“The Ten Commandments! It narrowly missed my head!” The ecstatic child had been running about beneath the bleachers, playing with his friends, when a coin with the Ten Commandments dropped from the cracks between the bleachers above and nearly struck him in the head. My family, sitting on the bleachers, had unknowingly let the coin slip from our grasp. But God’s Word never returns to Him empty (Is. 55:10-11). Who knows whether a certain rowdy baseball-lover will be in Heaven one day because the Ten Commandments almost knocked him out of his senses one fateful summer day?
Have the Ten Commandments ever hit you like that? The Bible reveals that the purpose of the Law is to bring the knowledge of sin (Rom. 3:20). Sin is disobeying God’s Law. So let me drop the Ten Commandments (a good summation of God’s Law) onto your head, and you can judge how you measure up:
1. You shall have no other gods before Me. Have you always put God first in your life? Is anything in your life more important than God?
2. You shall not make for yourself a carved image. Have you made up a false god in your head who doesn’t punish sinners, judge evil, or create Hell?
3. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain. Have you ever used God’s name flippantly, irreverently, or as a curse word?
4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. At Creation, God established the seventh day as a day of rest (Genesis 2:1-3). He blessed it and made it holy. Later, the Bible says that exactly which day of the week doesn’t matter (Romans 14:5-6). The Bible also commands us to take time to worship God (Deuteronomy 26:10; Philippians 3:3; Hebrews 10:25). Do you set apart a day to rest and worship God?
5. Honor your father and your mother. In the Old Testament, cursing one’s father or mother was punishable by death (Ex. 21:17). Have you ever dishonored, disrespected, or disobeyed your parents?
6. You shall not murder. The Bible says that hatred is the same as murder (I Jn. 3:15). Have you ever hated anybody?
7. You shall not commit adultery. Jesus says that even looking at a woman with lust in your heart is the same as committing adultery (Matt. 5:27-28). Have you ever looked with lust?
8. You shall not steal. Have you ever stolen anything, no matter how small?
9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. The Bible says that “lying lips are an abomination to the LORD” (Prov. 12:22a). How many lies have you told in your life?
10. You shall not covet. The Bible warns that wanting what others have is the same as idolatry (Col. 3:5).
Ouch! Did that hit you? Pay attention to the pain. The Bible says that “the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 111:10; Proverbs 9:10). Humbly admitting your guilt before God is the first step toward finding the cure for sin. This fear of God’s wrath warns you of hell, which is God’s eternal punishment for lawbreakers. If you honestly evaluate yourself against God’s unfathomable holiness, reflected in the righteous standard of His Law, you will see that a just God couldn’t not create hell. Sin is so repulsive to God that He cannot even look at it (Habakkuk 1:13)—much less allow it with Him into Heaven. He is perfectly just (Deuteronomy 32:4)—He must punish sinners (Romans 6:23; II Thessalonians 1:8; Revelation 20:15).
Come to your senses! You know in your heart that God exists. The Bible teaches that God gave man Creation and a conscience as infallible evidence for His existence (Psalms 19:1; Romans 1:19-20; 2:12-16), so “you have no excuse” (Romans 2:1). You are accountable to a holy God. As we have just seen, no one can measure up to God’s perfect standard, so everyone deserves eternal death in hell for their crimes against the Lord. Nothing you do can make you right with God. A lot has to happen before that:
· God’s wrath against you must be appeased.
· Your relationship with God must be restored.
· Your sin must be washed clean and replaced by righteousness.
In other words, you’d have to be a totally new, different person. Fortunately, God provided a Way for you to be just that. He sent His Son Jesus, Who is God in the flesh, to die for the sins of mankind. Jesus took the punishment that you deserve for your sin when He suffered and died on a cruel Cross (Isaiah 53:5; II Corinthians 5:21), thus appeasing God’s wrath against you through His once-for-all sacrifice (Romans 3:25; I John 2:1-2). Then, Jesus was buried and rose again alive into Heaven (Matthew 28:1-10; I Corinthians 15:3-4). Now, God can justly grant you mercy because Jesus’ righteousness covers those who repent and believe on Him (Romans 4:24-25) so that God sees Jesus’ righteousness instead of your sinfulness. He is offering you the gift of a restored relationship with Him.
You must repent (turn from your sin) and trust in Jesus’ sacrifice alone as the only Way to have a right relationship with God. Repentance requires the kind of humble heart that the tax collector had in Jesus’ story of the tax collector and the Pharisee in Luke 18:9-14:
He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee [a religious leader] and the other a tax collector [a traitor of the Jewish nation]. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’ But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.
Those who have the humility of the tax collector and trust in Jesus become new people who want to obey God (I John 2:3) and share their faith with others (Matthew 28:19-20). Only those whose sin has been covered and washed by the blood of Christ can have fellowship with God forever in Heaven (John 14:6; Acts 4:12).
So, come to your senses! You may not live another hour. Repent and trust Christ now! I’m not pushing anything on you—I just love you too much to let you go to Hell without a struggle. Come to your senses, and come to the only Way, the only Truth, and the only Life—Jesus.
