Choices

God desires that we choose Him over all else. This is reflected in the First and Greatest Commandment.

(Matthew 22:37-40) Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

In order to see whether you are truly dedicated to God and have a love of God, God set up alternatives to try your faith in Him and your love of Him. It is easy enough to feign fealty in God, while despising Him in your heart.

(Mark 7:6) He answered and said unto them, Well hath Esaias prophesied of you hypocrites, as it is written, This people honoureth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me.

People down through history have fashioned idols for themselves; gods made in the image of man, in defiance of God. Some idols however are more subtle, and more insidious.

Would it surprise you that God Himself set up an idol in order to see whether the Hebrews would follow Him, even as did Abraham and the Patriarchs? That God set up an idol; a false god in order to test the Hebrews that came long after Abraham and the Patriarchs, even as God set up two trees in the garden of Eden to test Adam and Eve?

(Exodus 20:1)  And God spake all these words, saying, 2  I am the LORD thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 3  Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

4  Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5  Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; 6  And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

What exists that someone could fashion an idol from, in the three realms mentioned; found in heaven, on earth, and beneath the earth?

Stone.

And what did God present them with? Stone tablets, engraven with the Decalogue; what Paul referred to as the 'ministration of condemnation and death, engraven in stones.' in 2Cor.3.

Moses smashed the tablets made by God, where God in turn had Moses make a replacement set, then later told Moses to engrave them with the wording found in the originals, thereby resulting in one of them forming this other god they served and obeyed; graven images of stone.

When it came to a choice between God Incarnate and that law, they opted for the law; the other "master" they served and loved, while hating Him.

Jesus stated that the Pharisees, who kept the law and administered the law, hated Him. And not just hated Him but also the Father in Heaven. Their hatred of Him was so great, they ignored the weightier matters of the law in order to use the law as the means of condemning Him. Jesus even cited Scripture to this effect.

(John 15:25) But this cometh to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that is written in their law, They hated me without a cause.

Who was their “master” then in this scenario? They claimed to serve God, but they had another master they obeyed.

(Matthew 6:24) No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

Mammon is often understood to mean “wealth” but like most words, there are nuances of meaning and understanding. It is wealth that one depends on; trusts, so that their wealth provides for them, and they rely on their wealth; not God.

The Pharisees of the Sanhedrin gave God lip service, whereas their hearts were far from Him. Their hearts, minds, and souls were focused on their place in Jewish society; their status; their condition in relation to Jewish culture. To now embrace God Incarnate was to effectively destroy everything they had worked for to get to where they were. Notice then the parallel with the wealthy man who came to Jesus and asked, “What good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?”

Jesus reminds Him that only God is good, but that what he could do would be to keep the commandments, which, in the narrative that follows, it is established for the reader to see that he was unwilling to actually keep the Two Great Commandments written in the law.

(Matthew 19:21-22) Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come and follow me. °But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful: for he had great possessions.

He had another god besides God. He had another master; mammon. His wealth and his reliance on his wealth, that he placed above following God and above showing any real love for his “neighbors” who were the poor. Jesus was saying to him to abandon his treasure on earth for the treasure of heaven.

(Luke 11:42) But woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass over judgment and the love of God: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.

They had an almost fanatic dedication to the law; the works of the law such as tithing, while passing over; ignoring, judgment and the [a] love of God. The law; their ‘cherry-picked’ law was what they were dedicated to. They were dedicated to the works of the law that presented them before the people their dedication to the law, sans judgment, mercy, and faith; the “weightier matters of the law.”

Jesus said they hated Him without a cause; a just cause. They twisted judgment / justice in order to condemn Him using the law as the means to do so.

Notice a modern equivalent, where Sabbatarian Adventists judge and condemn others for worshiping on a day other than their sabbath, specifically “Sundays” according to the name given the first day of the week in the Roman / Gregorian calendar, where there is no precedent in either Christianity or the law of the old covenant to do so. It follows a series of non-biblical associations conjured out of thin air in order to give their condemnation the air of legitimacy. There is no justice; there is no mercy; there is no faith. Just a cold, calculated condemnation for not following them and their idol that they have set up in their minds, hearts, and souls.

The choice is still there, where an apparently ‘legitimate’ other god; an idol engraven in stone was presented to the faithless, unbelieving Hebrews that they embraced wholeheartedly; a law they never kept, resulting in their condemnation, in accordance with that law. They sinned another, greater sin, violating the First and foremost commandment in the law.

Take special note that this commandment finds exclusion in the Adventist law based solely on the Decalogue, claimed to be ‘moral’ law to the exclusion of all other commandments in the law, deemed ‘ceremonial’ by them and other Sabbatarian churches.

They love the law. In Worldwide, there was even a hymn about this theme: “O How Love I Thy Law” with a statement to that effect in the Psalms. Ironic then that the same people had little love of God, if any, for they place the law above God, claiming that even Christ Jesus; God Incarnate, was subject to it.

The very concept of having a total dedication to God without the law is anathema, and where those same people do not see the inconsistency and cognitive dissonance with their belief; claiming a singular love of God AND a love of the law, serving two masters.

Jesus came to reveal the faith that was being established by Him where the Hebrews were held captive under the law UNTIL this revelation. Jesus gave the people HIS commandments which He even contrasted to old covenant commandments such as what you can read in Matthew chapter 5. And yet, people will read that and still conclude the old covenant commandments are not only still relevant, they claim them to be Jesus’ commandments.

The choice is either Jesus, following Him and abiding by what He said, as recorded by the apostles and Luke, or what Moses recorded in the book of the law of God, specifically affecting the Hebrews who had already demonstrated a faithlessness and disbelief in what all God spoke to them prior to the giving of the law; a blood covenant law that condemned them all as a result.

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It is important that you understand; Everything on this blog is based on the current understanding of each author. Never take anyone's word for it, always prove it for yourself, it is your responsibility. You cannot ride someone else's coattail into the Kingdom. ; )

Acts 17:11

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