Preached on 10-25-98

THE FIRST COMMANDMENT

A Sermon by the Rev. Patrick A. Rose

"I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me." (Exod. 20:2,3)

WHEN THE WRITINGS TALK ABOUT INTELLIGENCE, it is important to realize that they generally mean something quite different from what is commonly meant by this word in the world today. We are used to intelligence being regarded as a certain mental ability. There is much disagreement amongst psychologists as to just what intelligence is, but it is usually associated with certain mental abilities -- such as the ability to understand things, see relationships between them, figure things out, and reason about them. It is, however, regarded in a purely external way. A so-called intelligence test might ask someone to discover the pattern behind a series of numbers or letters. It might test mathematical or verbal ability. It might pose various problems which need a solution. Nevertheless, such a test does not probe deeply into the human mind. All it does is try to measure, to some degree, a type of external cleverness.

However, as we all know, the mere fact that somebody is clever does not preclude him from being stupid. So-called experts, people who may be brilliant in many ways, and who are thoroughly versed in their chosen fields, can sometimes do the most stupid things, and make the most idiotic mistakes. Nobody, however much of a genius he might be, is always right. Though he may know many things, and have great powers of reason, when it comes down to making important decisions, he is not necessarily going to make the right ones.

This, though, is what intelligence is. Intelligence, or intelligentia, as the term is used in the Writings, refers not so much to the power of reasoning and deduction, as to the ability to see, perceive and understand what is right. Especially is it the ability to see the truth -- the truth about what people should think, what they should believe, and, most important, how they should act.

In this sense intelligence is something few people feel they lack. Somebody might profess to being somewhat slow, somewhat less than a genius. He might freely acknowledge that there are many people who are a lot smarter than he is. But still he has his opinions. Moreover, he is quite likely to think that his own views on various things are the correct ones. Indeed, if people were honest with themselves, they would acknowledge that this is how they commonly define or think of truth. Truth is their own opinion. It is what they think. When two people argue, they both think that they possess the truth. To put it another way, they both think that they are right, and that the other person is wrong.

In one sense this is something we can smile about. It is human nature. It is so typical of human beings, so typical of all of us, that we will be convinced of our own views, and argue vehemently with one another, when obviously one or more of us must be wrong.

It is because of this that some people prefer to regard truth as relative. They tend to regard everything as a matter of opinion. They doubt whether there is such a thing as absolute truth. Indeed, they can cease to care whether a particular idea is true or not. But before somebody comes to regard all things as relative, relative to each person's opinion, he should realize that there is something very important, something very serious, at stake. Ideas, viewpoints, opinions and beliefs are important. They can be of the greatest significance, because people act upon them. Men will sometimes even fight for their ideas. Indeed, the whole of human existence is governed by the thoughts and beliefs that people have.

A thought, an idea, is one of the most powerful things there is. It might not be visible to the physical sight, but its effects most certainly are. Whole governments rise and fall on the basis of what people think about certain things. Wars have been fought, and millions have died because of men's differing ideas. And amongst the lesser concerns of mankind, individual beliefs and attitudes can prompt people to be cruel to one another, or else to extend kindness and consideration.

Ideas, ideas of what is true, what is right, what is important, are what govern the human mind. It is within the realms of individual minds that thoughts reign supreme. Here everything of the mind bows down and serves its cherished principles. Sometimes these principles are good. Sometimes they are downright evil. Some cherish above all the importance of serving their fellow-man. Others hold to the idea that a person must look after himself and not be overly concerned about others. Whatever an individual principle might be, and however wrong it might be, if a person believes it and cherishes it, then it rules his mind and his whole life. He in effect worships this principle, this belief that he has.

This is where men's gods, their idols, are to be found. They exist in their minds. Therefore it is to the mind especially that the first commandment of the Decalogue or Ten Commandments is addressed. When the Decalogue was first given it was addressed, initially, to a people who lived in a culture seemingly far different from our own. The peoples of the ancient world believed in many strange gods. They worshiped carved images, to which they sacrificed animals and even their own children. The Israelites who lived in this world of strange gods thus had to be forbidden from worshiping them. "You shall not make for yourself a carved imageCany likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. . . . " (Exod. 20:4-5).

So it is that in the literal sense this first commandment is addressed first of all to the Israelites, and to a primitive culture. Surrounded by many strange gods, the Israelites were absolutely forbidden from worshiping them. Indeed, they were not even allowed to make anything that might resemble an idol, lest they give way to temptation and begin to worship it. For us this commandment seems to have much less meaning. That terrible sin the Israelites committed, of making a molten calf and worshiping it, seems to us almost an incredible thing. Surely none of us have had the slightest inclination to make an idol and bow down and worship it. We of course know that we must worship the Lord alone, but because we have no desire to worship any other god, this first commandment seems to have little real importance for us, very little urgency about it. Though we may be tempted at times not to worship the Lord, we are hardly tempted to worship anybody else. This commandment seems to be addressed primarily to a time when even evil men were intensely religious, and when the whole world seemed filled with gods and idols.

But these ancient false religions have not really disappeared. They are still with us as much as they ever were. All around us people are worshiping their own gods, and we too are tempted to join them in this false worship. Today people are perhaps a little more sophisticated in their worship of idols. They don't carve images and bow down to them as they used to do in times gone by, and as they still do in certain primitive cultures even today. But they still have their gods. These false worships exist and flourish within their minds. After all, what is a god? A god is a powerful being, a source of life. A god is one who is worshiped and who governs his people.

We say that the Lord is our God. But what do we mean by this? Who is the Lord, and what do we mean when we say that He is God? That the Lord is God is the greatest truth of the church. Yet unless we think about what it means, it is just words. Who is the Lord? The Lord is the title by which we address a Man, a Man who came down to earth, and who, as Jesus of Nazareth, preached and taught, healed people, and did other miracles, and who, after being crucified, rose from the sepulcher and later ascended above the heavens. The Lord is none other than Jesus Christ, who is also Jehovah, the God of the Israelites.

And we believe He is God, the one and only God. What do we mean by God? We of course mean many things. We mean He is the one and only Creator of the Universe; we mean that He is all-powerful and all-knowing. We mean also that He rules all things. And so we mean that He governs, not just the external world, but also the internal world. He governs the world that exists within each individual mind. He governs our very thoughts and feelings.

It is here especially that we are to worship the Lord Jesus Christ as our God. He is to be our standard of truth, our standard of what is right. If we do not, in a very real way, allow the Lord to rule our very thoughts, rule the way we think, and rule the opinions we hold, then He is not truly our God.

All of us say such things as: "I feel that . . . " or "I think that . . . " We all have our opinions, our own ideas, our own thoughts on various matters. And to some degree all of us have a tendency to think that we are right, and that those who disagree with us are wrong. Of course we must think for ourselves. But we should beware lest we fail to listen to the first commandment. The Lord says to us: "I am the Jehovah your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me."

Jehovah God is of course none other than the Lord in His Divine Human, that is, the Lord's love appearing to us as a Divine Man who teaches us the truth. Jehovah refers to the Lord's love. God refers to His truth. "I am Jehovah your God." The Ten Commandments begin with this because this is the most important thing of all, and all the rest of the commandments are to be seen in the light of this. It reigns in everything that follows, for indeed it is to reign over everything in the human mind. We are to believe in and worship a Man, a Divine Man, who teaches us the truth, who is always right. We are not to think of Him in an abstract way. He is not just an abstract idea, some concept in our mind. No! He is not to be just one more of our own ideas. He is not an idea. He is another Person, somebody above and outside of ourselves, and somebody who, unlike ourselves, is always right. We are not to worship our own thoughts, our own opinions. We are to worship Him, and let His will govern our thoughts. This must be at the very center of our faith. We must believe in Him, believe that all that is good and true is from Him, and, above all, love it to be so (AC 8865:1).

This love is so important. People's own opinions and viewpoints tend to rule their minds. These principles are their gods. This is because they love their own opinions. They adore them. Indeed, what people think, how they view things, is always a product of their own loves. If they love themselves, they will believe above all that they are important. If they love the world, they will believe that the things of this world are more important than the things of heaven. And these beliefs, these opinions about what is right and what is wrong, will govern them in all that they do, because within these beliefs there is their ruling love.

On the other hand, the wonderful thing about loving the Lord as our source of truth, and not ourselves, is that we then reach upwards outside of ourselves to draw upon a greater wisdom, indeed the only source of wisdom and intelligence. If intelligence is essentially to see what is right, then true intelligence must be to see what the Lord teaches.

What are we? Are we really always right? It is a remarkable thing that most of us have opinions of many, many things, and scarcely ever stop to think that we might be wrong. But who are we? We are evil by inheritance. We tend towards all kinds of falsities. Our minds are dark and relatively dead -- devoid of heavenly life. This is why the Lord came to save us. We say that He is our Savior. But we cannot hold our own opinions as supreme and at the same time believe that He is our Savior. If He is our Savior, we need saving -- saving from our own evils, and the false concepts that these evils produce in our minds. These false ideas, false gods, enslave the mind. We need guidance. We cannot trust our own opinions. They are not reliable things by which to guide our lives. We need rescuing from being enslaved to them -- a slavery represented in the Word by captivity in Egypt. "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage."

People take their gods, their ruling ideas, very seriously. They love them and adore them. We can see this when the deeper principles which govern their lives are called into question. Take something like education. People will argue vehemently and earnestly about how children are to be educated, for involved are their ideas about the central purposes of life, the very purpose and nature of man. It is similar with subjects such as behavior during courtship, birth control, government, capital punishment, employment, abortion, and a host of other things. Almost everybody has his opinions. Almost everybody is sure he is right. Almost everybody gets excited when his beliefs are challenged.

But when it comes to issues such as these, even more important than whether or not a person's beliefs are right, is the source of these beliefs. Are his opinions, carved, as it were, out of his own limited experience, like man-made graven images? Are these viewpoints melted into shape by his own loves, by what he wants, like a molten calf? Or is he looking instead to a greater source than himself?

It is easy for us to protest that we must think for ourselves. We may even say that since the teachings of Divine Revelation are sometimes unclear, we must of necessity make up our own minds on such matters. But the fact that we must think for ourselves does not mean that we must think from ourselves -- that is, from our own limited experience and our own preconceptions. And if the teachings seem unclear, then all the more reason exists to go to these teachings, read them, think about them, and consider them for ourselves and see what they are telling us. This is why learning and considering the doctrines or teachings is so important. It is why, for example, we, as a church, have always laid great stress on the importance of doctrinal classes. Though we must, of course, think for ourselves, what we are especially to think about for ourselves is what the Lord is telling us, what He means, and thus why it is that He is right. Then indeed the Lord reigns. He is our God.

The principles we acquire from Him, the light He gives us, are to rule our thought in all areas of the mind. We may think concerning the heavens above -- about spiritual matters. We may think about the earth beneath -- the principles by which life on earth is to be governed. We may think about various facts we know -- the waters collected together under the earth. But whatever we think about, it is not to be a lifeless graven image -- a merely human likeness of truth. We are not to allow ourselves to worship, adore and be governed merely by our own limited thought. We are to be guided by the Lord. And we are to love being guided by Him. In this way we come to see things we never could see without Him. We come to love Him, adore Him and worship Him in all things; for He is Jehovah our God.

Amen.

Lessons: Exod. 20:1-6; AC 8867

© 1998 by the Rev. Patrick A. Rose