Number One

I’ve been thinking this week about baseball. The end of the season is here. The playoffs are beginning. The World Series is not far away. Sometimes watching a baseball game takes me back to the Little League games of my childhood. I wasn’t so hot in the field, but I was not too shabby with a bat, particularly in pee-wee league where they used a pitching machine. I remember when I was learning to hit, my coach kept reminding us of the No. 1 rule in hitting. Do you remember what it was? Keep your eye on the ball. If you did nothing else in the batter’s box, you had to watch the ball. I wish I had a nickel for every time I heard that growing up. It was rule No. 1, the main lesson in hitting. If you take your eye off the ball, you will not get a hit. You will only strike out. If you did keep your eye on the ball, however, the rest of the fundamentals started to work.

Today’s scripture is one of the fundamental passages of our faith. The Ten Commandments are important. Our kids learn them in Sunday School and VBS. They’re posted in various places from public buildings to key chains. Today I’d like to take a close look at commandment No. 1. In the same way that watching the ball is rule No. 1 in hitting, having no other gods before the Lord is rule No. 1 of the Christian life.

It’s helpful to remember the commandments were given to God’s people at a particular place and time. Keep in mind they were wandering in the wilderness, headed toward the Promised Land. Over the last few weeks we’ve heard time and time again how the people forgot about God’s faithfulness in the face of Pharaoh’s army, hunger, and thirst. Each time, God provides for their needs in miraculous ways, revealing himself and rescuing His people.

Now, at the mountain of God, the Lord speaks: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, you shall have no other gods before me” (20:2-3, NRSV). Notice the first words God says are “I AM.” This takes us right back to the burning bush, where God introduced himself as “I AM who I AM.” It is important to remember the commandments are not just rules from God. They are founded in the very nature of God. The Lord, who is the “I AM,” is the one who brought them out of Egypt. He kept them safe during the plagues and the Passover, brought them through the Red Sea, and provided for them in the wilderness. It was the Lord, “I AM who I AM; I will be who I will be,” who did those things. Through those signs, God was revealing himself as the one true God. Therefore, the people are to have no other gods before Him. He is to be first in their lives. This is commandment No. 1.

I am convinced each of the remaining commandments are derived from No. 1: if the people truly worshipped God as first in everything, murder, adultery, covetousness and the like will cease. Every way we sin against God involves putting someone or something else in the top spot in our lives. It’s especially dangerous to put ourselves in God’s spot. Whenever we say in our hearts, “I want my way more than I want God’s way,” acts of sin soon follow. When, however, we get the first commandment right, and have no other gods before Him (not even ourselves), we discover what loving God and loving our neighbor is all about. It’s very hard to sin against our brothers and sisters when God is truly No. 1 in our lives. We’ve got to keep our eye on the ball.

As we think about the commandments this morning, we must go deeper than the court cases and school board meetings. Simply displaying the Ten Commandments will not change our world. God’s people must live by them. Instead of using the commandments as a club with which to brow-beat “sinners,” how would our lives (and our church) change if we all truly lived-out the first commandment? What would happen we lived every moment with no other gods but the Lord? To me, that sounds like holiness of heart and life. It sounds like the kind of community of faith that can change the world. And it happens as we keep our eye on the ball.

	Pentecost Sunday May 11, 2008
	Trinity Sunday May 18, 2008
	May 25, 2008
	June 1, 2008
	June 8, 2008
	June 15, 2008
	June 22, 2008
	June 29, 2008
	July 6, 2008
	July 13, 2008
	July 20, 2008
	July 27, 2008
	August 3, 2008
	August 10, 2008
	August 17, 2008
	August 24, 2008
	August 31, 2008
	September 7, 2008
	September 14, 2008
	September 21, 2008
	September 28, 2008
	October 5, 2008
	October 12, 2008
	October 19, 2008
	October 26, 2008
	November 2, 2008
	November 9, 2008
	November 16, 2008
	November 23, 2008