Top Ten // Trust God (pt.2)

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Well, good morning, y'all.

So that's the last week.

If you've been here, or this is the last week of the series, if you've been here every week, then you've seen the same bumper over and over, same images, icons, uh, to walk through the Ten Commandments as found in the book of Exodus, chapter 20.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

We don't think um someday at judgment that there's like a test to get into heaven, but in case, right?

Now you know the Ten Commandments, right?

So pretty easy, pretty basic.

So um, but no, I've really enjoyed kind of being in the series and walking through it, and we'll finish that out today.

Um, before we get there though, I uh my hope is that um at any given point in each of your lives you're reading something.

So if I were to just ask, hey, like, what do you what have you been reading lately?

Like my hope is something.

There was uh an influencer recently that was asked something about reading a book, and they're like, Oh, I don't know.

I think the last book I read was Oh, the places you'll go, or the cat and the hat.

And I was like, that's probably not great that you're an influencer.

Um, but we want to read, and people have said before, I don't like reading, and I'm always just telling the same thing.

I don't care.

Um, like we need to read, right?

You're gonna love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength.

And so we need to engage our mind.

And sometimes I've heard accusations about the church or faith, you know, you gotta check your brain at the door, this, that, and the other.

No, I want you fully engaged.

Like you can ask anything, push back, think through, challenge.

Like, we want to engage in this way.

And so, as a staff, uh, we we do this regularly.

We have conversations twice a month typically.

We'll walk through a book together or a podcast.

Um, there's an article, something like that, because we want to sharpen our minds, we want to kind of keep learning, keep growing, keep developing.

Um, that's that's the notion.

And so we're reading this book right now as a staff, The Art of Asking Better Questions.

I mentioned it last week, and Jay had brought it to us.

And there's something for our reading tomorrow that I thought would actually be really helpful for us today.

And so I kind of just wanted to read it to you.

So if you're not reading a book presently and somebody's like, What have you been reading lately?

It's like, well, I mean, I was listening to a snippet out of a book the other day, right, about questions.

So that that way you're covered, okay, just in case.

And you're like, I'm feeling kind of judged.

Get over it, right?

I I got you covered, okay?

I got your book.

Here you go.

There's an ancient story of a rabbi returning from a long day of studying Torah, the Old Testament.

It was later than usual, and the sun had almost set.

Lost in prayerful thought, he arrived at a fork in the road, turning to travel left instead of his normal route home to the right.

Coming to his senses, he realized he had not arrived home, but was instead standing in front of a Roman outpost.

A loud voice called out into the darkness, Stop right there! A Roman centurion stepped into view.

Who are you?

And what are you doing here?

He barked.

The rabbi thought for a moment and he replied this way, How much are you paid to stand here each day?

The soldier, slightly puzzled, responded, Three drachma.

The rabbi says, I'll pay you twice as much if you stand at my front door and ask me those two questions every morning.

I want you to consider those questions with me for a moment.

They're good questions.

After all, everything we are, who we are, who we believe ourselves to be, shapes all that we do.

My guess would be in your life, you've had a lot of things said to you, about you, spoken over you.

Regrettably, there's a lot of painful stuff in our lives that have been spoken to us, about us, of who we are.

Remember the nonsensical saying people used to say, maybe they still say it, sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.

It's hogwash.

I've yet to meet somebody in therapy or trying to process through a hit with a stick when they were eight.

But the words that spoken by a parent, by a friend, by a teacher, by a coach, I mean, those things can reverberate for decades in the hearts and the minds and the souls of people.

Now, at the same time, I've also been on the other end of just people speaking life over me, speaking life into me, believing there's more in me than I believe there to be myself, or that evidence had thus presented so far.

And hopefully you've had that same experience.

I think about even like my role as a pastor.

I'm afforded the opportunity like to be there at the wedding, like closer to the bride and groom than anybody else.

I get to be there to dedicate children.

When somebody's preparing to say goodbye to a loved one, hey, thank you so much.

Like your presence here actually means something.

And that speaks life over me.

Like I've I've I know what that is, and it shapes who I am, it shapes who I am as a pastor.

There's those negative things, obviously, but there's also those positive things.

So I'd like us maybe to just consider for a moment these couple of questions ourselves.

Who are you?

Are you quick with the answer or are you hesitant?

Are you tentative with how you'd respond or are you sure?

Are you pleased or dissatisfied with what you'd say?

If we were having the conversation one-on-one and I said, who are you?

Is there this kind of sense of like, yeah, I like this, let's tease into this a little bit, or is it one of those things like, hey, could we pivot topics?

Is the direction of who you are and who you're becoming, is it a good one or is it worrisome?

Because again, who you are shapes everything that you do.

Who are you?

And the second question: what are you doing here?

Glenn and we typically have service every Sunday.

You should know that.

You're the pastor.

Fair point.

Fair point.

But what are you doing here today?

Did you show up to hear from God because you need confirmation of something you're hoping for?

Do you need some healing from some brokenness?

Are you open to rebuke?

To challenge?

What are you doing here?

Did you hope to connect with some other people?

Were you here to kind of critique and sit over what is and what isn't?

The same questions for the who are you apply.

Are you quick with the answer?

Are you hesitant?

Like, what are you doing at this stage in life?

Are you where you thought you would be or way behind?

Knowing oneself and knowing one's place is incredibly important, yet it would seem so often we don't take time to actually consider some of those things.

Hence the story.

I'll pay you twice as much to stand at my door and ask me the same questions.

I've always believed, or at least believed for a long time, that we live differently when we know we're gonna be asked certain questions.

So one of the things we encourage everybody is to live in community with people.

Like this is a commitment we want people to make, and it costs you something.

It's not easy.

Like it takes time, coordination of schedules, all these kind of things.

And if you get emotionally vulnerable with somebody else, like you expose yourself potentially to risk.

Because if you let people in, they can speak pain over you in a much more pronounced way.

But there's something about gathering with people regularly to say, hey, where yet in the scripture?

Where are you at in prayer?

Hey, how's your relationship?

Are you honoring your spouse well?

Hey, are you keeping healthy boundaries in your relationships with friendships and with work?

Hey, that thing you shared about last week where you were struggling, how's that going?

We live differently when we live in that kind of community.

Well, one of the reasons like we want all of our middle school and high school students to connect to youth because they need community.

They don't just need a Bible state, they need people rubbing elbows and everything else with them.

And there's this consistency of gathering together to have adults in their lives of asking them certain questions.

We've been considering together the past month the Ten Commandments as recorded in the book of Exodus, chapter 20, and Exodus is just the second book of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

And we've walked through the first nine commandments.

Today we're going to consider just the tenth.

And I think the commandments answer these questions for us.

Or at least they begin to answer the questions for the Israelites, and if we'll apply them to our lives today, they begin to answer the questions for us as well.

Who are we to be and what are we to do?

So God gives answer.

He says, Listen, you were slaves, you were captives, now you're going to be free and you're going to be conquerors.

God says that the people are his people.

At least that's what God would desire for them.

That is who they are.

They're free, they're loved, they're chosen, they're called, they're sent.

That is who they are.

The world is not meant to form them, rather, the shaping hand of God is forming them so that they can then in turn help shape and form the world.

They are people who regularly find themselves at rest.

And when asked in those moments, like, what are you doing?

Why are you resting?

And it's like, what are you doing here?

You're like, I'm resting.

Why?

Because my God said that it's really important for who I am.

And he said he's got everything handled, so he said it's okay for me to take a break.

There are people who honor and love their family, that most basic unit of any culture in human civilization.

They make the choice to honor and to love.

The people of God, by the way, always make the choice to honor.

There are to be a people who live well toward their neighbors.

There to be a people who find themselves precisely where God would have them, when he would have them to be.

So who are you?

We're God's people.

What are you doing here?

Living life to the full as a gift of God.

And then we come to commandment number 10.

So we're in the book of Exodus, chapter 20, I think verse 17.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

It was verse 17.

It says this you shall not covet your neighbor's house.

And if you don't know quite what covet is, we'll get there in just a second.

You shall not covet your neighbor's house, you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male or female servant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.

Leave your neighbor's life alone, leave your neighbor's stuff alone, leave your neighbor's relationships alone.

I mentioned a book last week that walks through the entirety of the Ten Commandments.

It's called Dancing with the Law by Boone and Boone.

It's a father and uh daughter that wrote it together.

And I thought their description of coveting at the very opening of the chapter was really helpful, so I'd just like to read it to you if that's okay.

Coveting is a marriage of two of the seven deadly sins.

There's not a list of seven deadly sins actually in the Bible, but rather it's through tradition that these were distortions, brokenness.

They're never satisfied, and they always lead ever and ever further from God.

And coveting is a marriage of two of them.

One part envy, one part greed.

Greed is the inability to say enough.

It's the when they come around the Italian restaurant with the cheese, and you don't know what you're supposed to do, and you're just like, should they stop now?

I mean, I feel like they should stop.

It's the ability to never say enough, and in life, so much that's the case.

It is the desire that lurks in the basement, always asking for more.

It is an emptiness that seeks fulfillment through the next acquisition.

Envy is the inability to enjoy the life we have because our eyes and thoughts are always on what another person has.

It's a rather tragic picture when viewed in this way.

Covetousness, this thing God calls his people away from is quite broken, to say the least.

The image of never having enough, of always wondering what I can get next, like it brings to mind in all the worst ways the word insatiable.

Let me ask you a couple questions.

Because God calls his people away from this way of being.

Who are you?

Are you satisfied or are you never satisfied?

Are you content or ever discontent?

Are you grateful or always complaining?

Now maybe you have some pushback, and there's a very fair pushback.

Lannon, it's not either or.

Like I'm not, yeah, I'm not always satisfied, but it's not like I'm constantly never satisfied in my life.

Which way do you lean?

Which one do you find yourself heading more toward more often?

And before you try and qualify it, well okay, yeah, I'm kind of always before you try and qualify it, why?

Well, because I want to learn, I want to grow.

A core commitment of mine in life is I want to leave things better than I found them.

Yeah, but there's a difference between being grateful for what I have and always trying to seek improvement and advancement, and never being content because it's never enough.

So who are you?

Next question: what are you doing here?

Are you leaning into each moment that life presents, or are you always longing for the next one?

Well, if I could just get to the next stage, if I could, if I could just get through this next piece, if we can get into this next chapter, if if I can just get through this semester, if I can just get through this season, if I can just get through this quarter, if we can just get through, if I can just, what do you hope to find on the other side?

Don't you realize you'll still be the one that's there?

And if who you are is fundamentally always bent towards dissatisfaction and discontentment and always chasing after one more thing that will ultimately bring satisfaction, because it won't, it'll be the same thing in the next season.

It'll just be something else we long for.

Now again, there's nothing wrong with you like, well, Lane, I was kind of thinking about adding an addition to the house, and is that sinful?

No.

If you think that's what will ultimately make you happy, yes.

I want to share something I heard years ago.

And I found it to be incredibly helpful about this commandment.

I don't know where to give credit.

I don't know if it was in a book I read, a sermon I heard, I don't think it was a podcast because it was years and years ago, and I don't know when podcasts started, but I don't think they were going around then.

And it was this idea about commandment number 10.

Here's the basic idea as I remember it.

There's a sense in which as we learn to live into the life described by the first nine commandments.

The tenth commandment actually becomes a gift.

It's not simply one more thing we must do, rather, as God is forming us into people, right?

God is forming us into people who don't need or want to grasp after the life or things of another.

As I live into each of these nine commandments, I get to commandment number 10, and it's like, well, don't grab after something else.

Like, why would I?

That's not the type of person I am, that's not the kind of person I'm becoming.

Think about it this way: God invites us into relationship with himself.

There's no competition, there's no posturing.

You can't do enough good deeds to make him love you more, you can't do enough bad deeds, and he's like, I'm done with you.

God just invites the Israelite people into relationship, and God has continued to invite people into relationship with himself ever since the beginning.

It's the nature of the story.

There's no competition.

And so we're loved, we're seen, we're called.

What he speaks over us is meant to be primary in our lives.

Commandments two and three, we're invited then to be open to his transforming work in our lives.

We can't reshape God into our image.

We need not try, but he is very interested in reshaping us more and more into the fullish picture of who he's called and crafted us and created us to be.

And so then we're to speak in ways about God and to God that respect that understanding and that relationship.

And we get to rest in this reality, fully loved by God, fully trusting in him.

This leads to our ability to honor our parents and love our families well, and that foundation leads to loving all of our community well.

If that's the reality of the people, if that's who they choose to be by the grace of God alone, because without the grace of God, we're all in a spot.

And if that's how they choose to live day in and day out, then they are freed from endlessly grasping after one more thing.

Because they have everything they need.

They have a foundational primary relationship with the creator of all the universe.

He's shaping their lives.

Gives core of relationship with family and with others and how to relate to one another.

And so I need not grasp after one more thing.

That's why the Tenth Commandment seems such an appropriate finish to the ten.

When we learn to live the life described by the first nine commandments, we become a people who can receive our own lives as a gift.

Who are you?

I'm dearly loved by God.

What are you doing?

Receiving the gift of life he's afforded.

So, in that sense, do not covet begins to sound less like one last restriction and more like an invitation to the fullness of freedom.

If we'll choose to live into this way.

Now there's a problem.

When covetous desire takes root, when I insist on having for myself what is not intended for me, I can literally undo all of the other nine commandments with just that one.

The tenth commandment speaks directly to our desires.

Desire, rightly ordered, is a good thing.

Like it is.

It's like, man, I we'd love to replace the car, I'd love to get that new opportunity at work, I'd love to do this, that, or the other.

But it's not because I find my satisfaction in there, but I have this growth mindset.

I'm learning to grow.

But that's not where my satisfaction is sourced.

So in finding who we are in God, full of grace, full of truth, we can be well set, we can pursue that which is good.

However, if we're determined to call our own shots, if we're the ones who get to say, well, this is what's good, and this is what I desire, and this is what I want, and this is what I should have, everything begins to fall apart.

It's a disordered way of seeing the world, and disordered desires always bring a lot of problems.

Consider with me the Garden of Eden, opening story in the creation.

Humanity has all they need, but there's a problem where there shouldn't be a problem.

Eve sees something that looks good or is pleasing to the eye.

And so she begins to greedily want what is not intended for her.

She begins to greedily want what God has said is harmful to her.

She has a choice.

I trust the God who's on the throne, or I try and bump him off so I can sit there.

I can't covet unless I take the throne.

Eve sees that it looks good.

After long enough, we don't know how long, she reaches out and takes it.

And it opens up this whole world of pain.

And this story plays out again and again throughout the Bible and history in our world today.

Something looks good in a moment.

Desire sets in, but it's just another trap.

Consider the story of King David found in the Old Testament.

He's described as a man after God's own heart.

David is on the rooftop one time, walking around, thinking, looking, and he sees something he should not look upon.

And rather than averting his eyes, running downstairs, owning it to somebody like, hey, we got to get me out of here, we've got to make a change, he keeps his gaze set.

And he longs to have that greedily, which he should not be having.

And it ultimately leads to him murdering, to him lying, to him dishonoring the relationship, the foundational relationship that's meant to be at the core of who he is as king, who he's meant to be as a man, a relationship with God, and all because something looked good in the moment.

And he greedily wanted it.

Throughout history, people have desired power, wealth, and fame.

Rightly ordered, there's nothing wrong with desiring to wield power humbly, or to steward wealth faithfully or responsibly, or to have your name carry weight so that it might be leveraged to the benefit of others.

Yet to seek them in and of themselves, how many lives, how many stories, how many nations, corporations, have completely been undone by this pursuit for wealth and power and fame?

Where all of a sudden we begin to cross lines or we shouldn't cross lines and we justify our decisions.

It's that old saying, sin will take you farther than you ever wanted to go, keep you longer than you wanted to stay, and cost you more than you were ever willing to pay.

It takes place in our world today.

I want what I want.

Who are you to tell me what's good for me?

It's my life after all.

It's my family, it's my career, it's my choice, it's my education, it's my, it's my, it's my.

While I'm grabbing after everything else, it's a covetous heart.

Never satisfied, always discontent, always grasping after what someone else has.

And it undoes everything else, which is meant to be relationship with God.

I can do as I please if I'm ultimately the one that's on the throne in my life.

But the Ten Commandments in the Bible as a whole invite us to a radically different way to live.

Galatians 2.20 lays this out rather clearly.

I have been crucified with Christ.

In other words, I've killed broken desires.

Those ways of living, those things that are caught up in stealing, killing, destroying, those things, I want nothing to do with them.

God says no, I'm like, I'm good with that.

It looks really good.

I confess that it looks good, but God, I trust you over that.

I'm not thinking about the next season, I'm not thinking about just the next opportunity.

I'm not going to get to the next place.

It reminds me of the old, I think it's the old uh Snoopy comic, and I think it's Linus or Charlie Brown talking to one another.

They says, Man, I wish we knew the good when we were living in the good old days right now.

Instead of this always chasing, this always relentless cycle.

I've been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me.

The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself up for me.

Exodus 20 is an invitation to an exclusive relationship with God, where it is the primary orienting concern of our lives, rooted in love and trust, first expressed toward God and then toward all people.

And if we'll live in this way, if we'll live in this way, we will not greedily covet what anyone else has.

Here's a really cool thing about that.

When your neighbor gets a new car or an upgrade to their house or they get the promotion or something like that, your friend, the same thing happens in their life.

They get to be the starter, they get this, they were awarded the honor.

Instead of being like, well, I want that, I should have that.

You're just like, that's amazing for you.

Like I celebrate this with you.

I know you were going for this too.

Yeah, but big deal.

If I got it, you'd be celebrating with me.

That's the heart of this.

But how often in our culture?

How come she gets that when I should have?

How come he gets to it?

How come their family, I should have?

Where does that come from?

Covet.

A way of living in which what I have is never enough, and where I am is never enough, and I'm always chasing, and God says, you don't have to live that way.

When we live within the life God describes in the first nine commandments, trusting Him, loving our neighbor, being formed into the kind of person who knows we're formed into the kind of person who no longer needs our neighbor's life.

You see, the commandments, the way we've been looking at them over this past five weeks, it's an invitation to relationship.

God rescues the people and says, Listen, I want to be your God.

Do you want to be my people?

This is what this looks like.

And God ever since has always sought to invite people into relationship.

And then we define the relationship a little bit.

What are the terms?

What's this look like?

What's this mean?

I was thinking about it.

We've got baptism coming up in a few weeks.

If you've been baptized before, you can kind of reflect on that.

If you've not been baptized and you're a follower of Jesus, we need to get you in the water.

Come have a conversation.

But in baptism, it's this kind of picture of what Galatians 2 says.

I've been crucified with Christ.

Literally, I'm buried and then raised to new life.

If that's my story, who am I?

I'm a follower of Jesus.

That's who I am.

Like in my family, I'm first a follower of Jesus.

In my relationships, I'm first a follower of Jesus.

When it comes to my work, I'm first a follower of Jesus before I'm the president or before I'm the janitor or anything in between or anything above or below.

I don't know what that would be.

In my play, I'm first a follower of Jesus.

In challenges that come upon me in my life, I'm first a follower of Jesus.

In opportunities that are presented to me, I'm first a follower of Jesus.

That's who I am.

And what am I doing here?

I'm learning to live the life I've received from him.

Man, this is a tough season for you.

I bet you can't wait to be out of it.

It is a tough season, and honestly, yes, I would like to be at it, but more than anything, because I'm first a follower of Jesus, I'm asking God, God, what do you want me to learn in this?

The God who rescued Israel before ever giving a single command is the God who's acted for us in Christ.

God rescues Israel, and in Christ, God has acted to rescue us.

God longs that all people would know life.

It's freely given.

So why would we covet?

Because I want what they have.

Ask God for it.

Well, God keeps saying no.

Then you should go with no.

But I really want it.

Like a petulant child in a candy aisle.

Or like myself, bless our hearts.

If God said no, let it be no.

If you live a life where you're always grasping after something, you will not find satisfaction there.

If you're like, well, I don't know.

Like, I think if I could get this one thing, go back five years.

What was the one thing you needed then that promised satisfaction?

When you found it, how long did it last?

I love what the Ten Commandments close out in this way.

God is forming us, if we're willing, to be the kind of people who don't have to grasp after anything.

Instead of grasping after all the different things in the world, instead we just pursue more of Him.

Liam's gonna come, she's gonna lead us uh in a reprisal of a song we did earlier, just talking about trusting in God.

I'd love to invite you to stay in with me.

And then um before we go or when we go, um, if you could use some prayer this week, we always have uh you can submit prayer requests online, that's always an option.

But if you're like, hey, I could use some prayer.

I've got a job interview this week, or I've got a stressful deal on the situation I'm dealing with, uh, myself, Kevin Miranda, will be up here after Lee Ann leads us in singing.

Um, and we'd love to just chance to pray with you.

If you want to share a little bit, we'll we can respond.

Or if you just say, hey, I just need prayer about work, we'll pray for you over work.

But let me ask you again just today, before you go, who are you?

Are you leaning more toward satisfied or more toward dissatisfied?

You leaning more toward discontentment or contentment, sorry, or towards being discontent?

What are you doing here?

Just trying to get through this season so you can get to whatever the next thing is, which will still be you living it?

God's invitation to us is to recognize we're invited into a relationship with Him where He knows what is good for us.

And He says, Trust me.

I have no deficits, I have no debts.

I have everything possible to leverage for your good and for your benefit.

Will you trust me to give you what you need to place you where you need to be placed?

Will you walk with me?

Will you talk with me?

Trust me when I tell you I'm your own, that you're that you're mine.

Father, we thank you for this day.

Your love and your grace and your kindness.

May we choose to trust you.

Just to trust you.

If we find ourselves in a season where we don't want to be, Lord, stir our hearts that would help us to grow.

We always want this healthy growth mindset, but not, oh, if I could just get or if I could just have, and say, God, how are you leading me in the midst of this season?

In a world where we're always sold, if we could just get this, if we could just get that, if we could just experience this, then life would be whole.

We can say my life is whole as it is.

Who am I?

I'm the first to follow Jesus.

It shapes everything I do.

What am I doing?

I'm learning to live more and more the life he feel like.

Thank you so much for listening to today's podcast.

If you're ready to take a next step in your faith, please reach out to us through our website, refineryohio.com, or you can email us at office at refineryohio.com.

We hope you have a blessed day.