Category: Devotionals

Since ultimately everything belongs to God and he dishes it out as he wills, God requires us to respect his division of material goods. The Eighth Commandment, which forbids stealing, demands that we respect what others have been given.

While the world may not care about marital faithfulness, God does. The Seventh Commandment forbids all types of marital unfaithfulness, pointing to the ideal of the one man-one woman union of marriage, and its expression of God’s relationship to his people.

The Sixth Commandment does not just forbid murder, but all forms of unlawful killing. More than that, it forbids the attitude of hate which is a type of murder in the heart.

Whether we are facing a new year in these “unprecedented times,” or a new year in “precedented times”, it is still important to look back before moving forward.

The Fifth Commandment serves as a bridge between the first four commandments, which deal with obligations to God, and the last five commandments, which deal with obligations to each other. The Fifth Commandment instructs us to honour parents, and indeed as a broader principle to all authority relationships. The commandment comes with a promise which…

In the Fourth Commandment, the importance of rest and worship is highlighted. God positively reminds us to set aside work and to rest – instead focusing our time on the worship of God. We do so both because it reflects God’s creative pattern, but also because it reflects God’s redemption, when we finally enter into…

While we tend to think the Third Commandment forbids using God’s names as an expletive, the commandment covers more than that. It reminds us God is holy, and we must always treat him that way in all our acts. We must not misuse God’s name for false worship, speaking blasphemy, or treating God like our…

God is not local, and certainly cannot be controlled. He is not to be worshiped as we desire, but instead in the way he commands, and worshiped as he has revealed himself. God is spirit, and those who worship him must do so in spirit and in truth (John 4:24). God is Creator, and cannot…

Idols are much broader than just (literal) religious figures, they are anything which takes the place of God as the highest priority in our life. Many of the ancient world’s idols were actually a physical representation of a sinful desire, such as fertility gods which were often connected with sexual immorality.