Welcome to the preaching ministry of Tri-City Baptist Church in Chandler, Arizona. Our desire is that God would be magnified through the preaching of His Word, and that Christians would be challenged, strengthened, and edified in their personal walk with Christ. Excellent message in that song, reminding us of the importance of being open to the Word of God. that He that has ears to hear would truly hear, and that we would apply God's Word faithfully, that we would love Him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. I want to invite you to take your Bibles and turn with me to Exodus chapter 20 in the Old Testament. We are continuing our study of the Ten Commandments, coming to the Second Commandment this morning. If you are using the Bibles there in the chairs, it's on page 52. We began a couple of weeks ago looking at the overview of the Ten Commandments, and then last week in looking at the first commandment. The first four commandments go to the heart of worship. It really speaks of worship that honors God. And that's interesting because we know that it's speaking of the Mosaic Law. We don't often think of law and worship coming together. And yet that's what we find in these first four commandments. The idea of worship is the adoration and worth-ship of the one to whom we are coming. So it's not first and foremost about us or our feelings or our emotions or what we like, but who God is and His character and what He likes. You know, coming out of the Protestant Reformation, there was a... element of debate as to what would be allowed in worship. It was one of the issues that came up and the issue of the use of images in worship. And there were a couple of different positions. One position was the regulative principle which said that God is to be worshiped only as He has said in Scripture and not adding anything else. The other was the normative principle that said God can be worshipped in any way that He has not expressly forbidden in Scripture, as long as it doesn't go too far out of bounds. And for a while, this was a major debate in the church. I think more recently, the church has not focused on those aspects, but on what people like. We hear about, and if you've been in churches for a while, you may have heard about the worship wars. where the focus was particularly in the area of music on personal preference, style, and what individuals liked. And so rather than the normative or the regulative principle, people operated by what one pastor called the effective principle. How does it affect me? And if I like it, then it's okay, and if you say anything against it, you're a legalist, a Pharisee, or you're trying to put God in a box. Well, we're not trying to put God in a box, but we do want to keep within God's Word, within the Bible. And rather than operating according to personal whims, to understand what pleases God. That biblical worship must involve our emotions, our affections, but it also must be accurate in understanding who God is, His character, and His will as He is revealed. What pleases God cannot be left out of the discussion. In fact, according to John 4, God is to be worshiped in spirit and in truth, with our affections but also with accuracy. And one of the Lord's statements of condemnation to Israel was that these people honored Him with their lips, but their hearts were far from Him. Their hearts were distant. So there must be heartfelt, compassionate worship. There must be an element of our heart's passion. Do you find it difficult to find that balance? Have you ever been in a situation where you walked out saying, wow, those people were passionate? That was heartfelt. That was exciting. Some time ago during my travels, I visited a place I'd wanted to attend for some time, and the moment I arrived, to be honest, I felt the energy. My attention was captivated by what I saw. The building itself was impressive and designed to be very intentional. The people were friendly, they were happy. They smiled and fellowshiped with each other, even in the parking lot. Now, granted, it wasn't 100 degrees and molten asphalt. But there was a friendliness that was unmistakable. We were greeted even before we entered the building, and when we got to our seats, the people around us were friendly. They were talkative. Most of the people got there early, and from the opening announcement, it was evident that everything being done was purposeful. The singing was energetic. I have to admit, I didn't know several of the songs, but most of the folks seemed to know all the lyrics. They had them memorized, and they sang with enthusiasm. When it came to giving, people had no hesitation in opening their wallets. No one seemed concerned about the time either. And when it was over, as people were leaving, you could still sense the joy and exhilaration. And I have to say, from the moment I arrived on the property until the moment I left, I observed something that was passionate. Wow, that was heartfelt. But it wasn't a church service. I was at the University of Michigan football game. You thought I was describing a worship experience, and in a sense, I was. Because worship means to be devoted, to be full of admiration, to have respect, and to perform acts of adoration. And it was a great experience. I thoroughly enjoyed it. But I wonder, what else could you call the fact that the big house in Ann Arbor has had over 100,000 people for every game since 1975? regardless of the weather. And last season, the average attendance was 110,246 people, making it the number one football team, at least in attendance. And I revel in that, knowing that Ohio State was number three and Georgia was number nine, at least in attendance. Okay, I've gone to meddling. You know, it was an enjoyable time. I would love to go back and do it again. But you can have exciting, heartfelt, emotional experiences without Jesus Christ being present. Say, well, you know, you didn't look at it as a religious experience. No, you're right. But do we understand how excitement can detract us? And we can begin to say, that was a great experience. So, if it's in a church context, it must be good because of how it impacted me. We need to make sure that we evaluate things biblically and not be led astray simply by excitement and assume that must indicate true worship. What I want us to understand from the second commandment when we come to worshiping God spiritually is that your worship of God must be spiritual. It has to have spiritual purity and be in harmony and keeping with God, how God has revealed himself in his word. that we must worship in spirit, yes, but also in truth. That brings us to the purity of how God has revealed Himself. And this is the essence of the second commandment that we find here in Exodus 20. If you have your Bibles open, follow with me. I'm going to begin reading in verse 1. We're going to get the context, considering, again, the first commandment as it leads us into the second. Exodus 20, beginning in verse 1. And God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord your God. who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage, you shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them nor serve them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God. visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing mercy to thousands to those who love Me and keep My commandments." Let's look to the Lord in prayer. Father, as we look into Your Word this morning, we pray that our hearts would reflect what we have sung just a few moments ago. Open our ears that we would hear what Your Word has to say, that our hearts would be open and that we would be submissive to Your truth, that we would truly worship in spirit and in truth, knowing that You seek such worshipers. Work in our hearts, for we ask this in Christ's name, amen. Last week we considered the first commandment. The first commandment really challenges us in the area of worship that we are to love, we are to worship God exclusively. We are to love Him with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, but there is to be an exclusivity to worshiping Him. It's really telling us who we're supposed to worship. You shall have no other gods. And so what we considered is the prohibition here is it prohibits atheism. It prohibits agnosticism because there is a God and He has revealed Himself. It prohibits polytheism and pantheism, worshipping lots of gods or everything as God. It prohibits syncretism, the idea of mixing the worship of the true God with other things. And the idea was not simply that God gets to the front of the line. You shall have no other gods before me. I get first place in the God procession. No, it's no other gods literally before my face. Well, where is God's face? Everywhere. So no other gods. The idea for Israel as they received this commandment was worship God alone. And it really is focused on the object of our worship, who God is. The second commandment is that we are to worship God spiritually. It comes to how we are to worship. Now, if you read the second commandment alone, beginning in verse four, you might naturally think it refers to not worshiping the images of other gods other than Jehovah. But isn't that what the first commandment said? Yes. So it's really not focused on other gods, it's focused on the manner of our worship. Theologian Charles Hodge said, idolatry consists not only in the worship of false gods, but also in the worship of the true God by images. And so this is what we're seeing here, and there are several things that we need to consider. The principle, the first thing I want us to understand, the principle caution concerning worship, or the predominant concern, is that not all worship is acceptable to God. And that's what we find in this passage. We must be careful that we don't assume that our worship is acceptable because we feel good about it. We have to ask, what does God think? If you remember, last week we talked about the scene that we find in 2 Samuel 6, where 30,000 of the choice men of Israel were brought with music, with harps, with lyres, with tambourines, with cymbals, and there was this tremendous excitement and celebration and rejoicing because the Ark of the Covenant was being brought back to Jerusalem. What an amazing emotional experience that must have been until the oxen stumbled. and Uzzah reaches up and grabs the ark so that it won't fall, and God kills him. What emotional whiplash. To go from the thrill and excitement of the ark returning to seeing Uzzah lying dead on the ground and thinking, what just happened? And why would God do that? Because Uzzah was obviously sincere in his concern for the ark. And as we mentioned, what happened was Uzzah failed to realize his sinfulness before a holy God. He thought he was cleaner than the ground. And what it says in that passage, even though David was angry, it says that God did this because of Uzzah's irreverence. Irreverent worship irritates God. And we need to understand that not all worship is acceptable. And secondly, do not worship the true God in the wrong way. That's what this commandment is warning against, that God is not pleased if we worship Him even as the true God in a way that is false or irreverent. That's why we have to be concerned about this. And we may not all agree, and there's going to be differences of opinion, and I get that. But the question can't be, well, whose opinion should rule? It ought to be, okay, how can we get closest to the image of God? and how He has revealed Himself in Scripture. How do we worship Him in truth and with the right spirit? See, worship must be of the right God in the right way. That God must be worshiped with spiritual purity as He has revealed Himself in His Word. And what we find is, we find in Scripture that God is spirit. So using images is prohibited. And it's interesting because in verse four, there are actually two different Hebrew words that are used in this verse that are dealing with images. The first one speaks of those carved images. The idea is something that's been chiseled, something that's been cut. But the second word is translated any likeness. This refers to some form or representation. And note the extent of the prohibition in verse 4. You shall not make for yourself a carved image or any likeness of any thing. It's okay, but there's probably geographical limits, right? Spatial limitations. No, then it goes on and says, anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth, that pretty much covers everything. From heaven above, angels, to the earth, to the water, and notice it doesn't say, you shall not use any bad images. That you can use good images but not bad images. And it doesn't say you need to have a limited number of images. You know, keep it to a half dozen. Two from heaven, two from earth, two from the water. No, it says none. Now, the prohibition is repeated, and it's actually repeated at the end of this chapter. If you look down at verses 22 and 23, it's reiterated. The Lord said to Moses, that thus shall you say to the children of Israel, you have seen that I have talked with you from heaven. You shall not make anything to be with me. Gods of silver, gods of gold, you shall not make for yourselves. So it's stated as the second commandment. It's reiterated toward the end of the same chapter. The prohibition is broad. So does that mean that we can't have pictures or sculptures of anything that's living? Or a sculpture of an angel? Does that mean we need to be checking what the children's church papers are? What they're coloring today? Or the pictures of angels that we had on PowerPoint? at Christmas, at the resurrection, is that a violation? No, it's not. Well, how do you know that? Just because that's what you've done. No, because God gives us direction. In Exodus 25, beginning in verse 18 and following, God gives instructions for the tabernacle. And one of the things He tells them, He directs that there would be two cherubim, angels, those are things in heaven, to be sculpted and placed on top of the Ark of the Covenant at both ends of the mercy seat. And so this was God's command. In Exodus chapter 36, God gives instructions for the artistic designs for the curtains of the tabernacle. And woven into the curtains for the holy of holies were to be the images of cherubim. We read in Numbers 21 when Israel is griping and complaining in the wilderness, and God sends serpents because of their disobedience and their rebellion to bite them. And God instructs Moses, when Israel repents, God instructs Moses to make a bronze serpent and put it on a pole and hold it up. And it says, those that will look to that in repentance will live. So we know it's not a prohibition against anything that's carved, that God's not prohibiting every picture, every image, even in a place of worship like the tabernacle. In fact, Solomon did it in the temple. So what is the prohibition? Well, if you look at verse 5, it gives us a little bit more, and we'll answer. I know there's going to be questions about what it says of God's jealousy, but notice what it says, that God visits the iniquity. And I want to draw your attention to that. It says that you shall not bow down to them or serve them, and that God visits the iniquity. So the idea of bowing down is bending the body, praying before those images. So it's not wrong to use pictures as representations or to use them as children's coloring pages, but it would be wrong if your children take them home and start praying before them and say, these are my worship aids. I just seem so much closer to God with my coloring page. That's going to be a problem. Because, well, you say, well, what harm can there be if it gets me closer to God? And that's the second thing I want us to see from this, the practical concern regarding improper worship when we remember that God is Spirit is that images distort and dishonor God. True spiritual worship is perverted by making material objects to represent the Creator or any of His creation as the focus or as aids to worship the true God. Because true worship then becomes perverted by showing the religious devotion to such objects. And the word I mentioned, iniquity, in verse five, is the Hebrew word that means to twist, to bend, or to distort. So the issue is not sincerity, but rather fidelity. Are we being faithful to the truth? The truth of who God is must not be twisted or bent. Well, how can that happen? I think there's several things that can happen. One is it conceals who God is. That one of the problems with these elements, with images, is they conceal the truth of who God is. Have you ever had somebody take a picture of you and you looked at it and said, that's not a good picture of me? Or you might even say, I don't take good pictures. What do we mean by that? That somehow the camera mixed up the pixels that somebody turned on a funny filter and, you know, gave us a cat face or something like that. No, normally what we mean is it doesn't really capture us. It doesn't capture our essence. Our eyes aren't quite open. We don't look like ourselves. We're putting food in our mouth. I mean, how many pictures do we have like that? I have certain pictures of my family, of my kids and my grandkids that I just love them because it seems to capture the sparkle in their eye or a little bit of their personality. And then I have other pictures that I've taken and I just delete them and say, yeah, that's not a good picture. Well, but it captured what there was at that moment. True, but it's not a good representation of the individual. Well, how do you represent an infinite God in a picture? If that happens with us, and we are human, we are material beings as well as immaterial, how do you capture God who is spirit? in a material way. Because even by the very essence of that, it's going to conceal. J.I. Packer, in his excellent work, Knowing God, said this, the heart of the objection to pictures and images is that they inevitably conceal most, if not all, of the truth about the personal nature and character of the divine being whom they are to represent. It's like, yes, the intent is to represent God, but it's going to fail. because it's going to conceal so much of who he actually is. The second thing it does is it corrupts who he is. The image is limited, it actually limits the finite. Do you remember when Moses, before going back into Egypt, as God speaks to him in the burning bush and says, I'm gonna send you to deliver my people, and do you remember Moses' question when he asked God his name? Do you remember how God answered? In Exodus 3, verse 14, he says, I am who I am. How do you draw a picture of that? How do you represent I am with an image? See, the problem is it ends up corrupting because it twists our thoughts of God when we limit our thinking to a painting or a carving or a picture or some image. And we may smile at the idea of a child's coloring page, help them get closer to God as a worship aid, but do we think our adult creations are viewed like God as any different? I mean, is He really going to hang up our images on His refrigerator and say, that is a perfect example of who I am? Do we understand that anything we would do is going to, by nature of what it doesn't show, corrupt who God is? The third one is it confines. It limits God to where that representation is. He ends up being localized. I mean, how many people go to a certain place because they think there they will feel closer to God? That, yes, we come together to worship corporately, But you ought to be worshiping God at home, with His Word, in a private time, coming before His face. There are people who will make trips around the world because they think that location, that statue, that cathedral, that place will bring them closer to God. And in essence, what it does is it confines God to a location. That somehow that location has some special spiritual power or essence. And in doing that, it distorts who God is, that He is infinite, that He is everywhere, that He is omnipresent, that He is all-knowing, that He is all-powerful. The image locks up the infinite, transcendent, limitless, eternal God in time and space. And the truth is, people want to do that. We want that power. I mean, how many people want protection while they're driving? And I agree, we need divine protection while we're driving, but not to try to get it from a statue or something hanging from the rear-view mirror. that we want God's power. I mean, people want this. When we moved to Maine many years ago, when we purchased our home in Maine, we purchased it in the fall and then went through the winter, and in the next spring, my wife was planting flowers along the walkway in our front yard, and as she was digging, she dug up this little statue that was buried there. It was a statue of a saint, the saint who's supposed to help you sell your house. It's St. Joseph, the patron saint of house hunters. And he had been buried there. And the former owners were trusting this image to help sell the house. You say, well, did it work? I mean, you bought it. Well, we did. But the house had sat vacant for two years on the market. And when we bought it, the market was down, and so we paid $50,000 less than the previous owner had when he had bought it many years earlier. I don't know about you, but if it were me and my hope was in that patron saint of real estate, I'd be tempted to lose my faith. Two years vacant and lose all that money. But what were they trying to do? In some way get God's power and control God. It confines God. And understanding the danger, the problem of this, recognizing that there are these problems, these aspects that are taking place as we would seek to do that, and ultimately it controls God. How can I get His power? How can I use God to accomplish my purpose? And recognizing all of this distorts who God is. Yes, we can come to Him in prayer. Yes, we ought to pray for safety as we travel. And I know with our Kenya team, I remember especially when I was over in Kenya and we'd get in the car and Pastor Messler would say, we need to pray. And once we got on the roads, I said, I understand why. The more I drive the 101, the 202, I think we need to pray. But we're not trying to control God with an image. We're simply interceding, Lord, protect us. And we're told to pray that. But the other side of it is not only does it distort and dishonor God, images deceive and degrade people. And that's the second aspect of this that is the problem with improper worship. Images are deceptive because they convey that false idea that they are somehow going to help, and yet they're inadequate representations. If you remember last week, we looked at Exodus chapter 32. It's the golden calf incident. If you're familiar with that, it's the story that Moses is up on Mount Sinai, he's receiving this law from God, and because he delays, Israel gets impatient. And they're frustrated because Moses hasn't come down, and they don't know what's happened, so they go to Aaron, Moses' assistant, his brother, and they said, look, we don't know what's happened to Moses, make us gods. And he said, okay, give me your gold. So they give him gold. Aaron then forms the golden calf. And if you remember the context, and we mentioned this, but I think it's an important aspect because Aaron doesn't say, okay, now you have a pagan god. He doesn't say, this is the god that we brought out of Egypt. No, he says, this is the true god who brought you out of Egypt. He said, tomorrow is going to be a feast to Yahweh. we're going to worship the true God with an image. And these are the people who had experienced personally God's amazing power. I mean, we began our reading this morning with verse one, as the Lord speaks in verse two, he says, I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt. This was just months earlier. with all of the plagues that had probably taken place over a number of months, and then they get to the Red Sea, and the waters part, and they go through on dry land, and then the army comes after them, and the waters close over, and the army is destroyed. Egypt is decimated, and Israel is saved. They had seen God's power. And the bull was a picture of power. And I suspect that was probably Aaron's thinking. Pastor Larry was talking about how in the museum in London, there are many images from that time of bulls, that this would be a picture of tremendous power. They probably used bulls to pull their carts out of Egypt. So it's a representation of what God had done, one of those things on earth. And it was an exciting scene. When you read the passage in Exodus 32, there was music, there was excitement, they were dancing, they were shouting, and not only was the bull a picture of tremendous power, it was also a picture of sexual power. And the whole scene went into moral debauchery. God speaks to Moses on Mount Sinai and says here's what Aaron said This is the God that brought you out of Egypt get down and deal with them God wasn't pleased even though there was sincerity It's an amazingly shocking scene that here is Moses on Mount Sinai receiving this word that says you shall have you shall not make carved images and Israel's doing exactly that and But they were sincere, they wanted to worship. Aaron said, it's the God who brought you out. See, the extent the image fails to tell us the truth of God is the extent to which we fail to worship Him in truth. And understanding that, you know, it's easy for us to think of, well, they shouldn't have done that. It's easy to picture the violations to this commandment as bowing down before false gods, like pictures that I took in Singapore this summer, like the celestial lamp demon that I saw in one of the Buddhist temples, or the statue of the multi-armed Buddha. I don't know what the name of it was. I just thought of it as the multitasking Buddha with all of the arms. But while I say that somewhat humorously, you see the serving as they've placed food before it, offering these to that statue. Or if you were with us when I showed the pictures and gave the report on our trip, the picture from Hong Kong, but these are pictures then, summer before, that we took. You know, we can think of it in one sense of false gods, but does the commandment also not prohibit the worshiping the true God using images? I mean, these images that are said, and I quote, the mysterious presence of the transcendent, sacred images as the channel of divine grace. The one is in the Basilica of St. Cecilia. took the picture just after a wedding. You can still see the flowers there on the floor where the couple, just as they were married, came and kneeled before the statue. It's very difficult to see, but at the bottom of the picture, just above that gold gate of this amazing carving of Saint Cecilia, who was martyred for her faith. And the sincerity, or the holy staircase. which are said to be the very steps that Jesus climbed when he appeared before Pontius Pilate, taken from Jerusalem and brought to Rome. And to be there and to see the images, and my heart was grieved seeing people that would come there and crawl up the stairs on their knees in prayer. And understand, folks, this, it's not just in paganism. It can come into that which would be viewed as, well, we're worshiping the true God. You know, it's interesting, and I give you this example, and I'm not trying to be unkind, but we need to be clear what Scripture says. You know, one of the battles of the Reformation was for image-free worship. We're looking at the second commandment. But you know, if you read in the Roman Catholic Catechism, which I brought mine this morning, on page 575, it says this as the second commandment. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain. Well, that's actually what we would consider the third commandment. And so what they have done is put the second commandment as a sub-point of the first. The idea being that you shouldn't have images of false gods. The statement I quoted a moment ago to give you the fuller statement was a quote by Pope John Paul II who said, a mysterious presence of the transcendent prototype seems as if it were to be transformed to sacred images. The devout contemplation of such an image thus appears as the real and concrete path of purification of the soul of the believer. Because the image itself, blessed by the priest, can in certain sense, by analogy with sacraments, actually be considered a channel of divine grace. The image becomes the channel of God's grace. You shall not make graven images. Well, how can the catechism justify that? As I mentioned, they put it in the first command, but you know how they justify it, the bronze serpent. When you read the catechism, they said, because Moses made a bronze serpent and God had the people look to it. Do you know what happened to that bronze serpent? In 2 Kings chapter 18, Hezekiah becomes the king, 700 years after Moses made it. And Hezekiah destroys the bronze serpent because it had become an object of worship. The very justification is why it became destroyed. that Hezekiah, in seeking to return Israel to proper worship, destroys that bronze serpent. He destroyed a 700-year-old antique because it was violating what God wanted for worship. What we need to understand is the character of God is conveyed through proper worship. and understanding how we can then apply this. So the third thing I want us to see this morning is the character of God is conveyed through proper worship, because number one, images obscure the glory of God. You shall not make graven images. God's not going to share his glory. His jealousy is always provoked when we worship other gods. But if we don't understand who he is and we worship him wrongly, that will also irritate him. You know, if my wife didn't like roses, now, she does, but for sake of illustration, if she didn't, and for her birthday, I said, honey, I got you a dozen roses. She said, okay, well, that's nice, and, you know, appreciate the thought. It's the thought that counts, right? And, you know, I didn't know better, and then our anniversary comes, and I said, I got another dozen roses. She said, well, you need to know, I don't really like roses. Oh, I'm sorry about that, okay. Next birthday, here's another dozen roses. And here's another. At some point, when you say, you know, it's really not about her, it's about me. And I'm not really showing my love for her if I'm just doing what, well, I like roses. I like to get them. It's easy. I can go to the grocery store, pick them up on my way out, you know, do the self-checkout, and we're good. So I want to give them. Yeah, but the real object of worship is the one who receives. and understanding God's not going to share his glory. Most of us don't have carved images, and we can look at what was going on with Buddhism, and we may even say, yeah, I'm not comfortable with Catholicism, but we as Baptists can create God in our own image. I like to think of God as, and we develop mental images that are contrary to the word of God. I like to think of the God of the New Testament and not the God of the Old Testament. I like to think of God as loving, but I don't want to think about His judgment. What we're doing is creating images that violate who He truly is, because the God of the Old Testament is the God of the New Testament. He said, I don't change. And the God of love is a God of judgment. That's why He sent His Son, so that He would pay the penalty for our sin, that we might be saved. And understand that God's jealousy is always provoked when people worship other gods and when they fail to worship Him properly. And recognizing this, that we like to think of the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, but we forget that Revelation speaks of the wrath of the Lamb. Those aren't words we usually put together, but it's biblical. We need to worship God as He's revealed Himself, because He will come in power to judge the world. So we can't make mental images and bow before those. See, God demands exclusive devotion, and he defeats those who oppose him. And that's the second thing that we see, that it provokes his jealousy. And we read these verses that, for I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me. And we have a concern about that. Wait a minute. What does that mean? Well, there's a couple of things we need to understand. Number one, fathers, our influence has consequences. Dads, we need to take spiritual leadership in our home and understand that your choices are going to have influence on your children and it will last beyond your lifetime. See, the reason God is a jealous God is because he protects what is rightfully his. When we think of jealousy, we tend to think of it as a sinful thing. Because what we normally think about as jealousy is really envy. We want what somebody else has that we don't have. But jealousy is not wrong if it's protecting what is rightfully ours that we are to protect. You know, if somebody were trying to create problems for your children, if there was somebody that was really trying to lead them a wrong direction, you ought to be protective. There is a right jealousy. that we're seeking to protect and to guard. Well, God has a right to his glory and honor, and he's not going to share it. Say, okay, but is it fair for God to punish the children for the sins of their father? I don't believe that's what this passage is saying, and I'll show you that in just a moment. But I think it's very probable that the children were also idolaters, because it says those at the very end, those who hate me. that there's a pattern. And it's probable that they would follow the pattern of their parents. But we also need to understand that we don't sin in a vacuum. We can't just say my sin won't affect anybody else. When Jonah ran from God, every person in that boat got rocked by the storm. And if you are a Jonah, the storms that you cause are going to make other people uncomfortable. It's gonna make life difficult. These children, the children of the people who are receiving these commandments here in Exodus chapter 20, are going to spend 40 years wandering in the wilderness because of the disobedience of their fathers. When God says, I'm taking you into the promised land, and they say, we can't get there, it's not gonna happen, there's giants, there's walled cities, we would have been better off staying in Egypt, God says, okay, you're gonna wander for 40 years, none of you will go into the promised land. Did that impact the kids? Absolutely, they spent 40 years in the desert. because of their parents' unbelief. But they didn't die in the desert. They were allowed to enter the promised land. And so the children were allowed. And I believe what this is saying is that the parents will be punished. This passage is actually being addressed to the parents, particularly to the fathers. Ezekiel 18 is addressed to the children. Notice what it says. The soul that sins shall die. The son shall not bear the guilt of the father, nor the father bear the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous shall be upon himself. The wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself. But if a wicked man turns from all his sin, which he has committed, and keeps all my statues, and does what is lawful and right, he shall surely live and not die. That's God's word to the children. that he's not going to judge the children for their father's sin, but understand that as parents, we can pave or pollute the path for our children. We have to make it easier for our children to love the Lord, to serve the Lord, to be influenced. And that's why I say when we dismiss our children, that we want our children to come to know the Lord at a young age and love him and serve him. And we're seeking to teach them in that area. I don't believe this is saying the children are punished for the sins of their parents, but parents are going to pave the way. And the truth is generations tend to follow the direction of parents. Often the generational sins, that if somebody grows up in the home of an alcoholic, they often fall into drinking themselves. Now, not always, and passage says if a wicked person turns from their sin, they will be forgiven and live. Fathers, we need to make God supreme in our lives and in our homes. Because if we don't make him supreme, there's a good chance our children won't either. Values are caught much more than they're taught. And if worshiping God is a matter of convenience and we get much more excited about a football game than the Lord, our kids will pick that up. You know, I love that football game. I'd love to go back. I'd enjoy doing it again. But what really thrills my soul is coming together with God's people. And we want that to be important. A father who pursues the path of corruption can cause collateral damage to their children. But the other side of it is what we also need to see. Obedience procures God's mercy. Notice the parallel in verses three and four. The generations between the third and fourth generation and the parallel in verse five and six is to thousands. Thousands of what? Thousands of generations. The parallel is in generations. God will judge third and fourth generation. He will show mercy to thousands. Now, a generation is said to be 20 to 30 years. If we just cut it in the middle and take 25 years, 25,000 generations, years? One generation at 25 years? We're talking 25,000 years. What does that say? God's mercy triumphs over sin. We talk about collateral damage and secondary results. This is collateral blessing. That God's loving kindness, His mercy goes to thousands of generations. And to see this, that godly parents are a blessing to their children. Young people, you need to thank God for your parents that they brought you to church today. Even if you didn't want to come, what are they trying to do? They're trying to have God's blessing on your life. that you will know the joy of the Lord and not face God's judgment. I thank God for my godly heritage, for my parents. I've shared with you, I went to public school. Most of my friends were unsaved. And there were many sins and invitations to sin that I could have easily gotten involved in and I didn't. And the truth wasn't because there wasn't opportunity, but it really was the influence of my parents. I made a number of choices, not because I desired to be holy, but because I didn't want to hurt my parents. And that protected me. Now, should I have done it because I wanted to please God and be holy? Absolutely, but that wasn't where I was at that time. But God protected me. He said, well, yeah, but I didn't grow up in that home. I didn't have the background you did. I understand that. I know I was blessed, I know a lot of people, I've heard enough testimonies through my years and know of the stories of the trophies of grace even in this room, but my question is, will your children have that testimony? Will your kids be able to say it was the mercy of God that protected me from things? Will your grandchildren and great-grandchildren and generation after generation, because God who is rich in mercy, So we can't use the past or our parents as an excuse because God's loving kindness triumphs over sin. God's jealousy is not just a negative, it's a positive. He protects, He guards. God's love overcomes human sinfulness. And it should motivate us to live holy lives because friendship with the world is enmity with God. But God is jealous to protect us. Now, we've talked about images that we're not supposed to worship, we're not to have any images. I think there is an acceptable image that we can worship. Having said all of what I have this morning, and I've sought to ground it in Scripture to give you that, we must understand that our spiritual purity, our worship would be in harmony with God. But in Hebrews 1, verse 2, it says, God has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom He also made the world, who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power. we can worship the image of His Son. Because the Son is the image of the Father. He who has seen me has seen the Father. And no one comes to the Father except through the Son. And we don't need other worship aids. Because the Bible tells us there's one mediator, one go-between between God and men, humanity, the man Christ Jesus. Well, how can He be that image? Because He is the image of the Father, the expression of His glory, the brightness. He is God, God the Son. And if you've come to the Son, you come to the Father. I am the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father but by me. So what is it that excites you today? Are you excited that you belong to God? Are you excited to lead your family in heartfelt worship? Does the joy of our salvation thrill our soul when we sing the songs? Does it speak to our heart that, Lord, that's what I need? Or do we get more excited about sporting events and shopping sprees and vacations and fishing trips and all the other things out there? Thou shalt have no other gods before me. and thou shalt not make a graven image or any likeness of anything in heaven on earth or below that we would bow down before and serve. Because he alone is God and him only shall we serve. Is he your God this morning? If he's not, he can be through Christ alone. Let's pray.