The second commandment: “You shall not make for yourself an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath, or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them nor serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, inflicting the punishment of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing favor to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.” Exodus 20:4-6 NASB
The second commandment tells how to worship God, why we should worship Him this way, and what happens to those who don’t and who do.
How are we to worship God?
We are not to make images representing God or worship images of any kind.
“The second commandment is against worshiping God in the wrong way…. Most generally, the second commandment forbids self-willed worship—worshiping God as we choose rather than as he demands. In particular, the second commandment makes two prohibitions:1. We are not to make images to represent God in any form. 2. We are not to worship images of any kind.” (DeYoung, 2018)
1. We are not to make images to represent God.
Have you ever made something? Were you satisfied that you were able to create it on your own? Most likely, you were proud of your creation. But did it look like the real thing?
God prohibited idol-making because it would and does misrepresent Him. God is not a statue, an object, finite, or has a form. People create because they want to see, touch and feel. We believe that having a tangle item can help in our belief and draw us closer to God.
“We must also guard against mental images of God. …….I’m talking about some strands of evangelical piety where we are told to picture God running to you. Or we are instructed to close our eyes and imagine God’s arms around us. To be sure, we may want to compare God’s love to a warm embrace or imagine God is like a father running to greet his prodigal son, but we ought not make images of the invisible God, even if they are only in our imagination. As the Westminster Larger Catechism puts it, the second commandment forbids “the making any representation of God, or all or any of the three persons, either inwardly in our mind, or outwardly in any kind of image or likeness of any creature whatsoever.” (DeYoung, 2018)
2. We are not to worship images of any kind.
We are not to create images to worship. What we worship reflects what we believe about God. Therefore, we should not only worship the One true God but also worship Him in the right way.
We can worship material idols, but we can also have idols in our hearts that can draw us away from God in the same way.
“Idols manufactured in a person’s mind lead to a faulty view of God, one that supersedes what God has revealed about Himself in scripture. John Calvin said man’s nature “is a perpetual factory of idols.” People prefer a God who is always tolerant, loving, understanding, and forgiving—in other words, a God who forgoes judgment and never condemns. This is like saying, “Let us make God in our own image.” (West, 2010)
Why should we worship Him this way?
When we create, it has limits. Because we are limited in our abilities, our creations are limited too. When we create an image of God, we put limits on God. God is free. “God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:24 NASB. We can’t make God visible by our means.
Not only is God free, but also He is a jealous God. God is not jealous in a human understanding of the word but jealous in that He is pure and good and will not share His glory with anything or anyone.
What happens to those who don’t worship God in His way?
“You shall not worship them nor serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, inflicting the punishment of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, but showing favor to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.” Exodus 20:5-6 NASB
If you create an image to represent God that influences your worship of God and you teach this misrepresentation to your children, you will be punished. And if your children continue in the exact false representation, all of your descendants that persist in this belief will be punished.
What happens to those that do worship God in His way?
God promised Israel that He would show favor to those who loved and kept His commands. Therefore, they would be blessed if Israel were to worship God as He commanded and taught their children how to worship God.
As believers, we are commanded to worship the one true God only in the way that He chooses because there is none like Him.
Bibliography
DeYoung, K. (2018) THE 10 COMMANDMENTS What They Mean, Why They Matter, and Why We Should Obey Them
Mohler, R. Albert (2009) Words from the fire : hearing the voice of God in the Ten commandments
West, R.M. (2010) “The 10 Commandments—Then and Now”
There is none like GOD!!