https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/02\/No-Other-Gods.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n\tby Jeffrey W. Hamilton<\/p>\n\t
Text: Isaiah 40:12-26<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I. The Ten Commandments formed the prologue to the Law of Moses<\/p>\n
A. They were the foundation of the Old Law<\/p>\n B. Even though the Law of Moses ended, nine of those ten commandments are still\nin effect today.\n C. Understanding these basic laws can help us understand the New Law – Romans\n15:4\n
II. The Old Law was directed to the Israelites<\/p>\n A. As the Ten Commandments are being covered again, Moses reminded the\nIsraelites that the law was made specifically for them – Deuteronomy 5:2-3\n B. Though it mentions their circumstances, the principles help us understand the God\nwho gave these laws – a God who does not change – Deuteronomy 5:6-10\n
C. This is the first commandment. It is the cornerstone – Deuteronomy 6:4-9<\/p>\n D. When discussing the Old Law, Jesus pointed out that this was the most important\nlaw – Matthew 22:37\n
1. It remains the foundation of the New Law<\/p>\n
E. But to understand a law, we need to understand the terms<\/p>\n
III. What is a god?<\/p>\n A. Any person or thing conceived to have superior power and is worthy of worship,\nhonor, praise, and exaltation.\n
1. We often think of gods as something in the past, but there are gods today<\/p>\n a. There are the outright gods worshiped in other religions, such as\nHinduism\n b. There are some who claim to follow the God of the Bible, but their\ngod is described so differently that it cannot be the same as God,\nsuch as the god of Islam\n
2. Sometimes we find gods in unexpected places<\/p>\n 3. In fact, we recognize it in our language. We idolize <\/i>sports heros and other\nfamous people. We give them our praise and honor. People get short of\nbreath in the presence of someone they have long admired for their\nsuperior skills.\n 4. Sometimes it is material things that captures a person’s attention. There\nare people who make wealth into their god. Everything else is sacrificed to\nplace money as one’s top priority.\n
B. But a god is more than just putting someone in place of honor or importance<\/p>\n
C. A person or thing that you believe has the power to direct and control your life.<\/p>\n 1. There are people who believe the alignment of stars and planets controls\ntheir destiny.\n
2. Others call on psychics to help them make decisions.<\/p>\n 3. Superstitions control many people’s lives, whether it is avoiding stepping\non a crack or wearing a lucky hat for a game.\n
4. Still others give prayers to luck as they are about to take risks.<\/p>\n D. Other gods are still with us, we just dress them up in different clothes and call\nthem by new names.\n
IV. Why there can be no other gods but God<\/p>\n
A. Man tends to make gods of physical things<\/p>\n
1. We tend to focus on what we experience.<\/p>\n 2. Romans 1:22-23 – It is unreasonable to believe that anything in this world\nis greater than the universe.\n
a. Animals cannot create things greater than themselves.<\/p>\n b. Man is able to create things, but never on the order of complexity\nthat this world functions. Many of the basic facts of this world we\ndon’t understand, let alone control, such as gravity or even life.\n 3. To claim that anything fashioned by the hands of man is superior to man is\nfoolish – Isaiah 44:9-20\n 4. Some try to avoid this by saying it is only a representation. It is not the god\nitself, the image merely helps them focus their minds.\n a. By the way, this is the same argument that Catholic church uses to\njustify its images.\n
b. Isaiah 40:12-17 – Who can comprehend the works of God?<\/p>\n
c. Isaiah 40:18-20 – How can anything made represent such a God?<\/p>\n d. Isaiah 40:21-26 – God is just too mighty in power. He exists\nbeyond time. He cannot be represented.\n
B. The divine nature cannot be like anything physical – Acts 17:29<\/p>\n
1. Idols are mute – I Corinthians 12:2<\/p>\n
2. Idols are not living things – Revelation 9:20<\/p>\n
3. God has proven that He is unlike any idol – Psalms 135:5-18<\/p>\n
C. No creation of man has been able to control the destiny of man – Isaiah 46:1-11<\/p>\n
1. Whether we talk of material things or a philosophy that man has devised<\/p>\n
2. Science has eased men’s lives but it hasn’t changed the nature of man.<\/p>\n
3. Psychology doesn’t solve problems. It doesn’t absolve guilt.<\/p>\n
4. Nothing of man can save him – Jeremiah 2:28<\/p>\n a. Isaiah 57:13 – Every god man has created for himself has failed this\nmost basic test.\n D. Other gods do not exist. They are merely the imagination of wayward men – I\nCorinthians 8:4-6\n
V. There is one God who exists<\/p>\n
A. As Jehoshaphat acknowledged – II Chronicles 20:5-6<\/p>\n B. God has proven His might in creating the world, in destroying the world with the\nflood, and in controlling events, both in the present and the future\n
C. It is this God who sent His Son into the world – I John 4:9-19<\/p>\n D. God is not so far above us that we don’t enter his thoughts. He cares for us. He\ncares for you\n E. Will you come this day and declare your belief in this God and submit you life to\nHis will. You can begin this very day.\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Text: Isaiah 40:12-26 I. The Ten Commandments formed the prologue to the Law of Moses A. They were the foundation of the Old Law B. Even though the Law of Moses ended, nine of those ten commandments are still in effect today. C. Understanding these basic laws can help us understand the New Law…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,32],"tags":[90,198,304,54,176,84],"class_list":["post-43089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audio","category-sermon","tag-god","tag-honor","tag-idolatry","tag-obedience","tag-ten-commandments","tag-worship"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":68221,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/law-of-god-and-law-of-moses-are-they-the-same\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":0},"title":"Law of God and Law of Moses: Are They the Same?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 30, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton Seventh-Day Adventists have long made the claim that the \"law of God\" is the moral and permanently binding \"Ten Commandments\" that were kept inside the ark of the covenant while claiming that the \"law of Moses\" was different. They claim it was \"ceremonial\" law and placed\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":53828,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-law-and-the-commandments\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":1},"title":"The Law and the Commandments","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 12, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton Text: Deuteronomy 30:6-16 \u00a0 I.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Seventh-Day Adventists insist that the only acceptable day of worship is the seventh day of the week, the Sabbath day. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0A.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0To get to that belief, they insist that the Ten Commandments are separate from the rest of the Law of Moses. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0B.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0While\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Audio"","block_context":{"text":"Audio","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/audio\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1945,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/do-the-ten-commandments-apply-to-christians\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":2},"title":"Do the Ten Commandments apply to Christians?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 23, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: If we, as Christians, no longer follow the laws of the Old Testament, does that also apply to the Ten Commandments? Answer: People today tend to look at the Ten Commandments as an entity separate from the Mosaical Law. Yet, these ten commandments were the prelude to the body\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":42388,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-many-commandments-are-there-now\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":3},"title":"How many commandments are there now?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 30, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: How many commandments are there 10 or 9 or 11? Could you please confirm, one way or the other, that in the New Testament there are only nine commandments mentioned as commandments? Is that missing commandment is the fourth original commandment \"Keep Holy the Sabbath Day\"? So does this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":55516,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-christians-sabbath\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":4},"title":"The Christian\u2019s Sabbath","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 5, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"by Jeffrey W. Hamilton based on an ad by Floyd Chappelear Some people teach that the Ten Commandments are a set of permanent laws established by God at the creation of the world. They believe that Christians are still supposed to be in obedience to these laws, including the law\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2004\/11\/resting-300x130.gif?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":19289,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/were-the-ten-commandments-nailed-to-the-cross\/","url_meta":{"origin":43089,"position":5},"title":"Were the Ten Commandments Nailed to the Cross?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 30, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"by Clem Thurman via Gospel Minutes, Vol. 56, No. 20, May 18, 2007 QUESTION: I understand that the Old Testament was \"nailed to the cross\" when Jesus died. \u00a0Would that\u00a0also include the Ten Commandments? \u00a0If so,\u00a0what about idolatry, murder, and the other\u00a0moral commandments? 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