“The TOP 10 WAYS HUMANS MESS UP THE IMAGE OF GOD IN THEIR LIVES.”
“You shall not commit adultery.”
Just like Jesus got to the heart of the “you shall not murder” command, He got at the heart of this command. Again in Matthew 5:27-30, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.” I have to laugh at the folks who INSIST the Bible always be taken literally. If that were the case, and we were true to the text, our churches would look like wounded war veterans’ conventions! We’d be limbless and blinded in our pews! I was deeply convicted by a married brother who confessed his sin of lust to me. He relayed this insight:
“The other day I saw a woman step out of her car. I was immediately captivated by her beauty and started to wonder what it would be like to be married to her. Convicted, I prayed and asked God, ‘Lord, why did you make her so beautiful? I can’t concentrate on You! Then the Holy Spirit stepped into my mind with this answer: ‘I made her beautiful for her husband, just like I made your wife beautiful for you.’”
Allow me to pray with you on this one—Father, thank You for building “desire” in us. Without desire, we would never reach out for You! I confess and recognize that my desire is attached to my sin nature, which makes it corrupt, deceitful, and desperately wicked. I recognize, first of all, that my body was made for You, made for praise, made to serve Your creation. But like static-filled black pants in a dog kennel, my soul attracts, invites, and holds so much dander from this world that I am hopelessly covered in sin. Father, let Your love for me and my love for You be enough to “de-energize” the static from my black heart. Let me be thoroughly content with where You have me right now physically and sexually. Keep my eyes off of people, pictures, and activities that would only pull my heart into adultery. Make my feet quick to RUN away from this sin. FILL me with You. Let those around me taste the overflow of You, instead of the emptiness of me.
“You shall not steal.”
The closer we look in the mirror, the more imperfection we see. On this command, when we first look at it, we see ourselves compared to “bank robbers, jewelry thieves, and house burglars.” We look pretty good. Then, when we look closer, we see an appetite and proclivity toward stealing that stops us in our “righteous” tracks. At our heart level, we are greedy. We always want more. We don’t feel like we’ve been dealt a fair hand in life. There are others who have more or have been given more. Life is just not fair. We steal “time and talent” from our employers. We steal life from our spouse in a hundred different ways. We steal from the government, from our church, from God… write down some specifics:
You shall have no other gods before me.
Jesus replied: “‘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 neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”