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Then Moses and all the people
stood round the mountain. They did not see God, but they heard His
voice speaking to them. He said, "I am the Lord who brought
thee out of the land of Egypt: thou shalt have no other gods before
me." There is only one true God; He is eternal; without
beginning, without end. He is everywhere; He sees all we do; and He
knows all we do; and He knows all things, past, present and future.
He knows even our thoughts; we cannot hide anything from Him. And He
is a holy God; He hates sin, and He says, that all whose sins are not
washed away, must perish: because sin cannot be wit Him in
heaven. But He is a very kind and merciful God too; He is a father
to us all: He made us, and keeps us, wherever we are, and gives us
all we have. But the best gift of God is the gift of His dear Son to
die for us; to bear the punishment of our sins; to cleanse us from our
iniquities in His blood, that, if we believe in Jesus, we may have eternal
life. And God gives us another gift; His Holy Spirit, to come into
our hearts, to make us holy. We are commanded too love and worship
this powerful and holy God: God the Father, Son, and Spirit; three
persons in one God. We must love Him better than all the world; for
if we love anything better than God, we make an idol of that thing.
Some people love riches, and make money their idol; some love pleasure,
and make the amusements of the world their idols; and many, very many,
poor ignorant people, in countries where the true God is not known, love
and worship images of wood and stone, which cannot help nor save
them. We must thank God, who has given us the Bible to teach us
about Him; and pray to Him to help us to love and serve Him with all our
hearts; and ask Him to send Missionaries to heathen lands, to teach poor
idolators to love Him too. The
Second Commandment says, "Thou shalt not make any graven images; thou
shalt not bow down to them, nor worship them." It is wrong to
try to make any likeness or picture of God; He is too holy, too wonderful
for us; we cannot tell what He is; He is not like man; He is a spirit, and
when we worship Him, we must worship Him in spirit, and remember what a
great and holy God He is. The Roman Catholics disobey the second
commandment, when they bow to pictures, and images, and crucifixes.
We must pray God to pity these people, and to teach them, by His holy
Spirit, to worship Him in the right way. The
Third Commandment says, "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy
God in vain." To take God's name in vain, is to dishonor Him,
and not to respect His word, and His house, and His day. We must be
serious and thoughtful when we read the Bible; it is God's book, and we
ought to honor and love it very much. And when we go to church, we
must remember it is God's house, a holy place, and therefore we must not
idly look about, nor think of worldly things. And when we kneel down
to pray, we must remember that we are speaking to God, to the holy God,
who will not hear us if we do not pray with our hearts. And on God's
day, we must not do our own pleasure, nor business; but give our time to
God, and pray to Him, and read His word, because all is holy that belongs
to God. The Fourth
Commandment says, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it
holy." When God had made all things, He rested on the seventh
day, and blessed it, and made it holy, and commanded us to keep it
holy. No work must be done on the Sabbath; all must be finished the
day before. The Israelites were commanded not to go out and look for
manna on the Sabbath morning, and God sent none on that day. But
Sunday ought to be a very happy day to us, because holy things are much
better and pleasanter than the things of the world; and the Bible is
better than any other book. It is pleasant to go to church, where
the Bible is read and preached, and where all God's people love to praise
and pray to Him together.
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