I am using the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.

Today, I am reading and commenting on Deuteronomy 5-7.

I really liked doing something different yesterday.  Perhaps next year I will seek out a different daily Bible reading schedule.  Now I return to reading my way through the Bible.  Starting today Moses presented the generation of Israelites who would enter the Promised Land with God’s commands for them which He had given to the previous generation.  Many of those listening to Moses on this day had been present when the commands were first given, but they were young and not yet responsible adults when they heard them.  Moses starts by repeating, with slightly different wording, what we know as the Ten Commandments.  In a way, these ten commands build upon each other.  I really think of them from two directions.  First, following the commands which come later in this list of ten is meaningless if you do not follow the ones which come before.  It is of no consequence that you do not steal if you murder someone.  It is of no consequence that you do not murder if you worship anything other than God.  However, as I said, it also goes the other way.  If you murder or steal, you clearly do not worship only God.

Then in chapter 6 Moses says something which tells us the most important part of making any set of rules work.  If we wish to truly be made holy by God we must worship and obey Him with our whole being, we must seek His will whole-heartedly.  Pleasing Him must be our chief desire.  All else must be subordinate to that.  If we do that, we will not look for loopholes or ways to get around God’s commands.  “Do not murder” means that we should value the lives of others.  “Do not steal” means that we should respect others ownership of the things which they have.  Jesus was absolutely correct, all of God’s other commands follow from two commands.  Actually, all other commands follow from this one: Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all of your strength.  However, the second command is one that offers clarification as to what doing the first one means: Love your neighbor as your love yourself.  This second one follows from the first, but needs to be stated so that people cannot claim they did not realize that the first one meant the second one.  All of the other commands are just applications of these two.