Exodus 20:16

You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor. – Exodus 20:16

"Lying distorts reality. We give a false testimony, or tell a lie about something, to change someone’s perception. It may be a person’s opinion of us, our abilities or strength. It may be to change their perception of another person. Either way, we are trying to be “God” in the situation. We are actually taking control over another person’s mind and emotions when we tell lies. Lying is an offense to God because he has commanded that we have no other gods before him-including us! If we believe and trust God to love and care for us in all things, we never have to lie to try and manipulate the circumstances. We only lie because we do not believe God is big enough to handle a given situation, so we take control of people and things with our words. We act like we are God in the situation. Trust that God is ‘large and in charge’ of everything in your life. Allow him to be your defender and you will no longer need to lie."

As I watch President Obama just now say, "No one is more committed to manned space flight than I am."  I want to pull a Senator Wilson and scream LIAR.  Just as I am reading this scripture about lying.  Lying to manipulate the circumstances. Politics.  Lying to manipulate the situation and our view of what they are doing behind the scenes.

I had never viewed lying as trying to be God.  Telling the truth lets Him handle the situation.  If you tell the truth, who can hold it against you.  Others may lie, but the truth is the truth.  You know only what you know and you tell the truth about what you know, then it is the truth.

I met a woman when I was working at Harding University named, Juanelle Teague, her motto is "Tell the Truth, Quicker, Faster."  I've never forgotten that.  She was impressive because of her willingness to just say it like it is.  Don't hold back because then you are known as a truthful person.

Another saying I used to have on my bulletin board when I worked for the Navy was "No one can take away your integrity but you."  The truth!  Always tell the Truth, God can work with it.  He doesn't work with lies, because he cannot lie. 

This has been an effecctive verse for me today.

Exodus 20:14

You shall not commit adultery – Exodus 20:14

I am intimately aware of this scripture as Jesus put it to not even desire it in your heart.  Both Tom and I have been on the wrong side of this scripture.  It's in our marriage and something we have worked through, but are keenly aware again, that God's ways are better than ours.  That breaching trust is the most destructive thing in our marriage.  That flirting with the disaster is as bad as the disaster in this case.  

Exodus 20:13

You shall not murder. – Exodus 20:13 (NIV)

I read a commentary that said this. "When we read this 6th Commandment, ‘you shall not murder’, we all sigh a breath of relief, “At least I’m keeping this command!” But remember, Jesus really raised the bar on this when he taught that if we have hate or hard hearts toward another person it is the same as if we murdered them. Ouch."

It also said that we play God when we decide to "remove" a person through hatred or murder.  I guess that I would be guilty of this then, because in my heart, I have hated one woman and one man in my life as to put them six feet under at least a dozen times.  They maligned me and hated me so much that I ran away from God for a while.  They were members of my own church and they were so evil toward me that I reached out in ways I never should have, or maybe would have.  I blame a lot of things in my life on them.  ULTIMATELY, what I did were my own choices.  I chose to behave the way I did.  I chose.  My life, my choice.  I still dislike those two people to a great degree and I cut them out of my life.  And through that, I cut out most people that were attached around them, like you cut out the cancer and the surrounding tissue.

I am learning so much about myself in these daily scripture readings. God has a plan so great and so far above me that I am in awe of how much he loves me.  How much he loves us and puts the world together.  How much is law makes sense in ways that my finite mind can barely grasp. 

Exodus 20:12

Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you. – Exodus 20:12

 Who doesn't have problems with their parents.  I've spent a few years in therapy because of mine and experiences I had as a kid. I love and respect my parents and I would do anything they needed me to do.  But they are not perfect.  I am not perfect.  And, I was not a perfect parent to my children and they will not be perfect parents to their children.

There must be a reason that God felt he needed to state this implicitly.  And that Jesus needed to repeat it in the new testament. 

I read a commentary that said that God specifically chose the parents you were born to and the time that you were born.  I struggle with that statement.  God would choose for me to be born to abuse, absent, murderous parents that I was then to honor?   Since God's ways are higher than my ways and God's wisdom greater than mine, I could see where that statement could make some sense.... in the way that we are all overcomers and that God can bring us out of ANY situation to be a great person for HIM, no matter the circumstances.  Choosing HIM is the ultimate point of any life and through him, we could honor our parents and show His love to them regardless.  Forgiveness is available for all if we honor ANYONE through Him.  That is the only way that the horribleness that some experience as children could overcome.  Forgiveness is amazing.  That is the only light in which this verse makes sense to me.  My thoughts are really jumbled on this one.

Exodus 20:7

You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. – Exodus 20:7

This verse always disturbs me because I worry about using God's name in vain by accident.   That OMG that is frequently used in email or text, I write OM goodness.  I don't say "jesuschrist"  or GAWD.  I also don't say YAHWEH.  I read today concerning this verse that it is more about not using his name to guarantee our own things that would not exhalt God.  for example, if I said, I swear by God that I will do something (that I never intend to do) in order to fool the person into believing me.  That is holding God as a false witness.  Or to swear an Oath by God and then lie.  Or, believe me, I'm a Christian, extorting our following of Christ. That makes better sense to me.  In the Bible, God said  his name is I AM that I AM.  We don't going around saying that.  I don't pray to I AM.  I know him as God.  Father, Lord. It is good to pay attention to how I know him.

1 Peter 2:24

He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.

— 1 Peter 2:24 (NIV)

Instantly my mind is singing the Acapella song "So that we might become his righteousness.  Instead of our sins he was offered for them, so that we might become his righteousness."

I am always humbled when I read about what He did for me.  I'm not worthy, but He loved me.  He loves me.  And that is why I can sing.

Exodus 20:1-3

And God spoke all these words: I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. – Exodus 20:1-3

I am  the Lord your God, thou shalt have no other God's before me is actually the first of the 10 commandments.  If you remember that the Lord your God is the God above all and we are to have no other Gods before us, then we would remember that he is more important than that televisions show.  More important than that book, or that hobby.  I'm talking to myself here because I have a tendency to not want to read the Bible, instead, watch TV or work on my cards/crafts.  I  need to remember all the things he has brought me out of and how much he loves me.