Exodus 20:1-3; Luke 4:1-8; July 6, 2025; Fourth Sunday after Pentecost
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I don’t know about you but every time I hear The Ten Commandments referenced in pop-culture, I immediately conjure Charlton Heston. I know it’s ridiculous. But I do.
Yup, old Charlton Heston, because apparently when I say pop, I mean the year 1956….
But God’s commandments have been pop-cultured a bit, haven’t they? Seized and parodied, sometimes weaponized, or just flat-out ignored.
And it has seemed, to me at least, that the loudest voices in the room screaming about these tablets of stone are also the first to believe that these ancient laws don’t apply to themselves.
And so, it all ends up sounding and looking like Charlton Heston to me. A caricature. A show. Theatrics.
Like, putting up The Ten Commandments in schools… is it actually done to respect them? To teach them so to live by them? Or is it merely performative? Theatrical?
I mean, if The Commandments are going to become so popularized such that they adorn the hallways towards our kids’ classrooms, then perhaps we need to make them more popular here in our own churches, where they are supposedly foundational.
For while I always thought it was a given that people of faith would know and follow The Commandments, it doesn’t always seem that those wearing visible crosses around their necks actually care for them at all.
Perhaps then God’s Commandments should return to the forefront of our own teachings, so that they might guide us and correct us and call us all to a higher way of living. A better and more godly way of living.
For, speaking of Godly, our first Commandment emphatically states the following:
“Then God spoke all these words: I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me.” – Exodus 20:1-3
You shall have no other gods before me.
Yeah, you know what? We need to make these popular again. So that they actually define our culture. Especially when all around us today, society wants to elevate basic and ordinary people, if not devious and vain people, into the pantheon of the Heavenly host.
Athletes, movie stars, musicians, you-tubers, tik-tokers, pod-casters, politicians, presidents, kings. All these small, mortal people whose words and ways we follow if not obey.
But these aren’t gods, my friends. They are caricatures. And rarely ever godly.
There is one God. One apex. One pinnacle and paragon of virtue. The Creator, the Father, the Source and Unifying Everything in everything.
And thus, there should be none other than God Almighty, to whom we bend the knee and worship.
Amen?
What makes this law, this commandment so much more emphatic, at least here in Exodus, is that back then there were a whole bunch of gods up in the sky. Or so the people thought
Ba’al. Zues. Ra. Marduk. Come up with a letter combination and you can almost bet it was once a god too.
Yes, even in our Old Testament there is this preservation of polytheistic thought:
Psalm 82:1 — God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment.
Psalm 86:8 — There is none like you among the gods, O Lord, nor are there any works like yours.
Psalm 95:3 — For the Lord is a great God and a great King above all gods.
Genesis 3:22 — Then the Lord God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil.
Exodus 12:12 – I will pass through the land of Egypt that night… on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the Lord.
Exodus 15:11 — Who is like you, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awesome in splendor, doing wonders?
Exodus 20:3 – You shall have no other gods before me.
But what’s important here, is not that these other gods were recognized, but rather, that none were better, nor greater than Yahweh.
For there is one true God (uppercase!). One higher power. One great authority to worship.
Anything else is just an imitation and a poor and insufficient one at that.
Which is what makes Jesus’ testing by the devil here in Luke (4:1-8) all the more pivotal. For it only reaffirms this oneness. But it also expands upon it!
Listen again: The devil says:
“To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. If you then worship me, it will all be yours.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’”
Not only does Jesus defer back to God, Jesus also dismantles any so-called power or authority that other “gods” like him might claim.
For the devil has no authority next to Jesus. Nor next to or under God. He, and those like him, don’t have the keys to the kingdom like they pretend to have. Only God has them. God alone. And only God is to be worshipped and served.
And that last bit is perhaps the most critical addition here by Jesus, the Son of God.
Such that the first Commandment is not only about worshipping God but also serving God. And serving just God. No other supposed power or leader.
For though it’s temping… to only worship God in here, while serving all these little lowercase
“gods” out there — they are yet shades, if that. Caricatures, if that. Charlton Hestons, if that, and ain’t none of them will last!
You see, my friends? We simply can’t worship God if we are also worshipping others, especially (ESPECIALLY!) if their agendas are absolutely contrary to the Word of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which brings good news to the poor rather than robbing them blind.
So, let’s not stand here and clap off beat to our responsorial week in and week out, but then go back home and get down on our knees and bend to another.
Okay?
For if we do that, we break the first Commandment. Something I’d rather try to avoid.
Amen?
Amen.
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BENEDICTION:
My friends, it is God who stands alone and above.
However you define or conjure God.
Father, Mother, Creator, Giver, Force, Energy, Presence, Power
It’s that belief in that something bigger, in upper case letters. Something greater, in capital letters. Indeed, something more capital and captivating than anything our eyes can see, or that our hands can touch.
It’s that belief in God as a truly Higher Authority that can define our lives with a deeper meaning that makes God so great and worthy of our worship and service.
So, I dare say, let us keep the first commandment, my friends.
Not only because it’s right, and that it will ward off any temptation to align ourselves with cultish people who would rather we worship their leader…
But because it will lead us towards a greater purpose. An ultimate truth.
A truth:
- that can expand the horizons of our mind
- and that can enlarge the chambers of our heart.
Two things, I think, we could do with more in our world today.
So go in peace and be of good courage
But also hold fast to the belief that there is one Power whom we worship and serve, and it’s in this God, the LORD God Almighty, that there is goodness and giving, love and serving.
And all of God’s people said:
Amen
