No Other gods
Scripture: Exodus 20:1-3
Deuteronomy 5:32-33: “You shall be careful therefore to do as the Lord your God has commanded you… You shall walk in all the way that the Lord your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess.”
I. You have no other gods before God by faithfulness to God alone.
A. The 10 commandments begin with a history lesson in Exodus 20:2: “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” God defeated the gods of the Egyptians through the 10 plagues. Isaiah 45:5: “I am the LORD, and there is no other; besides me there is no God.” There is one God, there is no god but God, and there is no rest for any who rely on any god but God. “Now the time came for Elizabeth to give birth, and she bore a son. And her neighbors and relative heard that the Lord had shown great mercy to her, and they rejoiced with her.” (v57-58)
II. You have no other gods before God by forsaking all other gods.
A. The idols we worship today are usually not made of metal. Usually, our idols are instead made in our hearts and kept in our hearts. In the prophet Ezekiel’s day, God said to his prophet in Ezekiel 14:3: “Son of man, these men have taken their idols into their hearts, and set the stumbling block of their iniquity before their faces.” The human heart is an idol factory. We make one idol after another and worship those many idols.
B. An idol is usually a good thing that you turn into a God thing. It’s a good thing that you turn into a supreme thing. Three questions help us determine what has become an idol to us. What do you love more than God? What do you trust more than God? And what do you obey more than God? Your idols want to enslave you and oppress you. But Jesus only wants to free you to live the blessed life that God designed you to live. Forsake your idols. Worship Jesus instead.
III. You have no other gods before God by following Jesus.
A. The first commandment says you shall have no other gods before me. Jesus is God, the second person in the Trinity. Hebrews 1:3: “(Jesus) is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature.” When we follow Jesus, we will kill the idols in our hearts that Jesus reveals to us. Colossians 3:5: “Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.” After we kill our idols, we bury them. See Genesis 35:4.
Application:
Follow Jesus alone. Kill and bury your idols.
Sources:
The Bible
“Counterfeit Gods by Timothy Keller/Books on the 10 commandments by Kevin DeYoung, J.I. Packer, Jen Wilkin and Philip Ryken.