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Today's reading is from Exodus chapter 20, verses one through seven.
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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 slavery.
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You shall have no other gods before me.
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You shall not make for yourself a carved image or 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.
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You shall not bow down to them or serve them.
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For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
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You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
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This is the word of the Lord.
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Thanks be to God.
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Well, good morning.
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It's great to gather together with you all.
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My name is James Rathman, I'm the pastor here at Redemption Church Denver.
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And we are continuing through Exodus this morning.
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And at this point, we're moving pretty slow because we're basically just adding about one verse at a time as we're moving through the Ten Commandments through the rest of fall.
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And we are covering the third commandment this morning.
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And the third commandment is you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
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That's the third commandment.
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Would you pray with me?
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Father, we praise you for gathering us together.
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Lord, for showing to us your name.
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How majestic is your name in all the earth, Lord, that we might know the name that we might call upon for our salvation, that you have revealed yourself to us fully in your Son Jesus Christ, and you have rescued us by great wonder and power of his resurrection.
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Lord, I pray that we would learn how to revere and honor your name.
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That just as we pray so often, as we pray each Sunday together, hallowed be your name, Lord, that we would understand and grow to understand what that means, Lord, that we might know you more completely and honor you as Lord.
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We lift this up in Jesus' name.
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Amen.
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I was thinking that if you if you aren't in church often or or uh if this is like your first time or something, I would think, I would, I would probably think that the Ten Commandments, that's probably something that those church folks talk about all the time.
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It's probably like every other week they're talking about the Ten Commandments.
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But I've been asking around on how many people have ever heard a sermon series on the Ten Commandments or gone through the Ten Commandments.
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And it's not, it's not, it's actually pretty rare, I think, that we talk about the Ten Commandments.
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It's recently rare.
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This would have been a part of uh your ch We would have taught our children the Ten Commandments, they would have memorized it.
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The Ten Commandments were an ordinary pattern of prayer in the Christian life for most of the church's history.
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If you read the Reformers and you're looking for like how to pray, and the Reformers are teaching you how to pray, they'll it's typical that they will teach you how to pray through the Lord's Prayer, and then they'll teach you how to pray through the Ten Commandments as sort of a survey of your own soul before the Lord.
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But it's a language that we've really lost, and so I'm thankful that we have the opportunity here moving through Exodus to re-look at the Ten Commandments, the central ethical, the summary of the moral law in Scripture, especially because I think one of the most unique things that Christianity has to offer right now, this is the understatement of all understatements, but uh something that maybe might capture people's attention the most is that we have an ethical framework.
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That we there is a clear Christian ethic.
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I think one of the things that surprised me in talking with non-Christians is how attractive the Christian ethic is.
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I think we have this sense, this sort of understanding that the Christian ethic needs to be sort of hidden because it can cause so much offense in our culture or to people who don't hold to this Christian ethic.
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But in my experience, more and more, it is the Christian ethic which has been so attractive to people.
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And I think that's because so much of our world is just tossed about with no grounding in terms of what is right, what is wrong.
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Is there anything that could inform practically how I'm living in a meaningful way?
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Well, praise God.
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We have the law of God that He has given to us.
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And it I think we can underestimate just how grounding that is uh and uh what it what it means to have something that
Load full transcript
provides such meaning to our ordinary actions.
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Okay, so the third commandment.
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The third commandment is uh not taking the name of the Lord your God in vain.
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What I've noticed in moving through the Ten Commandments is that I think I know what they mean, and then I read them, and I think I don't think I really know what that means.
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And that's been that's happened three times so far.
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And we are on the third commandment.
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And so I think uh that will probably continue to happen.
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But this is one I I think the Ten Commandments are something that we think we know.
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This one, especially, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
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This is the commandment about cussing, is what we think.
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And that's true.
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That's true.
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This is a commandment about cussing.
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This is a commandment which which informs that you you should tame your tongue, especially with regards to speaking about the Lord.
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But even more broadly, that we should have pure speech.
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This is a good reason to teach your kids to s to say fiddles fiddlesticks and zoinks, silly pants, these are all good ones.
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These are all good ones.
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It is it is good and right to give exclamations that are not curses and that are not cursing, especially not cursing the name of our Lord.
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This is the commandment which which is is proof that that our Lord has no middle initial.
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And it is not H, what his middle initial is.
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But where this commandment gets confused uh amidst all of that and all of that good stuff, like that is that is good.
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I think like for a if I were to imagine like what like uh you know, pastors have moves, there's pastor moves, well-worn grooves that we have that we can trot.
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If I were to do uh like a like what I would anticipate as like a pastor move for the Ten Commandments, it would be like, you know, everybody, you think it's about cussing, and you think it's about like, you know, saying the Lord's name when you stub your toe, but really it's about how you represent that would be that would be the pastor move.
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What I want you to hear, and what I want to be clear from the outset, it is about saying the Lord's name when you stub your toe.
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It is certainly about that.
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And my hope at the end of this is not just to expand your view of the third commandment, but also to see the unthinkable weight, the incalculable offense of saying the Lord's name when you stub your toe.
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That's part of that's part of my hope for this.
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The risk of taking the Lord's name in vain is that we will wear out the Lord's name such that when you need to call on him, you're not able to.
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That is the risk of the third commandment.
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That you will find yourself, after repeated violations of the third commandment, you will find yourself in such a situation where you need to cry out to God and you have no name to call.
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That is the risk of the third commandment.
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So, what we're going to look at is the name.
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What is the name?
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Taking the Lord's name in vain.
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What's the name?
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We're going to look at taking.
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It says taking the Lord's name in vain.
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What is the taking?
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Then we're going to look at vanity.
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What is the vainess?
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Why is it that why is why is this the word that's given to us?
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Why is it the vainess?
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All right, so first at the name, we'll refresh your memory what it says.
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Exodus 27, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain.
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For the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
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What is the name of God?
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The larger catechism offers a large extent to the name of God, that the name of God maps onto a lot of categories.
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In question 112, it says, What is required in the third commandment?
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And I'm just going to read the first part of it so we can get the sense of name.
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It says, the third commandment requires that the name of God, his titles, attributes, ordinances, the word, sacraments, prayer, oaths, vows, lots, his works, and whatsoever else there is whereby he makes himself known to us.
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This is the extent of the name of God.
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So you can kind of capture that last summary phrase.
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This is the way that the catechism often is, is they could have done one phrase, but it's nice to have a lot of examples.
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Because the phrase that would have worked is uh whatsoever there is whereby he makes himself known.
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That is the extent of the name of God.
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Anything by which he makes himself known.
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So we are not to misuse or
slander or swear by wrongfully any uh the very name that God has given us, when we say God and we know that we are referring to the true God, we are not to use that as a slander.
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We are not to use that name in vain.
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The Lord Jesus Christ, when we say Jesus' name, because we understand who he is, he is the fullness of the revelation.
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We are not to use that in vain, when we swear by the word, when we speak of the word, when we speak of his creation, the glory of his creation, the glory of the mountains that we love to go see, the leaves that are changing colors that we love to go see, whereby these things whereby he makes himself known, these are not to be taken or treated as though they are vain.
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Now, the importance of this is that these are the name of God is all that by which God reveals himself to us.
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And this is the central thing that we must grasp in the Ten Commandments, and that we've grasped since the first commandment, is that these commandments are coming from the mouth of God to his people.
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This is God's revelation of himself to his people.
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This is not an act of human imagination coming up with what we think God is like.
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This is not us surveying creation and saying, here's the framework, here's the ethics that this determines.
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This is the revelation of God to us.
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It is from the top down, him telling us who he is like.
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And what God discloses to us is his name.
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And because God has shared with us his name, because it it the this is the the way that we have to think about it.
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Most names names are the type of thing that humans give give to things.
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Humans do the naming.
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That's what we that's one of our creaturely roles.
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Did you guys hear about the new cat?
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There's a new cat out here with us.
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But when we say new cat, right, there's I do do you there's literally they found a cat for those of you with the blankest of stairs.
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Stay in like the jungle.
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You guys, you know jungles like from children's storybooks.
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Turns out they're real places.
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And there's this little cat in them, and they brought the cat to a vet, and the vet was like, I don't know what this thing is.
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And then they, you know, look up, they go through all the cat books.
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I don't know what biologists do.
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And then they're like, not still not in here, still not in here, and they look back and forth at each other, like, it's in yours, it's in yours, and then after a certain amount of time, if enough time has passed, that it's not in either of their books, then they look at each other and they say, New cat.
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And then they have to name it.
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Humans do the naming.
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Is the cat new?
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No, I think we assume the cat has been around.
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What's new is it we've we've named it.
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We've granted it an identity.
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That's what humans do.
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We're the naming things.
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And so we expect that all names are the types of things that we we are the ones granting an identity.
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If it has a name, that means it's been granted an identity by a human.
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Because we're the naming things.
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But God, in revealing his name, this is not us granting God an identity.
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This is receiving the revelation of who he is.
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That's what the Ten Commandments are designed to protect.
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So this is not a work of human imagination.
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This is God telling us how we are able to address him.
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In that sense, it's like the way we introduce ourselves.
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You know, when I introduce myself, although it's a received name, but you understand the analogy, I say, hello, I'm James.
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And then the other person doesn't get to be like, I'm gonna call you Steve.
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If they do, then they're then there's some sort of masculine challenge taking place, and you it now is a it's a test of your I don't know, wits or strength.
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They must call you by your n by your name.
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If they don't use your name, they're not addressing you.
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And so, in this sense, the name of God, what I want you to grasp when you hear the name of God, and even looking at the large extent that the name of God has, that the larger catechism shows to us, what you need to see is that it it works just like any other name.
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It works like your name.
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The difference is that God has placed this name, has to has told you, he has revealed his name to you.
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This is not something that humans have placed upon him in the way that we named that new that new cat.
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The way his name works is just the way ordinary names work.
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Names are a way of describing the exact identity and all of the attributes of somebody.
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This is all captured in a name.
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You can imagine that uh somebody uh that that I uh uh talk I'm talking behind somebody's back and I'm slandering them.
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Imagine this.
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And uh while uh and it when then it gets back around and the person confronts me and they say, You were talking badly about me.
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You you were you were dragging my name through the mud.
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And I say, No, no, no, I was just saying bad things about your name.
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This isn't you.
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It's not you're not your name.
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And they they would, this is this is obviously absurd.
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Because we know what names are.
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We know that names are real, that names matter, they actually adhere.
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You know, there's like uh uh you you could you could imagine uh an instance of somebody being like, who are you?
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you know, and then you tell them your name.
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This would happen in Boulder.
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You know, imagine this story is going to sound absurd.
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Now imagine it in Boulder.
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It won't sound absurd, it'll sound won't sound absurd.
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You'll say, like, what's it, what's, you know, you introduce yourself and it's like, hi, I'm James.
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You're like, yeah, that's your name, but who are you?
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You know?
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Who are you?
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That's uh we we get the sense of that, but the re but really what I'm wanting to say is that's absurd.
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That's not how names work.
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Names are these have this quality of capturing all of me and all of my attributes, and when I give you my name, you have the opportunity to bless me or hurt me with it.
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You have this incredible power that is not a false power.
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It is a real power over me.
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It is a real mechanism of relating to me.
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So the name of God is what I want you to see in this is why is it handled like this?
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Well, because this is what names are.
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This is how names ordinarily work.
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You already know this.
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You already know this.
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In order to pretend otherwise, you'd have to do some very intentional forgetting about how to how the world ordinarily works.
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So that is what we are discussing.
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We are discussing the name of God.
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And we know that the name of God is how we address him, who he has shown himself to be that we have received, not an act of human imagination.
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And the name of God carries with it an identification with all of his attributes, all of the truths of who he is.
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We express this by his name.
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Just like you.
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Now, the commandment is against taking the name of the Lord in vain.
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What is it to take the name?
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In Exodus 20, verse 7.
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Let's just hear the commandment again.
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I'm going to do this a couple of times.
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You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
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Now, this commandment is mostly about speech, because a name is a word.
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You say it with speech.
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But interestingly, the commandment does not say you shall not say the name of the Lord your God in vain.
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Hebrew has a word for saying, it doesn't use that word.
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Instead, it uses a word which sounds like Nassa, and it means to lift up.
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So when you're learning Hebrew, the way that you memorize that word is Nassah lifts up rockets.
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That's how I remember that.
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And this name means to lift up or to bear or to carry.
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To take.
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The word take means lift up, bear, or carry.
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You shall not lift up or bear or carry the name of the Lord your God in vain.
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It is not just say, but of course it includes the saying, the speaking of the Lord's name.
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Take or carry or to lift up.
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What this means is that we, in a sense, we bear the name of God as Christians.
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And the people of God that are gathered before him at Sinai, who are his covenant people, they are having the name of God placed upon him.
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They are God's people.
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We are, the church, we are God's people.
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We are Christians.
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His name is in our name.
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And so that means that we are representatives of him.
00:20:55.519 --> 00:21:00.079
That we demonstrate what it looks like to be God's people.
00:21:00.400 --> 00:21:02.799
We bear his reputation.
00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:07.200
We fly his colors, we wave his banner.
00:21:07.599 --> 00:21:09.759
That is who we are as a people.
00:21:09.920 --> 00:21:14.799
Therefore, you can see the large extent of
taking the Lord's name in vain.
00:21:15.039 --> 00:21:23.279
Taking the Lord's name in vain is any violation of any of the Ten Commandments by His people.
00:21:25.519 --> 00:21:29.920
You cannot violate any of the Ten Commandments without violating the third commandment.
00:21:30.079 --> 00:21:32.079
We'll see that they all work like this.
00:21:32.880 --> 00:21:52.960
Because what you are doing when you lie, when you commit adultery, what you're doing is at least as an even just as an image bearer, let's say a non Christian who just bears the image of God by dent of creation, they are demonstrating that the image bearers of God are covenant breakers.
00:21:54.079 --> 00:21:59.599
This shows that what God, what the name of God demonstrates, which is which is His righteousness.
00:22:00.240 --> 00:22:03.200
His fidelity, his faithfulness.
00:22:04.960 --> 00:22:09.119
It shows that that's actually vanity.
00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:13.680
Our thinking of God's name that way is actually vain.
00:22:15.039 --> 00:22:18.319
And so we have violated the third commandment.
00:22:20.720 --> 00:22:24.319
So this commandment, like the others, can be a taking on.
00:22:24.720 --> 00:22:25.279
It is.
00:22:26.640 --> 00:22:32.400
You cannot violate any of the other commandments without violating the third commandment.
00:22:33.039 --> 00:22:38.799
The close of the ironic blessing, which Zach recites at the end of each week, he'll recite it at the end of this week.
00:22:38.960 --> 00:22:40.319
May the Lord bless you and keep you.
00:22:40.480 --> 00:22:42.559
May the Lord make his face shine upon you.
00:22:42.799 --> 00:22:45.920
May the Lord lift his face upon you and give you peace.
00:22:46.240 --> 00:22:51.200
This blessing is described in Numbers 627.
00:22:51.279 --> 00:22:52.480
Let me see if I got it right.
00:22:52.799 --> 00:22:53.759
There's maybe.
00:22:54.079 --> 00:22:55.279
Numbers 627.
00:22:55.359 --> 00:23:04.960
It's described as putting, God says, so shall they put my name upon the people of Israel, and I will bless them.
00:23:05.440 --> 00:23:20.400
When you are blessed with that blessing, the way that the Lord describes it is you are putting, he is putting his name upon you, so that the whole of your life becomes a demonstration of the name of God.
00:23:20.720 --> 00:23:24.559
It is tied to the name of God.
00:23:25.599 --> 00:23:29.680
To bear God's name is to bear his blessing.
00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:32.559
Would you bear his blessing in vain?
00:23:34.880 --> 00:23:41.440
Would you have the blessing of God upon you and then live as though you didn't?
00:23:42.960 --> 00:23:51.440
Most directly, would you have the blessing of God upon you and then speak as though it is meaningless?
00:23:52.319 --> 00:23:55.759
This is to bear the name of the Lord your God in vain.
00:23:56.000 --> 00:23:57.920
Now I want to talk about vanity.
00:23:58.079 --> 00:23:59.440
What is the vainness of it?
00:23:59.599 --> 00:24:03.839
In Exodus 20, verse
7, we'll all be able to say it together by the end of this.
00:24:13.119 --> 00:24:15.039
What is the word vain here?
00:24:17.759 --> 00:24:23.440
Well, in Job 7, verse 3, it refers to emptiness.
00:24:23.920 --> 00:24:27.759
Job says, I am allotted months of emptiness.
00:24:28.880 --> 00:24:36.000
Or it can refer to general human wickedness, as in Job 11, 11, which refers to worthless men.
00:24:36.160 --> 00:24:39.119
The word for worthless there is the same word for vain.
00:24:40.319 --> 00:24:44.640
Or it can refer specifically to lies, to lying.
00:24:45.200 --> 00:25:06.640
In fact, in Deuteronomy chapter 5, where the Ten Commandments are stated for the second time in Scripture, the tenth commandment, which is not, or the ninth commandment, which is not bearing false witness against your neighbor, the word for false there is this same word for vain.
00:25:08.319 --> 00:25:12.880
The way that that commandment is given to us in Deuteronomy.
00:25:13.680 --> 00:25:19.039
So empty, worthless, wicked, false.
00:25:19.839 --> 00:25:28.799
These are ways that we are prohibited, commanded not to handle the name of our God.
00:25:31.279 --> 00:25:35.200
Empty, meaningless, or a lie.
00:25:37.279 --> 00:25:49.519
Now what this means is that we are treating the name of God, which he has given to us, as though it doesn't actually refer to anything out there.
00:25:50.480 --> 00:25:52.480
You know what a lie is?
00:25:53.279 --> 00:25:57.200
A lie is when there's, you know, reality out here.
00:25:58.400 --> 00:26:04.480
And then you say something, and that thing that you say does not connect with anything in reality.
00:26:04.640 --> 00:26:13.440
In fact, it's even meant to kind of hide it or shield you from what reality is, from what's actually happening out here.
00:26:13.680 --> 00:26:22.559
So you can see that that phrase, the word that you would say, the signal that you would send with that word, it signifies nothing.
00:26:22.880 --> 00:26:25.200
It adheres at no level.
00:26:25.440 --> 00:26:26.799
There's nothing there.
00:26:27.920 --> 00:26:31.839
If I were to say, look at the giant Christmas tree behind me.
00:26:32.720 --> 00:26:34.720
Well, there's not one.
00:26:35.759 --> 00:26:44.400
So that word, giant Christmas tree, or that phrase, it doesn't connect to anything out here in the world.
00:26:44.960 --> 00:26:49.279
It touches nothing, it's meaningless, it signifies nothing.
00:26:50.640 --> 00:26:53.519
We have the name of God.
00:26:54.640 --> 00:27:02.400
And when we treat it in vain, what we are saying is this word signifies nothing.
00:27:02.960 --> 00:27:05.839
There is nothing really there.
00:27:06.400 --> 00:27:08.960
It is fundamentally meaningless.
00:27:09.119 --> 00:27:12.160
We might say it's just words.
00:27:13.599 --> 00:27:15.279
It's just words.
00:27:18.319 --> 00:27:23.839
This, I think, is one of our greatest traps culturally.
00:27:25.440 --> 00:27:38.960
One of our greatest traps is that we treat our words as
though they are merely words that have no responsibility for connecting to reality.
00:27:41.920 --> 00:27:57.599
And one of the ways that we do this is we treat our talking about God as only mattering insofar as it affects our internal psychological state.
00:27:59.920 --> 00:28:11.200
So that if we talk about God in such a way that it creates positive states inside of us, then that is true and good and worth pursuing.
00:28:11.920 --> 00:28:23.359
If somebody around you talks about God in ways that create negative internal states around you, then we would say that is bad or that is wrong.
00:28:23.599 --> 00:28:27.039
That is not the way people should handle the name of God.
00:28:28.240 --> 00:28:32.960
Here's the problem with this mode of thinking or that level of assessment.
00:28:33.200 --> 00:28:35.839
You know who it leaves out of the picture?
00:28:36.960 --> 00:28:37.279
God.
00:28:39.519 --> 00:28:41.920
You know what this subtly teaches us?
00:28:42.160 --> 00:28:48.640
When we talk about God, we can use this word however we want because there's no one really there.
00:28:50.480 --> 00:28:54.240
And it doesn't actually refer to anything.
00:28:55.920 --> 00:29:01.680
God has given us his name, and God's name is not any word.
00:29:04.079 --> 00:29:13.759
To say that God's name could be any word, is to say that we are the ones who fundamentally do the naming.
00:29:14.480 --> 00:29:16.240
We identify him.
00:29:16.960 --> 00:29:19.440
This is not the story of God's name.
00:29:19.920 --> 00:29:25.039
The story of God's name is that he reveals it to us.
00:29:25.759 --> 00:29:38.720
The one who named man, like he found a new cat, is the one who named us, and this is the one who reveals to us his name.
00:29:42.559 --> 00:29:47.359
It is not any word, because we are not the ones who chose it.
00:29:48.559 --> 00:29:53.200
And how much more particular do we see this with the people of God here?
00:29:53.759 --> 00:29:56.160
The phrasing is the Lord your God.
00:29:57.119 --> 00:30:03.119
The word that's being used there is the famous Yahweh, the covenantal name of God.
00:30:03.279 --> 00:30:07.200
When you see Lord translated in your Bibles, it's typically Yahweh.
00:30:07.440 --> 00:30:10.319
And this is the covenantal name of God.
00:30:11.920 --> 00:30:15.599
Where he is saying, I am your God, you are my people.
00:30:16.160 --> 00:30:23.200
He is placing his name upon his people the way a husband places his name upon his wife.
00:30:24.559 --> 00:30:30.160
And when she takes on that name, she's not saying, Well, really, it could be any name.
00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:34.799
What she's saying is, no, no, it's his name.
00:30:35.519 --> 00:30:41.759
And so if another man walks up to her and says, Hey, do you mind if I call you Mrs.
00:30:41.920 --> 00:30:42.480
Jones?
00:30:42.720 --> 00:30:47.279
Jones is my last name, and I'd prefer to call you by my last name.
00:30:47.519 --> 00:30:49.680
She would say, no, no, no.
00:30:51.519 --> 00:30:54.880
This is not, it is not that any name will do.
00:30:55.440 --> 00:30:57.759
This one must be associated with my husband.
00:30:57.839 --> 00:30:59.599
It has to be associated particularly.
00:30:59.759 --> 00:31:03.599
There's a there's a that's where the meaning in this is.
00:31:04.319 --> 00:31:07.680
And yet we treat God as though he could go by any name.
00:31:08.160 --> 00:31:14.000
When we treat God as though he could go by any name, what we are saying is we're the ones that do the naming.
00:31:15.839 --> 00:31:18.720
We're the ones that ultimately are over him.
00:31:19.279 --> 00:31:28.000
There is a phenomena in existence, and we have the power over it to identify it and place it within our story.
00:31:28.160 --> 00:31:29.359
That's what naming is.
00:31:29.519 --> 00:31:32.079
It's placing things in the human story.
00:31:33.279 --> 00:31:35.519
That is not the way this is working.
00:31:36.000 --> 00:31:39.039
The name of God is not from man upward.
00:31:39.279 --> 00:31:41.920
The name of God is from heaven downward.
00:31:42.000 --> 00:31:55.119
It is something we receive, and he places himself into our story and defines the terms of our story and reveals the truth of who he is.
00:31:55.599 --> 00:31:59.839
His identity belongs to him to be revealed.
00:32:00.079 --> 00:32:07.039
When we treat the name of God as though it could be any name, and here's how particular this must get.
00:32:07.440 --> 00:32:12.000
It has to come down to the name Jesus Christ.
00:32:13.119 --> 00:32:16.319
Because here's the claim of Christianity.
00:32:16.960 --> 00:32:23.200
God has revealed himself in the fullness of his revelation in a man who has a name.
00:32:24.160 --> 00:32:28.079
And that man's name is Jesus Christ.
00:32:29.279 --> 00:32:35.599
And it is the only name given under heaven by which we may be saved.
00:32:36.720 --> 00:32:39.519
And you say, Well, couldn't I say any name?
00:32:39.839 --> 00:32:40.160
No.
00:32:42.640 --> 00:32:43.920
You can't.
00:32:45.440 --> 00:32:50.799
To say that you could say any name is to say that you could come up with a way to save yourself.
00:32:50.960 --> 00:32:52.880
That is not the story we are in.
00:32:59.359 --> 00:33:04.079
Consider this in relationship to the second commandment, which we looked at last week.
00:33:04.720 --> 00:33:09.279
The second commandment says that we cannot worship God by images.
00:33:10.480 --> 00:33:27.680
And the reason that we cannot worship God by images is because you can see how both of these commandments work together, and all of the commandments work together, as a hedge of protection around God's people as he is revealing himself to them.
00:33:28.000 --> 00:33:31.279
He is saying, Really see me.
00:33:32.799 --> 00:33:36.960
Really see God as He is revealing Himself to you.
00:33:37.200 --> 00:33:40.240
Do not see some work of your own imagination.
00:33:40.400 --> 00:33:44.400
Do not get distracted into the worship of something else in
creation.
00:33:44.559 --> 00:33:47.599
You're seeing something very unique here.
00:33:47.920 --> 00:33:49.839
I don't know if you can qualify unique.
00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:56.319
In fact, I know from an episode of West Wing that you can't qualify unique because the speechwriter says you can't qualify unique.
00:33:56.559 --> 00:33:58.079
Because he says very unique.
00:33:59.200 --> 00:34:01.920
That is the end of that thought stream.
00:34:05.359 --> 00:34:09.039
What is being revealed is God Himself to you.
00:34:10.559 --> 00:34:16.159
These are a hedge of protection around that prevent us by obedience to these commandments.
00:34:16.320 --> 00:34:21.119
What's happening, why God is giving them to us, is so that we won't miss him.
00:34:25.760 --> 00:34:28.960
The second commandment says, don't worship him by images.
00:34:29.119 --> 00:34:37.119
And that's because to worship him by images is to worship him according to an act of our own imagination.
00:34:37.519 --> 00:34:40.800
He has not revealed himself to us by images.
00:34:44.079 --> 00:34:48.320
And so we are not to worship him according to our own imagination.
00:34:49.280 --> 00:34:53.519
We are to worship him according to how he has revealed himself to us.
00:34:54.800 --> 00:35:00.239
You know, we are receiving him in truth of who he is.
00:35:01.920 --> 00:35:16.480
So you can imagine that there is like a container, you know, it's to worship God according to images is to take the transcendent glorious God as he has revealed himself to us and to place him within this container that he doesn't fit in.
00:35:16.960 --> 00:35:20.400
And then we worship that container as though it is God.
00:35:21.199 --> 00:35:24.559
Now, words are like containers of meaning.
00:35:24.880 --> 00:35:26.079
Stay with me.
00:35:27.840 --> 00:35:52.159
And God has given to us this legitimate container of meaning, which is his name, Yahweh, God, the Lord, Jesus Christ, his word, all these revelations, the sacrament, these true revelations of who he is that are meant to refer our minds to him so that we can direct our gaze to him, so that we can see him by the eyes of faith.
00:35:52.480 --> 00:35:55.519
He has given us this container of his name.
00:35:55.840 --> 00:36:02.960
And what we are doing when we use that name in vain, we are emptying the container of its meaning.
00:36:03.519 --> 00:36:10.880
And what we are left with is just a mere word that cannot connect us to God in any way.
00:36:11.119 --> 00:36:19.280
And that's why this commandment is about stubbing your toe and saying Jesus Christ as a curse.
00:36:21.119 --> 00:36:27.119
Because that word, those words, that's the name.
00:36:28.159 --> 00:36:36.079
And that name either has meaning and refers to a real person, or it is vain and meaningless.
00:36:37.280 --> 00:36:52.559
And if we empty the meaning of the name, if we pour it out as curses, you know, here's the way that this to think of this, because what you may be thinking is this is
just a verbal tick that people have.
00:36:53.199 --> 00:36:58.559
Like if you just stub your toe and you sh and you shout out the Lord's name, this is just a verbal tick.
00:36:58.639 --> 00:37:05.280
It it really amounts to the same meaning as, you know, shucks, zoinks.
00:37:06.320 --> 00:37:08.400
Those something like that.
00:37:08.559 --> 00:37:12.639
It really amounts to that say it carries the same amount of meaning as those.
00:37:13.039 --> 00:37:22.960
So is it really violating the third commandment to shout out something that is equivalent to shucks or zoinks?
00:37:23.440 --> 00:37:31.599
Well, don't you see that is right to the this is right to the heart of the third commandment.
00:37:32.800 --> 00:37:35.920
Because there is a name.
00:37:37.199 --> 00:37:38.480
We know it.
00:37:40.400 --> 00:37:43.519
We know the name is Jesus Christ.
00:37:44.719 --> 00:37:49.199
We know the name is our Lord, we know the name is God.
00:37:50.800 --> 00:37:52.320
We know the name.
00:37:52.559 --> 00:38:00.559
If we treat it as meaningless, what we are saying is this name actually refers to nothing.
00:38:01.039 --> 00:38:09.599
There is no being there, and because there is no being there, he doesn't care how I use these words.
00:38:13.039 --> 00:38:23.360
But in Exodus 20, verse 7, uh in this set in this verse, what it says at the end of it is for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
00:38:25.360 --> 00:38:27.679
He has given us his name.
00:38:28.400 --> 00:38:37.840
He cares how we use it, he cares how it is used, because, and this is the heart of the Ten Commandments, he's really there.
00:38:39.760 --> 00:38:47.039
And he is calling himself our God, placing his name upon us.
00:38:47.199 --> 00:38:53.440
And what he's saying is, when you call my name, I'll be there.
00:38:54.480 --> 00:38:56.559
Somebody should write a song like that.
00:39:00.719 --> 00:39:12.000
Acts 4.12, Peter says in his speech, and there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.
00:39:14.559 --> 00:39:19.840
No other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.
00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:21.360
There is a name.
00:39:21.679 --> 00:39:23.679
Jesus Christ is the name.
00:39:23.920 --> 00:39:26.880
You know how here's another way that names work.
00:39:28.880 --> 00:39:30.800
Imagine a crowd.
00:39:31.519 --> 00:39:35.280
And you're one of the you're one of the you know people in the crowd.
00:39:35.360 --> 00:39:36.800
Have you ever been that?
00:39:38.719 --> 00:39:46.639
And when you are, and when you're one of the people in the crowd, uh somebody's trying to get your attention.
00:39:47.519 --> 00:39:54.000
And what they shout is human person, human, human in the crowd, human in the crowd.
00:39:54.239 --> 00:39:57.599
You don't, it doesn't get your attention.
00:39:58.159 --> 00:40:06.559
But for me, I don't know if it's like this for you guys, when somebody shouts James, man, I it captures my attention.
00:40:07.119 --> 00:40:10.400
And it and it draws my attention to that person.
00:40:10.960 --> 00:40:14.960
We uh we are now in a position to relate to one another.
00:40:17.920 --> 00:40:28.480
Imagine that there is a crowd that you are shouting into, and you know that there is someone in there, someone in there that you need to meet.
00:40:28.800 --> 00:40:35.599
You know, they have the magic beans, something incentivizing for you.
00:40:35.760 --> 00:40:42.559
You would like to meet this person, and you're shouting into the crowd, but you don't know their name.
00:40:44.960 --> 00:40:48.800
You shout into a void, and no one turns around.
00:40:52.320 --> 00:40:55.840
You can think of the name of God, it's like a coin that's been given to us.
00:40:56.079 --> 00:41:02.719
And when we use it in vain, it's like the embossment has worn off the coin so that we can no longer tell what it is.
00:41:03.039 --> 00:41:12.079
And then it has that shape, and then we go to spend with it, and then the person says, it doesn't, it I know this is supposed to be a coin, but I can't tell what this is or what this is even worth.
00:41:12.159 --> 00:41:13.360
It has nothing on it.
00:41:13.519 --> 00:41:16.960
It's like it's been used so flippantly.
00:41:17.760 --> 00:41:21.679
It's been rubbed down into something that has become meaningless.
00:41:21.840 --> 00:41:26.480
There's no sign of what this amounts to anymore on this.
00:41:26.719 --> 00:41:27.840
This is just vain.
00:41:28.559 --> 00:41:31.360
And the person says, I cannot accept this.
00:41:31.519 --> 00:41:33.199
This amounts to no value.
00:41:33.440 --> 00:41:35.840
This is the way that we treat the name of God.
00:41:37.440 --> 00:41:40.320
And what that means, what the here's the risk.
00:41:40.800 --> 00:41:53.280
So when when we treat the name of God as though it has no meaning, as though it could be any name, it plunges us into a world of total meaninglessness.
00:41:53.599 --> 00:41:56.239
This is where we exist as a culture.
00:41:59.920 --> 00:42:02.559
This is the truth of where we are.
00:42:04.880 --> 00:42:09.679
We're a Christian nation that has to restart the church every generation.
00:42:09.760 --> 00:42:17.280
We're restarting the church right now in a world of people who have never experienced, never heard the name.
00:42:17.440 --> 00:42:28.239
And that means we are surrounded by friends and neighbors that are shouting into the void because they have not been given the name.
00:42:30.800 --> 00:42:32.880
There are not many names.
00:42:33.840 --> 00:42:37.519
You cannot attain to him by spiritualism.
00:42:37.760 --> 00:42:41.760
You cannot shout any name into the void.
00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:52.719
To pretend that we could shout any name into the void is to pretend that he has not revealed himself to us and that we don't know his name, but we do.
00:42:53.199 --> 00:42:54.480
We can say it.
00:42:54.880 --> 00:42:56.719
It's Jesus Christ.
00:42:58.880 --> 00:43:00.320
It really happened.
00:43:00.639 --> 00:43:04.880
He introduced himself to humanity by being one of us.
00:43:06.639 --> 00:43:20.719
It is not a hidden name, but it is a name which has been used with such vanity that the general assumption of people is that why would I turn to that name?
00:43:20.960 --> 00:43:22.800
There's nothing there.
00:43:24.239 --> 00:43:26.079
It's empty.
00:43:26.639 --> 00:43:30.880
When I call that name, nobody turns around.
00:43:31.039 --> 00:43:33.599
It captures no one's attention.
00:43:33.840 --> 00:43:36.400
It refers to nothing.
00:43:36.960 --> 00:43:50.480
What would a world look like if there was a people of God who God had placed their name upon him and we had consistently treated his name as though it were vain?
00:43:51.119 --> 00:44:03.039
We would have taught the oncoming, the we would have, we would have taught the onlooking world that if they cry out according to this name, they Should expect to receive no response.
00:44:03.360 --> 00:44:05.599
And what is the truth of the matter?
00:44:05.840 --> 00:44:20.159
The truth of the matter, the true reputation of God, is that if we cry out according to the name of Jesus, if he's walking in a crowd, he hears it and turns around and he pays you attention.
00:44:20.639 --> 00:44:25.440
And by his name, you might be saved.
00:44:26.000 --> 00:44:32.320
By the saying of his name, there is power in the name of Jesus.
00:44:33.199 --> 00:44:36.320
Wish I were Billy Graham to preach this to you right now.
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There is power in the name of Jesus.
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It is not vain, it is not some empty container.
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It does not refer to nothing.
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He's really there.
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You can really call upon him.
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Do you treat him in your speech as though he's not?
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As though you could say anything.
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As though him being handled flippantly amounts to nothing, to nothingness.
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You are plunging yourself into a world of vanity, a world of total meaninglessness.
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Everybody who talks about all the all the reformers and throughout church history, when you talk about the third commandment, you have to talk about oaths, making vows and oaths.
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And the reason for that is because this has to do, one of the ways that we take the Lord's name in vain is we swear falsely according to his name.
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We say, God is my witness, and then we lie.
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We place our hands on a Bible and we make a vow and we don't mean it, or we break it later.
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We take vows at a marriage ceremony and then we don't adhere to them.
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We treat those words as though they meant nothing.
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And those are counted as third commandment violations.
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Because what is tied to us being able to say the name of Jesus and it actually refer to the man who is God who saves me.
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If the reality of that connection is broken, then the reality of our being able to communicate any sort of relational fidelity to anyone in our lives is broken.
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We are plunged into a world of meaninglessness.
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And that's what our world looks like.
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There is no fidelity, there is no loyalty, there is no sense of real connection, there is no sense that our words matter, that they hold weight, that they convey things.
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There's like somebody needs to write the paper, some philologist needs to write a paper on how all of language and the ability to make ourselves communicable at all hang on the third commandment.
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And that without it, we are shouting into a void.
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Here's what to not use the name of the Lord our God in vain means.
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To not use the name of the Lord our God in vain.
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You know when children get lost in the grocery store?
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First of all, remember grocery stores?
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Well, there was a time when children would get lost in them.
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And what the way what a child would do is they would call out dad or they would call out mom, mom.
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This is what the third commandment is about.
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Jesus Christ has purchased for us the right to say father.
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The hope of the third commandment is that when we shout out Father to God in heaven, he turns around and hears us like he's our father.
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And he gives to us the fullness of his attention.
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To use God's name in vain is to say that word means nothing.
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And then when you need it, you will be a child in the supermarket calling out father and no one hears.
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Shouting into the void.
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Don't wear out, don't misuse, don't flippantly, flippantly pass off the name of God.
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Here's the last thing that I want to talk about is I'm skipping a section.
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Just know that I'm skipping a section to talk about a new thing.
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So it's not just I'm doing some favors up here.
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We if only it were just misusing.
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If only it were flippantly casting off.
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But let us be honest with the way we use the name.
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We curse by the name.
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--> 00:49:23.199
We curse by the name.
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One of the ways that you can tell that our world is a world that has plummeted away from obedience to the third commandment is that we are a world that is trapped in irony.
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We are completely trapped in irony.
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And this is what the world of the crucifixion is.
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The world of the crucifixion is a world that is trapped in irony, unable to sincerely participate with God as they are face to face with him.
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And you know what they're doing when they're interacting with Jesus during the crucifixion?
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The people that are crucifying him, you know what they're doing?
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They're using all the right words.
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They're performing all the right actions.
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When they crucify him, they make a crown for him.
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Does he deserve a crown?
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Yes, he is the king of kings.
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And it is a crown of thorns.
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It is the crown stripped of its meaning.
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They put a robe on him.
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Is he royal?
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Does he deserve a robe?
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What do robes signify?
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Royalty.
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What does this robe signify?
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False royalty.
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They hail him.
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They hail King of the Jews.
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Is he the king of the Jews?
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Should he be hailed as king of the Jews?
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Yes.
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It's the right words, so full of irony that they neglect the God who is right in front of them.
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There's a sign that's placed above him.
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And the sign says King of the Jews.
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The sign placed above him is King of the Jews.
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Is he the King of the Jews?
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Yes.
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Why is the sign placed there by Pilate?
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Because Pilate thinks he isn't.
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All of these, what those are instances of, by the right words, what's taking place on Christ, what is happening to him is he is being cursed.
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He is being cursed.
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When we curse his name, we curse his name.
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Why was he treated like a curse?
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Isn't it funny that we say curse words?
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Like we're witches.
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It shows that we understand what I think that's a breakthrough.
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We get what we're really doing.
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That we can curse with our words.
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Why was Jesus treated like a curse?
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Why do we see in the plainest way all of these third commandment violations stacking up to curse the Son of God?
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Because we deserve to be cursed.
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We deserve to be the ones that shout into the void as though we've been forsaken by God and hear silence in return.
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Because we've worn out the name.
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Jesus shouts his forsakenness so that when we shout Father, we are heard for real by God the Father.
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We are tended to by him.
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We know his name.
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We know his name.
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It is a heavy thing to know the name.
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We should not pretend it's just any other word.
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Or it can be used flippantly or uselessly or ironically.
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We do not want to find ourselves trapped there.
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There's salvation in no other name than Jesus Christ.
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Let's pray.
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Father, all of these prayers at the end of the Ten Commandment sermons must be confessions.
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Because the goodness of your word, especially, is as we see it manifested in Jesus Christ, bearing the curse for breaking this, bearing the guilt that we deserve for breaking this, Lord.
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We see the terror of it, and we see the wonder of your mercy and grace.
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Lord, may your name be held above all names.
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Might we pray in a new way that hallowed would be your name.
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Lord, would we not take for granted that we have been given your name to call upon?
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Lord, that we can call out Abba, Father.
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That your spirit testifies with our Spirit, that we are sons of God, co-heirs with Christ.
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Lord, would we not think of these as just worn-out words or as flippant curses?
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May we not think of you flippantly, but may we think of you as you have revealed yourself to us, because it is more glorious than we would imagine on ourselves or by ourselves.
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Father, let us hallow your name.
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Have mercy on us.
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We confess we have used your name in vain.
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Lord, praise you for giving us the name of Jesus Christ that we might pray in with such confidence.
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And we do pray this in Jesus' name.
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Amen.