Dear Friends,
Imagine thinking of giving someone one a costly gift. He finds out about it and tells you He wants something else – far less costly – that He actually hates what you were thinking about. What would you do? Would you go ahead and give him what he hates? That’s what some people do – and they call it worship. Today’s devotional will explain. God bless you.

Because of Calvary,
John Janney

• Exodus 20:4-6 (ESV)

  4 “You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or 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. 5 You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.

“If the first commandment concerns the object of our worship, the second concerns its manner. In the first God demands our exclusive worship, and in the second our sincere and spiritual worship. For ‘God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth’ (John 4:24).

“We may never have manufactured some gruesome metal image with our hands, but what hideous mental image do we hold in our minds. Further, although this commandment does not forbid the use of all external forms in worship, it implies that they are useless unless there is inward reality as well. We may have attended church; have we ever really worshipped God. We may have said prayers; have we ever really prayed? We may have read the Bible; have we ever let God speak to us through it and done what he said? It is no good approaching “God with our lips if our hearts are far from him (Isaiah 29:13; Mark 7:6).” [John R. W. Stott, Basic Christianity, (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1958), p. 65-66]