His law is love
Nancy Kennedy
This summer, my church is doing a sermon series about the Ten Commandments.
The pastor team titled it “Thou Shalt,” as opposed to “Thou Shalt Not,” because even though most of the commandments begin with a negative (“Don’t do this”), there’s always a positive aspect to all of the commandments.
They start out: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage” (Exodus 20:2), and then the first commandment — “You shall have no other gods before me.”
The second commandment is: Don’t make for yourself any idols.
God is the only God.
As the pastor pointed out last week, before all the “Don’t do this” commandments, God told his people, “I have set you free from your bondage, and here’s how you can keep from going back into it. Follow these commandments and you’ll be OK. Don’t follow them and you won’t flourish.”
It’s like your dad saying don’t touch the hot stove. But if you do it anyway, you’ll find out the hard, painful way what happens.
If you steal and get caught, you’ll get arrested. If you covet your neighbor’s wife, your neighbor might punch you in the face and your own wife won’t be too happy either.
God gave us commandments to keep us free from trouble, free from bondage to idols. His commandments are because he loves us.
Years ago at a women’s retreat, during a break I pulled out my bag of what I called “emergency chocolate” and started stuffing my face with it.
That’s when my friend said to me, “Chocolate is your idol.” I laughed it off, but her words stung and later I cried.
Earlier, the retreat speaker had asked us, “What holds you? What do you turn to first for comfort, pleasure, satisfaction, purpose or meaning in life?
“What do you think you can’t live without?”
If the answer is anything other than God, it’s a good indication that that’s an idol in your life, she said.
Want to know if something is an idol in your life? Ask: Is there something that’s TOO important to you? Is there a person, experience, possession, relationship, substance, position, ideology, etc. that if you can’t have it you get excessively angry, fearful, worried or despondent?”
For me, my biggest idol is security, followed by comfort, with a bunch of lesser, fleeting idols that change constantly.
Actually, my biggest idol is me. My comfort, my reputation, my perceived wisdom, my plans and agenda, my anxiety and worry and need to control my surroundings.
Everything that I allow to steal me away from experiencing God and the freedom of his grace that took me out of bondage to sin points to self.
So, what do I do about it? Willpower rarely works. I can’t grit my teeth and will myself to love God more. So I go back to the basics: “We love God because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19).
When I remember that God loves me first and perfectly, the lure of idols loses its power.
It’s a daily battle, and even though idols may look shiny and fun, they also lie in their promise of satisfaction.
But the more I remember that I am loved, the more I’m able to loosen my grip and let go of my worthless, disappointing idols.
Truly, God’s love is far greater than any idol, and his love makes following his commandments, not a burden, but a blessing intended for my safety and my flourishing.
His law is love, and his gospel is peace.Contact Nancy Kennedy at 352-564-2927 (leave a message) or email at nkennedy@chronicleonline.com.
