Exodus 20:3 “Thou shalt have no other (another) gods before me.”
A man came to a rabbi and asked if the rabbi could teach him the deep mysteries of God. The rabbi asked the man a question. Two burglars entered a house through a chimney. Upon emerging from the chimney one burglar had a dirty face and the other a clean face. Which one washed his face? The man quickly responded that the one with the dirty face. The rabbi replied that this showed that the man was not ready to study the deeper things of God because he could not correctly answer a simple question. The man with the clean face would have washed his face because seeing his partner had a dirty face he would have assumed his face was dirty. The one with the dirty face would not have washed his face for seeing his partner with a clean face he would have assumed his face was clean. The man replied that he now understood the depth of thinking he needed to study the deeper things of God. The rabbi replied that he did not understand the proper thinking, for how could two men come down a chimney and only one have a dirty face? Sometime even if we are able to grasp the obvious, there is something even more obvious that we never consider. Such is the case with Exodus 20:3.
There are few people reading Exodus 20:3 who have never heard this commandment. Yet, how many have ever thought to think about what it really means?
There are three words in this passage that we need to look at closely. The first is the word other. In Hebrew this is the word ’acharwhich is often rendered as another. At first glance the phrase: “Thou shalt have no other gods” appears similar to the phrase: “Thou shalt not have another god.” The phrases are identical, except that we are so used to hearing the first phrase that we never consider its implications. Saying it a different way: “Thou shalt not have another god…” does make one think on this a little deeper because, how many times do we approach God while having another god fills our thoughts.
The word gods is elohim. Here is where we tend to miss the fine point of this commandment. We automatically think this is a reference to something supernatural. Since we do not worship Baal, or Zeus, or other supernatural gods, we chalk this commandment up to one that we will never break. Yet, the word elohim means much more than this. An elohim is anything or anyone that you put your trust in. It is anything or anyone that you depend upon for your security or build your life upon. Hence you shall not put your trust in anything before God Jehovah. A god does not have to be some pagan deity. It can be a simple thing like your 401K or your job. Rick Joyner put it in words that make more sense than the words I could use. “If you are a sincere seeker of truth, a simple test will determine whether you are building your life on a true faith in God or in this present world. Ask yourself: ‘Where do I get my encouragement, or discouragement, from?’ Does it depress you when the stock market takes jolt or when you hear other troubling economic news? If we are troubled when the world begins to shake, it is a revelation of what we have been building our lives on.”
So, if we look at it in this context, this would define what a god is. It is whatever you build your life upon.
The word before is pani. It is the word use for face as well as for the presence of God. “You shall not trust in anything or person when in My Presence.” The children of Israel knew all about the presence of God. It was there as a Cloud by day and as a pillar of fire by night. For many of us, the presence of God is expressed in different ways. Often it is a sense of peace. Yet, if we build our lives on our jobs, our 401Ks or our money market accounts and we are stressed out over fear of losing our job or our money market accounts taking another hit, we will not enter that peace of God or his presence. To try and enter into the presence of God while fretting over our job or money market accounts would be like a man trying to be intimate with his wife while worrying over his relationship with a mistress. No man can serve two masters. Exodus 20:3 should alert us to really give serious thought as to who our real master is. Ok that is pretty obvious
Remember the second question of the rabbis’ story – how could two men come down a chimney and only one has a dirty face? Sometimes we can understand the obvious but miss an even more obvious point. If, say our jobs or 401Ks have become our gods, then what an insult it must be to pray to God to protect or bless our jobs or 401K (our gods) so as to increase our sense of security and thus cause us to embrace this other god even more. That is the commandment – thou shalt not have another god while in My presence. Before we begin praying to God to bless our jobs or 401Ks we need to stop and really consider just why we are asking Him to bless it. Before we begin praying for anything we need to consider if we are asking Him to bless or provide something that is more important to us than He is, are we asking Him to spare something that we are depending upon more than God? Are we coming into His presence with another God?
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