NO OTHER GODS BESIDES ME
Today’s Text: Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. (Exodus 20:4-6)Today’s Thoughts: Only God is worthy of our worship. We must never reverence anyone or anything else. He is to be our only God and the only One we worship. God is a jealous God. Wouldn’t you be?! He created us and then He gave His Son to die in our place so He could keep us, and then we decide that He isn’t good enough and find other gods. When we sin – we reap the results. The results of sin often affect more than just the ones who sin – it can affect, as this text tells us, generations to come. But God doesn’t want us to choose the gods in this world, whatever they be, because He knows that any other god will only cause us pain. He wants us to have Him as our one and only God. If He is our God He will be merciful to us. If we choose Him, love Him and obey Him He will have mercy on us. I want the Lord to be merciful to me and bless me. I want to place Him as First and Foremost and All in All. I want Him to be my everything. How about you?
Today’s Testimony: God might be first in our lives, but do we have other gods as well? When the Lord gave the Ten Commandments the other nations were worshipping graven images, more commonly known as idols. We do still have idols today, but those are not the only gods we can have. This commandment I often used to skim over as I did with many of the others. For instance the one that says, “Thou shalt not kill.” I didn’t really think I had to worry too much about that one because I would never kill anyone on purpose, but there is far more to this commandment than what it appears to be. I found the same with the second commandment. I don’t have or worship any idols so I thought I didn’t have to worry about this one. The way I’ve rephrased it is the way I now understand this commandment – “No other gods besides me”.
A god can be anyone or anything that occupies a special place in your heart. No, I’m not saying that everyone and everything that occupies a special place in your heart is a god, but those things are what can become gods. A god usually has some sort of control over our lives. For instance: how does fashion affect the way you dress? How do your friends affect the way you speak and act? Do TV, movies, books and games have an influence on your mind? Does food appeal to you more than it should? Are you over-concerned about your weight? Are there any forms of entertainment you would hate to miss? What matters to you in this life? Have you got any gods other than the one true God?
I think most of us, if not all of us, have things in our lives that have a very important place in our hearts. We need to be sure that God is our only source of strength, peace and joy and that nothing else is ever good enough. We need to run to God when we’re in need and to no one and nothing else. It’s when we try and find peace in someone or something other than God that we become more dependent on other gods. The peace this world can offer is only temporal – God’s peace is eternal. The benefit of having God as our one and only God is that we can have eternal peace no matter what troubles we face, because we always run to the only one who can solve our problems. We can be content when all else fails and disappears – God will always be there. If we only follow the Lord’s will for our lives we will be far happier than if we followed the will of others and our own will. God knows what’s best for us. He will have mercy on us if we choose Him as our One and Only. Life is sweeter with only one God!
Today’s Task: Today’s message is the hardest one for me to follow, even though I used to think it didn’t apply to me. We all need to find our only source of peace, strength and joy in our Lord Jesus Christ. If we need to feel valued – we need to find that sense of value in knowing that Christ valued us enough to give His life for us and that he still cares about us so much. God is ALL we need. Today’s task is simply to remember that and to give God our hearts – the whole thing.
Today’s Thanks: O Lord we praise You that You are our God. Please help us to have no other gods besides You. We thank You for the peace, joy, strength, sense of value and all our other needs that only You can provide. Please help us to run to You and to You alone. All earthly gods are only temporal peace-givers and will never fill those empty spaces in our hearts. Lord I thank You that You want to fill every heart and that You have not just left us to battle on alone without Your mercy. I thank You for the benefit of making You our One and Only and All in All. Please help us, we are so weak. Lord please be our Everything. We love You Lord. Amen.
