Scripture Daily

Context No. 4087 of 4322 · Exodus

Context · Reflection

Exodus 20:7-11: in context

7“You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who misuses his name. 8“Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9You shall labor six days, and do all your work, 10but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. You shall not do any work in it, you, nor your son, nor your daughter, your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your livestock, nor your stranger who is within your gates; 11for in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day, and made it holy.

Among the ten commandments is one that guards something we might not think to protect: you shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain, for the LORD will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain. God's name stands for God himself, his character, his reputation, his very being, and to use it lightly, emptily, or falsely is to treat God himself with contempt.

There is something worth recovering in this command. In a culture that throws God's name around casually, as a curse, an exclamation, or an empty phrase, we can grow numb to the weight of it. But God's name is holy, because God is holy, and it is to be treated with reverence, not used carelessly or invoked to back up our own falsehoods. To misuse God's name is to treat as trivial the One who is anything but trivial. This command calls us to a deeper reverence, not only in how we speak God's name, but in how we regard God himself. The way we treat his name reflects the way we regard him.

Do I treat the name of God with the reverence due to his holiness, refusing to use it carelessly, emptily, or falsely, and does my regard for his name reflect a heart that truly reverences God himself?

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