Q: What is the first commandment?
A: You shall have no other gods before Me.
What does this mean?
We should worship, love, and trust in God more than anything else.
What do you love? What do you really love? If someone asked you that question, what would you say? The Bible says that we were made to worship but that our worship should only be directed toward God alone. Nothing else in all creation should be seen as the most important thing in the world. God alone is. That doesn’t mean that other things are not important. It just means that God alone is the most important and when we put anyone or anything in God’s place we harm them.
Read Exodus 20:1–3:
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.”
Do you notice anything different between verses 2 and 3? Take a look and see if you can find what it is. Both verses have the word god in it, but in verse 2 the word looks a little different from the word in verse 3. Did you notice that? Why do you think that is?
In the English language, we use a capital letter to signify importance. In this case, the true God gets a capital G and the false gods get a lowercase g. This is our way of understanding that anything else that we would worship besides God would be false worship. There is nothing greater than our God. There is nothing equal to our God. There is nothing like our God. That is why God commands us to worship Him. God alone is worthy of worship.
Prayer
Dear God, please help us ascribe to You the worth, value, and honor that You are due. We are tempted to worship other things but want to worship You alone. Help us in our unbelief. Forgive us our sin for Jesus’ sake. Give us eyes to see the true nature of Your beauty, majesty, and glory. In Jesus’ name. Amen.