The Ten Commandments are divided into two parts; the first part comprises the first four commandments which teach OBEDIENCE, man’s duty to God, secondly are the six remaining commandments that deal with RESPECT, man’s duty to man. Nevertheless, disobedience to any of the ten is a sin. 

The Ten Commandments were given, to reveal the treacherous character of sin and the different acts by which man offends God in yielding wilfully to sin’s rebellious nature. All disobedience to God is a sin. “Through the disobedience of one man sin entered the world and death through sin.” (Romans 5:12.) We have seen in our previous chapter that God hates sin, every sin is an attack at Him, man is God’s enemy and is at war with Him! God has shown that He cannot ignore it and He must deal with it and destroy it! He proved it in Eden when he put Adam and Eve out of the Garden. As stated already: God punished sin severely before the Ten Commandments were ever given, but sin was not defined until God gave the Ten Commandments, the first four commandments are more important than the rest, nevertheless, all disobedience is deadly. In fact, if men obeyed the first four, the other six commandments would be obeyed that much better! God proved it in the case of Cain and Abel, he did it also in the days of the flood, when the whole world perished, then only eight persons were saved, then He capped it at the Tower of Babel when He destroyed it and dispersed the people on the surface of the whole earth, and ceased to speak to man. All these judgements were applied before He gave the Laws  

From the land of the Chaldeans God began to deal with people individually. In was from the remnant of the people He left there, that God called personally Abraham into a life of faith. To him He spoke directly, as he did to Isaac and Jacob and later on to other descendants of Abraham, became the patriarch of the Israel. When the people of Israel settled in the Land of Canaan, He appointed prophets who brought the words of the Lord to their Leaders, whether they were bad or good. Finally, God spoke to the Jews, a remnant of the nation, by His only son Jesus-Christ our Lord. We read in the Bible: “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son whom He appointed heir of all things, and through whom he made the universe.” (Hebrews 1: 1-2.) Today the Holy-Spirit is still speaking to men, but not through prophets and apostles of Christ, but He speaks to all who read the Bible, and through the preachers of the Gospel, choice men that He call, anointed by the Holy Spirit, the Words preached is alive forever! More will be detailed concerning this eventful happening later on. 

The history of mankind before there were divided into various nations and prior to the call of Abraham is very short and precise. God in the Bible does not spend much time to say how the people evolved spiritually from the time that Adam left the Garden of Eden to the call of this illustrious man, Abraham! Although it covers a period of twenty centuries, for Abraham, called originally, Abram, was born in 2008 from Adam or 1991 years B.C, yet all that we read about the world is found in ten and a half chapters of the Bible; from that short resume, some very important elements emerge, that give us a picture of man’s troubled relation with God, giving us the fundamental reasons of why the world is as it is today. We have the event of the flood and why God had to destroy all the souls that were alive bar eight that found grace in the sight of God; it is said: “I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth~ men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds in the air ~ for I am grieved that I have made them. But Noah found favour, or grace, in the eyes of the Lord. God did it: “Because the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways.” (Genesis 6: 7-8 & 11.) Stated already.

Noah and his family were in the ark for one year, when God opened the door of the ark Noah was 601 years old, and he lived until he was 950 years old, the year of his death was 1993 B.C. During the 349 years, from Noah’s exit from the ark, to his death are the darkest in the history of mankind, for they lead to a complete degradation of its spiritual state. It is astonishing to find man’s rapid slide into idolatry and a total rebellion against God. It appears that man under the power of sin is incapable to learn the vital lesson of life, for the flood and the reason of the flood should have taught this new humanity, that it is never right to oppose the will of God, and instead of yielding their will to God and accept his rule, they turned their eyes to the heavens, and started to worship various planets; it is their rebellion that saw the birth of astrology, this godless invention has taken its place in the history of the world, and men still practice this idolatrous formula, and worship creation rather than the Creator

Their rebellious concert, led man to construct a massive temple which, in the Bible is called: ‘The Tower of Babel’; the worshippers of various planets, united themselves to build this temple, from the top of which they planned to offer their sacrifices to their celestial divinities; it was rebellious creation of fallen man’s imagination; they hoped to find a god stronger than Jehovah, a god that could free them from submission to Him! For God told them to: ‘Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.’ (Genesis 9: 1) But, of course they were bound to fail for there is, as ever, only one God, Creator of heaven and earth. Of course, as before God had to intervene and this he did; a fire came down from heaven and burned the whole structure in one blast. Archaeologists studying the stone, etcetera, of the mount in Iraq, where stood the Tower of Babel, tell us that the fusion of the rocks is similar to that of an atomic explosion. Think of it! There is nothing new under heaven, but only God could limit such an explosion to a localised area as the one on which this temple was being erected, without touching men with various diseases! God is still ahead of men, it is by His will that men of science discover what they do, He still hides from them what He wants to. 

I have mentioned these events to show that although the Ten Commandments were not yet given, men knew what was right and what was wrong, because long before God wrote them on tablets of stone, He wrote them in the heart of men. Man’s conscience is the voice of God, and when he disobeys God, that voice is there warning him that he is about to do that which is wrong. The conscience as strong as it is, worked in man from the day Adam and Eve sinned for immediately, after having eaten of the forbidden fruit, they felt convicted of wrong and tried to hide from God. It has not ceased to this day, men still hide from God, because in their heart they knew that they have done Him wrong. 

Before God gave the Ten Commandments, and after he gave them to the people of Israel, conscience was always at work, just at it did before there ever was a Hebrew on earth. Gentiles, of course are all the people of the earth that are not born Israelites. This is declared in the Bible, but individually, by nature, they are not different from the rest of men: “All who sin apart from the Law will also perish apart from the Law, and all who sin under the Law will be judged by the Law. For it is not those who hear the Law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those that obey the Law who will be declared righteous. (indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, (that which God gave through Moses) do by nature things required by the law, (the Ten Commandments) they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law,(such as God gave to the people of Israel) hence they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.This will take place on the day when God will judge men’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares.” (Romans 2:12-16.)

The conscience is so real, that at the judgement day, those who never knew the law or about the law, will be judged by their conscience, when all men rise from the dead to stand before God, their deeds will condemn them! Nevertheless, by resisting to the voice of the conscience over and over again can be dangerous, form eventually that voice of God dies, and God ceases to warn men who, at that point are completely and forever forsaken. To that end the Bible says: “The Spirit (Holy-Spirit~ the third person of the Holy Trinity) clearly says that in the later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons. Such teachings come through hypocritical liars, whose conscience has been seared as with a hot iron” (1Timothy 4:1-2.)

In giving his Commandments, God proved his right to legislate His will to mankind, and by them He specifies the way sin broke man’s relationship with Him. God shows especially that He will judge men for the sins that His commandments have revealed to be sins. All men have not necessarily disobeyed all the Ten Commandments, but all men have disobeyed the first four, that’s for sure, sins are fruits of enmity and man is an enemy of God! God shows his threefold authority over them, saying: “For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our law giver, the Lord is our King.” (Isaiah 33:22.)  God declares simply that his sovereignty cannot be taken away from him, even if men, in their stupidity refuse to accept it. “There is only one law giver and judge, the one who is able to save and destroy.” (James 4:12.) 

In the religious world some men have given themselves an authority to legislate to their subjects. They have either taken away from the law of God or added to it. Millions of people in the world today slave under points of doctrine that have no place in the will of God, but all their privations caused by religious impositions and practices, will not in any way plead their cause and justify them before the Great Judge. During his life time Jesus warned his followers, not to do what is done by their religious rulers, saying: “Do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. They tie up heavy loads and put them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.” (Matthew 23:3-4.) These religious teachers were the ones that condemned Jesus-Christ to die on the cross, they are all dead, but Jesus is alive. 

I have considered these remarks to be important to our subject, so now I want to answer the elements of the question we are considering: “What does the law of God reveal?” Firstly, it reveals the very sinfulness of sin. Sins are not just human faults or mistakes as so many like to call them nowadays. This is not only done by common people, but it is done by people sitting in the pews of Christian churches, especially from the pulpits, where many preachers have abdicated to the spirit of the age, and are teachings doctrines of demons. Sin is and always will be a direct assault on God, or those that belong to Him. When Saul of Tarsus, breathing out cruelty towards the disciples of Christ, he was on his way to Damascus, he was going there to apprehend Christians and bring them back to Jerusalem to be judged: “Suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him, and he fell to the ground, and heard a voice say to him, ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me’? ‘Who are you Lord’? Saul asked, ’I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting’ (Acts 9:3-5.) Although he was on his way to do his dirty work, planning the death of Christians, He was directly persecuting the Lord! 

In committing sins, there always are two stages, 1 the temptation to sin, 2 followed by the acts; to be tempted is not a sin, Jesus Himself was tempted, but He never yielded to any of them, it is the yielding to temptation that is the sin. The devil does not tempt as such, but the sin that Adam committed by obeying him, rooted in every man tempts man to sin. Sin is of the devil. The Bible says: “He (Satan) speaks lies and is the father of it. When Adam sinned the venom of sin entered the human race, and Satan’s rebellious nature manifests itself by every sin man commits 

The reason for which God gave the Ten Commandments is, firstly, to reveal what sin really is in the eyes of God, secondly, they analyse how sin reveals itself through disobedience to them. Although sin came into the human race through Adam’s sin, and manifested itself through men’s actions, man did not know the various aspects of what sin was. God gathered Israel around Mount Sinai to give, through Moses, a full revelation of sin’s character. With the Commandments, God also gave instructions to Moses concerning various offerings, amongst which was included the Sin offering and the Trespass offering. He also instituted a Priesthood of which Aaron, Moses’ elder brother, was the High Priest, he only could offer sacrifices for the forgiveness of sins. 

The Law of the offerings is a very important study, we cannot enter into it now. But since God revealed, to Israel and through it to the world, that sins deserved punishment, it was right to teach His people how horrible sins were in His eyes, for which punishment was death! Since it was so serious, through the Ten Commandments men learned, for the first time in the history of man, that when they disobeyed them, death alone could atone for the sin committed; to save man from his guilt, the sacrifice of an animal took the place of the guilty sinner, and atoned for his crime. “Every high priest is selected from among men and is appointed to represent them in matters related to God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins; He is able to deal gently with those who are ignorant and are going astray., since he himself is subject to weakness, this is why he (the high priest) has to offer sacrifices for his own sins, as well as for the sins of the people. No-one takes this honour upon himself; he must be called by God, just as Aaron was”. (Hebrews 5:1-4.) The calling of God is essential for any man to work for His glory, with such a call comes also the anointing.

This passage shows that only from among the Israelites could a high priest be called, specifically he had to be a member of the Levites, one of the tribes of Israel! God chose them to this high office, Aaron was a Levite as was Moses, and Aaron alone presented all sacrifices to God. No sacrifice for sins was acceptable, if offered by any other man, even if Moses did it! This exclusiveness is better understood in God’s appointment of   Jesus Christ, His Son, to be an eternal high priest of a new order, and as such he sacrificed Himself and atoned, by His death for the sins of the whole world, by shedding His own blood, who alone cleanses, from all sins, those that come to Him. We shall return to this subject later on, nevertheless I will add this verse taken from the epistle to the Hebrews: “Now there have been many such priests, since death prevented them from continuing in this office; but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore, he is able to save completely those who come to God through Him, because he always lives to intercede for them.” (Hebrews 7:23-24.)

Sin is a power; it is called in Scripture as a reign, a power that rules man. “Therefore, do not let sin reign in your body so that you obey its evil desires.” (Romans 6:12.) We must now take The Commandments one by one, and my purpose in doing this, is to leave, everyone that reads this chapter, in no doubt that all men are hopelessly lost, without hope and without God in the world, utterly lost and then present to all the only positive way to real forgiveness, which is the first step of any man that is called by God to a sincere repentance from sin, and by it, he begins a new life through faith in Christ. 

1. YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS BEFORE ME. 

2. YOU SHALL NOT MAKE TO YOURSELVES AN IDOL IN THE FORM OF , IN HEAVEN ABOVE OR ON EARTH BENEATH OR IN WATERS BELOW. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing thew children for the sins of their fathers to thew third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those that love me and keep my commandments. 

3. YOU WILL NOT MISUSE THE NAME OF THE LORD YOUR GOD, FOR THE LORD WILL NOT HOLD ANYONE GUILTLESS WHO MISUSES MY NAME.

4. REMEMBER THE SABBATH DAY BY KEEPING IT HOLY. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant nor maidservant, nor your animals, nor the aliens within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

If people were right with God on the first commandment, there would not have to be any other, but because sin is so subtle, man needs direction from God on the smallest details, so that he does not stray from giving Him his rightful place and keep Him alone as his object of worship. During one of His trips Jesus was questioned by some Pharisees as concerning the Law, they asked Him: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law? Jesus replied: Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and will all your mind. This is the first and the greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbour as yourself. All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:35-40.) Jesus has simplified the ‘Ten Commandments’ into two groups, ‘loving God’ which incorporates the first four, and the second ‘loving your neighbour as yourself’.He did not shorten any of them, for in a simple way, Jesus said everything that is said by the Ten Commandments, but what He said is so much easier to remember, but it is just as impossible to keep.

Idol worship is a very real thing, and it really took hold of humanity in the construction of the tower of Babel, I will not go into details, but it is then that men began to worship various planet in our galaxy. Some worshiped the Sun, others the Moon or some other planet. The Tower of Babel was planned to be a Great Temple which would unite the various idols worshippers to do so in one place. The Tower was an immense ‘Temple’, the top of it ended with a flat roof from which sacrifices were offered to all the heavenly bodies that men worshipped. The rich valley of the Euphrates became the cradle of astrology, this was man’s first attempt to create a unified religion under a ruling of a self-made King ‘Nimrod’. I mention it quickly because it is every vast subject, yet it is important to mention it, because from then on idolatry was always practiced by pagan nations to this very day. Yet what lesson we get from that time ,is that idol worship is repugnant to God and from the terrible destruction of the Tower of Babel, God revealed what end he reserves to idols and the people that worship them! 

In this modern world, man thinks that he has evolved so much in knowledge, wisdom, now he has become so clever, that like Satan, he thinks that he is bigger than God, he believes that he is so much more enlightened than previous generations, that he wonders how men can still believe in the existence of God! His pride has become his folly, by which he has foolishly rejected the true God his maker. The western world, with its history of Christianity, has forsaken the worship of God and of His Son Jesus-Christ, to the point that it is now the most godless part of the world, rightly has the Bible called Satan, “the god of this world”. Man, today worships all sorts of unseen idols, having rooted themselves firmly in his heart, they monopolise all his thinking and actions. Man has reached the point at which God has to intervene to stop him, just as He had to do it before, in the days of the flood! The first step to cure cancer, is to, by various means, cut it out, this God will do with a corrupted humanity and cast it into the lake of fire. 

Saul of Tarsus was a very religious man, devoted to the God of his people, the Jews. He belonged to its most important religious sect, the Pharisees; these people were sectarian and appeared very strict in the practice of the Jewish law. Saul of Tarsus was a pupil of a best teacher; Gamaliel. At an early age he climbed to the highest rank and would most certainly end up among the elite. He was completely devoted and zealous for his faith to the point that he was prepared to destroy all Christians! He lived in Jerusalem towards the end of the ministry of Jesus-Christ; it is there that he was the instigator of the martyrdom of Stephen, a disciple of Jesus Christ, who was one of the deacons in the budding Church of Christ in Jerusalem. It is written that: “As they were stoning him, Stephen prayed: Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. Then he fell on his knees and cried out: Lord, do not hold this sin against them. When he had said this, he fell asleep. And Saul was there, giving approval to his death” (Acts 7: 59. & 8:1.)

After this stoning of Stephen: “A great persecution broke out against the Church in Jerusalem, and all except the Apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. But Saul began to destroy the Church. Going from house to house, he dragged men and women, and put them in prison. Pleasing his masters, he received from them letters for the synagogues in Damascus. As he was nearing Damascus: “suddenly, a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him: Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? “Who are you Lord?” He knew there and then that some divine being was talking to Him, for he said Lord, meaning Jehovah. The voice replied and said: I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. (Read Acts 9.) From then on Saul of Tarsus, the proud and ruthless Pharisee, became the most devoted disciple of Christ, his name was changed to that of Paul, the great Apostle. Eventually, he also was martyred (it is believed that it happened in Rome) for his faith in Jesus-Christ, for whom he suffered more the any other disciple of his days. I have used this one story, among so many, to show that even a religion can be one’s god. Saul of Tarsus thought he was serving the God of Abraham, who was one the great patriarch of his nation, but having a staunch religion made him a fanatic, ready to murder all the disciples of Christ! 

Saul realised that he was persecuting the very one he thought he was serving. God says: “You shall not bow down to them or worship them”. Just as the people of Israel turned away from God and disobeyed this commandment, much of the so-called church, does today exactly the same. Christian churches are filled with real idols and such Christians bow down to them, pray to them and worship them! They also serve their own ideas of God and, do not accept the God revealed in Holy-Scripture. To some God is too loving, so much so that they have turned His love into weakness. To some He is too cruel, for punishing sinners too harshly, and so they create to themselves the God that suits them but God gives them the freedom to do what they want, but they be judge for it.  

Some of these idols have been given human names and Christians seek their protection for various problems of life. Mary, the mother of Jesus has been given more divinity than Christ Himself, and I could go on quoting all the place that wayward men give to their made-up gods, but behind these representations of divinities, is a hidden, wicked spirit, People are brainwashed and do not realise that their priests are leading them into demon worship, and that, with them, they will spend eternity in darkness, lost forever. The apostle Paul warned Christians not to participate in pagan feasts, and eat of sacrifices offered to idols: “Therefore flee from idolatry…Do I mean then that a sacrifice offered to an idol is anything, or that an idol is anything? No! But the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons, not to God, and I do not want you to be participants with demons.” (1 Corinthians 14-22.) (Read also Revelation 9:20-21.)

Such sacrifice in nothing and does nothing, nor is an idol anything, it is stone, wood, of some other material, it neither hears nor speaks it is dead, but pagans by those sacrifices enter into the world of spirits and worship demons, which are fallen angels. The Bible says that you cannot drink the cup of the Lord, in true worship and drink also the cup of demons at the same time. One cannot sit at the table of the Lord, and at the tables of demons. One is on God side and lives for God or one is against Him, and this is why a true Christians cannot have another god before the Lord, even if a bit of wood or stone has the name of some saint, even if it represents Mary, the mother of Christ. “YOU SHALL HAVE NO OTHER GODS BEFORE ME.” ~ YOU SHALL NOT MAKE TO YOURSELVES AN IDOL IN THE FORM OF ANYTHING IN HEAVEN ABOVE OR ON EARTH BENEATH OR IN WATERS BELOW.”

If you, reading these lines, have been led into such practices repent now, confess to God your sins, believe, from the heart, on the Lord Jesus-Christ and worship God, Father, Son and Holy-Spirit, the Holy Trinity, the only True God! It is not my purpose to enter into details, for there is so much one can say about modern idols, and how crowds of people gather and hail their heroes, of one description or another. Things that are completely legitimate, can be given an unreasonable importance, and become foundations of an ungodly proportion. Career, sport, art, the possession of things that one covets, anything that has an unhealthy hold on one’s existence is an idol. Anything one lives for, anything that takes God’s place is another god it is an idol ~ the sacrifices of pagans are offered to demons. 

3. YOU WILL NOT MISUSE THE NAME OF THE LORD YOUR GOD, FOR THE LORD WILL NOT HOLD ANYONE GUILTLESS WHO MISUSES MY NAME. 

In the King’s James version of the Bible, the words are as follow: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.” It is basically the same, yet it sounds good, this is why that for my personal use, I prefer to use that version more than others. Now that Jesus-Christ has been revealed, for in the days of Moses the three distinct persons of the Holy Trinity were not revealed, for it only comes in its true light in the New Testament, thus the name of Jesus-Christ is the Name of the Son of God and must be revered. Jesus is a holy and precious name to every Christian, but especially precious to God, his Father. Christians worship Him they sing praises To Him, honour and revere Him, with the approval of His Father. They do the same with the Holy Spirit whom Christ made so real in His life and in His teachings. So, we must honour Him in the same way, He is the third person of the Holy Trinity, being the third does not make Him less Holy, less God than the Father and The Son. He is not an ‘it’ He is a ‘Him’, a person just as holy just as perfect ~ ONE GOD, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. As humans we tend to think that being the third person somehow, he is lesser then the Father and his Son Jesus-Christ. The Father decided, the Son confirms verbally His decision, and the Holy Spirit does it! Whilst they are three separate persons, they are equal in power in glory and Holiness; this is why he is called the Holy Spirit. Sinning against the Holy Spirit is the unpardonable sin. We are called, especially as Christians, never to misuse the Name of God!

The names of all three are blasphemed by the majority of people who have not got a clue at the sins that pile up to their account, every time they misuse the names of God. People may call themselves Christians, but they are nothing of the sort, for they blaspheme the name of God continually. Their uncouth language misuses the name of Jesus-Christ, a name that true Christians revere, respect, honour, love and adore, Men should not be made to swear by the name of God whether it be in a law court, or for personal caprices, such as swearing by the name of God, to give value to lies that men use to deceive, cheat or outwit people. By the misuse of God’s name, guiltless men have been sent to the gallows, Judges and Lawyers have covered a multitude of crimes that are still very real before God, evil deeds for which they shall be judged, the guilty one shall bear the wrath of God!

This is why references to this commandment, cover this kind of rotten dealings by evil men. The Bible says: “Do not steal, do not lie, do not deceive one another, do not swear falsely by my name and profane the name of your God. I am the Lord. And ye shall not steal, neither deal falsely, neither lie to one another. 12. Ye shall not swear by my name falsely, neither shalt thou profane the name of thy God; I am the Lord. 13. Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbour neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning”. (Leviticus 19: 11-13.) False believers in God can appear so holy and can deceive many, but before God they are the worst crooks on earth,  by misusing the name of Christ, they shall know that Gods is here on earth, He sees and hears everything, and He has prepared a hell for all liars and deceivers! (Read also Leviticus 6: 1-7.) The last verse of this selected reading concerning the office of a High Priest which says: “In this way the priest will make atonement for him before the Lord, and he will be forgiven for any of these things that he did that made him guilty.” If a wrong testimony has been given in court at any time, even if it is years ago, it can only be put right by a confession to God, and to the civil authorities. God will forgive is there is true repentance, but the guilty liar may still have to be judged by man and pay for his guilt. Restitution is very real in the eyes of God. No-one will get away with a simple confession to a priest; he has not been given that authority to any man, God only can forgive sins, if men truly repent from them!

The blood of an innocent animal had to be sacrificed for such a man to be forgiven of his sin. Today, this procedure does not exist, for forgiveness is only possible for true Christians that confess to God and claim the cleansing of the blood of Christ. Restitution must be made to the full. Even confession cannot lead to forgiveness if a restitution is necessary. If, for instance, harm has been done to the reputation of a person thus wronged, by malignant gossip which ruins people’s lives and grieves the Holy-Spirit of God, in such cases, a public confession before the Church must be made and a discipline imposed for it is a grievous sin. 

To this misuse of God’s name, could be added the destructive work that has been done and is being done by false prophets, or ministers, who speak falsely in the Name of God. In the Old Testament wars were lost; the people of God, Israel, suffered great losses, eventually went into captivity, because they turned to idol worship and imprisoned and killed true prophets; it is a great evil. I know of ministers who have suffered greatly through unrighteousness gossip, all those that fill the churches’ pews are not necessarily disciples of Christ, such men will not get away with such evil deed, unless they confess and ask forgiveness from God, from the minister that they treated awfully, and to the Church where it happened. 

Jesus, the Son of God, for saying the truth, was hated by the political rulers, and teachers of the Law of his people, and the clergy; they often thought of killing him, but his hour had not yet come says the Bible. but we read in the bible the following instance that shows the devious people he was dealing with: “Some Pharisees, came to Jesus and said  him: ’Leave this place and go somewhere else; Herod (their king) wants to kill you’. To this he replied: ‘Go tell that fox, ‘I will drive out demons and heal people today and to morrow, and the third day I will reach my goal. For surely no prophet can die outside of Jerusalem. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing”.

These priests taught the people in the name of God, but they were seeking to kill him, just as their fathers killed the prophets. Eventually, when the time came for Jesus to die, it was in Jerusalem that they condemned him, and killed him on a CROSS, outside the city walls. There is a judgement awaiting false religious teachers, because, for their own ends, they misuse God’s holy name. They appear harmless as lambs but they are as ravenous wolves. They will not enter the kingdom of God for with their lies, by misusing God’s name and his word, they have led people to hell.

To this end Jesus has left to his disciples this instruction, which is one among many, saying: “Again, you have heard that it was said to the people long ago: do no break your oath, but keep the oaths you have made to the Lord. But I tell you, do not swear at all; neither by heaven, for it is the throne of God; or by earth, for it is his footstool; or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the Great King. And do not swear by your head, for you cannot make one hair black or white. Simply let your Yes be Yes, and your No be No. Anything beyond this comes from the evil one ~ the devil.”

Incidentally, forgiveness of sins is only possible for those who truly believe in Jesus-Christ, to them the Bible says: “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, (not to a priest, but directly to God in the name of Jesus) he is faithful and just and will forgive our sins and purify from all unrighteousness. If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives.” (1 John 1:8-10.) If one thinks that not being a Christian exonerates one from guilt, such a person is playing with fire. 

Those men that will not believe in Christ and claim him as Lord, will not be exonerated from their responsibility to obey God, they are victims of the greatest lie that ever existed. It is not hard to become a believer in Christ, accept him now humbly open your life to Him, and accept him as your Saviour. He will do it! Confess all your sins to Him; put all wrongs right with men you have wronged. If you owe money to anyone, pay your debts, it will challenge them and give glory to God. To such persons God says: “But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, (with all Christians and Jesus-Christ their Lord) and the blood of Jesus-Christ, his Son, purifies us from all sin.” (1 John 1:7.) “For without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. God says: The law (of God) requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” (Hebrews 9:22.)

4. REMEMBER THE SABBATH DAY BY KEEPING IT HOLY. Six days you shall labour and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant nor maidservant, nor your animals, nor the aliens within your gates. For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore, the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

We shall return to this commandment later in our present consideration of Holy-Scriptures. Enough for now to say, that under the New Covenant of grace the Sabbath has a complet, different meaning. 

5. HONOUR YOUR FATHER AND YOUR MOTHER, SO THAT YOU MAY LIVE LONG IN THE LAND THE LORD GOD IS GIVING YOU.

6. YOUSHALL NOT MURDER. 

7. YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY!

 8. YOU SHALL NOT STEAL.

9. YOU SHALL NOT GIVE FALSE TESTIMONY AGAINST YOUR NEIGHBOUR

10. YOU SHALL NOT COVET YOUR NEIGHBOUR’S HOUSE. YOU SHALL NOT COVER YOURNEIGHBOURS WIFE, NOR HIS MANSERVANT OR MAIDSERVANT, HIS OX OR DONKEY, OR ANYTHING THAT BELONGS TO YOUR NEIGHBOUR

We have now arrived at the point where we have to consider the six remaining commandments; they differ in their application, as stated, the first four have in view man’s relationship with God, whereas the six remaining commandments have to do with man’s relationship with his fellowmen. Public relation is a very touchy subject. Men follow a certain line in their contact with others, thinking that the person they are dealing with is worse than them! You might say: ‘This might be a cynical view of human nature,’ it might be, but my experience has proved it to be true. I heard not so long ago from a person that had an interview for a job, after all the tension and having done her best, she got the job, hurrah, but on six months trial. After the six months she was excused and told that she was not really up to what they are looking for. How disappointing! That is how a deceitful society works, without any feeling for those that they destroy or hurt badly. That woman was very good at her job, but her boss did not like her!

I have been a pastor for many years, and I have been dealing most of my life with people that have gone through a complete change of life by their conversion to Jesus-Christ. No man can become a Christian without making a conscious decision to believe in and follow Jesus-Christ, there must be this commitment to Jesus Christ. The basic experience that leads to a true conversion is a conviction of sins. It is, no doubt, a completely unknown subject to most people in the world, but true Christians know exactly what I am talking about. A conviction of sins is essentially the first step to a radical change of life, it is followed by a conversion of the whole man, changing him from a sinner into a child of God. It is a deep work of the Holy Spirit, and the aim of it is to convince sinners that they need pardon for their sins which Jesus-Christ alone offers to those that will believe that on the CROSS He died for their sins for “All have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Jesus-Christ.” (Romains 3:23) To admit that one is a sinner is much harder than an alcoholic to admit that he has got a big problem.

I cannot go any deeper about this subject at this point, but I have mentioned it because many outsiders look at Christians, in the neighbourhood they live, in the place of work and there are times, when, whether one is a Christian or not, sparks start flying, and the non-Christian did not expect such a reaction from the Christian, because men outside the Church think that those in it should be like angels, perfect people. But it is not so, Christians are people that have dealt with the question of sin, and by God’s grace they have been led to Christ. There are sins of various degrees, but when pardon is sought sincerely, in Christ God will forgive His child, because a true Christian has known a thorough conversion from being a sinner into a Child of God. The apostle John writing to Christians tells them: “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us, if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8-9.) Only true Christian can confess their sins and be forgiven, they do so directly to God without the need of a priest. A sinner must repent from his sins; repentance is a return to God by accepting Jesus-Christ as a Saviour at that point a man ceases to serve Satan and becomes a servant of Jesus Christ, All Christians are servants of Christ, they have various duties but they all serve to His glory! When one has become a Christian as stated above, he lives in a constant communion with God and confession of sins is a natural part of it. The unbeliever sins and thinks nothing of it, but the believer will regret it, and confess it; “The blood of Jesus-Christ God’s Son, purifies us from all sin.”

Therefore, because of sins human relationships are strained. Men do not really trust each other. Some sins hurt deeply, others are very destructive, they destroy marriages, families, lives, reputations and they lead even to murder. Because of sin people become suicidal, many factors contribute to it. Children live in fear because of violence at home; many get violated within the family and out of it. There are murders, wars, hatred. There are divisions due to religious fanaticism, and race; preachers of hate use politics to foster their ideology, and throw to the wind words that will produce a harvest of destruction. 

In Europe there have been two terrible world wars and men have not learned, in spite of 

them, that the Gospel has been preached for twenty centuries saying that sin is a poison and that sin will drive men to a disastrous end. Because people are born in, so called, Christian Countries, nations that look at what is done by supposed Christians Countries judge them without realising that people born in a “Christian” country are not necessarily Christians. In any case in God’s economy Christians countries do not exist, for most of their citizens do not believe in Jesus Christ as their Saviour and Lord! By nature all men are sinners, children of darkness, agents of the devil, and enemies of God and of true Christians. The punishment of false Christians will be more severe because they will have blasphemed the Name of God. The Bible does teach that men by nature are unable to obey God. That is what the Ten Commandments finally prove, they were given to prove to men that because that sin, being their master they were unable to obey God’s righteous demands. 

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What I have just written concerning the Word of Truth is to show that Jesus alone is the founder of true Christianity, and he says: “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 neighbour as yourself. All the law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22- 37-39.) Such statements from Jesus-Christ, the Master of all true Christians show that a true relationship with God is live in love in the Holy Spirit. If the verse quoted above is not enough to establish the importance of man’s relationship and attitude to God there is another one which sums it up perfectly: “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.” (Ecclesiastes 12: 13.) To obey is greater than sacrifice.

Man is not in a position to select what suits him or to create a diluted Christian way of life by a self-made code of practice and live by it. What God says can only be appreciated by those that are born of the Holy Spirit, it is he who gives to God’s children the capacity not only to understand His words, but to actually practice them and live the life of God that is far greater than what the Ten Commandments could do. One may think to be extravagant and keep nine commandments, and feel absolutely proud of such a moral achievement, but my friend, God says: “For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all”. (James 2: 10.)

Men have been influenced morally, mainly by churches responsible to the government of the country they live in. The clergy misuse the Bible and teach that which will make of their people good citizens, their teaching is mainly moral and ethical as a code of practice. This means that they end up disciplined, orderly, hard- working individuals that pay faithfully their taxes. Obviously this is right and to be expected, but one does not have to be a Christian to be such a good citizen. God expects it from men as their duty, but it will do nothing to save their Soul. Men deserve faithful ministers who teach them the full counsel of God, a full Gospel, to help men to learn how to treat God. Past history proves that the gentry and the clergy were hand in glove to keep people poor and ignorant by keeping the Bible a closed Book. In many countries of the world it is still so. In the western world especially, the first four commandments are largely ignored by a huge majority of Christendom. Oh Yes, they are mentioned but how can a church filled with idols, teach their adepts that idolatry leads to hell? They cannot because they do not believe it and it does not suit their purpose.

May I ask you sincerely to continue with this study; please do not give up. Read on. It will become clearer to you as you go on and lead you to a better understanding of life, and the importance of being right with God! Understanding the Gospel and believe its teachings is the only way to eternal life. All the remarks that are made concerning the commandments are made to convict you, the reader, that all men are sinners from birth and stand in need not only of forgiveness, but especially of a new life; I mean the power of a new life, which is the new birth, being a mighty miracle, it is a work of God the Holy-Spirit! Therefore, I ask a big question: ‘How can a man receive it and be led to inherit Eternal Life’? The purpose of explaining the Ten Commandments, in as many details as possible, is to lead you to discover all that God has provided in Jesus-Christ his Son for man’s total emancipation from sin and its eternal penalty, which is the second death. Jesus is the escape route from darkness to light. 

Let me now explain how God views each of the remaining commandments, and how He expects men to apply themselves to obey them and do His will. So turn to chapter 10b.