Online Sunday Service "Thou Shall Not" - Ps Shane Willard

[Music] [Music] hello and welcome to public church online we're so glad that you've joined us here's a little bit about what's coming up in the life of public church if you are new to the life of our church and you really want to get connected in why don't you go and hit the description box right now and there is a link that will say new to church so just click on that if you are believing for something if there's an area of your life that you need prayer for why don't you click the description box as well because there is a whole pastoral care team who would love to pray with you right now so you can click the link submit your prayer request and we will definitely be praying for you click church thank you so much for your constant and consistent generosity there is a new way to give in the life of our church so check this video out right now if your type likes following an actual bible exodus chapter 6 i get i get to open the bible today and i take that very seriously so anytime you open the bible you want to ask at least two questions one what happened and two more importantly what's happening in me right now because of what happened and so we're going to get to that afterwards outside these doors there's a small resource table i'm set up with my stuff uh the reason we do that is because we make a lot of money from it okay and the reason we do that is because we live with the conviction that we're not simply called to go to heaven when we die we're called to bring heaven to every place we see hell here so for a hundred percent of the profit we make from that we give to the poor and the afflicted and so we we have three um children's homes in china that look after children with mental disabilities two and henyang one in chiang sha we also have a rescue home in cape town that gets girls out of sex trafficking off drugs high school educated and job trained so we can break the cycle of poverty in the cape flats we can do our part in doing that and so we do that out there since last time i was here there's some brand new stuff um on i wrote a ten part christology course on the nature of christ essentially asking the question what what is god like and so that's out there i also wrote one on mastering the art of living that's out there as well and then there's a host of other things so you can um come say hello only i ask is if you don't want anything god bless you i'll see you next time if you know you're going to grab something before you leave if you would do that first that would be awesome because we have to tear it down and um and take it to kumra all right so if you could do that that would be great so i want to talk to you about the 10 commandments because that's what you guys are in a series on and i want to frame it in its historical context so to understand this before we get to the scriptures let me just tell you a brief story about how the ten commandments came about there's a guy named abraham who had an encounter with god and he knew god as a as a name el shaddai which literally is god almighty right so the idea is is that the almighty god there's lots of gods but i'm the one in charge of that that was abraham's understanding of god and abraham has a son named isaac who has a son named jacob who has 12 children and then one of those 12 children gets sold into slavery in egypt by the other 11. only to later need him to save them in a famine which is how this family ends up in egypt that's the whole book of genesis in 30 seconds so that's the that's the idea is that they end up in egypt because their brother chooses to be kind to them instead of taking vengeance and he gives them a piece of land now the problem has comes along that they start overpopulating egypt and so this this weird group of people that aren't egyptian are actually starting to outnumber the egyptians so the egyptian pharaoh puts them into slavery only for later did god raise up a guy named moses to get them out of slavery into freedom because here's the problem if you're it's a laughable comedy if you're praying to a god named god almighty and another god is enslaving you it sort of confronts your idea of god that if your god is the biggest god how come our god is putting you under his thumb right and so so the book of exodus starts with this sort of massive away game boxing match between god and the gods of egypt right and so the whole point is is that our god is not only god almighty over this he's got almighty over your rivers he's god almighty over your for your fertility that remember the frog's plague the frogs the the the god of fertility in egypt was a frog i don't know why but his name was haqqet and so god says you want frogs i'll give you some frogs come on i'll bring some frogs your way and so there's this huge away game as to what's going to happen and god gets these people out of slavery they go across the red sea um obviously this is a a quick overview and then they end up at mount sinai now mount sinai is where things get a little bit strange because moses says i want you to stand here do not move i'm going to go up that mountain and find out what god expects from us because up to this time there has been no sort of indication as to what god might expect there's been lots of indication that this god is really powerful now think about that if you're a slave and you know god is all-powerful but you have no idea what he's like is this great or scary this is really scary because what if this god demands that we cut ourselves what if we go back into child sacrifice what if we go in what if he expects something that just is not possible for us to do you have no idea and so this thing called the ten commandments um comes down now for us we call it the ten commandments i don't mind that i call it ten commandments you call it ten commandments but in jewish culture they do not call it ten commandments because there's no command in there it's actually called a ten word katuba let me um summarize it it is the way the jews see the ten commandments is that the ten commandments was a ten word marriage proposal from a god teaching slaves how to be human again that you haven't even known what it's like to be human much less relate with a god let's talk about your humanity right and so and so the whole book of exodus follows an ancient hebrew wedding formula now let me show you five words these are the uh if you could just bring that first slide up for me these are the five words that are the order of a normal hebrew wedding and i'm going to teach them to you today and and so and i want us to say these with some gusto okay not a real awkward you guys are public church you're full of energy and life and vitality i'm going to teach you these words the first one is called la ca now with some real energy and together let's say that together ready go la cah now let's try the second one this no no no back the the second one is called segula can i hear you say that one went with some gusto sagula all right the third one is called mikvah let's try that one together ready go mikvah the fourth one is called katuba let's try that together go katuba and the last one is called hoopa so let's try that one ready go so this was the five stages of a hebrew marriage la casa and that is sort of what you're thinking now let me put this in today's world all right so let's say that i'm dating someone i'm going to make up a name no association intended let's say her name is susie and i'm dating susie and we're wondering if this is going somewhere you know how the dating process works you you have attraction and then you start hanging out a lot right and then those early those early stages of attraction those are the stages where you could talk on the phone for four hours and it feels like 10 minutes right like but once you're married 10 years a 4 hour conversation sounds like hell right but but in those early stages you've got that right and then and and then at some point you and suzy start having conversations like is this going anywhere like do we need to go and end this or is this like going to the to the next step and i'm like you know what susie i i i think this could go somewhere and susie's like you know what i think i could as well right i think i think this could go to the next thing well once you're at that point the word that susie would be longing for me to say is was the initiation of the process so we're out we're on a date we're out at um i don't know uh some sort of uh thai orchid or something we're out on a date and she gets ultra extra spicy green curry and i'm thinking any woman that can eat extra spicy green curry this is the kind of woman i want to spend the rest of my life with and so i take her to her home i'm a gentleman i walk her to her door i hate i hold her by the hand and i say susie la well she can barely contain herself she can't keep her hands off of me why because if you sleep in and drink coke you too can have a body like this right who could resist all this and so she runs inside she calls her three best friends and she's like he said locotomy he said la chotomy oh yeah he said locotomy facebook status changed he said la ca now let me show you what la car means next slide laka means my own will you be mine la ca is like hey uh will you be mine it's that kind of thing and it's the initiation of the marriage process this is exodus chapter six verse 6 this is god talking to a group of slaves and here's what he says and i will free you from being slaves to them and i will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment verse 7 and i will take you as my own the word in hebrew there is now remember this is an ancient hebrew people you didn't have to explain this is a marriage this is a the initiation of a marriage process this group of slaves would have been like going did god just say does god want to marry us see in their world gods were always existent and far away somewhere else this god is using relational language this is the first time this is ev this is revolutionary sort of stuff the god of egypt the gods of egypt were existent far away thing this is why christianity must never explain god as an existent far away thing but rather an insistent spirit holding the whole thing together so so la ca is i want to be my trust the the slaves in egypt would have been like is god serious this did he just does god want to marry us now let's go back to me and susie go back to those five words for me there you go so so once i say la cal what word would susie be longing for me to say sagula and you know how it works susie's friends would be ringing her as he said sagula yet right and susie's like defending me she's like shut up he'll say it when he wants right and the girlfriends are like i don't know i think he might be scared of commitment and she's like shut up but deep inside you know she definitely wants me to say segula so one night we go on a date and at the end of that date i walk her to her front door and i'm like susie sagula she can barely contain herself because how could you if you sleep in a drink coke you two can have a body like this she runs inside she calls her three best friends he said segula to me he said segula to me facebook status change he said segula now sagula is la cha times two segula means treasured possession treasured possession now i realize this is 2021 and girls be like what you think you own me okay no this was this was a this this was a good thing it was a romantic thing it was uh uh think of it think of it as special treasure or my most treasured person right treasured possession this is segula so the same group of people that heard la ca this is acts chapter 19. same group of people here's what god says now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant now remember they don't know what he expects yet this could be scary now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant then out of all the nations you will be my treasured possession the word is segula now let's go back to me and susie so i've said like go to those five words for me so i've said like i've said segula now what would she be longing for me to say mikvah now i have preached this all over the world at massive women's conferences i spoke in an arena full of women on this topic and it's always the same picture 2700 women and i go la com means my own and everybody's like [Laughter] and then segula means treasured possession and everybody's like mikvah is far less romantic mikvah means go wash girl you need a bath your breath is stinky mikvah was a three-day notice see today there's mystery and intrigue around when someone's gonna ask you to marry them like if if there was a couple getting serious and some sort of special night was planned the girlfriends of the girl will be like is tonight the night you reckon he's gonna propose tonight now look the mystery is sort of getting less and less and less because of social media i'm talking about proposals are getting ridiculous i'm talking about people are spending deposits on homes on what it cost to propose to somebody and then they put it on the internet and that what that does is that that creates this one upsmanship that oh you don't love me as much as he loved her because he rented a helicopter with the fireworks and like wait a minute so the girls the girls start to figure this out too because the girls show up at a restaurant that's way outside of your pay grade and you show up at a restaurant there's already a photographer there people start putting two and two together right and so but but in in jewish culture back then there was no mystery as to when someone's gonna ask you to marry you so if you said lakka and then you said segula when you said mikvah mikvah was a three-day notice in three days i'm gonna ask you to marry me in three days from now i'm gonna ask you to marry me so i want you to be clean the idea was remember in their world and their and i know i know in their world everything was about clean or unclean and the idea was is that i you know hey don't let this take you by surprise in three days i asked you to marry me i need to be able to touch you be sure to wash this was a customary thing you you see it the the one place in the bible that it's a massive overkill is the book of esther because esther it says that esther bathed and perfumed for a year before she went in and saw her husband which i think we could all agree is a bit overkill right like seriously like if you if you have to bathe in perfume for a year to hide whatever you're hiding that's bad right it's like girl girl that's strong you must be hiding something right like this was a this was think now this is exodus 19 same group of people who've heard laka and segula and then this bomb breaks and the lord said to moses go to the people and consecrate them today and tomorrow and have the mikvah wash their clothes and be ready on the third day mikvah now quick bible trivia what happens three days after exodus 19. exodus 20. right three days later go back to those five words yeah no go back to the five words there's a ketubah so three days later you're looking for a proposal of marriage a ketubah now what i'm gonna do at this point is i'm going to explain the last two together before we go forward and then we'll go forward and i'll show it to you in the scripture okay so katuba was a marriage proposal it was a contract that was a basic agreement on how we're going to live our lives what is acceptable what is unacceptable what is on the table what is off the table when i used to be in charge of counseling for a big church um any pre-marital stuff i did i i tended to make them write a ketubah like let's put it all in writing let's hey let's get it out in the open what do you expect in this area what do you expect in that area hey how do you think about raising kids how many kids do you want hey when you have kids what's appropriate discipline these are conversations you got to have before you get married because in jesus's day they died at 32 so till death do us part was more doable now you have to live with them to 84. you got to be more careful and more clear so here's basically how it would work in that culture i would sit down with my bride to be my fiance to be and we would have our fathers our fathers were there for witness and wisdom in other words older people can go i know you think it's gonna be that way but it ain't gonna be that way so it's dumb to put that one in writing right and so here was the rule i could put anything in the ketubah i wanted and she could put anything in the ketubah she wanted so long as we both agreed because how can two walk together lest they be agreed and once this ketubah was written and agreed upon i would stand up and i would face her and tell me where you've heard this before i would say i go to prepare a place for you that where i am there you may be also and she would say back to me well when are you going to come back to receive me unto yourself and i would say i do not know the day or the hour but when my father approves the wedding chamber i'm gonna build for you i will come back but be watchful and ready does that language sound familiar to anybody you realize when jesus starts talking like this people are going is he is he serious is god still interested in an intimate relationship with us right and then i would go and prepare a place now don't don't think too much of this this was a room on the back of my family's compound house right like like we they didn't have private property ownership back then like i've seen these places you had one family who put all their resources together to own a house and if there's a new couple coming into the house what do you have to do you have to build an extra room on the back of the house and what would happen is the youngest people are in the back of the house and then the older people were in the front of the house and in the very front of the house was like your family business it was on the store front and as people died they would literally move them out of the front of the house so the idea was is as you get closer to the front door you're that much closer to being out the door right so it's that kind of of things i would go build a house build a room so that we have a place to stay then i would come back to receive her under myself and at that point you would have a wedding and at the wedding there was something called a hoopa now a hoopa was a altar it was um you guys know what a hoop if you saw meet the parents like remember the guy built that fifty thousand dollar hoopa right uh and we and every wedding i've ever seen in my life has some version of a hoopa um in western culture you tend to stand under an archway or something the idea is is being covered in god's presence that what's happening right now is koopa is to cover something in god's presence in the most elemental sense they would take a prayer shawl they would put four stakes in the ground and they would attach it to the four stakes so become this canopy or this covering in god's presence and at that wedding there was two hoopas the first troopa was at the wedding altar where you made promises and you did something called a salt ceremony where i would have a bag of salt she would have a bag of salt the priest would have an empty bag and they would mix the salt and then they would shake it and they'd say what god has joined together let no man tear asunder right and then they would sprinkle the salt because the rabbi said that even if a divorce is the only option and sometimes it is the only option even if a divorce is the only option it still floods the altar with tears because you can't totally separate the salt right that was the i that was the idea then once the marriage once the wedding was over i would then take my new bride to this room that i prepared for her i would take her to the door of the room and i would pick her up i don't you guys do that in australia where you um you carry them under the threshold right you pick them i mean it's a good idea for some for others i wouldn't recommend it right it's like well okay hop on right whatever right so but but to some it's it's a thing and so i would pick my bride up now the idea of picking your bride up is where we get the word rapture from rapture is not about going somewhere else rapture is a romantic term about being picked up into the presence of somebody right so you you you would pick your bride up you would take her into the room where there was a second hoopa the second hoopa was basically a prayer shawl that was put around the four corners of the bed so that when the marriage was consummated it was consummated under the witness of the presence of god the idea is is that's not a great spectator sport so we're gonna let god witness the consummation of the marriage under the hoopa so you would you pick your wife up you go in you close the door you would consummate the marriage underneath the hoopa while everybody waited outside right which like that is like they were far less embarrassed about their sexuality than we are so the two young married couple they would finish their consummation which of course they're like 13 years old so like 16 seconds later they're walking out of the room and now you have a party right so this was la ca segula mikvah katuba and now exodus chapter six i will take you as my own exodus chapter 10 segula exodus chapter 10 verse verse 11 go wash wait for three days exodus chapter 20. three days later next slide you have ketubah the marriage contract and this is how the ten commandment starts and god spoke all these words saying i am the lord your god that's how the ten commandment starts so the ten commandments does not start as a condition the ten commandments starts as an affirmation of i am your god i love you this is gonna go well now in hebrew there's only three words in that sentence and god so god's marriage proposal starts with a three-word sentence anarchy jehovah elohim now if you know hebrew at all you know you can say i am the lord your god with two words jehovah elohim i am the lord your god but it starts out with this um weird word that doesn't belong that actually should make us when the first word of a contract between god and man doesn't belong there there's this huge light on it like hey pay attention to this word the word is anarchy now ancient hebrew was written in pictures not letters every hebrew letter is a picture every hebrew word is a comic strip right and when you look at this in in the ancient hebrew letters it's the a is like a an ox head going into a yoke the n is fish multiplying the ch is a hedge or a fence and the y is an up raised hand it means to praise or submit so you got this idea of of of carrying a burden or an authority to carry something um and then you've got this idea of multiplication you've got this idea of a hedge or a fence and then you have an idea of praise and submission so when you put all that together next slide this is what you get your authority is multiplying inside the hedge of praise and submission in other words i'm here to make you bigger i'm not here to hold you back i'm here to make you bigger i'm here to treat you're a bunch of slaves i'm here to teach you how to be human and if you start if you start thinking about the ten commandments that way it gets very beautiful very quickly like think about it as a marriage proposal um okay first no other gods in other words if we're gonna be married i'd like to be the only one is that okay like it's not that you don't believe in anyone i'm just the only one that's worth your worship right oh dude don't don't don't don't have idols in other words if we're gonna be married could you put pictures of your old boyfriends away they hurt my feelings right um oh don't use my name in vain in other words once we're married you're gonna have authority like power of attorney on everything i own i would prefer that you don't use my name for something i wouldn't use it on right in other words don't sign checks i wouldn't sign in other words don't use the name god to give umph to your dumb idea because no one's buying it so you just say god said don't do that don't do those kinds of things because we would never do that right oh oh hey take a day off every week now remember these are slaves when was their last day off never god says in our new world we're ordering it is a mandate everybody has to take a day off you imagine being a slave and hearing that like what in our new world we get a day off this is unbelievable we haven't had a day of ever oh in our new world don't kill each other can you imagine being a slave and hearing wait a minute hang on excuse me um in our new world the biggest strongest people can't murder us with no judicial impact at all no we've never lived like that in egypt if an egyptian wanted to murder us they just murdered us oh hey don't sleep with each other's spouses wait wait what so in our new world the strongest people can't rape our women no oh what we have never known a world like that oh hey don't take each other's things what hang on so in our new world the biggest strongest people can't take our stuff if they want it no so wait a minute in our new world our life our wife and our stuff are protected and we get a day off every week yes this is like heaven this is like unheard of to a group hey you want to know how to be human you've got to have hey you can't be a machine day off in your life your wife and your stuff are protected this was this is like on and i realized we're australians that's like obvious a day off australians get like more vacation than anybody in the i'm american we ain't never heard my mom has worked for the same company for 50 years and she only gets 15 days vacation a year right like we never heard of this stuff right australians took this to the they said take four days off it doesn't matter right take a long weekend check a city whatever right this but in this world it's like wait a minute slaves are being told hey this is what i expect from you take a day off and your life your wife and your stuff are protected do you realize no slave ever would go oh no it's the law no this would have been the most gracious thing ever and god spoke all these words saying i and the lord your god now the ten commandments ends of course you have lakka segula mikvah ketubah and of course you know how this is going to end how does the ten commandments end with uh check this out next slide this is the end of the ten commandments like you should not covet right and then this is the next verse when the people saw the thunder and the lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke they trembled and feared that's a weird sentence in english isn't it like let me walk through it when the people saw the thunder let's ask a question how do you see thunder and it's not like the author didn't know how to use the word heard it should say the people saw lightning and smoke and they heard trumpets and thunder it doesn't say that it says that they saw thunder and lightning and heard a trumpet and saw the mountain cover them in smoke so here's what happens right they're standing at the foot of the mountain the ten commandments are given and it says they look up and the presence of god covers them in smoke and it says they see thunder now in hebrew there the word is kole which is languages or voices they see voices and then the word lightning is the word fire it's the same two words that moses used to say i saw a voice out of the burning bush same two words in other words they saw languages or voices inside fire over their head now what would those voices have been saying will you marry me the talmud says that on this day in history god proposed to all of creation with 70 000 tons of fire from the sky which leads me to this observation in 1857 in rangoon burma an english sociologist was studying the people groups of burma and he asked who were those people up the mountain and they said those are the kirin people and so he climbed the mountain and he asked the karen people who is your god and this was their answer in 1857 we serve a god named yava who proposed to us thousands of years ago with languages of fire from the sky it's almost like god was always at work in people before we could go make it more complicated this was and so they look up and these languages inside fire now if you're married what is the one thing you do every year on the day you got married you celebrate your anniversary yes if you have if you don't do that try it right because it's like the it's like the it's it's like this one day a year where you get together and you remember how you used to feel right yeah you you remember you remember hey there was a day i couldn't wait to spend time with you there was a day that a four-hour conversation seemed like 10 minutes there was that day right so anniversaries help us do that so god does what you expect he says i'm asking you to marry me on this day i want you to set aside a day every year to remember this day and celebrate it and that day was called pentecost pentecost was the day every year that they set aside to celebrate this day and now pentecost is strange because at pentecost every other feast you've got to bring unleavened bread not on pentecost pentecost you must bring your bread with yeast and here's what they would do at the pentecost ceremony they would break the leavened bread and they would dip it in oil symbolizing that god wanted to saturate or fill flawed and the idea was the point of pentecost is that is that god wants to be with you leaven and all issues and all flaws and all that god is not sitting above you judging you criticizing you or banishing you god is actually wanting to engage your broken story in order to make a better story that's the whole point of pentecost so years later what happens it says that they're all together in one accord celebrating the feast of pentecost this is in acts chapter 2. why are they doing that because they're israelites and israelites celebrate pentecost and so they're all together celebrating pentecost and what happens it says that the room filled with smoke and covered them and languages inside fire sat above their head hang on a second so the same exact thing is happening on the same exact day the only difference says this time they spoke back which is the birth of the church which is the bride of christ this whole thing was not about a condition for god to love us it was proof that he already did it was an affirmation of your humanity that god made you good and when you embraced the goodness that god made humanity to be you can show that loving god to the whole world so this group of people have this experience and what's their response next slide this is leviticus 23. this is talking about the feast of pentecost on that same day you're to proclaim a sacred assembly and do no regular work this is to be a lasting ordinance for the generations to come wherever you live and when you reap the harvest of your land do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest leave them for the poor and the foreigner residing amongst you for i am the lord your god in other words the response of pentecost is to be so moved by god reaching out to us that we can't help but make life better for people who can do nothing in return for us it's that that pentecostals are not supposed to be the weirdest people in the community they're supposed to be the most generous people in the community and in acts chapter 2 they have this encounter just like at pentecost and what was their response it says so they went outside they sold what they could and they made sure that all the poor and all the afflicted were fed and taken care of that day why because that's what pentecostals do pentecostals are supposed to be the most generous people in the community not the weirdest we're supposed to be so aware that god reached out to us without us doing anything to deserve it that we make a commitment to treat people as they are worth and never as they deserve so when we have an encounter of pentecost an encounter of the holy spirit it's not meant for us to just stay in this room in our encounter my personal encounter with god that encounter is supposed to be saying the actions out there so may you my brothers and sisters be the most pentecostal place in this community what do i mean by that i mean not weird i mean aware of the needs of your community i mean when people think of public church they think look right wrong and different i don't know but that is the nicest most generous group of people they are so moved by whatever they believe in god that they treat others better this is the ten commandments the ten commandments is a god reaching out to people who could do nothing in return and saying you want to know how to be human let's do it day off your life your wife your stuff protected contractual law matters you can build a lasting community this way you can do that and not only that i don't want to be an existent far away god i want to be the one right in your midst but be so moved by that that you take care of the poor and the afflicted you don't leave anybody behind in other words so may we be the embodiment of that for our world hope jesus got bigger for you today the cross worked better the resurrection central scriptures got bigger not smaller i hope i played my part in bringing a richness about to the thing you guys can be studying for a little while now on the ten commandments grace and peace everybody god bless [Music] if that message spoke to you and you want to respond or you want to give your life to jesus for the very first time why don't you click the description box there is a link that says new to faith and we will have a pastor reach out to you this week thank you so much for joining us today we cannot wait to see you next sunday we hope you have a fantastic week bye

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Length: 36min 12sec (2172 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 20 2021