Bible Readings
Reading 53: A summary of Yahweh’s covenant with Israel: The Ten Commandments (Part 2)
Read Exodus 20:1–26. (Again!)
(Note: Today's reading is the second part of our look at the Ten Commandments.)
We will now look at the six commandments that are about how the people of Israel are to relate to each other.
We’ll see that God describes His design for mankind’s society and that living by His commands will result in a healthy, thriving society with the respect for each other, trusting relationships and the protection of lives at the centre of everything.
Commandment 5: Honour your father and mother
Recall that at Creation, after creating marriage, Yahweh created the divine institution of family. He designed families to be the basic unit of society. When parents are honoured, there will be healthy, thriving families that lead to healthy, thriving societies. For Israel, when families thrive, they will live long in the land that Yahweh gave them.
For a family to thrive, the children (no matter their age) must honour their parents. Honouring is more than showing respect and care for one’s parents. It is being willing to listen, obey and humble oneself before one’s parents. Honouring is based on the assumption that the parents are obeying the commandments too. If one’s parents are rebellious, then one has to exercise wisdom in how to honour the parents.
Commandment 6: You shall not murder
In Hebrew, the middle of a list contains the most important point. This commandment is in the middle because it is God’s priority for mankind. It focuses on life.
Yahweh is the God who creates life, saves lives and forms life-giving relationships with people. And so He instructs Israel to preserve and respect the life of every person, marriage, family and therefore, the whole of society. God wants life to thrive. And He demonstrates His love and care for the life of people through His good laws.
What’s more, Yahweh created mankind in His image. Every human reflects Him and so the life of every human is very important to Him. An attack on an image of God is an attack on Yahweh Himself.
Commandment 7: You shall not commit adultery
Marriage is the second divine institution that God created after responsible dominion. If family is the basic unit of society, then marriage is the centre of the family. God commands that marriage is to be honoured and protected.
No one is to disrupt or destroy a marriage, either their own or someone else’s. One of the purposes and gifts of marriage is sexual intimacy between husband and wife, resulting in children. By God’s design, the gift of sexual intimacy and children is for marriage alone.
This commandment provides the key to real social stability. Stable marriages lead to stable families. And stable families lead to stable societies.
Commandment 8: You shall not steal
This command is God’s way of granting people the right to private property. God had created people to work, and work produces wealth. God wants people to respect the fruits or results of each other’s labours. Whatever a person owns, produces or has received, belongs to that person. No one else has a right to take it away.
Commandment 9: You shall not give false testimony
Do not give false testimony means do not lie. Yahweh is full of truth and He expects His people to be truthful like Him. He knows that relationships and societies can only function and build trust if there is truth in communication. How can one trust another if no one speaks the truth? How can relationships be formed or business be conducted without truthful communication?
Commandment 10: You shall not covet
This final commandment is like the first—it deals with the focus of one’s heart. The first command was for Israel to have complete heart allegiance to Yahweh. This final command also deals with the heart. To covet was to dwell upon, or feed, the heart’s desire for anything that God says was sinful. People who desire things that are not theirs or that are sinful will begin breaking God’s laws in order to satisfy their desires. So Yahweh warns people to watch the desires of their hearts.
How did the people respond to the Ten Commandments?
The people reacted with deep respect to God’s display of His glory (the cloud, smoke, lighting, thunder and loud blast of the ram’s horn). In fact, they trembled with fear. Moses told them that God appeared in this awesome display of power to encourage them not to sin against Him by disobeying the laws He was giving them.
We are another group of God’s special people known as the church. Everyone who puts their faith in Christ for salvation belongs to God’s church-age family. As His children, God expects righteous behaviour from us so that we have good fellowship with Him and fellow believers. God has standards for His family.
What are those standards? God has revealed them in His Word. God doesn’t want us to remain as “spiritual babies” but to grow into spiritual maturity.
The Mosaic Covenant was made between God and the people of Israel. It’s not a contract with us who are church-age believers in Christ. But there are similar standards for church-age believers in the New Testament because it is the same God both in the Old Testament and New Testament. Just know that the specifics of the Mosaic Covenant are not for us to follow. Keep investing in reading the Bible so we know God better and know how to live.