This Sunday we will begin our series on the Ten Commandments. So the text for tomorrow will be Exodus 20:2-3 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before me.” Any consideration of the first or all of the Ten Commandments must begin with this prologue, this reminder that there is one who has taken initiative to bring a people out of bondage. The Exodus writer recalls the event: The Israelite

"When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. . . . They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. (Luke 4:16, 29 NRSV) JESUS HAD JUST RETURNED HOME after a two- to three-month journey that included his baptism by John and forty days of fasting in the wilderness. On the Sabbath, he entered the small s

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.” Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! for it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’ ” (Matthew 4:8-10 NRSV) IN APRIL OF 2011, A SEVENTEEN-year-old Chinese high school student named Wang made news around the world after it was discovered that he had sol