11/28/17 – Eph 6:2-3, The Ten
Commandments, Pt 31, The 10th Commandments, Pt. 1, Lesson # 17-128
Grace Fellowship
Church
Pastor/Teacher,
Jim Rickard
Before we
begin, if you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, (If You have - Trusted
in Him for Eternal Life), it is important to prepare yourself to: Take-in God’s
Word and/or Participate in a Communion Service, so take a moment to name, cite,
or acknowledge your sins privately, directly to God the Father. This will
assure that you are in fellowship with God the Father & the Holy Spirit’s
convicting ministry will then be able to teach you as the Holy Spirit is the
real teacher.
1 John 1:9 says— “If we confess [simply
name, cite, or acknowledge to God the Father] our sins [known sins], He
is faithful and just to forgive us our sins [known sins] and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness
[all unknown & forgotten sins].”
For those of you who have not yet accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord & Savior, please see: The Salvation Message @ the
end of this document.
2 Pet 3:9, “The Lord is
not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward
you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance.”
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The Doctrine of the Ten Commandments Related to the Church Age,
Part XXXI
Ex 20:17; Deut 5:21; Gen 2:6; 3:9; Num 11:4, 34; Prov 21:10; 23:3; Mark 15:19
The
10th Commandment.
Ex
20:17, “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your
neighbor’s wife or his male servant or his female servant or his ox or his donkey
or anything that belongs to your neighbor.”
Deut 5:21, “You shall not covet your neighbor's wife,
and you shall not desire your neighbor's house, his field or his
male servant or his female servant, his ox or his donkey or anything that
belongs to your neighbor.”
The final commandment in the Decalogue, reemphasizes the
individual’s rights of privacy, property, person, and possessions. This is the
6th of the horizontal commandments that primarily deals with man’s
relationship with man. But as all the commandments tell us, they have to do
with our relationship with God, first and foremost. The previous commands
implicitly forbid all acts that would harm or injure your neighbor; this
forbids all inordinate inner desires of having what belongs to your neighbor
that would presumably gratify yourself.
The Hebrew begins with LO for “not” once again. In Deuteronomy, it includes the WAW for “and,” before LO, as the previous three
commandments did also.
Both “covets” in the
Exodus passage are the Verb CHAMAD, חָמַד in the Qal Imperfect, spelled TAHMOD,
that means, “to desire or take pleasure in.” CHAMAD is used 18 times in the OT,
and has a variety of nuances stemming from the notion of desire related to
physical beauty, both in a good and evil way. The motive of the subject who
desires something or someone, often determines whether the desires are sinful
or pleasing to the Lord, YHWH.
In the negative way, as it is used in the Decalogue, it means, “to
lust, to want somebody else’s property, a strong desire to possess something
that belongs to somebody else, to yearn to have, and to want to have something
very much inordinately, culpably, or without due regard for the rights of
others.”
In this commandment, there is a list of 7 things that are not to
be coveted that belong to your neighbor, with an 8th that is a
catchall for any other property or goods belonging to others: 1) house, 2)
wife, 3) land, 4) male servant, 5) female servant, 6) ox, 7) donkey, or 8)
anything that belongs to him.
Seven is the number of “spiritual perfection” in the Bible.
Therefore, if we do not covet what our neighbor owns, we can walk in God’s
light and righteousness.
Eight is the number of “superabundance” in the Bible and here
reflects God’s provisions for each individual that should not be coveted by
another.
Therefore, we are to be content with what we have been given by
God, and not sinfully desire the things others possess.
As you may have noticed, the first two prohibitions in this
command are reversed between Exodus and Deuteronomy. Exodus first prohibits
coveting “your neighbor’s,” REA, “house,” BAYITH, that can mean, “home or
household, family, or even property,” and then prohibits coveting your
neighbor’s “wife,” ISHSHAH.
Deuteronomy reverses them.
The Catholic church believes these are two different commands, but
as Keil and Delitzsch note, “The objects
of desire do not point to two different commandments. This is evident at once
from the transposition of the house and wife in Deuteronomy.” (Keil and
Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament).
In addition, even though the “wife” could rightly be included in
BAYITH, “house,” she is called out separately, because she is the crown of the
man, and a possession more costly than pearls, Prov 12:4; 31:10.
Nevertheless, this is one commandment with 8 examples of
inordinate desire or lust.
In fact, Deuteronomy’s second “covet” related to the neighbor’s house or household, is the Hebrew
Verb AWAH, אָוָה that also means, “to desire or lust for,” in the reflexive
action Hithpael Imperfect. That means that this “lusting” comes from within,
whereas CHAMAD emphasized lusting based on the beauty of the object. AWAH is
used here in a morally or spiritually negative way for the inward desire to
possess what your neighbor has.
As Keil and Delitzsch note, “The
only difference between them being, that "the former (CHAMAD) denotes the
desire as founded upon the perception of beauty, and therefore excited from
without, the latter, (AWAH), desire originating at the very outset in the person
himself, and arising from his own want or inclination,” (Schultz, as quoted in the Keil and
Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament)
Prov 21:10 tells us, “The soul of the wicked desires, (AWAH), evil; his neighbor finds no favor in his eyes.”
Examples of this covetousness include:
Num
11:4, 34, the Israelites in the wilderness started “craving” the food of
Egypt. This disregard for God's deliverance and provision resulted in a plague
that arrived simultaneously with the miraculous provision of quail.
Prov
23:3, warns of another kind of “craving” that is wrong. Here, the
reader is warned against dining with a ruler who offers delicacies as a snare
in disguise.
Prov 23:3, “Do
not desire his delicacies, For it is deceptive food.”
The next difference we see is in Deuteronomy, where we are not to
covet our neighbor’s, “field,” where
SADEH, שָׂדֶה is added. Now that they were entering into the Promised Land to
possess it, land property would be an issue. SADEH means, “field, territory, or
countryside.” Now that they would own land and have fields, whereas in the
wilderness they did not, they were prohibited from wrongfully desiring the land
property of their fellow kinsmen.
The other prohibitions of lusting included the neighbor’s:
1. Household workers, slaves, servants, or employees.
a. “Male servant,” which is the Noun EVED, עֶבֶד meaning, “servant,
slave, or one who is under the authority of another.” Workers or employees are
also in view.
b. “Female servant,” which is the Noun AMAH, אָמָה that means, “maid,
handmaid, female slave, etc., and sometimes concubine.”
2. Working animals.
a. “Ox,” is SHOR, שׁוֹר meaning “a fully grown male bovine, ox, bull,
steer, or cattle,” but can also mean a female or a calf.
b. “Donkey,” is the Noun CHAMOR, חֲמוֹר. It is referred to as the
“beast of burden,” because of the heavy loads it is able to carry. This is the
animal Jesus rode into Jerusalem on, as prophesied in Zech 9:9.
3. All other belongings.
a. “Anything that belongs to your neighbor,” KOL ASHER LE REA.
Therefore, this commandment, like the prohibition against
stealing, implies that God allows people to own things that belong to them and
not to others.
The Conjunctions “or”
in the English translations are for the Hebrew WAW to create groupings and
differentials, as you can see.
The first time “covet”
is used in the OT is Gen 2:9, of
God’s creation of trees that are “pleasant
to the sight,” yet the first sin of humanity entered because Eve “desired”
the fruit which was “desirable to make
one wise,” from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, but was
forbidden to be eaten by God, Gen 3:6.
So, we see that coveting led to the first sin in mankind, and is the basis of
all sin and crimes.
Unlike the other commandments, which focus on outward actions,
this commandment focuses on thought; the mentality of your soul. It is an
imperative against setting one’s desire on things that are the property or
ownership of someone else. For example:
1. As the 7th Commandment forbids the act of adultery.
This commandment forbids the desire for adultery.
2. As the 8th Commandment forbids stealing. This
commandment forbids the desire for acquisition of another’s goods.
Therefore, coveting is the starting point of stealing,
forbidden by the 8th Commandment, and, in the case of coveting
someone else’s spouse, adultery, the 7th Commandment.
As we have previously noted, the NT describes Jesus as
interpreting the Ten Commandments as issues of the heart’s desires, rather than
merely prohibiting certain outward actions, cf. Mat 5:28. The 10th
Commandment makes clear that a relationship with God and man is a matter of the
heart, first and foremost. As such, the 1st and 10th
Commandments deal with what is in the heart, while the other eight focus on
outward actions that begin in the heart. And as we have seen, covetousness is
about the heart. It is about desire.
Desire, coupled with the Old Sin Nature, (OSN), creates a pattern
for sinning called the “lust pattern” of the sin nature. When someone has a
desire for praise, the lust pattern of the OSN tempts the soul in various forms
of asceticism. When someone desires pleasure, the lust pattern of the OSN
tempts in various forms of lasciviousness. See the doctrine and slides on the
OSN, Lust Pattern of the Soul.
Jesus stated in Luke 12:15,
“Beware, and be on your guard against every form of greed; for not even
when one has an abundance does his life consist of his possessions.”
Covetous people will break any and all of God’s commandments in
order to satisfy their desires, because at the heart of sin is the sin in the
heart, Mat 15:19.
Mat 15:19, “For
out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts,
false witness, slanders.”
To covet is to feed inward desires for anything that God says is
sinful, and this commandment highlights the twisted desires of mankind and the sin
of discontentment.
A
PERSONAL NOTE FOR YOU
John 6:47 says: “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me [Jesus Christ] has everlasting life.”
Notice again
what John 6:47 says, “he who believes in Me [Jesus Christ] has everlasting life.” It doesn’t say, “will have;” it says,
“has.” Therefore, the very moment you believe Jesus Christ’s promise of
everlasting life, you have it, and it can never be lost or taken away from you [John 10:28-29]. Furthermore, the gift
of everlasting life [also called eternal life in Scripture] is available to
every human being; there are absolutely no exceptions.
John 3:14-18 says: “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must
the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but
have eternal life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the
world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but
he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in
the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
Eph 2:8-9, “For by grace are ye saved through
faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9 Not of works, lest any
man should boast.”
If
you have never accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, I am here to tell
you that Jesus loves you. He loves you so much that He gave His life for you.
God the Father also loves you. He loves you so much that He gave His only Son
for you by sending Him to the Cross. At the Cross Jesus died in your place.
Taking upon Himself all of your sins and all of my sins. He was judged for our
sins and paid the price for our sins. Therefore, our sins will never be held
against us.
Right
where you are, you now have the opportunity to make the greatest decision in
your life. To accept the free gift of salvation and eternal life by truly
believing that Jesus Christ died for your sins and was raised on the third day
as the proof of the promise of eternal life. So right now, you can pause and
reflect on what Christ has done for you and say to the Father:
"Yes
Father, I believe that Your Son, Jesus Christ,
died on the cross for the forgiveness of my sins."
If you have done that, I Welcome You to the Eternal
Family of God !!!
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Grace Fellowship Church
Pastor/Teacher: James H. Rickard
23 Messenger Street, Unit 3
Plainville, MA 02762
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Property of: James H Rickard Bible Ministries
All Rights Reserved.
