Commandments, not suggestions

KING JAMES VERSION OF 10 COMMANDMENTS

1. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.

2. 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, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

graven image

noun

an object of worship carved usually from wood or stone : idol

Wor·ship

noun 

reverent honor and homage paid to God or a sacred personage, or to any object regarded as sacred

 This includes plastic, metal, rosaries, statues, scapulas, Crosses, saints, Mary and even the Bible if someone is worshipping the material book , rather than reading the words and building a relationship with God through them or learning how we should live our lives through reading it.. There is a difference in having a material item to look on as a reminder, and feeling that the item or person has supernatural powers equal to or above our Lord. We have access to His power because He lives in us Gal 2:20. It is imperative that we remember where the power is coming from, and give Him due praise. He will not share this with another. It is our duty in love as believers to speak His Truth into the lives of other believers for open rebuke is better than hidden love.

A word from Charles H. Spurgeon: 

Saul had been commanded to slay utterly all the Amalekites and their cattle. Instead of doing so, he preserved the king, and suffered his people to take the best of the oxen and of the sheep. When called to account for this, he declared that he did it with a view of offering sacrifice to God; but Samuel met him at once with the assurance that sacrifices were no excuse for an act of direct rebellion. The sentence before us is worthy to be printed in letters of gold, and to be hung up before the eyes of the present idolatrous generation, who are very fond of the fineries of will-worship, but utterly neglect the laws of God. Be it ever in your remembrance, that to keep strictly in the path of your Saviour’s command is better than any outward form of religion; and to hearken to his precept with an attentive ear is better than to bring the fat of rams, or any other precious thing to lay upon his altar. If you are failing to keep the least of Christ’s commands to his disciples, I pray you be disobedient no longer. All the pretensions you make of attachment to your Master, and all the devout actions which you may perform, are no recompense for disobedience. “To obey,” even in the slightest and smallest thing, “is better than sacrifice,” however pompous. Talk not of Gregorian chants, sumptuous robes, incense, and banners; the first thing which God requires of his child is obedience; and though you should give your body to be burned, and all your goods to feed the poor, yet if you do not hearken to the Lord’s precepts, all your formalities shall profit you nothing. It is a blessed thing to be teachable as a little child, but it is a much more blessed thing when one has been taught the lesson, to carry it out to the letter. How many adorn their temples and decorate their priests, but refuse to obey the word of the Lord! My soul, come not thou into their secret.