Giving & Taking Life

On the first and last commandment

#1 What We Worship, We Become

“But their idols are silver and gold, made by human hands.

They have mouths, but cannot speak, eyes, but cannot see.

They have ears, but cannot hear, noses, but cannot smell.

They have hands, but cannot feel, feet, but cannot walk, nor can they utter a sound with their throats.

Those who make them WILL BE LIKE THEM, and so will all who trust in them.”

Psalm 115: 4-8

Never underestimate the importance of role models

“What people revere, they resemble…either for ruin or restoration”

GK Beale

“And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory…”

~ 2 Corinthians 3:18

#2 What We Worship Gives Us Life

My Sunday School confusion:

What’s with the 10th commandment?

“No lusting after your neighbor’s house—or wife or servant or maid or ox or donkey. Don’t set your heart on anything that is your neighbor’s.”

~ Exodus 20:17 (The Message)

Coveting is…

• The only prohibition among the 10 that even Christians gleefully flout (and may even ‘defend’!)

• The driver of our ‘liberal free-market’ system

• Today’s key factor of which causes us to get life APART from God!

But the serpent said to the woman, “You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God…”

“Man’s desire is the desire of…the Other”

Jacques Lacan

70-80% of the 10 Commandments are about what NOT to do!

“Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.

And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’

All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

~ Matthew 22: 37-40

Conclusion

• We fast from everything which tempts us with life

• We fast from our desires, the ‘engine’ of the world system

• We feast on God, our only true Life

“Love God, and do whatever you please…in that order.”

St. Augustine of Hippo