The fifth commandment is, “Honor your father and your mother.” Or, as God says in Leviticus, “Every one of you shall revere his mother and his father.” God gets heavy with us in this command. That’s what the Hebrew word for honor means. Heavy. Weighty. It is the same word the Old Testament uses to speak of the glory of God, and of the weight of divine majesty and authority that He has. So to honor...  Read More

I wonder which of the Ten Commandments is violated most often, even by those who know Jesus? I would guess the fourth commandment is near the top. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” I am just thinking of the sheer numbers of people who say they follow Jesus but do not gather with a local expression His body. Or the people who belong to God but work every day of the week. Or if they don’t...  Read More

The third commandment, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain” could be paraphrased, “You shall not lift up the name of the Lord your God into nothingness.” There are many ways we can do this, and perhaps the most obvious one is with profanity. When God saves, He begins the process of sanctification, often dealing with the “big sins” first. When I trusted Christ as a teenager, I...  Read More

How does the second commandment relate to us today? “You shall make no carved images…(to) bow down to them or serve them.” How should we be warned or exhorted from this commandment? I hope none of us have idols in our homes. No images made of stone, wood, metal, or any other material that we kneel before and worship. But remember, the commandments are aimed at our hearts, not our knees. What are s...  Read More

In 2015, Lex Bayer and John Figfor, wrote a book entitled, “Humanist heart, Atheist Mind.” To help get information for the book, they offered $10,000 to a would-be atheist Moses who could produce the best answers in a “Ten Non-Commandments Contest.” Interesting that they wanted to find some rules to follow…just not the ones God gave us. Here’s a sampling of what they thought the best non-commandme...  Read More

The scene in Exodus 19 is one that Universal Studios cannot hope to capture. They could try to duplicate the noise of thunder and the flash of lightning and the cloud and the smoke and the blaring trumpets and the fire. They may even be able to make a mountain tremble. But that would not be enough. No one could show us what two million people saw that day on Mt. Sinai. Because the Lord had come do...  Read More

Moses shared with his father-in-law Jethro the story of God’s deliverance of His people from slavery. He told him about the plagues and the parting of the Red Sea that led to their salvation. He told him about the trials and troubles they had faced since the Red Sea, and he told him “how the LORD had delivered them.” Moses witnessed to dear old dad-in-law, telling him ALL that the Lord had done!Sa...  Read More

You all know this story well. Just a few weeks after God delivered His people from slavery in Egypt, they were attacked by the Amalekites, who cowardly targeted the stragglers in the back of the procession. That led to Moses commissioning Joshua to gather men who would fight a battle the next day.  Men died on the battlefield, but God did not inspire Moses to write about the costs, how many men di...  Read More

When the children of Israel got to Rephidim in the wilderness, there was no water. They complained, just as they had at Marah where the water was undrinkable. God had healed the water there, but their memories were short, as ours often are. So they threatened Moses to the point that he thought they would stone him. He cried out to God and the Lord had him pass before the people with a few elders a...  Read More

Every day except Saturday, the people of God went out in the morning and gathered manna. On Saturday they rested. But every day but Saturday they went out and got their food for the day. Fresh bread. Fresh provision from God. Fresh opportunity to trust that morning by morning when they opened their tent flaps and stepped out, it would be there. Manna from heaven. Which gave them a fresh occasion t...  Read More

You may have heard the story about the monk who joined a monastery and took a vow of silence. After the first 10 years his superior called him in and asked, “Do you have anything to say?” The monk replied, “Food bad.” After another 10 years the monk again had opportunity to voice his thoughts. He said, “Bed hard.” Another 10 years went by and again he was called in before his superior. When asked ...  Read More

“Then Moses made Israel set out from the Red Sea.” The word there is forceful, meaning Moses had to pull them up or to pluck them out. I love that because I would imagine the pillar of cloud started to move and the people did not budge. They had been on a mountaintop like we cannot begin to imagine. It was on this seashore that they had seen the hand of the Lord move in a powerful way and they res...  Read More