Exodus 20:4-17

What happened at Sinai may look like a list of rules, but it was a resuscitation.

For centuries, the Israelites ate, worked, and submitted to Egypt at the expense of their humanity. The glow of their dignity flickered and dimmed. They became lifeless units of production more than image bearers of God.

While their grumbling in the desert wasn’t justified, it makes sense - disruption of familiarity makes anybody cranky.

But at Sinai there came an unfamiliar new way. Rather than mindless acquiescence to human masters, they would worship God. Rather than functioning as cogs in a machine, they were to see one another with God’s eyes.

The saving heart of God was breathing love into the lifeless soul of humanity.

To meditate on and live in these ways is to both see and display a picture of our Savior. It rehearses resurrection. The result? The very wilderness we walk in becomes the fertile soil of God’s kingdom.