Ten Words to Live By E-Book

Jen Wilkin

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

New from the Best-Selling Author of Women of the Word Christianity isn't about following rules, it's about a relationship. The rise in popularity of this phrase coincides with a growing disinterest and misunderstanding regarding the role of God's life-giving, perfect law in the Christian life. Rather than the source of joy it was intended to be, the law is viewed as an angry god's restrictions for a rebellious people. In Ten Words to Live By, Jen Wilkin presents a fresh biblical look at the Ten Commandments, showing how they come to bear on our lives today as we seek to love God and others, to live in joyful freedom, and to long for that future day when God will be rightly worshiped for eternity. Learn to see the law of God as a feast for your famished soul, open to anyone who calls on the name of the Lord.

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“In this short book, Jen Wilkin takes the reader through the Ten Commandments with her characteristic depth, wisdom, and clarity. Whether you have studied the Bible for decades or it is brand new to you, this book will help you to understand what these ancient words mean for you today. This book makes me covet Jen Wilkin’s amazing gifts of writing and teaching while giving me the tools to combat the coveting. Don’t steal this book, but get it any other way you can, and you’ll be glad you did.”

Russell Moore, President, The Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention

“Jen Wilkin leads us to look at the Ten Commandments anew—welcoming obedience from a place of love and delight for the Lord, rather than fear and dread. For the believer set free in Christ, this is a reminder that the good news produces good fruit.”

Ruth Chou Simons,Wall Street Journal best-selling author, Beholding and Becoming and GraceLaced; artist; Founder, GraceLaced Co.

“In Ten Words to Live By, Jen Wilkin does what she does best: taking Scripture and making it plain; taking theology and revealing its everyday, here-and-now practicality. And once again, we remember that God’s ways and his commands are for our good. Once again, we remember that his words are life and health and peace.”

Hannah Anderson, author, All That’s Good: Recovering the Lost Art of Discernment

“Jen Wilkin has provided a fresh and timely guide through the Ten Commandments. She draws out their significance to those who follow Christ, giving us a mouth-watering vision of what life can look like as we follow the good words of King Jesus.”

Sam Allberry, pastor; author, 7 Myths about Singleness and Why Does God Care Who I Sleep With?

“I try to read everything Jen Wilkin writes, and this book is another example of why. I found myself informed, challenged, and encouraged, and I think you will too.”

Andrew Wilson, Teaching Pastor, King’s Church London

“Jen Wilkin has provided a clear, insightful, and accessible explanation of one of the most important sections of Holy Scripture—the Ten Commandments. With ease and verve she helps us understand the heart of God’s laws and how they are given to bring us life. Highly recommended!”

Jonathan T. Pennington, Associate Professor of New Testament, The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary

“What I appreciate most about Jen Wilkin is that as she teaches the Bible, she also teaches us how to read the Bible for ourselves. That’s exactly what she does in this book with one of the most important and yet misunderstood parts of Scripture—the Ten Commandments. Far from being cringe-worthy rules from a grumpy God, we learn that God’s commands are beautiful and lifegiving, revealing the pattern of Christlikeness that we can experience by God’s grace. Reading this book will help you not only to know the Ten Commandments but also to love them, delight in them, and ultimately live by them.”

Jeremy Treat, Pastor for Preaching and Vision, Reality LA, Los Angeles, California; Adjunct Professor of Theology, Biola University; author, Seek First and The Crucified King

“I’ve studied and preached the Ten Commandments over the last thirty years, but Ten Words to Live By helped me to see new truths and consider fresh applications. This book is biblical, thoughtful, and deeply practical. Jen Wilkin masterfully brings the ancient summary of the law to daily life. Regardless of your background with studying the Bible, read this book. You’ll be led to appreciate the Ten Commandments and how much we need them today.”

Mark Vroegop, Lead Pastor, College Park Church, Indianapolis, Indiana; author, Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy and Weep with Me

Ten Words to Live By

Ten Words to Live By

Delighting in and Doing What God Commands

Jen Wilkin

Ten Words to Live By: Delighting in and Doing What God Commands

Copyright © 2021 by Jen Wilkin

Published by Crossway1300 Crescent StreetWheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law. Crossway® is a registered trademark in the United States of America.

Cover Design: Crystal Courtney

First printing 2021

Printed in the United States of America

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked ASV are from the American Standard Version of the Bible. Public domain.

Scripture quotations marked CSB have been taken from the Christian Standard Bible®, Copyright © 2017 by Holman Bible Publishers. Used by permission. Christian Standard Bible® and CSB® are federally registered trademarks of Holman Bible Publishers.

Scripture quotations marked KJ21 are from 21st Century King James Version of the Bible. Public domain.

Quotations designated (NET) are from the NET Bible® copyright © 1996–2016 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://netbible.com. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com. The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™

All emphases in Scripture quotations have been added by the author.

Trade paperback ISBN: 978-1-4335-6634-9 ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-6637-0 PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-6635-6 Mobipocket ISBN: 978-1-4335-6636-3

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Wilkin, Jen, 1969– author.

Title: Ten words to live by : delighting in and doing what God commands / Jen Wilkin.

Description: Wheaton, Illinois : Crossway, 2021. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020040303 (print) | LCCN 2020040304 (ebook) | ISBN 9781433566349 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9781433566363 (pdf) | ISBN 9781433566363 (mobi) | ISBN 9781433566370 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Ten commandments—Criticism, interpretation, etc.

Classification: LCC BV4655 .W535 2021 (print) | LCC BV4655 (ebook) | DDC 241.5/2—dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020040303

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020040304

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

2022-02-18 10:20:28 AM

Contents

The Ten Words

Introduction: Remember to Delight

 1  The First Word: Undivided Allegiance

 2  The Second Word: Undiminished Worship

 3  The Third Word: Untarnished Name

 4  The Fourth Word: Unhindered Rest

 5  The Fifth Word: Honor Elders

 6  The Sixth Word: Honor Life

 7  The Seventh Word: Honor Marriage

 8  The Eighth Word: Honor Property

 9  The Ninth Word: Honor Reputation

10  The Tenth Word: Honor in the Heart

Conclusion: Delight to Remember

General Index

Scripture Index

The Ten Words

Exodus 20:2–17

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

COMMANDMENT 1

“You shall have no other gods before me.

COMMANDMENT 2

“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. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

COMMANDMENT 3

“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.

COMMANDMENT 4

“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, 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, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

COMMANDMENT 5

“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.

COMMANDMENT 6

“You shall not murder.

COMMANDMENT 7

“You shall not commit adultery.

COMMANDMENT 8

“You shall not steal.

COMMANDMENT 9

“You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

COMMANDMENT 10

“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.”

Romans 13:8–10

“Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.”

Introduction

Remember to Delight

For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome.

1 John 5:3

This is a book about the law of God in all of its life-giving beauty. In the church today there exists a great forgetfulness about the role of the law in the life of the believer. This book is an exercise in remembrance.

Far back in the earliest pages of the Old Testament, in Exodus 20 and then again in Deuteronomy 5, an ancient people in a distant land were given the aseret hadevarim, the Ten Words. What the Torah and the rabbis called the Ten Words, you and I know as the Ten Commandments. Given to Moses on Mount Sinai, inscribed on tablets of stone by the very finger of God, these ten laws were intended to serve the Israelites as they left behind pagan Egypt and entered into pagan Canaan. They comprise the moral law of the Old Testament, undergirding its civil and ceremonial laws.

Moses assured those people, the nation of Israel, that obedience to these Ten Words would result in life and blessing:

So be careful to do what the Lord your God has commanded you; do not turn aside to the right or to the left. Walk in obedience to all that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live and prosper and prolong your days in the land that you will possess. (Deut. 5:32–33 NIV)

The Ten Commandments are perhaps the best-known example of moral law, informing law codes into modern times. Though most people know about the Ten Words, few can actually enumerate them. One well-known survey found that, while Americans struggled to recall the Ten Commandments, they could name the seven ingredients of a Big Mac and all six members of the Brady Bunch with relative ease.1 In my experience, not many Christians are able to name the Decalogue’s ten “key ingredients,” either. Can you name them all? Should you be able to?

When the Ten Commandments are not forgotten, they are often wrongly perceived. They suffer from a PR problem. They are seen by many as the obsolete utterances of a thunderous, grumpy God to a disobedient people, neither of whom seem very relatable or likable. Because we have trouble seeing any beauty in the Ten Words, forgetting them comes easily.

Law and Grace

Perhaps you have heard the statement “Christianity isn’t about rules, it’s about relationship.” It is an idea that has enjoyed popularity in recent decades, as evangelistic messages increasingly emphasized a personal relationship with God, one made possible through the grace that forgives our sins against God’s law. In many ways, this evangelistic approach seeks to solve the PR problem I have noted. It trades the grumpy Old Testament God of the law for the compassionate New Testament God of grace.

Thus, law and grace have come to be pitted against one another as enemies, when in fact, they are friends. The God of the Old Testament and the God of the New have been placed in opposition, when in fact, they are one and the same. God does not change. His justice and compassion have always coexisted, and so have his law and his grace. Herein lies our forgetfulness. Rather than seeing the sin of lawlessness as the barrier to relationship with God, we have steadily grown to regard the law itself as the barrier. We have come to believe that rules prevent relationship.

So, is Christianity about rules, or is it about relationship? The Christian faith is absolutely about relationship. But while that faith is personal, it is also communal. We are saved into special relationship with God, and thereby into special relationship with other believers. Christianity is about relationship with God and others, and because this statement is true, Christianity is also unapologetically about rules, for rules show us how to live in those relationships. Rather than threaten relationship, rules enable it. We know this is true from everyday life. Imagine you are a substitute teacher at an elementary school. Which kindergarten class would you rather substitute for: the one with established and respected rules posted on the bulletin board, or the one without? Rules ensure that the one in charge is honored, and that those in her charge look to the interests of others as well as their own. Without rules, our hopes of healthy relationship vanish in short order. Jesus did not pit rules against relationship. It was he who said, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments.”2

Christians have been taught, with good reason, to fear legalism—attempting to earn favor through obedience to the law. Legalism is a terrible blight, as evidenced in the example of the Pharisees. But in our zeal to avoid legalism, we have at times forgotten the many places the beauty of the law is extolled for us, both in the Old Testament and the New. Blessed, says the psalmist, is the one whose delight is in the law of the Lord.3 While legalism is a blight, lawfulness is a blessed virtue, as evidenced in the example of Christ.

We should love the law because we love Jesus, and because Jesus loved the law. Contrary to common belief, the Pharisees were not lovers of the law; they were lovers of self. This is why Jesus says that unless our righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, we will never enter the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:20). Legalism is external righteousness only, practiced to curry favor. Legalism is not love of the law, but is its own form of lawlessness, twisting the law for its own ends.

When the Scriptures condemn lawlessness, as they repeatedly and vehemently do, they condemn both the one who ignores the law and the one who embraces it for self-righteous ends. Note the words of the apostle John: “Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness” (1 John 3:4).

The very definition of sin is rejection of law. What, then, is lawfulness?

Lawfulness is Christlikeness. To obey the law is to look like Jesus Christ. While legalism builds self-righteousness, lawfulness builds righteousness. Obedience to the law is the means of sanctification for the believer. We serve the risen Christ, “who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works” (Titus 2:14).

So, it is my fervent hope that this book will increase your zeal. There are good works to be done by the people of God, not out of dread to earn his favor, but out of delight because we already have it. That favor is our freedom, a freedom from slavery better understood when we remember its foreshadowing many years ago in the time of the Ten Words.

A Feast in the Wilderness

Before God speaks the law to Israel from the top of Sinai, he speaks deliverance to Moses from the burning bush. Israel was in the throes of bitter toil. Four hundred years in Egypt had rendered them slaves with no hope of freedom. But the bush speaks. Yahweh makes known his plan of great rescue. Moses is to go to Pharaoh with a request: “Please let us go a three days’ journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God” (Ex. 3:18).

Let us go. It will become the refrain of the next sixteen chapters of Exodus. Seven times, Moses will bring the words of God to Pharaoh: “Let my people go that they may serve me, that they may make a feast to me in the wilderness” (Ex. 5:1; 7:16; 8:1, 20; 9:1, 13; 10:3).

A feast in the wilderness. An act of worship. Something heretofore out of the question. Bitter servitude to Pharaoh had made blessed service to God an impossibility for Israel. How could they serve both God and Pharaoh? Obedient worship to the King of heaven cannot be offered by those enslaved in the kingdom of Pharaoh. Let us go.

But Pharaoh is a stubborn master. Why would he release them to serve another master when they are serving him? With ten plagues, Yahweh breaks the rod of Pharaoh and delivers his children through passageways of blood and of water. Ten great labor pains, and a birth: the servants of Pharaoh find themselves reborn into their true identity as the servants of God. Let the feasting begin.

But hunger and thirst are their first companions, and they grumble against God. He meets their needs with living water and food from heaven, a foretaste of the provision awaiting them in Canaan. And at last they draw near to the foot of the mountain, the place God has called them to for the purpose of worship, sacrifice, and feasting.

God descends in thunder and lightning, and gives them not the feast they expect, but the feast they need. He gives them the law. The law of Pharaoh they know by heart, but the law of Yahweh is at best a distant memory to them after four hundred years in Egypt. He does not give it when they are in Egypt, for how could they serve two masters? No, instead, he waits, graciously giving it at the point they are finally able to obey. Come to the feast. Come famished by the law of Pharaoh to feast on the law of the Lord. Come taste the law that gives freedom (James 1:25).

Many years later, Jesus would speak to his followers of their own relationship to the law. No one can serve two masters. Be born again by water and blood. Hunger and thirst for righteousness. If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.4Jesus shows himself to be the true and better Moses, leading us to the foot of Mount Zion to trade the law of sin and death for the law of love and life.

It is for freedom that Christ, the true and better Moses, has set you free.5 We are moved from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light, from the dehumanizing law of the oppressor to the humanizing law of freedom. We find ourselves in the wilderness of testing, nourished on the bread that came down from heaven, longing for a better home. How then shall we live? Hear the words of Paul:

For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. (Rom. 6:19)

For those in the wilderness, the law is graciously given to set us apart from those around us, and to point the way to love of God and love of neighbor. The Ten Words show us how to live holy lives as citizens of heaven while we yet dwell on earth. For the believer, the law becomes a means of grace.

Encouraging Words

Rules enable relationship. The Ten Words graciously position us to live at peace with God and others. The Great Commandment, the one which Jesus says sums up all 611 of the general and specific laws of the Old Testament, bears this out:

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself. (Luke 10:27)

The Great Commandment is the underlying principle for all right living. Not surprisingly, the Ten Words follow the same pattern of Godward lawfulness first, and manward lawfulness second. The Ten Words are encouraging words, meant to give us hope—hope that we will live rightly oriented to God and others, hope that we will grow in holiness.6 They are not given to discourage but to delight. They are no less than words of life.

But take note: they are not words of life for everyone. For the unbeliever, obedience to the Ten Words can yield only the deadly fruit of legalism. As the author of Hebrews makes plain, “Without faith it is impossible to please [God]” (Heb. 11:6). These words bring life only to those who have been joined to Christ through faith. Our relationship has been purchased by the perfect obedience of Christ to the law. The life of Jesus fulfills the prophetic words of Psalm 40:8: “I delight to do your will, O my God; / your law is within my heart.”

He who delighted in the law of God offers it to those who trust in him, that they might delight in it, as well. And so that they might please God. With faith, by the power of the Spirit, it is possible to please God.

I propose that we determine not just to remember the Ten Words, but to delight in them, to see beauty in them, to seek encouragement from them, and to live by them. They stand ancient and timeless, as for ransomed Israel, so for us: a feast of righteousness spread in the wilderness, fortifying our hearts for the journey home.

1  Reuters Life!, “Americans Know Big Macs Better Than Ten Commandments,” Reuters, Thomson Reuters, October 12, 2007, www.reuters.com/article/us-bible-commandments/americans-know-big-macs-better-than-ten-commandments-idUSN1223894020071012.

2  John 14:15

3  See Ps. 1.

4  Matt. 5:6; 6:24; John 3:5; 8:36

5  Gal. 5:1

6  Rom. 15:4

1

The First Word

Undivided Allegiance

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. You shall have no other gods before me.”

Exodus 20:1–3

Even as a life-long Texan,