I recently had a chance to plan a Sunday School lesson of “the first commandment”…
(I use quote marks because the term common at Mount Sinai is “word” or “matter.” Maybe “rule” would cover the nuances better. It is not wrong to call them commandments. Jesus (Matthew 19:17), Paul (Ephesians 6:2), and Luke (23:56) refer to them as “commandments,” for instance. But it is not the word used in the Pentateuch, even though they are emphatically commanded by God to keep the Ten Words.)
When I set about the task, it surprised me that it did not seem obvious how to go about it. What point do you make about the First Word if you are not 1. Refuting atheism and defending theism, or 2. teaching a series on “The Doctrine of God,” or 3. teaching about the Trinity or the incarnation, etc.? In other words how do you exhort Christians to live better, or to amend their lives, to conform better to the First Word in a practical way?
I am YHWH your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me.
Deuteronomy 5:6–7 ESV
Obviously, this command is telling Christians to stay and become more loyal to God. As will prove significant: it is the negative command corresponding to the positive content of the “great commandment” (Matthew 22:36; Luke 10:27; Deuteronomy 6:5). But how do you explicate on the First Command without simply exhorting Christians to follow steadfastly and grow into obeying more fully the other Nine Words? It seems somewhat lame to simply beg your audience of professing believers to “love God harder.”
Team Sola Scriptura
In the context of the Decalogue delivered from God at Mount Sinai (Exodus 20:1-17), and then preached and transformed by Moses, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, to the next generation (Deuteronomy 5:6-21), the impetus of the First Word is to live by the Word of God as supreme in all of life for all the cosmos.
After all, Moses leads into the Decalogue, by reminding them how God spoke his word and they must live by that word:
And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them. YHWH our God made a covenant with us in Horeb. Not with our fathers did the LORD make this covenant, but with us, who are all of us here alive today. YHWH spoke with you face to face at the mountain, out of the midst of the fire, while I stood between YHWH and you at that time, to declare to you the word of YHWH. For you were afraid because of the fire, and you did not go up into the mountain. He said:
Deuteronomy 5:1–5 ESV
What follows the Decalogue is a long passage about living by God’s word and teaching the following generations to do the same. And embedded in that exhortation is THE GREAT COMMAND. This is clearly the way we keep the First Word. Below is a long passage, but take time to read it and think about it as an explication and application of the First Word.
These words YHWH spoke to all your assembly at the mountain out of the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice; and he added no more. And he wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me. And as soon as you heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness, while the mountain was burning with fire, you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes, and your elders. And you said, ‘Behold, YHWH our God has shown us his glory and greatness, and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire. This day we have seen God speak with man, and man still live. Now therefore why should we die? For this great fire will consume us. If we hear the voice of YHWH our God any more, we shall die. For who is there of all flesh, that has heard the voice of the living God speaking out of the midst of fire as we have, and has still lived? Go near and hear all that the LORD our God will say, and speak to us all that YHWH our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it.
And YHWH heard your words, when you spoke to me. And YHWH said to me, “I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. Oh that they had such a heart as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever! Go and say to them, ‘Return to your tents.’ But you, stand here by me, and I will tell you the whole commandment and the statutes and the rules that you shall teach them, that they may do them in the land that I am giving them to possess.” You shall be careful therefore to do as YHWH your God has commanded you. You shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. You shall walk in all the way that YHWH your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess.
Now this is the commandment—-the statutes and the rules-—that YHWH your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them in the land to which you are going over, to possess it, that you may fear YHWH your God, you and your son and your son’s son, by keeping all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear therefore, O Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that you may multiply greatly, as YHWH, the God of your fathers, has promised you, in a land flowing with milk and honey.
Hear, O Israel: YHWH our God, the YHWH is one. You shall love YHWH your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
And when YHWH your God brings you into the land that he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give you-—with great and good cities that you did not build, and houses full of all good things that you did not fill, and cisterns that you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees that you did not plant-—and when you eat and are full, then take care lest you forget YHWH, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is YHWH your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear. You shall not go after other gods, the gods of the peoples who are around you—-for YHWH your God in your midst is a jealous God—-lest the anger of YHWH your God be kindled against you, and he destroy you from off the face of the earth.
Deuteronomy 5:22–6:15 ESV
I used the term “team Sola Scriptura” in the subhead above. God had made a covenant with Israel and the First Word is built on that (“I am YHWH your God who” saved you). Likewise, Christians have been marked by the name of Father, Son, and Spirit (Matthew 28:19). The First Word tells us to be loyal and grateful to the One who loved us, called up into His company, and gave his Son up for us…
To trust in Him and to never compromise or lose confidence in His Word.
To love the true and only God with all our heart, soul, and strength.
The First Word means the Church is Team Sola Scriptura.