that we can craft out of wood or stone. 00:08:36.080 --> 00:08:42.319 And so he's coming and he's saying here, very important, the true God rescued you on Eagle's 00:08:42.319 --> 00:08:43.480 wings. 00:08:43.480 --> 00:08:45.039 There is no other God like him. 00:08:45.039 --> 00:08:51.839 He is not a creature and so you cannot worship God in the form of creatureliness. 00:08:51.839 --> 00:08:52.839 He's invisible. 00:08:52.839 --> 00:08:53.839 You can't see him. 00:08:53.839 --> 00:08:55.839 That's just not the way you can approach. 00:08:55.839 --> 00:08:56.839 Now two caveats. 00:08:56.839 --> 00:09:03.079 One where maybe you're here tonight and you've grown up in the free church of Scotland. 00:09:03.079 --> 00:09:05.399 We're a free church, a Scotland church. 00:09:05.399 --> 00:09:07.159 Many of you haven't. 00:09:07.159 --> 00:09:10.039 Some of you are Presbyterian historically. 00:09:10.039 --> 00:09:11.439 Some of you aren't. 00:09:11.439 --> 00:09:14.519 Some of you are just coming in and exploring Christianity and that's great too. 00:09:14.519 --> 00:09:19.679 But for our free church folk, our Presbyterians are people who have wrestled with this in the 00:09:19.679 --> 00:09:26.120 past, one of the things to say here is that this command does not mean that you can't 00:09:26.120 --> 00:09:28.439 have images in worship. 00:09:28.439 --> 00:09:30.279 It actually doesn't mean that. 00:09:30.279 --> 00:09:32.120 You say, whoa, are you sure? 00:09:32.120 --> 00:09:40.120 Well, if you just look around the room, you can see things carved out of wood. 00:09:40.120 --> 00:09:41.840 Things on the banisters here carved out of wood. 00:09:41.840 --> 00:09:44.519 There's pulpit right behind me carved out of wood. 00:09:44.519 --> 00:09:49.440 John Fram says that even if you take a church and you empty the room and you paint all the 00:09:49.440 --> 00:09:55.280 walls white, you're still communicating something by representational art. 00:09:55.280 --> 00:09:56.440 It's actually impossible. 00:09:56.440 --> 00:10:00.879 It's impossible not to have an image in a church, in a worship space. 00:10:00.879 --> 00:10:09.200 The key here in this passage is God is saying, never try to make an image of God. 00:10:09.200 --> 00:10:11.320 Don't ever try to image God himself. 00:10:11.320 --> 00:10:12.920 You can't do it. 00:10:12.920 --> 00:10:15.080 You cannot image the invisible God. 00:10:15.080 --> 00:10:19.879 Number one, number two, never try to take an image, something carved, something built, 00:10:19.879 --> 00:10:25.120 something in the creaturely domain at all, and use it as a medium to interact with the 00:10:25.120 --> 00:10:27.640 divine, with God. 00:10:27.640 --> 00:10:28.640 That's the simple thing. 00:10:28.640 --> 00:10:29.640 He's not saying you can't have an image. 00:10:29.640 --> 00:10:31.680 He's not saying you can't have images. 00:10:31.680 --> 00:10:34.400 He's saying never use it and think that's God. 00:10:34.400 --> 00:10:40.520 That's what God looks like and never use it as a point at which you can meet the holy, 00:10:40.519 --> 00:10:42.879 a point through which you can come to the mountain. 00:10:42.879 --> 00:10:49.639 Here's how we can both drift as Protestant Christians or use things well. 00:10:49.639 --> 00:10:54.759 One of the ways you might can drift into the fault here that he's talking about. 00:10:54.759 --> 00:11:01.000 When I was growing up, I would be at church any time the doors were open. 00:11:01.000 --> 00:11:03.559 That was my family life. 00:11:03.559 --> 00:11:06.720 Maybe you grew up that way. 00:11:06.720 --> 00:11:07.919 You're the first person to get there. 00:11:07.919 --> 00:11:13.319 The last person to leave and one of the things that your parents and the elders, the deacons, 00:11:13.319 --> 00:11:21.319 whoever else says to you is, do not run, do not run, child, through God's house. 00:11:21.319 --> 00:11:22.519 Never run through the house. 00:11:22.519 --> 00:11:23.519 This is the house of the Lord. 00:11:23.519 --> 00:11:25.159 Don't you know that? 00:11:25.159 --> 00:11:28.639 So it's a Monday night and there's nobody in the building and you're running down the 00:11:28.639 --> 00:11:29.639 hall. 00:11:29.639 --> 00:11:30.639 What are you doing? 00:11:30.639 --> 00:11:31.639 This is the house of the Lord. 00:11:31.639 --> 00:11:37.759 Now, that's a slight drift because you're saying that this building has become a medium. 00:11:37.759 --> 00:11:42.200 A mediation point for the divine and that's not what it is. 00:11:42.200 --> 00:11:45.799 The house of the Lord is the people of God, wherever they might be gathered. 00:11:45.799 --> 00:11:47.960 Or you say, you know, I wear it. 00:11:47.960 --> 00:11:50.960 It's a great thing to wear a cross. 00:11:50.960 --> 00:11:54.120 A cross helps you to remember to pray. 00:11:54.120 --> 00:11:57.080 There's all sorts of things like that that might help you to remember to pray. 00:11:57.080 --> 00:12:04.519 But when you start to treat it in a way that it's magic, it's divine, that's superstition. 00:12:04.519 --> 00:12:05.879 That's what's being forbidden here. 00:12:05.879 --> 00:12:08.919 So there's all sorts of ways that we can fall into this command. 00:12:08.919 --> 00:12:11.799 Now here's the why and we'll close the first point. 00:12:11.799 --> 00:12:12.960 What's forbidden? 00:12:12.960 --> 00:12:15.720 Don't ever try to create an image of God. 00:12:15.720 --> 00:12:20.399 Don't ever try to use any object in the creature-led domain through which God is mediated. 00:12:20.399 --> 00:12:24.399 His presence is mediated and use it for worship. 00:12:24.399 --> 00:12:25.399 Why? 00:12:25.399 --> 00:12:29.399 Let me just say quickly, two things about God, one thing about us to give the why. 00:12:29.399 --> 00:12:32.639 And he tells us the first thing, I've already said it. 00:12:32.639 --> 00:12:36.360 You can't do that because God is free. 00:12:36.360 --> 00:12:38.759 He can't be bounded. 00:12:38.759 --> 00:12:39.759 God is invisible. 00:12:39.759 --> 00:12:42.720 He can't be imaged. 00:12:42.720 --> 00:12:46.279 God cannot be captured in any way. 00:12:46.279 --> 00:12:52.480 And so to bound God through any type of creature-ly thing is forbidden because it actually tries 00:12:52.480 --> 00:12:54.840 to limit that which cannot be limited. 00:12:54.840 --> 00:12:55.840 Right? 00:12:55.840 --> 00:12:56.840 That's the first thing. 00:12:56.840 --> 00:13:02.039 The second reason is he tells us right here, he says, don't do this because I am jealous. 00:13:02.039 --> 00:13:07.159 And when I was growing up, I heard a celebrity on television. 00:13:07.159 --> 00:13:13.719 I remember this so vividly as a child say on a talk show, I used to be a Christian, but 00:13:13.719 --> 00:13:18.439 whenever I read that God is jealous, I had to leave the faith behind. 00:13:18.439 --> 00:13:20.360 I couldn't follow a God who says I'm jealous. 00:13:20.360 --> 00:13:21.360 Now, what does God mean? 00:13:21.360 --> 00:13:24.759 He says, you can't do this because I'm jealous. 00:13:24.759 --> 00:13:27.319 I'm jealous of you and for you. 00:13:27.320 --> 00:13:32.160 And even more importantly, he's saying here, I'm jealous for my own glory. 00:13:32.160 --> 00:13:35.760 Now the word jealousy here is a marriage term. 00:13:35.760 --> 00:13:40.520 You look at the way this word in Hebrews used all across the Old Testament and almost exclusively 00:13:40.520 --> 00:13:43.200 it's used in the context of marriages. 00:13:43.200 --> 00:13:48.040 And so God has already said, I bore you on eagle's wings in Exodus 19, if you were here 00:13:48.040 --> 00:13:50.640 two weeks ago, you are my family. 00:13:50.640 --> 00:13:51.640 You're my children. 00:13:51.640 --> 00:13:53.320 You're my sons and daughters. 00:13:53.320 --> 00:13:59.240 And now he takes the metaphor to another level and says, you're also my bride and I'm your 00:13:59.240 --> 00:14:00.560 groom. 00:14:00.560 --> 00:14:06.560 And so he's saying here, whenever you give worship to something in the creaturely realm 00:14:06.560 --> 00:14:14.400 that's created, you are actually robbing me of the glory that I'm owed. 00:14:14.400 --> 00:14:16.400 God deserves to be worshiped. 00:14:16.400 --> 00:14:17.400 He deserves to be glorified. 00:14:17.400 --> 00:14:21.720 And he's saying, he's saying in other words, anytime you use an image, something carved 00:14:21.720 --> 00:14:26.600 to worship me, it's as if you are committing adultery against me. 00:14:26.600 --> 00:14:28.600 That's the language of the Old Testament. 00:14:28.600 --> 00:14:33.840 And so every single act of idolatry is an act of adultery in the grand image that God is 00:14:33.840 --> 00:14:37.920 the great groom and the church, the people of God are his bride. 00:14:37.920 --> 00:14:41.080 And so he says, I'm jealous for my glory and I'm jealous for you. 00:14:41.080 --> 00:14:43.759 And so don't give it to a piece of wood. 00:14:43.759 --> 00:14:47.680 Don't give it to a piece of stone or to the cross on your neck or to the church building 00:14:47.679 --> 00:14:53.000 or to anything else in all of creation, give me the glory I'm due. 00:14:53.000 --> 00:14:54.599 Think about it like this. 00:14:54.599 --> 00:15:00.000 If you're married, if you're married, you get up in the morning and you get ready. 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:03.439 Maybe you leave the house for work, perhaps one of you does. 00:15:03.439 --> 00:15:08.079 And you're getting ready to leave and your spouse is about to walk out the door, the 00:15:08.079 --> 00:15:10.599 wife, husband. 00:15:10.599 --> 00:15:16.839 And before your husband, your wife asks for a kiss. 00:15:16.840 --> 00:15:19.320 You know, you're leaving for the day and you're going to give your wife a kiss, your 00:15:19.320 --> 00:15:21.280 husband a kiss. 00:15:21.280 --> 00:15:23.560 And they say, don't leave without giving me a kiss. 00:15:23.560 --> 00:15:25.399 And so you say, oh, yeah, sure, no problem. 00:15:25.399 --> 00:15:30.480 And you pull your wallet out of your pocket and you open up your wallet and you pull a 00:15:30.480 --> 00:15:35.720 picture of your wife out and you peck the picture and you say, all good. 00:15:35.720 --> 00:15:37.920 And you walk out the door, right? 00:15:37.920 --> 00:15:42.720 You've actually stolen from your wife, your husband. 00:15:42.720 --> 00:15:50.080 You've stolen the love that is due to them by relationship of the covenant marriage. 00:15:50.080 --> 00:15:52.200 And he's saying, I'm jealous for your love. 00:15:52.200 --> 00:15:53.200 I'm jealous. 00:15:53.200 --> 00:15:56.960 Don't give it to a piece of wood or a statue or anything else in all of the creaturely domain. 00:15:56.960 --> 00:16:02.120 Don't kiss a picture when your spouse is standing right in front of you. 00:16:02.120 --> 00:16:05.120 It's the exact same idea, except on a much grander level. 00:16:05.120 --> 00:16:07.680 Now, those are the two reasons from God's perspective. 00:16:07.680 --> 00:16:09.560 One for Mars. 00:16:09.559 --> 00:16:15.319 The reason why that this is forbidden is because you don't try and image God at all ever in 00:16:15.319 --> 00:16:16.799 this world. 00:16:16.799 --> 00:16:20.559 Not only because God is invisible and cannot be imaged, but also because God already has 00:16:20.559 --> 00:16:21.559 been imaged. 00:16:21.559 --> 00:16:29.599 You see, back in Genesis chapter one, God created the Garden of Eden. 00:16:29.599 --> 00:16:36.959 And he put first, first, he put, he put all sorts of things to remind you of himself. 00:16:36.960 --> 00:16:41.600 So it's not that we don't think God's presence is mediated through anything in the world. 00:16:41.600 --> 00:16:47.360 No, we say like Calvin said, creation itself is the theater of God's glory. 00:16:47.360 --> 00:16:53.280 You don't need images because God says, go out and look at creation and there's my power. 00:16:53.280 --> 00:16:56.720 I speak, I speak through the stars, through the sun. 00:16:56.720 --> 00:16:59.360 I speak deeply into your consciousness. 00:16:59.360 --> 00:17:00.360 I am with you. 00:17:00.360 --> 00:17:03.360 He reveals himself already in the things that have been made. 00:17:03.360 --> 00:17:06.759 And he did that most acutely in the Garden of Eden. 00:17:06.759 --> 00:17:10.319 And then at the center of the Garden of Eden, he said, there, he said, you don't make an 00:17:10.319 --> 00:17:11.319 image. 00:17:11.319 --> 00:17:12.319 There already is an image. 00:17:12.319 --> 00:17:19.360 And on day six, remember, he said, the image of God is humanity, male and female. 00:17:19.360 --> 00:17:20.360 That's the image. 00:17:20.360 --> 00:17:21.680 Now the image is not God. 00:17:21.680 --> 00:17:24.279 And so you don't worship the image, but there is an image. 00:17:24.279 --> 00:17:29.960 And he said that human beings are actually that which you can look at in this world and 00:17:29.960 --> 00:17:36.160 remember a faint analogy of the glory of the triune God built in the corporate humanity, 00:17:36.160 --> 00:17:39.279 revealed in corporate humanity, that human beings are the image of God. 00:17:39.279 --> 00:17:40.279 You don't need an image. 00:17:40.279 --> 00:17:41.480 There already is one. 00:17:41.480 --> 00:17:46.240 It's the closest thing you can get to helping you remember what God could be like and never 00:17:46.240 --> 00:17:49.960 worship the image, but know that there is an image. 00:17:49.960 --> 00:17:52.559 And so you don't need any more images. 00:17:52.559 --> 00:18:00.359 Actually one of the ways the Old Testament develops this is that in Ezekiel 18, Ezekiel 00:18:00.359 --> 00:18:02.759 18 says this very acutely. 00:18:02.759 --> 00:18:09.879 It talks about how the nations, as they focused on carved images, idols throughout the centuries, 00:18:09.879 --> 00:18:14.039 more and more and more lost their focus on the real image. 00:18:14.039 --> 00:18:16.839 And this happens across the Old Testament. 00:18:16.839 --> 00:18:20.839 Derek mentioned this morning, one of the most difficult things to read about in the Old 00:18:20.839 --> 00:18:26.839 Testament is that the more and more and more idolatry through images took over a society, 00:18:26.839 --> 00:18:33.559 the closer and closer and closer they drew to human sacrifice as one of the ways of worship. 00:18:33.559 --> 00:18:37.119 You see, the more and more and more you forget that there already is an image and you create 00:18:37.119 --> 00:18:42.799 images, the more and more and more you mistreat the real image of God, which is human beings. 00:18:42.799 --> 00:18:49.679 And so in Ezekiel 18, it says that you've replaced humans with idols and you've forgotten 00:18:49.680 --> 00:18:52.279 about the poor. 00:18:52.279 --> 00:18:56.400 You've actually been so focused on a statue and trying to get what you want from the gods 00:18:56.400 --> 00:18:59.320 that you don't ever think about the people who are suffering all around you when God 00:18:59.320 --> 00:19:01.240 says, look at them. 00:19:01.240 --> 00:19:06.440 Go and give them a drink of water and boy, have you loved me, have you served me. 00:19:06.440 --> 00:19:11.799 That's one of the fundamental costs of graven image idolatry throughout the Old Testament. 00:19:11.799 --> 00:19:13.480 Now that's what's forbidden. 00:19:13.480 --> 00:19:17.320 That's why, secondly, what is commanded. 00:19:17.320 --> 00:19:18.759 This is the implicit side. 00:19:18.759 --> 00:19:21.440 Let me give you four. 00:19:21.440 --> 00:19:24.359 The first two, I'll just list. 00:19:24.359 --> 00:19:26.039 What is being positively commanded here? 00:19:26.039 --> 00:19:28.039 I think it's this. 00:19:28.039 --> 00:19:34.039 One, remember, you are fundamentally religious. 00:19:34.039 --> 00:19:36.240 You have to worship. 00:19:36.240 --> 00:19:38.200 That's the first thing he's telling us implicitly. 00:19:38.200 --> 00:19:46.839 The second thing he's telling us implicitly is come to worship to worship God, the real 00:19:46.839 --> 00:19:47.839 God. 00:19:47.839 --> 00:19:50.000 It's as simple as that. 00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:53.879 He's commanding us here that when we come to worship and we gather together, come to 00:19:53.879 --> 00:19:59.759 worship to worship the real God, the God of the Bible, the God of the Lord Jesus Christ, 00:19:59.759 --> 00:20:00.759 the Triune God. 00:20:00.759 --> 00:20:02.919 Come and worship nothing else. 00:20:02.919 --> 00:20:06.759 Give your worship completely to the God that has saved you. 00:20:06.759 --> 00:20:07.759 That's the second thing. 00:20:07.759 --> 00:20:10.279 It's that simple. 00:20:10.279 --> 00:20:12.679 God alone is worthy of worship. 00:20:12.680 --> 00:20:18.200 Worship has this idea of worth built into it, worthship. 00:20:18.200 --> 00:20:19.200 What is worship? 00:20:19.200 --> 00:20:23.440 Worship is nothing but giving that which it is due. 00:20:23.440 --> 00:20:28.080 Giving worth, giving value, ascribing honor to something that deserves it. 00:20:28.080 --> 00:20:35.440 God is the only being in all of existence that is truly deserving of worthship. 00:20:35.440 --> 00:20:40.840 So, come to worship to worship the one who is worthy of worship. 00:20:40.840 --> 00:20:42.560 That's the implicit command here. 00:20:42.559 --> 00:20:46.159 Third, now a little more detail. 00:20:46.159 --> 00:20:54.720 Third, the implicit idea here is when you do that, you have to be okay with living by 00:20:54.720 --> 00:20:57.440 faith not by sight. 00:20:57.440 --> 00:21:02.879 He's saying, don't make any graven images of God, oh, I know you want to. 00:21:02.879 --> 00:21:11.159 You see, it's default, human nature, to try to find images of God, to bring God down, 00:21:11.160 --> 00:21:13.080 to bound God in some way. 00:21:13.080 --> 00:21:14.080 Why? 00:21:14.080 --> 00:21:15.080 Oh, we want to. 00:21:15.080 --> 00:21:19.759 And he's coming and saying, you've got to actually be okay to live by faith, not by 00:21:19.759 --> 00:21:20.759 sight. 00:21:20.759 --> 00:21:23.400 You see, they wanted graven images. 00:21:23.400 --> 00:21:26.240 They had been trained by Egypt for graven images. 00:21:26.240 --> 00:21:31.200 And what they got instead in this passage is graven words. 00:21:31.200 --> 00:21:36.440 God engraved words into stone for them, but they wanted an image. 00:21:36.440 --> 00:21:38.480 And they would run at the golden calf not long after this. 00:21:38.480 --> 00:21:39.480 And that's us too. 00:21:39.480 --> 00:21:42.200 We want an image, but what we've got is words. 00:21:42.200 --> 00:21:43.200 Why? 00:21:43.200 --> 00:21:46.160 It's never been harder to face this, I think, than now. 00:21:46.160 --> 00:21:50.279 We live in an age of image more than ever in human history. 00:21:50.279 --> 00:21:55.839 If it was hard for Israel, it's harder for you. 00:21:55.839 --> 00:21:59.480 Because most people in the modern world are not words people. 00:21:59.480 --> 00:22:01.079 They're image people. 00:22:01.079 --> 00:22:03.640 We read less books than ever. 00:22:03.640 --> 00:22:05.720 We look at things more than ever. 00:22:05.720 --> 00:22:07.480 We want sight, not faith. 00:22:07.480 --> 00:22:09.460 We want image, not word. 00:22:09.460 --> 00:22:10.640 Why? 00:22:10.640 --> 00:22:13.039 Why are images so appealing? 00:22:13.039 --> 00:22:16.559 Peter Lightheart points out that with images, why do you want to graven image of God? 00:22:16.559 --> 00:22:20.600 Because an image is something that you can control. 00:22:20.600 --> 00:22:21.680 You can fashion it. 00:22:21.680 --> 00:22:22.680 You can shape it. 00:22:22.680 --> 00:22:24.279 You can move it around. 00:22:24.279 --> 00:22:26.000 You can bring it anywhere you want to bring it. 00:22:26.000 --> 00:22:27.000 You can smash it. 00:22:27.000 --> 00:22:28.160 You can rebuild it. 00:22:28.160 --> 00:22:29.400 You can add things to it. 00:22:29.400 --> 00:22:30.920 You can restructure it. 00:22:30.920 --> 00:22:37.160 You see, it's saying you can never approach God by sight, by image, because that would 00:22:37.160 --> 00:22:42.720 train you to think that you can control the God who can't be controlled. 00:22:42.720 --> 00:22:44.880 He is good, but he's not safe. 00:22:44.880 --> 00:22:50.279 And as soon as you try to image him and bound him, you've tried to control him. 00:22:50.279 --> 00:22:57.400 And exactly the reverse is the truth, that God is the one who sees you, the image. 00:22:57.400 --> 00:22:59.600 You never see him. 00:22:59.600 --> 00:23:01.880 Meaning he has total control over you. 00:23:01.880 --> 00:23:03.040 You're bounded. 00:23:03.040 --> 00:23:04.040 He decides. 00:23:04.040 --> 00:23:06.080 You never do. 00:23:06.079 --> 00:23:08.399 You can't bound him, but he has bounded you. 00:23:08.399 --> 00:23:10.960 You can't image him, but you are his image. 00:23:10.960 --> 00:23:13.639 And it doesn't work if you flip it around. 00:23:13.639 --> 00:23:18.079 And any attempt to do so is actually to try to control or construct a God that doesn't 00:23:18.079 --> 00:23:19.079 actually exist. 00:23:19.079 --> 00:23:22.559 He says, you've got to be okay with faith, not by sight. 00:23:22.559 --> 00:23:28.000 And so the Holy Spirit works in our hearts in the New Covenant era by speaking, by speech, 00:23:28.000 --> 00:23:29.000 through the word. 00:23:29.000 --> 00:23:32.799 Why are we a word-centered religion? 00:23:32.799 --> 00:23:34.879 Why do we have preaching? 00:23:34.880 --> 00:23:37.720 All because we cannot control God. 00:23:37.720 --> 00:23:39.440 He controls us. 00:23:39.440 --> 00:23:40.440 We can't image God. 00:23:40.440 --> 00:23:41.560 We can't bind him. 00:23:41.560 --> 00:23:45.400 He images himself in us and binds us. 00:23:45.400 --> 00:23:46.400 That's all. 00:23:46.400 --> 00:23:49.720 We have to be okay with faith, not by sight. 00:23:49.720 --> 00:23:56.480 Fourth, finally, maybe most importantly, the fourth implicit thing that's being commanded 00:23:56.480 --> 00:24:02.280 to us here is to realize that because we are religious people by nature, we're always going 00:24:02.280 --> 00:24:03.480 to worship. 00:24:03.480 --> 00:24:09.360 We're not only going to worship explicitly in corporate contexts, surrounded and gathered 00:24:09.360 --> 00:24:14.779 around something, whether it's the temple of Athena or the word of the Lord. 00:24:14.779 --> 00:24:22.640 Not only are we like that as human beings, but also worship is built into our daily existence, 00:24:22.640 --> 00:24:24.559 our 24-7 existence. 00:24:24.559 --> 00:24:26.519 We never stop. 00:24:26.519 --> 00:24:28.360 We're always worshiping. 00:24:28.360 --> 00:24:29.759 It's not only about the corporate gathering. 00:24:29.759 --> 00:24:34.359 It's also about being awake to how often you worship outside the space of the gathered 00:24:34.359 --> 00:24:36.279 church. 00:24:36.279 --> 00:24:43.119 The gods of Egypt, the gods of Babylon, the gods of Hinduism, they're all crafted gods. 00:24:43.119 --> 00:24:44.839 You say, that's not really my problem. 00:24:44.839 --> 00:24:46.279 That's not the thing I'm struggling with. 00:24:46.279 --> 00:24:51.319 The second commandment doesn't hit me that hard because I'm not prone to something like 00:24:51.319 --> 00:24:52.319 this. 00:24:52.319 --> 00:25:00.720 Let me ask you, do you craft gods that you can control in your ordinary life and bring 00:25:00.720 --> 00:25:05.159 them with you into the space of worship? 00:25:05.159 --> 00:25:11.559 Have you brought gods that you've created, idols of the heart, into worship with you 00:25:11.559 --> 00:25:13.319 tonight? 00:25:13.319 --> 00:25:17.960 David Foster Wallace, I've used this quote several times in this pulpit. 00:25:17.960 --> 00:25:24.840 He gave the very famous Kenyan College address some 15 years ago now, I think it was. 00:25:24.840 --> 00:25:28.600 I'll give you the very famous quote in just a moment, but nobody ever reads what he wrote 00:25:28.600 --> 00:25:31.519 before the famous part of the quote. 00:25:31.519 --> 00:25:38.319 Listen to what David Foster Wallace, the philosopher, says to these graduates in their final day 00:25:38.319 --> 00:25:39.319 in university. 00:25:39.319 --> 00:25:42.240 He says, well, let me frame it. 00:25:42.240 --> 00:25:43.240 Think about it. 00:25:43.240 --> 00:25:48.160 You can be a Christian, you can be a Christian tonight and say, I don't struggle with icons. 00:25:48.160 --> 00:25:50.799 I don't struggle with little gods. 00:25:50.799 --> 00:25:54.200 Maybe you're not a Christian tonight and you say, I don't even recognize the category 00:25:54.200 --> 00:25:55.200 of idolatry. 00:25:55.200 --> 00:25:59.480 It's not a category that makes sense to me in any way, shape, or form because I don't 00:25:59.480 --> 00:26:04.279 believe in the God that you're talking about. 00:26:04.279 --> 00:26:05.279 Listen to what he says. 00:26:05.279 --> 00:26:08.680 It's a bit of a long quote, so you'll have to focus. 00:26:08.680 --> 00:26:16.519 He says, a huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, 00:26:16.519 --> 00:26:20.960 it turns out, totally wrong and deluded. 00:26:20.960 --> 00:26:27.160 For example, everything in my own immediate experience supports my deep belief that I 00:26:27.160 --> 00:26:32.160 am the absolute center of the universe. 00:26:32.160 --> 00:26:37.840 The realist, the most vivid and important person in all of existence. 00:26:37.839 --> 00:26:42.599 We rarely talk about this sort of natural, basic self-centeredness because it's so socially 00:26:42.599 --> 00:26:49.199 repulsive, but it's pretty much the same for all of us deep down, that we center our universe 00:26:49.199 --> 00:26:51.079 around me. 00:26:51.079 --> 00:26:54.720 Now, Abraham Kuiper a century ago, he said this. 00:26:54.720 --> 00:26:59.439 He said that the God, the icon, the idols that we structure our world around. 00:26:59.439 --> 00:27:04.959 Remember, Egypt had a God, the God of the Sun, right at the center of the city. 00:27:04.960 --> 00:27:09.200 The unknown God right at the center of Athens, and Athena right at the center of Ephesus. 00:27:09.200 --> 00:27:13.960 And you say, well, what's the God, what are the crafted Gods that we're all gathered around? 00:27:13.960 --> 00:27:14.960 Here's what Kuiper says. 00:27:14.960 --> 00:27:19.920 He says, in the modern world, there is no longer a graven image at the center of the 00:27:19.920 --> 00:27:23.440 city, but instead it's just me. 00:27:23.440 --> 00:27:27.240 It's just the eye, the ego. 00:27:27.240 --> 00:27:32.960 It's the great eye, no longer a big statue, no longer the Egyptian God or the Babylonian 00:27:32.960 --> 00:27:36.640 God's, it's individualized self-actualization. 00:27:36.640 --> 00:27:41.360 It is that I live in my world, and my world centers on me. 00:27:41.360 --> 00:27:43.440 And so you think about it. 00:27:43.440 --> 00:27:49.720 If society is not demanding, society no longer demands that you turn and bow before a great 00:27:49.720 --> 00:27:55.799 statue at the city center, then the default position of humanity is that you will naturally 00:27:55.799 --> 00:28:01.600 serve the master that is most immediate, most near you, most often, and that is your own 00:28:01.599 --> 00:28:04.679 mind, your own heart, your own consciousness. 00:28:04.679 --> 00:28:06.839 And so Wallace then says this, the famous part. 00:28:06.839 --> 00:28:13.319 He says, in the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. 00:28:13.319 --> 00:28:15.919 There is no such thing as not worshiping. 00:28:15.919 --> 00:28:16.919 Everybody worships. 00:28:16.919 --> 00:28:20.480 The only choice we get is what we're going to worship. 00:28:20.480 --> 00:28:24.079 And if you worship something that is not true and transcendent, then pretty much anything 00:28:24.079 --> 00:28:27.359 else that you worship is going to eat you alive. 00:28:27.359 --> 00:28:32.240 If you worship money and stuff, if they are where you tap real meaning, then you will 00:28:32.240 --> 00:28:34.159 never have enough. 00:28:34.159 --> 00:28:35.519 You'll never feel like you have enough. 00:28:35.519 --> 00:28:36.639 It's true. 00:28:36.639 --> 00:28:42.639 You worship your body and beauty and sexual allure, and you will always feel ugly. 00:28:42.639 --> 00:28:46.759 And when time and age starts showing, you will die a million deaths before they finally 00:28:46.759 --> 00:28:47.759 plant you. 00:28:47.759 --> 00:28:50.439 Now here's the real key, the real secret of the Second Commandment, and we'll move to 00:28:50.439 --> 00:28:53.039 the final thing. 00:28:53.039 --> 00:28:57.480 God deserves your worship, but he does not need it. 00:28:57.480 --> 00:29:04.879 But you need to worship the real God, or you will fall into despair. 00:29:04.879 --> 00:29:08.759 God commands your worship, he deserves your worship, he doesn't have to have it. 00:29:08.759 --> 00:29:10.680 He doesn't need it. 00:29:10.680 --> 00:29:16.480 But you desperately need to worship him, or you will slowly but surely fall into deep 00:29:16.480 --> 00:29:17.480 despair. 00:29:17.480 --> 00:29:23.559 You see, anytime you fail to worship the real God, ultimately you will move and drift 00:29:23.559 --> 00:29:30.000 towards the default position of putting your trust and your hope in your own self-justification, 00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:32.000 in some way, shape, or form. 00:29:32.000 --> 00:29:37.079 And when you try to justify yourself through performance, or through prodigality, or through 00:29:37.079 --> 00:29:44.160 anything else, you will fail and you will fall into sadness. 00:29:44.160 --> 00:29:48.519 Anything else can handle the weight of your worship except the true God. 00:29:48.519 --> 00:29:51.480 Now lastly and finally, how can we grow? 00:29:51.480 --> 00:29:52.640 Only one thing. 00:29:52.640 --> 00:29:54.680 How can we grow into obedience? 00:29:54.680 --> 00:29:57.680 It's the maths of mercy here. 00:29:57.680 --> 00:30:01.759 Did you see the mathematics that God lays out here at the end of this commandment? 00:30:01.759 --> 00:30:11.000 He says, as we close, don't bow down to gods that are crafted, don't have idols in your 00:30:11.000 --> 00:30:18.480 life because I'm jealous and I will visit the iniquity of the fathers on the children 00:30:18.480 --> 00:30:21.759 to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me. 00:30:21.759 --> 00:30:25.680 But I'll show steadfast love to thousands of those who keep my commandments. 00:30:25.680 --> 00:30:34.200 So he says here briefly that it is the default position of humanity to run to craft the idols, 00:30:34.200 --> 00:30:36.960 whether you can see them or they're deep down in your heart. 00:30:36.960 --> 00:30:43.840 And he says that I will punish, I will visit that iniquity, the iniquity of idolatry, the 00:30:43.840 --> 00:30:49.559 iniquity of a father, of a parent, onto the third and fourth generation of those who hate 00:30:49.559 --> 00:30:52.400 me, of those who persist, he's saying, in idolatry. 00:30:52.400 --> 00:30:58.200 Now people come to this passage, a 90 second aside on this, people come to this passage 00:30:58.200 --> 00:31:09.160 and they say, is this teaching corporate guilt that the sins of a parent God will take and 00:31:09.160 --> 00:31:13.360 he will save that punishment for the grandchildren? 00:31:13.360 --> 00:31:18.519 And the answer is no, he's not at all talking about here some substitutionary punishment 00:31:18.519 --> 00:31:23.759 where grandchildren are going to pay the price for the sins of idolatry that you commit today 00:31:23.759 --> 00:31:24.960 or did in Israel. 00:31:24.960 --> 00:31:30.759 We know this because in Ezekiel 18, verse 20, he says, the sons shall not suffer the 00:31:30.759 --> 00:31:34.519 iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son. 00:31:34.519 --> 00:31:36.120 So it's not anything like that. 00:31:36.120 --> 00:31:44.880 Instead he's saying a couple things, he's saying one, when a generation, a family, a 00:31:44.880 --> 00:31:52.519 parent, someone in relationships really, really struggles with idolatries chasing after false 00:31:52.519 --> 00:32:00.240 gods in this world repeatedly and repeatedly, it has consequences for everybody around them. 00:32:00.240 --> 00:32:06.920 So the iniquity of a father can be brought down on even the third and the fourth generation 00:32:06.920 --> 00:32:12.400 because sin has consequences and sometimes those consequences really, really ripple out 00:32:12.400 --> 00:32:13.400 and matter a lot. 00:32:13.400 --> 00:32:16.559 And he's just saying, you've got to be aware of that. 00:32:16.559 --> 00:32:18.920 But did you see how he concluded? 00:32:18.920 --> 00:32:24.680 He said, you know, there's consequences for sin down to three and four generations, but 00:32:24.680 --> 00:32:27.360 and here's the translation issue. 00:32:27.360 --> 00:32:35.759 He says, verse six, but I will show mercy, steadfast love to not thousands, but to literally 00:32:35.759 --> 00:32:40.440 the thousandth generation of those who love me. 00:32:40.440 --> 00:32:42.160 You see what he's saying? 00:32:42.160 --> 00:32:47.320 He's saying every single one of us struggles with idolatry and every single one of us can 00:32:47.319 --> 00:32:57.759 say I'm a person who has cost other people in some way, shape or form because of my idols. 00:32:57.759 --> 00:33:00.079 Every single one of us has to be able to say that. 00:33:00.079 --> 00:33:01.879 That's what he's asking of us. 00:33:01.879 --> 00:33:04.879 And he's saying, but yes, your sin has consequences. 00:33:04.879 --> 00:33:10.679 Your idolatries have consequences, but I, you know, three generations, I want to show you 00:33:10.679 --> 00:33:13.480 mercy to a thousand generations. 00:33:13.480 --> 00:33:18.120 You see the math he's saying his mercy is so much bigger than our idolatry. 00:33:18.120 --> 00:33:23.559 He has mercy to overcome all of our sins, to overwhelm our sins. 00:33:23.559 --> 00:33:26.240 And so here's the real secret of the second commandment. 00:33:26.240 --> 00:33:31.400 How he says, you know, I want to take this to a thousand generations of pouring mercy 00:33:31.400 --> 00:33:34.039 down for people who struggle with idolatry. 00:33:34.039 --> 00:33:36.640 How does he do it? 00:33:36.640 --> 00:33:39.240 And he does it all through John 14.9. 00:33:39.240 --> 00:33:46.880 When John 14.9, Jesus Christ turned to Philip when Philip was very confused and he said, 00:33:46.880 --> 00:33:53.480 Philip, don't you know that if you've looked at me, you have seen God the Father. 00:33:53.480 --> 00:33:58.120 So you can never image God, but Jesus Christ did what is absolutely impossible. 00:33:58.120 --> 00:34:00.640 He imaged God Colossians 115. 00:34:00.640 --> 00:34:04.799 He is the icon, Paul says of the invisible God. 00:34:04.799 --> 00:34:09.039 When you look at him, God has been perfectly imaged. 00:34:09.039 --> 00:34:15.759 Jesus Christ has made him known and he says, you know, I will visit punishment on idolatry, 00:34:15.759 --> 00:34:18.440 but I want to show mercy to a thousand generations. 00:34:18.440 --> 00:34:25.719 How he had said in Ezekiel 18, I will not punish the sons for the sins of their parents, 00:34:25.719 --> 00:34:27.759 the daughters for exactly what the parents did. 00:34:27.759 --> 00:34:36.880 I will not, I will not put vicarious satisfaction onto a child for what their mom and dad did, 00:34:36.880 --> 00:34:41.920 or I will not cause a parent to have to suffer in vicarious satisfaction for what their son 00:34:41.920 --> 00:34:42.920 or daughter do. 00:34:42.920 --> 00:34:45.920 Oh boy, but one time he did. 00:34:45.920 --> 00:34:46.920 One time he did. 00:34:46.920 --> 00:34:52.360 One time he put the sins of every father and mother, every son and daughter, the idolatries 00:34:52.360 --> 00:34:57.720 through vicarious satisfaction substitution on one, the image himself, Jesus Christ at 00:34:57.720 --> 00:35:01.200 the cross, at the cross. 00:35:01.199 --> 00:35:06.759 When you say tonight with the hymn writer, cast down, oh God, the idols that hold us 00:35:06.759 --> 00:35:10.319 in their power, the empty God's eye worship. 00:35:10.319 --> 00:35:16.919 When darkness has its hour, we bow, I bow to other masters than Jesus Christ. 00:35:16.919 --> 00:35:25.079 I invite you this week simply to this, contemplate and meditate on the cross of Jesus Christ 00:35:25.079 --> 00:35:30.279 in order to smash your idols and come to true worship. 00:35:30.280 --> 00:35:31.280 Pray. 00:35:31.280 --> 00:35:43.720 Father, we ask that you would reveal to us the idols of our heart tonight. 00:35:43.720 --> 00:35:48.120 Maybe we don't struggle with icons and graven images of wood and stone, but we struggle 00:35:48.120 --> 00:35:51.040 with graven images of the heart. 00:35:51.040 --> 00:35:56.680 And so we ask tonight that you would show us the truth about us, remake us, reshape us, 00:35:56.679 --> 00:36:03.960 help us to see that in Jesus at the cross, at the cross, Jesus has poured forth mercy 00:36:03.960 --> 00:36:06.599 to a thousand generations. 00:36:06.599 --> 00:36:10.759 So we thank you, oh Lord, and help us to live into that tonight. 00:36:10.759 --> 00:36:11.759 We pray in Jesus' name. 00:36:11.760 --> 00:36:27.760 Amen.