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Deuteronomy 5.8-10
8 “‘You shall not make for yourself a carved image—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; 9 you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. For I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me, 10 but showing mercy to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.’”
The worship of God invites the use of a sanctified imagination, one that is shaped, not by the creations of finite men, but of the descriptions of God and the forms used to appeal to our thinking and affections which are provided in His Word.
Much of the great hymnody of the Christian tradition captures these Biblical referents extremely well, combining words and music in ways designed to lift us up to the very presence of the majesty of God. On the other hand, while contemporary Christian music can achieve the same, much of the worship music being written these days seems to want to bring God down to our frame of reference, forcing our worship into forms and expressions familiar from popular culture, and employing lyrics which, while simple and true, frequently lack the power to lift us above our own frame of reference into the heavenly courts.
The eye of the heart (Eph. 1.18), or the eye of faith, is a particular use of our imaginative souls to engage unseen realities in exalting, sustaining, and transforming ways. Informed by the teaching of Scripture and engaged through discipline and worship with the glory of God, we soar, by means of the eye of the heart, into realms beyond description, where our experience of God cannot be captured in forms or words, but comes to expression in a love that exceeds knowledge and that fills us with all the fullness of God (Eph. 3.19).
Any depictions of God – in word, music, or other form – that do not conform to Scripture’s use of such devices, or that do not encourage an expansive vision of unseen things, cripple the eye of the heart rather than engage it, keeping it from functioning as it should and making us dependent in our worship on created things rather than God Himself.
We shall have more to say about the proper way of worshiping God as we unpack the rules and statutes which attend the second commandment.
T. M. Moore
The Law of God is the soil which, fertilized by the rest of God’s Word and watered by His Spirit, brings forth the fruit of Christian life. If you’d like to understand this process better, and how to make best use of the Law in your walk with and work for the Lord, order the book, The Ground for Christian Ethics, from our online store.
Except as indicated, Scripture taken from the New King James Version. © Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.