As
I have been reading the Ten Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount this week
and jotting down my reflections in the form of prayers, one big thing God keeps
pointing me back to is the image of Marriage.
God
renews his “wedding vow” to Israel in Ex. 20:2, “I am the Lord your God
who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery”.
Vs. 3 tells us how we, His “bride” can reciprocate the vow by giving
ourselves fully to him who already has given himself fully to us.
These two verses reiterate Ex 19:4-6.
We
are being presented with image of a wedding ceremony.
It’s the picture of a wedding, each party (God and his people) fully
committing their full loyalty to the other.
In
both the remaining 10 commandments and Jesus’ fuller explanation of them
(Matt. Chaps. 5-7) we read how these vows get played out in a successful
marriage: no
mind wandering off onto other images and other “lovers”, a commitment to
honesty, no deceit, no coveting other things or people be they human or
material, no harsh words etc.
In
a sense Ex 20:2, 3 are the wedding vows and the rest of the “commandments”
and sermon on the mount are what the pastor does when he gives the mini-sermon
during the wedding ceremony, just as I will do this Saturday when I officiate
and the wedding of Phillip and Victoria.
One
of the things I have found myself saying at weddings is this great statement I
heard somewhere, “It is not your love that will hold your marriage together.
Rather it is your marriage that will hold your love together”
It
is the commitments of marriage (The Clue is in the Do!) that are the strong
walls of the structure of your life together in marriage that keep your love
alive. It
is this very same thing that we are learning about our relationship with God as
we finish Day 5 in our study of the 10 Commandments and the Sermon on the Mount.
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