Exodus 20:22-22:15

Exodus 20:22-22:15

Right after giving the Israelites the Ten Commandments, God began laying out the rest of the Law. The first set of laws He gave dealt with the first two of the Ten Commandments. It is obvious that God is serious when it comes to worshipping Him. We do not have to worry about all of these specifics laid out in the rest of Exodus 20. We no longer make sacrifices or build altars that fit these guidelines. However, the principle still applies to us. We are to have no other gods in our lives. So even if we do not physically make idols like the Israelites did on several occasions, we still are not to put the things in our lives before our devotion to God.

Exodus 21 begins a discussion on slaves. Coming to this passage with a twenty-first century perspective will cause us to miss what is being commanded here. We of course no longer believe in slavery or practice it. But in this time, slavery was practiced. However, even then God placed specific commands on how the slaves were to be treated. They were not to be dehumanized. For instance, if they were set free, they were supposed to leave with their entire family. Unlike the slave problem that America faced, where slaves were generally treated as property, the slaves for the Israelites did have a certain amount of rights, and they were expected to be treated correctly.

The next section of Exodus 21 talks about the consequences of another one of the Ten Commandments. Specifically some of these verses seem to speak on the command not to murder, stating the consequence for murder is murder. But God takes it further in these verses stating that even through dishonor or striking a father or mother, the punishment can be death. He then goes into a discussion on how we should treat others, slave or free. Think back to the Greatest Commandment that Jesus gave on loving God and others. We are to love our neighbors as ourselves. God placed heavy consequences on those who did anything to harm their neighbors. The consequences ranged from death to repayment to the loss of a slave. The point God was trying to make was that there have to be a certain amount of restrictions or limitations in a society. If there are not, then people will be free to do whatever they want and the world will turn back into it what it was in the days of Noah. God understood the importance of man treating each other fairly and placed restrictions on us for our own good.

The end of Exodus 21 and the beginning of Exodus 22 covers a fairly new topic, that of restitution. This topic has already been covered slightly, but the discussion is more extensive here. The law God gave the Israelites basically told them that whenever they (or even their livestock) harmed someone else in any way, they were expected to pay for the costs. Depending on how serious the act was or if it was a repeat offense, they were at times expected to give back more than was taken or destroyed. The basic point of Exodus 22 appears to be humility and responsibility. We should be man enough to admit our mistakes, be willing to fix a wrong that we have caused, and try to work things out with the one we wronged. If we are not willing to mend those broken relationships then we are not truly showing love to our fellow men. God new that this would help keep the Israelites unified, and that is one reason He gave commands such as these. Another reason He gave such commands was so that we could show others the love that God has showed us.

Matt