Let's begin with a common parlor game that most of you will be probably be familiar with:   Imagine you are in your house, or dorm room.   Suddenly you smell smoke, and a smoke detector goes off, and someone yells, fire!    You only have time to grab three things before leaving the burning building.   What will they be?    When we played this in Sunday School, one of those things had to be a Bible to demonstrate our super spirituality.

The idea of the game is to identify what is most precious to you, and what you are most passionate about.    So, for example you might say -- I would grab my violin, of course.   And then we would guess that music is among the things you most value.

A huge part of getting to know a person is getting to know what he or she values:   What drives her?   What is he passionate about?   And if you put a group of people in a circle and ask them to express what they are most passionate about you would hear all sorts of different things:    Some people are passionate about beauty;   others about music;   some people value books and ideas;  some people are passionate about justice;  for others family and relationships are what drives them.    And if I really want to know someone, I will want to know what they value most highly.

The same is true of knowing God.  What does God most value?   What is God passionate about?  I can hardly think of a more important question.    If we want to know God we will desperately want and need to know what he most cares about.

But how?  Suppose we were to ask God, ìCould you please give us a summary of what you care about most.   And since I have a short attention span, could you do it in point form.  And maybe just give the top ten so that I won't be overwhelmed?î

God has given us exactly this in the ten commandments.

There are different ways to think about the ten commandments.    For example, I've heard the ten commandments described as a sort of manufacturer's maintenance manual for human beings.   When you get a car or a refrigerator, you get a little booklet that tells you exactly what you are supposed to do to keep the thing going.   And if you are lucky, somewhere in the booklet there will be a summary checklist:   change the oil every 3000 miles, check the tire pressure, check the brake fluid, etc.   And we could come to the 10 commandments that way:    Want to be a well tuned human being?   Want to get the most out of your body.  Follow the manufacturer's guidelines.   This is a common and perfectly good way of thinking about the 10 commandments:   They are the instructions of a loving God to teach us how to live and how to love.

But I want to ask a different question.   I want to ask ìWhat do these commands tell us about God?   What do they say about his character and what he cares most about?î     And why did God choose these particular ten things?

And if I look at the 10 commandments this way, I  find something surprising.     The first commandment says:   ìYou shall have no other gods before me.î    What does this say about what God most values?

I had my first class this week at Mount Holyoke.   Suppose that in that first class I had said, here are the 10 things that are most important to me, and the first thing on the list is this:   ìYou shall have no other professors before me.î     And just to make a small point clear:   When I use the words ìbefore meî I  mean not that you could have other professors so long as you didn't treat them as more important.  ìBefore meî means ìbefore my faceî or ìIn my sight.î   In other words, don't let me every see you treating anyone else as your professor.   I expect you to devote yourself exclusively to me and my class.

My students would leave muttering things like, ìHe's really full of himself, isn't he.î  It would be an incredibly arrogant attitude.    Basically I would be saying, what I most value is myself.  If you want to be in my class, I expect you to value me as much as I value me.

Here's what I learn about God from the first commandment:  God's highest value is God.   God's greatest passion is for His own glory.   And what he most wants from his creatures is that we share that passion.

We see this not just in the first commandment but throughout scripture.  Listen to what God says about himself:

Isaiah 44:6  This is what the Lord says -- Israel's King and Redeemer, the Lord Almighty:  I am the first and I am the last;  apart from me there is no God.  Who then is like me?  Let him proclaim it.

Isaiah 48: 11-12:   For my own sake, for my own sake I do this.  How can I let myself be defamed?  I will not yield my glory to another.   Listen to me O Jacob, Israel, whom I have called:  I am he, I am the first and I am the last.

Revelation 22:13  I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End.

(God repeatedly speaks of himself as not just the beginning of all things, but also the end.   He is not just the origin of creation -- he is the purpose and the end of creation.)

Romans 11:[33]-36 ìFor from him, and through him and to him are all things.  To him be the glory forever.î

Proverbs 16:4  ìThe Lord made all things for himself.î

When God looks at us, he expects to see his mercy, righteousness, power and love reflected back.   He has created us to be mirrors of his glory.

Mirrors of God's Glory

What is the purpose of a mirror?   I have this mirror in my office.   It's purpose is simple.   It is there to reflect an image of me.   When I stand in front of the mirror, and gaze into it I expect to see a true reflection of my face.

Suppose I spent most of my time, standing in front of this mirror, gazing at my reflection .  Suppose I was always wanting to get back to my mirror so that I could delight in having my image reflected back at me.   That would not be a good thing.   You would call me vain, proud, a narcissist.

Why is it OK for God?   Well the difference between me and God should be fairly clear to you.   I am not infinitely beautiful, infinitely perfect, infinitely good, infinitely powerful, infinitely righteous.  If I was to gaze in the mirror all the time, I am acting as though there is nothing more worthwhile to gaze at and think about than myself.   That is quite obviously not true.   But it is true of God.   God has nothing more lovely or awesome to look at than his own image.

That is the purpose for which we were created:   To be like this mirror, reflecting God's character -- to himself and to the world around us.

Mirror, mirror on the wall . . .

But mirrors don't always do what they are suppose to.   A number of things could happen to this mirror that would make it useless to me.   It could become so dirty and clouded that the image was obscured or distorted.   Or it could be shattered, so that when I look into it I see hundreds of different images.   Or it could simply be turned so that it reflects the light bulb on the ceiling rather than my face.

When God says ìYou shall have no other gods before meî he is saying, ìI don't want anything or anyone else reflected in the mirror of your soul.  Keep the mirror directed towards me.   You were created to be a reflection of my character -- make sure that when anyone looks at you, they see me.î

And when the image in the mirror is anything other than God, that is idolatry.   That is allowing something less than God to take the place of God.  One thing is certain:  something will be reflected in the mirror.   Either it will be God, or it will be something less than God.   Whatever is reflected in that mirror -- that is the god of your life.   Everyone has a god, the question is only who or what that god is.   Who or what is reflected in the mirror of your soul?

It's fairly easy to find out.   Just ask yourself three simple questions:

1.  What or who is my deepest source of trust?

By far the most common source of trust in our culture is money.   Money is the god of this age of prosperity.   When someone looks at you, what do they see you depending on and trusting in?   Money?  Your own abilities.   Whatever you put trust in, that is a god to you.

2.  What or whom do I most fear?

Do I fear  losing my reputation more than I fear disobeying God?   Then my reputation is a god to me.  Do I fear  losing my children more than neglecting the work of God?  Then my children are gods to me.   To fear God is to have such holy awe of him that we fear his displeasure more than anything, and we desire his pleasure more than anything.
 
3.  What are the sources of my greatest delight?
 

There are other questions we could ask as well.   But these are enough to make the point.   When I ask these questions honestly, I know that I am an idolater.   Every day I trust in things other than God, I fear other things more than God, and I am constantly seeking my joy apart from God.

Shattered mirrors

The mirror of my life is not just clouded, it's shattered.   If someone looks at me, they don't see a clear picture of God -- what they see are hundreds of different gods in my life.

So here is my problem:   God is passionate for his own glory, so he created me to mirror his character.  He commands me to direct the mirror of my life toward him alone.   But that mirror is shattered, and try as might I can't make it give a true image again.   I am an idolater by nature -- unable to keep even the first commandment.  What am I to do?

Here is the good news:   God is so passionate about his glory, that he does not throw away broken mirrors.

He replaces them completely.   And this is how he does it:   When I put my faith in Jesus,  Jesus himself comes to dwell in me.    Jesus was the one person who ever lived who reflected God's glory perfectly.   So now, when God looks at me he doesn't take into account the old broken mirror.  He sees the glory of Jesus, a perfect reflection of his character.

My job now is to gradually get rid of the old shards of glass, so that when people around me look at my life, they don't see the old idolatrous images -- what they see is Christ in me, the hope of glory.

God is passionate for his glory.   And that is wonderful news.  God's love for me does not rest on my goodness.  If that was the case, there would be no hope.   God is remaking me from an idolater into the image of Christ not for my sake, but for the sake of his name and his glory.   And that means that he will not give up, and he will not fail.

 ìYou shall have no other gods before me.î  Through this week, I encourage you to keep this first commandment always in your mind, and let it work on you.   And my prayer is that two things will happen:   First, that you will see clearly the areas of idolatry in your life;  Second, that you will see clearly that your only hope is in Jesus and that you will allow him to shine through you more clearly.