8th October 2025

8th October 2025


Pray (ACts)


Read (Exodus 20:4-6 focus v5b)


Message (Alan Burke)


Jealously is often seen negatively. Think about it though, if I were to say that I am jealous for my wife’s affection, that I am jealous for her love you can either understand that in a negative sense that Alan has issues and lacks confidence in his marriage or you can see it as a positive thing that I am protective of my my wife, if I did not care for my wife’s affection or her love that would be a major issue. My jealously for my wife means that I act in a way that protects my wife, seeking her best, loving her sacrificially as Christ loved the Church (Eph 5:25). Here the Lord God describes himself as a jealous God, not because he’s some insecure irrational monster who lacks any self confidence but his jealously is for his peoples affection. After all they are his, he I the one who redeemed them, he is the one who had covenanted himself to them and likewise they should be committed to him. In effect the First Commandment made it clear that the Lord demand our devotion and the Second helps us to understand that he rightly demand our devotion because he is a jealous God. 


For has entered into a covenant relationship with his people, it is described to us in the scripture in the imagery of marriage, (Eph 5:22-33). God as in marriage covenants himself to his people. They belong to him he belongs to to them just as in a marriage the husband belongs to the wife the wife to the husband and the LORD is jealous, not against idols for they are but wood and stone, but he is jealous for his peoples affection. He desires their devotion, he wants none before him. He is a jealous God, a zealous God and for those who are his they should remember what he has done for us. For the church in the Old Testament they were to respond to his grace, they were to know it wasn’t enough to know who to worship but also how they worship matters for they were his, his redeemed people, in an exclusive relationship with him. 


For the church today the LORD desires our devotion, he wants none before him. He is a jealous God, a zealous God and for those who are his we should remember what he has done for us. As we respond to his grace, we are to know it isn’t enough to know who to worship but also how we worship matters for we were his, his redeemed people, in an exclusive relationship with him. He is the living and true God and as a result of him covenanting himself with his people, as he is redeeming them by his grace, he demands their devotion, he demands that they have no other gods before him nor do they try to limit him or look to anything that is 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, instead they would be faithful to his will. 


Because of what God has done for his people, because of what he has done for us, because he has redeemed us by his grace, shown forth in the Lord Jesus Christ he is jealous, his love for us is such that we should take seriously what he has done. These commandments reveal to us what it should look like on our part to be his people rightly. Our response to his grace towards us should see us respond rightly to what he has done. Jesus made this clear, if we love him we will keep his commandments (Jn 14:15, 1 Jn 5:3) 


In our sinful nature, we substitute God’s way for our own and even when we are redeemed by God we still do it. We are told in 1 Corinthians 2, not to let our faith rest in the wisdom of men but in the power of God, not the wisdom of this age, or the rulers of this age who are doomed to pass away but the wisdom of God. The wisdom of God forbids us from making images of 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 of him for he is a jealous God and rightly so.


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q94 What is Baptism?
A. Baptism is a Sacrament, wherein the washing with water, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, doth signify and seal our ingrafting into Christ, and partaking of the benefits of the covenant of grace, and our engagement to be the Lord’s.
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