“A sticking point”

Meditation – Sunday, October 8, 2023

Exodus 20:1-20 (Forward, p. 71) CEV p. 74

At first glance, it might seem a rather strange thing to be fighting over – the placement of the Ten Commandments or Decalogue on the walls of public places. Might most people not say, ‘Well, the Ten Commandments are ‘old hat’, generally accepted and recognized by most people, so why fight over it?” But then, there are those who argue that posting them violates the American ‘doctrine’ of the separation of church and state—as ‘they’ see it. The doctrine, as I understand it, says that that the state cannot establish any particular religion, so I don’t see how something as general and non- specific as to any religion in particular could be a problem. Rather than being religious in the narrow sense of the word, they are, to my thinking, an exposition of moral principles that apply, or should apply, to everyone!

But, maybe these objectors have another reason for their concern, albeit an unconscious and un-thought-out one. The Ten Commandments, when examined more closely, offer a critique to almost everything in our times today, our daily lives. They constitute a real ‘sticking point.’

Talk about other gods or idols, for instance. Almost everyone falls into the trap of worshipping or valuing something or someone other than God. And almost all of us, at some point in time, give priority to people or things and allow them to have a place before God. It is easy, and almost instinctive, as humans, to make idols for ourselves. As one of the European reformers say, “We are indeed an idol making race.”

Or take the idea of the Sabbath: this injunction is very wide in its scope—almost frustratingly so. It says that our animals, our slaves [workers?] and even the ‘foreigners’ who work for us, should have a day off. So, what about the machines that have taken the place of our beasts of burden? Or, what about all those who serve us in restaurants etc. on the Sabbath? Or, what about our foreign factory workers?

And, then, is there a place for a common ‘day of rest’? Maybe, part of its underlying ethos runs parallel to the ancient practice of gleaming, namely, not to try to get maximum profits from your land but to leave some of your harvest uncollected. Maybe this commandment is saying the same thing,

but in this case, with regards to time. We should not be trying to ‘exact’ results from every last minute or hour or day but leave some of it ‘fallow’ as well.

All of these are things certainly worth thinking about. I suspect that most of us have never really thought out the possible far-reaching implications of this command. Maybe the commandment is saying that the entire workplace, the entire environment, needs to take a rest from time to time.

Moving on then, what about the commandments about murder and adultery? Jesus ‘exploded’ any nonchalance or self-assurance about these two commandments by saying that they also apply to the thoughts, things like anger or lust, that might lie behind them (see Matthew 5:21-22; 27-28). Oh, this gets most uncomfortable for now it involves our thought life!

And, finally, there is the commandment about coveting, wanting or desiring after something that is not ours, or not or desiring after something that is not ours, or not yet ours. Isn’t this what our whole commercial world, our entire marketing system, is based on? Trying to convince us that what we have is not sufficient or enough in some way, and that we need more, that we need the new and improved model. Coveting, I must say, is almost our way of life, and certainly, I must confess, undergirds many of our goals and motives many of our actions.

So, maybe, just maybe, those who would ban the Commandments from their public display, are a bit like us, like us in being made rather uncomfortable with both them—and our inability or unwillingness to properly obey them or measure up to them. However, what all this says to me is that we need the grace of God all the more so that we might be more faithful in obeying them, and His abundant forgiveness and mercy in not doing so. And thanks be to God that both of these are widely and freely available to us. Amen.

Forward notes: “Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy” (verse 8).

“Like many of you, I have a lot of plates spinning in the air. Work, family, school, and church responsibilities all beg for attention. With commitments almost every day, I cherish when I have some (rare) free time.

“On a recent empty calendar day, I ran a couple of necessary errands, but then spent the rest of the day hanging out on my couch, binge-watching a

favourite show. I still had a bunch of stuff on my to-do list, but I decided to set those aside. I enjoyed a refreshing, much-needed reset day. The next morning, I felt rested and ready to tackle the list again.

“Rest is necessary for living. God knows we can’t just keep going and going without time to refuel and refresh. Taking Sabbath time is so important that God elevated it to one of the Big Ten. How you spend your Sabbath time is up to you: vegging on the couch, taking a long lunch with friends, reading a book, praying. The critical thing is reserving Sabbath time in our busy lives, remembering God wants us to rest so we can continue to do the work we have been given.”

Moving Forward: “Block out an extended period for rest each week.”

[A question: why did our lectionary leave out verses 5-7 and 10-11? Was it to shorten the passage to make it more ‘readable’? Or, was it because these verses were ‘uncomfortable’, ‘unreasonable’ in our modern thinking, or out of touch with our times? I won