"The 2nd Commandment (no graven images)" by Kathryn Kuhlman part 4 of her "Ten Commandments Series"

Here we are back again in our fourth heart-to-heart talk together regarding God's 10 rules for living. I know we speak of them as the Ten Commandments, but in reality they are literally God's ten rules for you and for me when it comes to living this daily life. Now very important is the argument in which God stated his laws. Watch me closely. The first four deal with man's relationship with God and then the last six with man's relationship with man. Because remember something, before a man, before a woman can live rightly with each other he must first get right with God. And it's just like that. I reminded you in our last heart-to-heart talk together that there are those who constantly remind us that the golden rule is their religion. But remember something, the golden rule is nobody's religion because the golden rule is not a religion. It is merely the expression of religion. That's all. For until a man has found God he begins at no beginning and he works to no end. I repeat that. You think you are a very intelligent person. You think you know all the answers. But until you become a Christian, until you have found God, you are beginning at no beginning and as you work daily you really have no goal whatsoever. You are working to no real end. Consider that. Now the first commandment is somewhat surprising. We would think that it would be, thou shall believe in a God, which is of course a law against atheism. But there is no such law. You cannot find in all of the Bible. You cannot find one word of scripture where God tries to prove his own reality. Do you even know why? Because God took care of that in our creation. We do not teach a baby to hunger, to thirst. Nature does that. It seems almost the minute that little baby makes his first cry, the very second it comes into the world, the first thing the youngster does is, it's hungry. The baby comes into the world hungry. The baby isn't taught to hunger. The baby comes into the world thirsty. It is not taught to thirst. We do not teach a baby to hunger or to thirst. Nature has already done that. However, we must train our children to satisfy their hungers and their thirst with the right things. In exactly the same way, man instinctively believes and worships. The one in darkest Africa. The tens of thousands and thousands in India, without exception, worships. But he worships the wrong thing. For man instinctively believes when he comes into the world, as surely as he comes in, born to hunger and to thirst, he also comes into the world with the capacity to worship God, a capacity for God himself. That's the reason nowhere does the Bible attempt to prove the existence of God. Man is created incomplete. He cannot be at rest until there is a satisfaction of his deepest hunger, the yearning of his soul. But the danger lies in the fact that man can pervert his worship instinct and make for himself a false God. That's exactly the reason why in God's Ten Rules for Living, these Ten Commandments, the very first one is, thou shalt have no other gods before me. Do not pervert your worship instinct and make for yourself a false God. For no false God satisfies the longing of the soul. Only one can give real satisfaction and that is the true God, the mighty creator. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. That's it. That's the word of God. All right? If God is what he claims to be, he will be, he that is, he that was, if he is all of this, then he must be the supreme object of worship. Every man needs a God. There's no man who has not somewhere in his heart, in his life, in the essential that it be, a shrine in which is a deity to whom he worships. And I believe that. I believe that with every atom of my being is as impossible for a man to live without having an object of worship as it is for a bird to fly if it's taken out of the air. The very composition of human life, the mystery of man's being, demands a center of worship as a necessity of existence. All life is worship. There may be a false god at the center of life, but every activity of being, all the energy of life, the devotion of powers, these things are all worship. But the question is whether the life and the powers of man are devoted to the worship of the true God or that of a false God. The moment a man gets out of touch with God and loses the vision of him who is the great Jehovah God, the mighty creator, God Almighty, the very second he gets out of touch with him, invariably he puts something else in the place of God. You've seen it over and over and over again. But when you consider there is only one God who is the giver of every good and perfect gift, only one true God, the great I Am, the God from all of eternity past, the God from all of eternity out there in the future, the great God of this moment who holds within the palm of his hand the giving of life, the taking of life, the blessing of the life. Little boy was bringing home a loaf of bread and someone stuffed the youngster and said to him, what do you have there? He said a loaf of bread. Where did you get it? From the baker. Where did the baker get it? He made it. But what did he make it? A flower. Where did he get the flower? From the miller, of course. Where did he get it? From the farmer. Where did the farmer get it? And then suddenly the truth dawned upon the little boy's mind and he looked up and smiled all over and said, why from God? Well then from whom did you get that loaf of bread? Oh, I see the kid says, from God, of course. And here is the little boy who in the last resort acknowledges God to be the giver of every good and perfect gift. And in this materialistic age, you've heard many a man say, my business supports me and my family. That's not true. You may work every day and you may work hard, but it's the life. God in reality supports him and his family. It is God who gives the strength to that man in that physical body that he might earn the living. We are dependent on God for the next beat of that heart. You say you're independent? Not really. We need to get back again. The selfish materialistic world of men and women need to get back again and realize who is still at the helm of things, who is still in control. I don't care how much money you have. I don't care what great influence you might have. I don't care what your status in life might be, how warm you may feel physically. That every blessed one of us is dependent on the mercy of God for the very next beat of our heart. Now that's being mighty dependent on God. And not one of us is living an independent life, a life independent of God. It's like that. That's the reason God says, put me first. Your business second, your family second. And I shall never forget, I don't think I was any more than 16 years of age when I was in Boston, just beginning in my ministry. And I was the guest in the home of Mother Jones. Her husband was the head of the Boston shoe company. And while being a guest in her home one afternoon we were having tea together, she said, you know, the secret of my husband's business was just this. And she said, he always kept these words above his desk. God first, family second, shoes third. Because he was constantly reminded of the fact that he was absolutely utterly dependent on Almighty God for every blessing. That's putting it right down the line. That first command, thou shalt have no other gods before me. Now we come to that second command. And the second command is by no means a repetition of the first. It forbids a practice which becomes possible only when the one God is believed in and worshiped. Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness of any form that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them nor serve them. For I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers above the children upon the third and upon the fourth generation of them that hate me, and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. That's the second command. The first forbids us to have any other gods beside the one who makes himself known by name, the great Jehovah God, the Lord thy God. The second, taking it for granted that there is no God but the one true God, forbids the creation of anything which is supposed to be a representative of him. To assist man in worship. Now you and I are going to have a very good heart to heart talk about this because there is so much involved and it must be most important or God never would have put it down as the second of the rules for living, the second of the great commandments. Let it be considered why man makes an image or a picture to help him in his worship. The answer may be briefly stated. The spiritual sense in man, that which realizes God is dead. No man who knows God, no man who is living in daily communion with him needs a picture to help him to pray. No person who's had a real experience and knows God as a heavenly father, no person who's had that wonderful experience of being born again, having become acquainted with Jesus Christ the son of a living God, needs to have an assist or a prop or a crutch or something that will help him to make God more real to him. By the new birth in the spirit, they have had the spiritual consciousness restored so that they know God and they are able to commune directly with him. Look at something. Look at the matter from another point of view. In the instant that a man sets up a representation of any description to help him to realize God, he denies that which is essential in God. Suppose that there is an image, a picture or some system of worship concerning which he says, now this is intended as an aid to my worship of the one God. What has he done? The image, the picture or the system of worship is limited. The essential fact of God is that he is limitless. God is absolutely limitless. There is no limit to his power. That is the essential fact of God. That he is eternal. That he is self-existent. There being no end to his being and no limit to his power. Limitlessness lies at the heart and center of the thought of God and the very moment a man makes an image, he denies the essence of God. He brings God down to his standards instead of bringing himself up to the standards of God. For that reason, God forbade that there should be the making of any image. For not only is the image false, it is misleading. If the image of God that man has and that he has made, that which he puts in the place of God, that he may understand God better, if that is false and if it is limited, what is the effect produced by worship upon character? As a man thinks in his heart, so is he. The thought of God produced by a false representation of God will produce character that is false. Here we have the word of God. In effect, God says, thou shalt not attempt to liken me to end, because every effort of that kind must result in failure and must react upon man to his abiding injury. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them. When you kneel to pray, don't bow down before an image. You bow down before Almighty God. The person of God seated upon his throne in heaven, a person with a definite personality, by facing him and when you bow down, when you bend the knee, you bow to him, the one and only God. Never use a substitute. Father, make this real to hearts for Jesus' sake. Amen.