11 Aug God is JEALOUS

Exodus 20:1-6

And God spoke all these words, saying, ² “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ³ “You shall have no other gods before me. 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.

God is jealous. I know what you are thinking right now. “How can God be jealous?” This is probably one of the most confusing attributes of God. Later when you have free time, go to YouTube and search, ‘Oprah Winfrey + Jealous God’. Not now though. It is a sin to open YouTube while I am preaching. You will find an interview where Oprah talks about why she left Christianity. What happened was she was sitting in a Baptist church with a minister who spoke about the attributes of God. God was all-knowing, all-powerful, all-presence; God was righteous, holy, sovereign etc. And then the preacher said, “The Lord your God is a jealous God.” Then she said in the interview, “I was caught up in the rapture of the moment until he said “jealous,” and something struck me. I was 27 or 28, and I was thinking, “God is all. God is omnipresent. God is also jealous? A jealous God? Jealous of me?” And something about that didn’t feel right in my spirit because I believe that God is love and that God is in all things.” She walked away from Christianity after that day. Why did she stumble over the jealousy of God? She did not say exactly why, but it’s not hard to guess. It is the same reason some of you feel uncomfortable when you hear that God is jealous. So, what does it mean for God to be jealous? Is God in heaven looking at Oprah saying, “I can’t believe how much money she has. I wish I had that much money. Gosh, I’m so jealous of her”? Because if that’s the case, then I agree with Oprah. We should walk away from Christianity. That kind of God is not worthy of our worship. But is she right? Is that what it means when God says, “I the Lord your God am a jealous God”?

Today we are on the fifth sermon in our series, “God is”, with the tagline, “Knowing God living right.” Throughout this series, we look at different attributes of God and how those attributes shape who we are and what we do. The attribute we are looking at tonight is jealousy. I hope by now it is clear that what we think of God is extremely important. If we don’t think rightly about God, we might end up like Oprah. We are disappointed in God who never existed in the first place. Let me put it this way. God created us in his image, and we have been creating him in our image ever since. And the God we create in our image is useless because it does not exist. So, what does it mean for God to be jealous? Let’s look at it together. Our text for today is the first two commandments of the Ten Commandments.

Here are the three points of my sermon: the exclusivity of God; the personhood of God; the jealousy of God.

The exclusivity of God

Exodus 20:1-3 – And God spoke all these words, saying, ² “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ³ “You shall have no other gods before me.

Let me give you the context first. The Israelites had just come out of Egypt, where they had lived in one of the most polytheistic cultures. Polytheism is simply the worship of many gods, and the Egyptians were unsurpassed in this. They worshipped the gods of fields and rivers, light and darkness, sun and storm, love and war etc. But not only them, the Israelites worshipped these gods too. Over the 400 years under the slavery of Egypt, they had gradually given in to the temptation to worship other gods. But the God of the Bible has always been a monotheist. He has only ever believed in one God, himself. Then God set the Israelites free from the slavery of Egypt. God flexed his muscles and showed the Israelites that the many gods of Egypt couldn’t stand a chance against him. The ten plagues God sent Egypt were not random. Each plague dealt specifically with the gods that they worshipped. God showed the Israelites that they were false gods. And now that God has brought Israel out of Egypt, he wants Israel to know who he is and what it means to be in a relationship with him. That’s what the Ten Commandments are. The Ten Commandments are not a list of dos and don’ts to have a relationship with God, but they are dos and don’ts because of an established relationship with God.

And the first commandment is, “You shall have no other gods before me.” God is saying, “I know you used to have many gods in Egypt, but those days are over. There is only one true God and that is me. And since I am the only God, I will not share my glory with another. You must worship me alone, or you don’t worship me at all.” In other words, the relationship that God wants to have with Israel is exclusive. It is an all-or-nothing relationship. God cannot be one among many. He demands pre-eminence and supremacy. But listen to the reason why God wants Israel’s exclusive worship. He says in verse 2, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” The Lord is the covenant name of God, YHWH. It’s the name God gives to people who have a personal, loving relationship with him. This is what God is saying. “Israel, I don’t want just to be your God, I want to have a personal, loving relationship with you. I want you to be mine and I want you to give me your allegiance. I want to be the most important thing in your life. I have already chosen you to be mine. I am committed to you. I am your God. And I have set you free from the slavery of Egypt because you are mine. Now, enter an exclusive relationship with me where you will have no other gods but me.”

That’s the essence of the first commandment. And this is the most important commandment. If we obey the first commandment, we will keep the other nine. And we can’t break the other commandments without breaking the first commandment. Think about it. We cannot kill, steal, lie, and commit adultery unless we have other gods in our lives. When we break God’s commandment, we are actually putting something else in the place of God. Let me show you. Raise your hand if you ever tell a lie. If you do not raise your hand, you are lying right now. Why do we lie? We can lie for many reasons but ultimately, we tell lies because it brings us more benefit than telling the truth. Why do we lie to our spouses? Because we don’t want them to think badly of us or we don’t want to make them upset. What we do is we are putting our spouses’ opinions and feelings in the place of God. Why do we cheat on our income taxes? Because we want to have more money. It means that money is more important than God. Do you see? The reason we break God’s commandments is we worship other things but God. That means sin is so much more than simply breaking the rules.

Let me give you three truths about everyone, everywhere, at all times. One, we must worship something. Two, we worship other things besides God. Three, all our misery comes from wrong worship. All of us have something that excites us, something that is on our minds constantly, something that drives what we do. That’s worship. The question is, who or what do we worship? We either worship God or we worship the wrong thing. And if we worship the wrong thing, that is the source of all our misery. How many of you are worriers? Why do you worry a lot? Why are you sleepless and constantly filled with fear and worry? Here is why. We all have things in our lives that we treasure. We love them and we cherish them. And they are good things. Children are good things. A career is a good thing. Family is a good thing. Church is a good thing. But when good things become the thing we must have for us to be happy, we worship them. We seek them. We desire them. And we believe we cannot be satisfied unless we have them. So, when good things become the thing we worship, that’s when worry hits.

Worry is like smoke that we can trace down to the fire. When we are overly worried about something, and we trace down the root of that worry, we will always find good things that have become the object of our worship. At the root of our worry, we will find false gods that have replaced the one true God. Do you know what we call this? An idol. What is an idol? An idol is something we look at and say, “If I don’t have this, there is no reason for me to go on.” An idol is anything we add to God as a requirement for being happy. So, we don’t need to bow down to a statue to commit idolatry. An idol is whatever we feel we must have to be happy beside God. It is the thing that we say, “If I have that, then I’ll be happy. If I have that, then I know I am somebody. Then my life will be meaningful. Then I’ll be satisfied.” That means underneath our worry, we have made something into an idol. We worship an idol instead of the one true God. That’s why we are miserable.

Let me get more specific in my example. Parents and children relationship. Are they good things? Of course, they are. They are gifts from God. But at the same time, I do not know a more glorified idol in Eastern culture than family. The idolatry of family is not only tolerated; it is celebrated. Let me speak to the parents first. Parents, it is only natural for you to love your child. When you hold your child for the first time in your hands, it is natural for you to feel like you would gladly take a restraining order for that child. You would do anything to protect your child from harm. You want what is best for your child. But if you are not careful, here is what often happens. You become delusional and say, “When she grows up, she is going to be this and that. She is going to do this and that. She is going to marry this kind of person. She is going to make me very happy and proud, and we are going to be best friends forever.” Do you know what you are doing? You are turning your child into an idol. And it will never satisfy you. At worst, you will suffocate your child, and she will walk away from you when she grows up. Then you will feel you failed as a parent, and you will hate yourself. At best, you will succeed as a parent, but you will have a dysfunctional child. You will feel extremely empty. Why? Because you have put your child in the place of God, and she cannot satisfy you.

And children, listen. One time Jesus said to the crowd, “If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, he cannot be my disciple.” What was Jesus saying? Surely, he was not saying it is wrong to love your parents. Jesus was saying, “I have to be first in your life. I must take priority over your parents and everything else. You must love me in such a way that your love for your parents looks like hatred in comparison. Following me and obeying me must take absolute priority over your parents.” And Jesus was saying this in a Jewish culture in which family meant everything. Do you see? In other words, listen. When we allow anyone or anything else to make our decisions which we ought to make simply in obedience to God, we are breaking the first commandment. Whether that be our jobs, ministries, spouses, children, whatever hinders us from obeying God is what we worship. And whatever we worship will control us. We do not control ourselves. We are controlled by what we worship. So, God is saying in the first commandment, “Don’t give your heart to anything or anyone else. Don’t worship other things besides me because they will fail you. I am the only one who can satisfy you. Worship me and me alone.”

The personhood of God

Exodus 20:4 – “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.

This is the second commandment. If the first commandment is about worshipping the true God, the second commandment is about worshipping the true God in the right way. This means that how we worship matters as much as whom we worship. It is not enough to worship the true God, but the true God must be worshipped rightly. In this verse, God tells us to not make any carved image of him. What is wrong with a carved image of God? Here is the problem. The problem is not that a carved image doesn’t look good, but no matter how good it looks, no matter how majestic it may be, it cannot portray the true beauty of God. It will inevitably conceal most if not all the truth about the nature and character of God. For example, there are many stories where some monarchs asked an artist to make a sculpture of them. Once the artist was done with his work, the king or queen looked at it and said, “There is no way I look like that. Your work doesn’t do me justice. I look way better than that.” Even right now, with an HD camera. How many of you have ever taken a photo of yourself and not like the result of that photo? Why? Because you think you look better than you in the photo. That photo doesn’t do you justice. Or you are just very narcissistic. It doesn’t matter how good an image is, it cannot portray all of us. It only shows part of us. If that’s true for a finite being like us, how much more for the infinite God? There is nothing that could be done to visibly express God that would not diminish our view of God. Our finite mind cannot conceive the infinite. Every time we display one side of God, we fail to display others. So, what ends up happening is we create a god of our own making, and that’s an idol. Phillip Ryken puts it this way. “An idol makes the infinite God finite, the invisible God visible, the omnipotent God impotent, the all-present God local, the living God dead, and the spiritual God material.” In short, it makes God the exact opposite of who he actually is. Even the best we can imagine God is never God enough.

We might think that it is easy to keep this commandment. Just make sure we don’t have any statues or visible representations of God, and we are good. But it is so much more than that. This is a commandment that we often break without realizing it. Listen. Every time we define God the way we want him to be rather than who he is, we are breaking the second commandment. We understand this. In relationships, one of the worst problems that often happens is when one person wants to believe the other person is a particular way instead of listening to what the other person says he or she really is. In other words, if we impose our needs, if we impose our wishes, if we decide a person in the relationship should be like this, instead of listening to that person’s actual revealing of him or herself to us, we inject distortions into the relationship. For example, Josh can say to Bella, “My beloved wife, you are so beautiful. Every time I look at your blonde hair and blue eyes, I am reminded how blessed I am to have you as my wife. Every time I see you play the drum at church, my heart beats for you. You shine brighter than cap go meh moon.” And Bella would say, “Excuse me? Who are you talking about? Which girl are you referring to? Because I have black hair and black eyes. And I certainly don’t play the drum.” Do you see? Most of our relationships are marred by this problem. We relate to the person as we imagine the person to be, not as the person reveals him or herself to be.

When we get to know people, we don’t get to choose who we want them to be. We must accept them for who they say they are. If that’s how we approach relationships with one another, what makes us think we can do it differently with God? We don’t get to pick and choose the characteristics of God that we want and do not want. We must accept God as he has revealed himself to us. Here is the problem. We don’t like it. We want to be in control, and we like to tell God who he should be. So, what ends up happening is rather than worshipping the God of the Bible, we worship the god of our own making. This is why a good theology is absolutely crucial. Without the right theology, we will worship the god of our own making. However, there are many Christians today who do not like theological sermons. They want easy, practical, relevant, funny sermons that are easy to digest. This is very dangerous because it can easily lead to idolatry. Idolatry is not only worshipping the false god but also worshipping the true God in false ways.

Remember the story of the golden calf? I’ve read this story many times but never saw it until a few years ago. So, Moses went up the mountain to meet God and did not return for a while. The Israelites were worried and asked Aaron to make them a god to worship. But here is what’s interesting. The Israelites were not asking Aaron to make them a random god they did not know. Pay attention to these verses. Exodus 32:4-5 – And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!” When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made a proclamation and said, “Tomorrow shall be a feast to the LORD.” And they rose up early the next day and offered burnt offerings and brought peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat and drink and rose up to play.

What the Israelites wanted to do was good. They wanted to worship the God who brought them out of Egypt. They wanted to have a feast for the Lord. They offered burnt and peace offerings to the Lord. But God was offended and angered by it. Why? Because the Israelites worshipped the god of their own making. They had their own conception of God that was not in line with who God is. And this is the problem with many of us as well. We do not worship the God of the Bible. We worship the god of our own making. We think God is pleased with our worship while the truth is God is offended by our worship. What we do is we turn God into Yo-Chi. When you go to Yo-Chi, you choose the flavour of yogurt that you want. You get the toppings that you like, and you ignore the rest. You create your own froyo to your liking. And that’s what we do with God. We love to talk about the blessings of God. We love the God who gives health, success, and prosperity. We believe that if we obey God, life will turn out great. So, our relationship with God is transactional. We do what God wants and he is obligated to bless us with good life in return. We are in control. But what happens to the God who is sovereign over pain and suffering? What happens to the God who uses evil to bring glory to his name? What happens to the God who demands our obedience, even when it leads us to the eye of the storm? Do you see? We like to give God an extreme makeover. But when we do that, we no longer worship the one true God; we worship an idol.

Here is my point. There are only two ways to function in the world: an idolater or a God-worshipper. An idolater says, “I want to create a god that I like. I want to create a god that pleases me.” A God-worshipper says, “I want God to create in me someone who pleases him.” An idolater says, “I want a god that I can control and give me what I want.” A God-worshipper says, “I want a God who is in control and gives what he thinks is good for me.” An idolater says, “I can’t believe in a God who would let this or that happen to me.” A God-worshipper says, “I have a real God who is shaping me through everything that happens.”

Let me tell you the story of Jim and Elizabeth Elliot. In January 1956, Jim Elliot and four other missionaries landed on a small strip of land in the jungles of Ecuador. Their hearts were set on reaching the Auca Indians with the gospel. The Aucas were well-known as an extremely dangerous tribe. No one had reached them before. When they landed, they built a hut and waited for the Aucas to come and find them. These five men knew the dangers. Their wives had discussed the possibility of becoming widows. But they still went because they loved God and wanted to obey God no matter the cost. A few days later, the Aucas killed the missionaries. All five were martyred for the sake of Christ. When that happened, many Christians said, “I could never believe God would ever treat a devout Christian missionary like that.” And Elizabeth Elliot said, “The real question is do you have a god of your own making? Do you have a god who is on a leash? Do you have a god who is a carved image? Do you have a god who is under your control, or do you have a real God under whose control you are? Do you have a God who is wiser than you are?” That’s the real question. Because the God of the Bible is the God who rescued Peter out of prison and let James be killed in prison. Why? Because he is wiser than us. Because he is sovereign, because he is real, and he doesn’t just do the things we want him to do. He is not only the God of blessings; he is also the God of storms. Here is the litmus test. How often does God contradict us or confuse us? If hardly, then we are not worshipping God but the idealized version of ourselves.

The jealousy of God

Exodus 20:5-6 – 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.

God says that he is a jealous God. He forbids idolatry because of his jealousy. The reason why this is confusing is because most of us think of jealousy in a negative sense. And the Bible often uses the word jealous to communicate something negative. Jealousy is included in the long list of sins in the Bible. But the Bible also uses the word jealous in a positive sense. So, there are two types of jealousy in the Bible: the bad jealousy, which is most jealousy, and the good jealousy. What is the difference between the two? Bad jealousy is basically envy. Do you remember the story of King Saul and David? Saul was the king of Israel. People loved him. But then came along the young David. David killed Goliath, and he was a very skilful man of war. He was victorious in all his battles, he was handsome, and people adored him. One time after a victorious battle, the people sang, “Saul has killed his thousands, but David his ten thousand.” When Saul heard that, he was extremely angry. Why? Because he realized that David was more popular than him. David was taking away the love of people from him. Saul went berserk and he tried to kill David because he was jealous of David. He envied David’s attractiveness and popularity, and it turned him into a monster. Why? Because bad jealousy is selfish. It is all about you. It’s all about your ego, your pride, your destructive anger. In bad jealousy, love is replaced by anger. You can even attack the person whose love you lost because you are so angry at them.

But good jealousy is different. This is what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 11:2 – For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ. Paul uses the word ‘divine’ to let us know that this is not the normal kind of jealousy. Paul was really upset with the Corinthians. He was angry. Why? Because the Corinthians easily accepted the message of the false gospel preached by the false apostles. They walked away from the gospel that Paul taught and embraced another Jesus. And Paul was saying, “What are you doing? What is wrong with you? Why are you living like this? This is not good for you. This is going to destroy you.” Paul was angry but his anger was driven by love. It was angered love. Divine jealousy is angered love that stays love. It’s not so much about you and your hurt pride. It’s about the loss of the relationship. Tim Keller puts it beautifully. “Godly jealousy is love fighting extinction. Normal jealousy is love gone extinct because of your self-centredness and because of your hurt pride.” So, bad jealousy makes the other person the enemy, while good jealousy fights to rescue the relationship and get the other person back.

So, what does it mean when God says, “I am a jealous God”? God is not saying, “How can you be so popular? How can you have so much money? Geez, I’m jealous. I want what you have.” That’s not what God is saying. But God is saying, “I love you, and I want your exclusive commitment. I want to be at the centre of your life because there is no one else like me. I am the best there is. And I don’t want you to turn from me because it will ruin you. I am the only one who can satisfy you. So, I am going to fight for this relationship.” Do you see? God is not jealous because he wants something from us that he does not have. God is jealous because he wants us to be happy in him. He wants what’s best for us because he loves us. And he knows he is the best. So, he won’t let us settle for anything less than him. That’s what it means for God to be jealous.

Then to show how serious this is, God gives a proclamation of judgment and blessing. He says that if we neglect him, if we bow down to other gods, our children and our grandchildren will experience the consequences of our sins. But if we love him and keep his commandments, he will show his steadfast love to thousands of generations after us. What does it mean? Does it mean that if our parents don’t love God, we are screwed? It can’t mean that. Everyone is responsible for their own actions and choices before God. God will not hold children accountable for their parent’s sins. However, parents, hear me. Your decisions, your lives, your actions, have consequences on your children. Do not think you can live however you want, and your children are unaffected by it. If you don’t love God, if you don’t prioritize God, then your children will grow up not loving God and not putting God first. If you are always busy and never have time for God, don’t be surprised if your children grow up hating God. And God will judge you and your children for it. Parents, what you do affects your children. But parents, if you love God, if you treasure God above all, God promises to show you his steadfast love for thousands of generations. Notice the comparison between the judgment and the blessing. If the judgment is to the third and fourth generation, the blessing is to thousands of generations. The blessing far outweighs the judgment. As parents, you should be far more concerned about loving God and putting God first than your bank account and portfolio. If you treasure anything else above God, it will corrupt your family. But if you treasure God above all, you will see God’s blessing upon your family. So, parents, choose wisely.

So, here is a reflection question for us. What is it? What is it in our lives that provokes God’s jealousy? Because a relationship with God will not work unless God is first in our lives. It’s like a marriage relationship. Do you know what is the cause of most marriage problems? It’s because good things become more important than the spouse. The husbands would say, “She loves the children more than me. She spends all her time and energy on the children but not me… She listens to what her parents say more than what I say. Her parents’ love is more important than my love.” The wives would say, “His real wife is his job, not me. He always chooses his work over me… He always spends time with his friends. They are his real lovers.” Do you see what’s happening? What’s wrong with children? What’s wrong with parents, work, and friends? There is nothing wrong with them. But if those things are more important to you than your spouse, if those things are what energize you and bring you joy, the marriage will fall apart. Marriage only works when your spouse has the first place in your heart. So, what God is saying is, “I don’t want you just to obey me. I don’t want you to come to church because you have to. I want you to love me. I want to have the first place in your life. If there is anything you treasure more than me, if there is anything more important to you than me, I am not okay with that. You are provoking my jealousy.”

So, what are the good things in our lives that provoke God’s jealousy? I asked myself this question when I prepared this sermon. And here is my answer: this church. I know it sounds strange, but I realized I used this church to justify my existence. My identity is tied to this church. If my ministry in this church is doing well, if the people in this church are blessed by my ministry, if the leaders of the church are happy with me, then I feel good about myself. I feel loved and accepted. But what if my ministry in this church is taken away from me? What if the people in the church are not happy with me? What if the leaders of the church reject me? That’s my greatest nightmare. That’s what keeps me up at night. Do you know what it means? It means something else other than God is first in my life. This church is a good gift from God, but it has become a false god in my life. It provokes God’s jealousy. Do you see? Even the good things from God can replace God. So, what are the good things in your life that provoke God’s jealousy? Is it your spouse? Is it your children? Is it your work? Is it your bank account, career, achievement, ministry? Whatever it is, God is saying, “This relationship won’t work unless you put me first. Either I am your everything or I am nothing.” That’s what it means for God to be jealous.

But let me tell you why God’s jealousy is good news. Because if God is jealous, it means he is in love. The reason God is jealous is because he is passionately in love with us. He doesn’t want us to fall into the arms of another lover who will fail us. He knows he is the only one who can satisfy us. The problem is we continue to fall into the arms of another lover. That’s what we do when we sin. We say no to God, and we say yes to our idols. But the jealousy of God says, “I love you and I won’t let you go. I will fight for this relationship, and I will get you back no matter the cost.” This is the difference between our jealousy and God’s jealousy. Our love, when betrayed, will get angry at the lover who betrayed us. But God’s love, when betrayed, will die for the lover who betrayed. And that’s what God did at the cross. At the cross, the love of God was betrayed, and the jealousy of God refused to give up. What we deserved was abandonment and judgment. We failed to love God first and we broke his heart again and again. It was only right for God to give up on us. God had to reject us for all we did to him. But he didn’t. Why? Because God’s jealousy gets angry but stays love. So, do you know what God did? He sent Jesus to die for his unfaithful spouse. Paul says in Ephesians, “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.” That’s what the jealousy of God did. Jesus gave himself up to rescue the relationship and get us back. Jesus took the condemnation and the judgment we deserved so that when we put our faith in Jesus, he might present us holy, righteous, and without blemish. And this solves our problem. In spite of our constant rejection of God, God can stay with us and not reject us. Why? Because Jesus has received the penalty for us. Jesus was already rejected in our place. Jesus absorbed our debt and paid the debt himself, so God can never ever stop loving us. And this is what changes our hearts. The more we see what Jesus has done for us to preserve the relationship, the more we see how committed God is to love us, the more we see God’s burning jealousy to make us his, the more we can love him in return. Let’s pray.

Discussion questions:

1. What struck you the most from the sermon?
2. Why is the first commandment the most important commandment of all? Give daily life examples.
3. What is the essence of the second commandment? What does it look like to break this commandment?
4. Explain the difference between bad jealousy and good jealousy. What is it in your life that provokes God’s jealousy?
5. Why is God’s jealousy good news?