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Voice Of Prophecy

Shawn Boonstra

No Other Gods

Today on the Voice of Prophecy, we're going to talk about why God insists on exclusivity, why he demands that you only worship Him.

So, if Christianity has ever seemed a little too exclusive for you, you might want to catch this episode.

We're going to look at some passages from the Bible, so if you have a Bible around the house somewhere, you might want to go and grab it, and I'll be right back.

Welcome to another edition of the Voice of Prophecy.

I'm your host Sean Boonstra, and today I'm going to be talking about the 10 Commandments.

And of course that's a topic that's always been a favorite for preachers who want their congregation to smarten up, and It's also a favorite topic for a lot of American Christians who are growing more and more concerned as they see public displays of the 10 Commandments being taken down from public places under pressure from different atheist groups or maybe even the ACLU.

So I know there's no shortage of preachers on the radio dial talking about the 10 Commandments, or at least talking about these political scraps in the classroom or the courthouse.

But today I want to do something just a little bit different.

I want to look at reasons why the 10 Commandments actually make sense for a good life on a personal level.

Today I want you to think about why you might consider making the 10 Commandments part of your life.

So let's forget for a moment about trying to create an American theocracy or forcing other people to keep the 10 Commandments.

What I'd like to do is have you consider why you might want to keep them, why you might want to make them a part of your life.

Let's just think about your own private life and ask why God gave us those 10 rules at all.

I mean, are God's 10 Commandments just some arbitrary list of rules that God came up with to make our lives hard?

Or is there actually some kind of benefit to keeping them?

Is there some kind of logic to the 10 Commandments.

And again I want to be really clear that I'm not advocating for a theocracy.

I might be a preacher but I absolutely do not believe in the marriage of church and state.

Apart from the Old Testament nation of Israel, The marriage of church and state has been an unmitigated disaster every time we've tried it.

History books are full of horror stories from people who tried to legislate religious morality, tried to force it on other people.

I mean it gave us such marvelous developments as the stretching rack or burning people at the stake.

I'm not advocating that Christians take over secular government and force their whole world to be Christian.

Because honestly, Forced religion isn't worth anything.

I mean you probably know the old poem, A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.

I mean you can use coercion to force someone to behave a certain way, But unless they actually believe it, unless they actually want it, you haven't accomplished anything except making them resentful.

If you have to force someone to worship God, that's not even worship.

And I can promise you, biblically speaking, that God doesn't want involuntary worship, involuntary obedience.

God's not interested in a coercive relationship because that would just be, well, slavery.

So I'm not going to talk about legislating morality And we're not going to talk about whether or not the 10 Commandments should be hanging in a courthouse or a school room, even though that could probably be a subject for another day.

What I want to do today, though, is talk about why God wants you to make His moral law a part of your life.

I want to talk about why you should give His 10 simple rules 1 more look.

So today I'm going to begin right at the top and we're going to look at number 1.

The commandment that says, you shall have no other gods before me.

Does He ask for it because He's afraid of the competition?

Is this because He's a God of force, a God who could only ever attract your attention by making worship compulsory?

Or is it because he knows what would happen if you choose to worship something or somebody else.

Well you can kind of find the answer in the book of Revelation where you find this incredible scene in Revelation 4.

There are heavenly beings worshiping God and in the process of worship they suddenly make this statement that gets right to the heart of why we worship the God of the Bible.

Here it is now, it's found in Revelation 4 verse 8.

It says, The 4 living creatures, each having 6 wings, were full of eyes around and within, and they do not rest day or night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come." These living creatures describe God as the 1 who was and is and is to come.

They're describing God as eternal, timeless, someone who exists outside the normal realm of our existence.

And then over in the book of Isaiah chapter 6 you have this very similar scene where the angels speak in a way that's very similar, and they describe God there as someone whose glory fills the whole earth.

So that means God is also part of our world.

So to use the language of philosophers, God is both imminent and transcendent.

He is both present here with us in this world, in His creation, but at the same time He exists apart from His creation, completely independent of it.

And that would mean that God is not a part, an integral part of His creation like the pantheists would tell you.

The Pantheists say God is in the rocks and in the trees and in the birds, but the Bible teaches God is distinct from His creation.

Now of course you can learn a lot about God by just observing the things He made, but the God of the Bible is not a pantheistic God.

But at the same time, God is not an absentee landlord, like the deists would tell you.

The deists say that God created this world and ran away from it and he's out there somewhere ignoring us.

The book of Isaiah says this earth is full of his glory.

He didn't just start the planet spinning and then head for some other corner of the universe.

He didn't leave us here to fend for ourselves.

So These are 2 things we know about the nature of God.

He is imminent here with us and He's transcended.

If you go back to Isaiah 6, when Isaiah sees God sitting on His throne, He suddenly feels very, very small.

He says, Woe is me, I am undone, I am a man of unclean lips, for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.

Isaiah shows us that there's something about standing in the actual presence of God that creates this sharp contrast between who God is and who we are.

You and I might be tempted to think we're the center of the universe but the very small handful of people who have actually seen God's throne in vision suddenly feel very small in His presence.

As they stand there, they have no question about whether or not God deserves to be worshipped.

So we have to come to the same conclusion some other way.

And in these 2 passages, Isaiah 6 and Revelation 4, there are some major clues that will help you piece the case together.

Why does God want us to worship Him exclusively?

Well, I'm going to take a short break and as soon as I come back, we'll start to unpack what the Bible actually says about that.

What does God say about why we should worship only Him?

Do you feel as if your life has lost its meaning, just moving from 1 task to another without any answers to the really important questions in life?

Like is it possible to have a fresh start and to find real happiness?

Well, the Discover Bible Guides will help you find the answers that you're looking for to this and to all of life's big questions.

Visit us at BibleStudies.com or give us a call at 888-456-7933 for your free Discover Bible Guides.

You can choose to study in the format that's most convenient for you.

You may either do the lessons completely online or have them mailed right to your home.

Both options are completely free of charge.

Visit BibleStudies.com and begin your journey today to discover answers to life's deepest questions.

You are listening to the Voice of Prophecy.

My name is Sean Boonstra, and today I'm tackling a question that honestly is too big for just 1 show.

But that's what we do here at the Voice of Prophecy.

We pick up these major, massive questions and we never have time to explore them fully.

But what I'm hoping is that we'll give you a place to start investigating these topics for yourself.

And if you contact us, we'll give you the resources you need to keep studying further.

The question that we're asking today is simple.

Why does God say in the 10 Commandments, you shall have no other gods before me?

And the really simple answer is there are no other gods.

And I know that's not the politically correct thing to say, but it is what the Bible teaches and I'm a Bible teacher.

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No Other Gods

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