Some people don’t stand a chance.  Some names are just not easy to remember.  Perhaps they are uncommon or have an unexpected pronunciation.  Or worse yet, maybe they are middle names.   ‘Middle-namers’ are doomed to the fate of David Allan Coe’s classic country lament, “You Never Even Called Me By My Name.”   Constantly mistaken for other country musicians, Coe laments.

“Well, I’ve heard my name a few times in your phone book.

And I’ve seen it on signs where I’ve played

But the only time I know I’ll hear “David Allan Coe”

Is when Jesus has his final judgment day.”

And for me I have the double curse of going by a middle name that is unfamiliar to modern man.   When telemarketers and ‘well-meaners’ aren’t calling me William or Bill, they invariable call me ‘Harold’ or ‘Hal’ and surprisingly even, ‘Brian.’  But I rarely hear ‘Howard.’  While I get it, it still leaves me feeling a bit unseen.   Everyone wants to be called by their name.  Recognized, Seen. 

A name is more than a label.  It forms the core of your identity.  When others use your name, it is profoundly meaningful.   Your name may come from your family or character, but ultimately your name grows to reflect your family and your character.  It stands for who you are.  It becomes your logo.  

Good or bad your name forms an association.   New parents may love a name for their baby but choose not to use it because ‘they knew someone with that name.’  Wise King Solomon noted that a “good name is to be chosen more than great riches… and a good name is better than precious ointment.”

Names are important.  And no name is more important than the name of God.  And no name is more unused and misused than his name.   Like each of us, his name is much more than the word we used to call him or refer to him.   The Westminster Larger Catechism notes that in the Bible, God’s Name refers to “His titles, attributes, ordinances, the Word, sacraments, prayer, oaths, vows, lots, His works, and whatsoever else there is whereby He makes Himself known.” 

When we consider this list of all the ways whereby God makes himself known, hallowing his name and not taking it in vain becomes a significant concern for the man whose main purpose is to glorify and enjoy this God.  The Third Commandment, “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain” is often overlooked in importance when discussing the Ten Commandments.  Or relegated to a caution against cussing like a sailor.   But just as God’s name is far more than a title, to “lift up his name to emptiness” is a most egregious affront to his glory and betrays rank unbelief.  

The Third Commandment is foundational to the formation of our attitude toward our God.   Far from being tucked in between warnings about idolatry and sabbath-breaking, the Third Commandment calls us to love the Lord our God with all our heart and mind.   And the warning annexed to it is no small matter.  “The Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.” 

Our guilt in taking God’s name in vain cannot be hidden.  It will not go undetected or unjudged.  We live our lives coram Deo, before the face of God.  He knows the thoughts and intentions of our heart.  Our sweet words and pious deeds cannot conceal what is in our heart or mind.   As God noted of his people in Isaiah’s day.

[T]his people draw near with their mouth
    and honor me with their lips,
    while their hearts are far from me.

Isaiah 29:13

So, what does it mean to hallow, and not lift up to vanity, all of God’s “titles, attributes, ordinances, the Word, sacraments, prayer, oaths, vows, lots, His works, and whatsoever else there is whereby He makes Himself known?”  Join us as we examine Exodus 20:7 and consider what it means to keep and to break the Third Commandment. We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

Of course, it is proverbial, “Seeing is believing!”  We like to make critical decisions based on what we see.  And attribute infallibility to our sense of sight.   We pity the fool who made a significant purchase ‘sight unseen.’  Our northerly neighbors have enshrined this mantra in their regional identity as the ‘Show Me State.’   We prefer books with pictures and treat words with a certain amount of suspicion.  Confident they are trap to prey upon our weak and unrefined vocabulary.   We believe in WYSIWYG!  “What you see is what you get.”

But does that line up with our experience?  Do we really get what we see?  Is our sight really an infallible guide to inerrant truth?   One pass by the carnival magician should be enough to give us pause.   And who has ever bought a fast-food hamburger that bore the slightest resemblance to the billboard?  We think a picture is worth a thousand words, but the opposite is actual reality.  A word is worth a thousand pictures. 

In a world awash in memes, we understand this well.  Virtually any picture can convey virtually any sentiment when supplied with the right caption.   Without the caption your guess is as good as mine as to the reality the image conveys.   Unfortunately, we are an image driven society.   We communicate ‘pictographically and not typographically.’  And so, we are informed by emotion and impression, rather than truthful expression.  

The ultimate meaning of all imagery depends largely upon the subjective context supplied by the beholder.   Thus, the maxim, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder.”   Go to any art museum and ask another patron, “what is going on in this painting?” And you will see this play out.  

Sight is not an infallible guide to truth.   We often say, “there is more here than meets the eye.”  In fact, in no sense are we more easily fooled than in our seeing.  Which is why the Bible exhorts us to “walk by faith, not by sight.”   And “faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ.”   The word of Christ – not a picture of him.

When God communicated the moral law to his people, Israel at the foot of Sinai, he was careful to give them sound, not sights.    He revealed his character, nature, and holiness through sound not sight, giving words, not pictures.   It is through words, his words, and later The Word that we are to understand, worship, and follow him.  

When Moses prepared the people to enter the Promised Land after 40 years in the wilderness, he recounted the law and warned them against the danger of seeking God through images.

Then the Lord spoke to you out of the midst of the fire. You heard the sound of words, but saw no form; there was only a voice… Therefore, watch yourselves very carefully. Since you saw no form on the day that the Lord spoke to you at Horeb out of the midst of the fire, beware lest you act corruptly by making a carved image for yourselves. 

Deuteronomy 4:12, 15-16

In Exodus 20, God tells the people not only what to worship, but how to worship.   The first commandment warns the people not to worship, follow, love, or trust false gods. But the second commandment is no mere elaboration of the first.  It provides a warning not to worship the true God in false ways.    It cautions us to worship by faith, not by sight.  A faith that comes from hearing his word, not imagining what he might or must be like from our experience or emotion.  

The second commandment warns us to worship God only as he has revealed himself and as he has commanded us to worship him in his word.   Reformed Christians sometimes call this the ‘regulative principle.’  One early Reformer, Martin Bucer, said it best when he noted that the worship of God is to be ‘reformed according to Scripture.’  But what does that include?  And what does that exclude?

The Westminster Shorter Catechism puts it succinctly.

50. What is required in the second commandment? The second commandment requires the receiving, observing, and keeping pure and entire, all such religious worship and ordinances as God hath appointed in His Word.

51. What is forbidden in the second commandment? The second commandment forbids the worshipping of God by images, or any other way not appointed in His Word.

WEsminster Shorter Catechism, Questions 50-51

Join us as we examine Exodus 20:4-6 and consider what the second commandment requires, what it forbids, why it is given, and what it promises.  We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

Sharing! We instruct children to do it.  And it is universally hailed as a virtue.  We practice it in whole new ways through the internet.  Sharing puts the ‘social’ in social media.  Who but the most selfish would not agree that ‘sharing’ is what the best of us do.   But should everything really be shared?

Sharing a precious toy with a peevish, visiting child may lead to destruction. Sharing passwords could empty your bank account and ruin your credit.   Sharing Netflix credentials will soon result in extra charges on your bill.  Sharing pictures of your ongoing vacation may invite unwanted attention.  Sharing a confidence destroys relationships and reputations.  Sharing unasked for opinions produces unpredictable and unpleasant reactions.  And sharing physical, emotional, relational intimacy with someone who belongs to another will create incalculable sorrow for generations of your families.

Some things are clearly non-sharable.   As virtuous as sharing can be, the Bible reminds us that many things are not to be shared.   Chief among these is God’s glory.   In the Ten Commandments God establishes a picture of life as a Christian.   These commandments reflect God’s nature and character.  And they reveal what we should desire and reflect as we love him with our heart, mind, soul, and strength and love our neighbor as ourselves.

These commandments were given to a people who had been set free.  They are for freedmen in Christ, not slaves to sin.  They are not a way to redemption.  But they are the ways of the redeemed.   They speak to our thought lives, our speech, and our deeds.  And the first and foundational commandment is,

“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 20:2-3

God shares with us grace upon grace.  He has not withheld from us even his Only Son but gave him up for us in order to graciously give us all things in him.   But there are some things God has not and will never share.  He is a jealous God.  But he has no improper jealousy.  We are his.  He has redeemed us.  We are his people and the sheep of his pasture.  And he permits no interlopers for our affections.  He tolerates no other claimants to our love, our worship, or our trust.   And it is this first and foremost commandment that forms the foundation for all the rest.

As with each of the commandments, however, this first simple commandment expresses both positive requirement and negative prohibition.  The Westminster Shorter Catechism expresses these succinctly.

46. What is required in the first commandment? 

The first commandment requires us to know and acknowledge God to be the only true God, and our God, and to worship and glorify Him accordingly.

47. What is forbidden in the first commandment? 

The first commandment forbids the denying, or not worshipping and glorifying, the true God as God, and our God; and the giving of that worship and glory to any other, which is due to Him alone.

Westminster Shorter Catechism, Questions 46-47

Perhaps you have no carved idols in your home that you love, serve, or trust instead of the Lord God.   But are there things that you love, serve, and trust that keep you from knowing and acknowledging God as the only true God?   Are there people, activities, or circumstances that routinely prevent you from worshipping Him?   Or are there other affections or confidences vying for your love for Him?  

While God has shared with us every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms, he will never share his glory.  Nor will he claim less than all your love for him — love with heart, soul, mind and strength.  How deep and wide is your love, trust, service, and worship for this God who alone is the true and loving God?  Have you put other things before Him?   Have you brought other ‘gods’ into your relationship with Him?

Join us as we examine the First Commandment in Exodus 20:3 and consider the one thing God never shares and what that requires and forbids in our lives.  We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

How do you read a book?  While this seems a simple question, everyone approaches reading differently.   Consequently, there are a multitude of books about how to read books.  Mortimer Adler’s “How to Read a Book” is a part of our children’s curriculum.  And Fee and Stuart’s “How to Read the Bible for All It’s Worth” is a standard work in many seminaries.  And because the digital age has shortened our attention span from a thousand pages to 140 characters, many colleges and universities require new students to take classes such as “Freshman Experience” which remediates the art of reading.

For some the answer revolves around form.   After all, who actually has time to sit long enough to read an entire book?  In our digital age, audio books fill the place of reading for many.  Or perhaps you want to read a book yourself, but don’t want the bulk of an actual tome.  For you there is Kindle.  And if you are nostalgic for the aesthetic of reading, you can buy a spray or candle to recreate the smell of actual books.  Or perhaps you, like me, need to the tactile experience of rustling pages to stay engaged in the reading. 

Others focus on approach.   When I was in school ‘speed reading’ was touted as the panacea for busy students.  Readers would scan the center of each line of text and trust peripheral vision to supply the rest.   We were also taught to skim – by which we gleaned facts, but failed to suck the marrow out of literature.  Some cherry-pick, reading here and there to extract only what seem to be relevant ideas.  While others read the last chapter immediately after the first, just in case they never make it to the end.  

What few will do, however, is to read the front matter – the preface, acknowledgements, table of contents, and any bibliographies or attributions.   Yet without these, much is lost to guide the reader on his journey.   Like the composer who explains the symbolism behind a cryptic lyric or the artist who describes with words what he was trying paint, front matter provides the keys to understand a book’s perspective, purpose, and progression of thought.  Without it, much is lost.

This is especially true of the Bible where “a text without a context is a pretext.”  For this reason, virtually every Reformed confession of faith and catechism introduces the study of the Ten Commandments with a discussion of its preface.   God himself writes and delivers the preface in Exodus 20:1-2.   Patterned after an ancient style of covenant, called a suzerain-vassal treaty, the Ten Commandments are a foundational expression of the God’s covenant with his people.   Yet unlike every instance of such treaties in the ancient world, the Ten Commandments are authored and delivered by God himself.   Exodus 20:1-2 give us a simple preface that establishes perspective, purpose, and progression of thought for our life in covenant with the Lord.

Christians often struggle to understand the place of Biblical law in their lives.  Some claim we under no longer under law, but under grace therefore law has no place in our Christian walk.  Others look to law as a “ladder of merit by which we try to climb by grim obedience into [God’s] good graces.” (J. A. Motyer, The Message of Exodus)  But neither view is faithful to the Bible’s teaching.   The preface to the Ten Commandments reveals the gracious nature of the covenant and the God who makes it.   To consider God’s law without reading the front matter risks seeing it as “a letter that kills” instead of a gracious gift through which the Spirit gives life.

Join us as we examine Exodus 20:1-2 and consider the ‘front matter’ God has given us to understand the purpose, perspective, and progression of the moral law as summarily revealed in the Ten Commandments.  We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

Pastors are often the last to know.  Everyone is so convinced we are ‘in the know.’ But more times than not we are out of the loop.  I always appreciate those who call, email, or text to say, “I don’t know if you heard, but…”   Because being out of the loop sometimes places pastors in awkward and unprepared positions.  I have occasionally found that I was officiating a funeral from the obituary in the newspaper.  But even more common is late notification that I am solemnizing a wedding.

Many a prospective couple will negotiate their wedding date with the venue, the florist, and the photographer, put down deposits and order invitations all before collaborating with the pastor.  And unfortunately, I have had to warn more than one couple that until we begin the process of premarital counseling, it is not a certainty I will be able to officiate.  

My mantra in the first session is “spend more time preparing for the marriage than for the wedding.” This is the failure of many couples.   They spend months of their lives and thousands of dollars preparing to be bride and groom, but virtually no time, prayer, or counsel preparing to be husband and wife.  The process of two becoming one demands much more than simply declaring it to be true.   As much planning as a wedding requires to be successful, it is a drop in the bucket compared to the preparation required for a successful marriage.  

In Exodus 19, the Lord begins to prepare his people for life together with him.  The awesome ‘storm theophany’ that takes place as the Lord reveals himself to Israel as her husband is not just a magical moment in the relationship of God with his people.   But it is meant to prepare them to live in union and fellowship with Him.   Three times in this chapter alone, Moses ascends Sinai to receive instructions so that the people will be prepared to live as God’s people.

The Exodus was not just a plan to free slaves.  The Lord to is creating a people who are His “treasured possession among all peoples.”  The goal of the Exodus was Sinai, not Canaan.   It was there at the base of Sinai that the Lord transforms Israel from a mass migration of refugees to a “kingdom of priests.”   It is critical for them and for us to understand this.  There God instructs them on what life with him will be like.   He has already saved them.  Wed them.  Now he prepares them for married life.  

How prepared are you to live out the reality of your salvation?   Paul tells us in Colossians, “as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, so walk in him.”   How is your walk?  How intentional are you to “work out your salvation?”  Are you living as a wife or only as a bride of the Lord Jesus Christ?   The bride focuses on the day she will become a man’s wife, but a wife focuses on day-to-day life together with her beloved.  Join us as we examine Exodus 19 and consider how God prepares his people, Israel, and us to live as a redeemed people who are his “treasured possession among all peoples.”

We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube. 

We are all born with it, but until recently scientists did not know its function.   The appendix is a thin, finger-shaped appendage attached to the beginning of the large intestine.  Its name comes from the Latin word which means “to add on.”  In the history of medicine, it has been viewed as an unnecessary part of the body with absolutely no clear function.   Proponents of macro-evolutionary biology have long argued that it is a “vestigial” organ which offers evidence of human evolution.   It is merely an add-on.  A part of the body with no part in the body’s function.

Yet as is often the case, scientific advance has rewritten the story of the appendix.   Scientists now believe the appendix contains a particular type of tissue associated with the lymphatic system.  The system which carries white blood cells to fight infections.  We now know that such lymphatic tissue encourages the growth of beneficial gut bacteria, which play an important role in digestion and immunity. Studies have also shown that the lining of the gut contains a biofilm — a thin layer of microbes, mucus, and immune system molecules — and these biofilms appear most pronounced in the appendix.  So contemporary theory contends that the appendix protects beneficial gut bacteria when diseases wipe them out elsewhere in the GI tract. 

Far from being vestigial or simply an “add-on,” the functions of the appendix are indispensable for digestive health.   There are no parts of the body which are unimportant.   Every part serves a function.  Every part is indispensable, crucial to the optimal functioning of the body.   And even the language of disability makes this clear.   When someone is missing a part of their body, they are considered “handicapped.”   As in everything that God makes and does, there is no waste in His economy.  No mere appendages to the body.  

And what is true for our physical bodies is even more true of the body of Christ, the Church.   The Apostle Paul often compared the church to a physical body.   The Bible describes the community of faith is essential to Christian life.   And like the body, each and every member is absolutely vital.   He describes this most decisively in 1 Corinthians 12 to illustrate the proper use of spiritual gifts.

But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.

1 Corinthians 12:18-25

The Christian life is not a solitary pilgrimage to an ethically higher plane.   Monasticism is a distorted expression of the Christian life.   As Bonhoeffer would write, the Christian life is “life together.”  The Church, the body of Christ has no spare parts, no rugged individualists.   The Christian faith is the ultimate expression of Psalm 68:6 which says that “God settles the solitary in a home.”   Every believer is called to live in the covenant community.  

And we see this first expressed in the Exodus.   The promise of the Exodus was not a call for slaves to find freedom on their own, but for the Lord to create a people who are His “treasured possession among all peoples.”  One of the foci of God’s redemptive plan is to create a redeemed community.  

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Titus 2:11-14

The first major step of God in creating the covenant community comes in the Exodus. And the goal of the Exodus was Sinai not Canaan.   It was there at the base of Sinai, that the Lord transforms Israel from a mass migration of refugees to a “kingdom of priests.”   But before the Lord meets with them to give the Law, their gracious constitution, he uses a new convert, Jethro, to give a plan for shepherding and care.   And remind them they are not just a mass of individuals seeking a better life. 

They are a body of believers and a covenant community.   There are no spare parts, no indispensable members, no mere appendices.    Join us as we examine Exodus 18:13-27 as we consider Jethro’s counsel and its implications for our life together as believers.

We meet on the square in Pottsville, right next to historic Potts’ Inn at 10:30 am for worship.  Get directions here or contact us for more info.  Or join us on Facebook Live @PottsvilleARP or YouTube.