The Ten Commandments in the Bible are not introduced as commands.

They're called the Ten Words.

And that's because they're not a rulebook or a simple checklist to follow.

The ten words are ten foundational ways for finding life.

God's commands will always point God's people towards even more life than you're currently

experiencing and avoiding the diminishment of your life.

And this idea of diminishing life connects us to what we'll talk about today.

The second word.

And it's about idolatry. In its simple form,

it reads, You will not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of what is in the skies above or on the land beneath or in the waters underneath the land. Now, idols are statues, usually of familiar animals, and they're meant to represent God and give you

access to God. And while this practice was normal in the ancient world, the Creator God

prohibited Israel from doing it. The moment you image Yahweh by something in your mind first and then give a physical

expression to that by something you make, you are reducing the incomprehensible transcendent

reality. But interestingly, while God prohibits Israel from making an image of him, God made an image of himself.

It's in Genesis 1, where humans are called the image of God.

And in Deuteronomy, Moses reminds Israel of this in a creative way.

The Lord has taken you all, the Israelites, and brought you all out of the iron furnace.

So Egypt is described as a furnace for melting

down metal. And this is a very subtle reference to Israel is to imagine themselves as the molten

image of God. If humans are God's image that don't make images, be the image of God to each other.

If you want the closest representation that will get you closer than anything else,

look into the eyes of your neighbor, your coworker, your family member,

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