In the last few posts, I’ve been writing about how reading God’s word frequently and eagerly teaches us obedience to God. What exactly does that mean? What are we to obey? The world may laugh when I say that the Ten Commandments provide a complete pattern for the way of life we should live as christians. Some detractors may argue that following the Ten Commandments is a quaint and totally irrelevant habit in today’s world. Quaint? Maybe. Irrelevant. Absolutely not.
A few years ago, my Wednesday night bible study watched a video series on the 10 Commandments presented by Adrian Snell. (I highly recommend this series). For this and the next nine posts, I will be living up the to the name of this blog and will share with you the notes I wrote in the margins of my bible based on what Mr. Snell presented in the series. I think you will see how Mr. Snell makes each commandment relevant to today’s world and how he ties them all together to provide an essential map for navigating life in obedience to God.
The First Commandment:
You shall have no other gods before me. (Exodus 20:3)
My notes: I [God] am for you, not against you. God = Freedom. Do not accept any other authority over yourself except God. Work with Him. Do not be subject to the things WE have authority over. Love God without reserve. Friends [are] obedieny by choice.
The world may scoff and say “how can you have freedom with a God who has so many restrictive rules.” The first commandment, though, tells us that there is NOTHING and NO ONE in the world that has any authority over us except God (and those authorities that God puts over us for our good). The things of the world that He provides for our necessity and pleasure DO NOT have any authority over us. The world, the flesh, and the spiritual forces of evil have absolutely no authority over any christian if that christian puts God first and only. God is not against us. We are friends with God through Christ and friends subject themselves to another friend by choice, not be compulsion. There is no one over me because I chose to come to God through Jesus Christ.
To be continued………..
LJG (c) 2009
