This will be a fairly brief post as the points that need to be made are few and short. God is God. He is the one and only God and his name is above all names. The third commandment is that we not take the name of the Lord in vain. After referring to a few different translations of the Bible there are a couple different understandings that I have come to for this one, all of them good.
- Do not use the name of the Lord for evil purposes.
- Do not make wrong use of the name of God.
- Do not use the name of God irreverently nor to swear to a falsehood.
- Do not take the name of the Lord in vain.
It seems to me to be a pretty straightforward and reasonable request. This command is found in Exodus 20:7. If we go back only 2 verses we can see God refer to himself as a jealous God when commanding us to not make idols or bow down to them. In this we can learn that God is emotional. I think that is something that we don’t consider very often. I am sure there is not one person reading this post that enjoys being disrespected. Consider the fact that God created us in his likeness and that he does not want to be disrespected either. God is the one who created us and loves us beyond our comprehension and despite all of our short comings.
One thing I often think about is all the people that say they don’t believe in God, or worse yet do but don’t practice what they profess to believe in, only use the name of our creator and redeemer in the heat of anger or passion. Other times people use the name of God to “swear” to something they know isn’t true. And sometimes people like to refer to themselves or someoen they know as a God whether jokingly or genuine. All of these are bad.
Lastly, here is something great that I pulled from another website:
Next an analogy: When my mother married my father, in Germany back in the 1940’s after World War Two, she took my father’s name. The taking of the new name, reflected a change in life, and change in status and a change in priorities. She was no longer a single woman, she was married. She no longer dated men, she was mated to one. She was now responsible for a family and a relationship that would last over 50 years (so far!).
If her lifestyle did not change from that day forward, she would have been ostracized by her community. Few, if any, cultures or societies encourage their married women to live in the same way after the marriage as they did before they married.
In other words, if my mother had taken my father’s name, but not changed her lifestyle, she would have taken my father’s name “in-vain”. She would have had a ceremony, but not a new life, and boy would my father have been… upset, to put it mildly.
When we put on a uniform, we take the name of those whose uniform it is. Whether it is a sports team uniform, a work uniform for an employer or a military uniform. When we choose a career, we take the name of the best of everyone in that career field.
If you take the name of God, at a ceremony, and tell the world that you are now part of the ‘bride of Christ’ as the church is called, yet you do not live like a ‘bride of Christ’, you have taken His name in vain, and you will not be considered guiltless. Live with Jesus as if you are committed to Him for life, not as if He is a friend. A spouse is supposed to be an intimate friend, companion, confidant, friend and a lifetime commitment. To treat Jesus as anything less than that, is to take His name in vain. Ouch. Are you ‘guilty as charged’?
With this series I have been commenting at the end of the posts as to how the world would be different if the commandment being examined was followed. I have to say I have had a hard time with this one on that level. I do think if we made our best effort in being revreant of God’s name in this commandment and the rest of them it would be easier to see his presence. In that we would he less struggles and heart ache. I think we would feel a snowball like effect goodness instead of the snowball effect of evil we see in the world today.
Tags: God, ten commandments