Exodus 20:1-17
The Ten Commandments
1 And God spoke all these words:
2 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.
3 "You shall have no other gods before me.
4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. 5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, 6 but showing love to a thousand {generations} of those who love me and keep my commandments.
7 "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.
8 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.
13 "You shall not murder.
14 "You shall not commit adultery.
15 "You shall not steal.
16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
17 "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."
God gave us, through Moses, the Ten Commandments...These commandments are still valid today...
The focus on the first four commandments are about our LORD...The fifth commandment is about honoring our parents... The next five, commandments six through ten are the shall not commands, focusing on things we shall not do to others...
God has taken this very large group of people, some 600,000 men (Exodus 12:37) and probably 2.5 million total people and led them into the desert...An unorganized group of former slaves, would be organized into the nation of Israel where they would take the Promised Land that God had promised...They now had Ten Commandments and later would receive Laws from Moses (actually from God) that would make the people more civil and moral...Getting the nation of Israel organized, together and focused on the right ideas and values would take forty years...
With God's patience and the Ten Commandments, the people of Israel will continue their journey in the wilderness of the Sinai to the Promised Land of Canaan, the land of milk and honey...
Jesus later tells us the two greatest commandments are Love the LORD with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength...We must put God first...This takes into account the first four commandments...
The second commandment Jesus talks about is to Love your neighbor as yourself...This takes in account our last six commandments...
We are to put God first and our neighbors next...The commandments are all about love...We are to love God, and if we do the first four commandments will take care of themselves...If we love our neighbors the final six commandments will take care of themselves...