1. "Love to God will admit no other God."  In order to Love Him we must know Him, and in order to know Him we must read His word and study the book of nature.

    2. "Love will not debase the object it adores."  Anything we love more than God becomes an idol no matter what it is.  Cars, homes, clothes, status, just keeping up with the Jones.

    3. "Love to God will never dishonor His name."  Would we use our best friend's name as slang?  Cursing with it.  Other ways to dishonor His name is by not living lives that bring Him honor.

    4. "Love to God will reverence His day."  Ezekiel 20:12 Moffatt translation:  "I gave them My Sabbath, to mark the tie between Me and them, to teach them that it is I, the Eternal, who sets them apart."  (From Dr. A.G. Maxwell's book - I Want to be Free.)  "Most of the world has broken this tie, the seventh-day Sabbath.  God's last message to the world is the restoration of this tie.  It is not a message of legalism; it is not warning people that they must keep the Sabbath and the other commandments of God lest they be destroyed.  On the contrary, it is a message of love and faith."

     "We preach Christ as the One who created us in the beginning, as the One who is working to recreate us now, and as the One who is coming again to restore all things.  And when we preach this, we are preaching the seventh-day Sabbath.  If the Sabbath means so much, what is the proper way to keep it holy?  Our spiritual forefathers, the Jews, tried hard to live up to every requirement of the Sabbath commandment.  As a safeguard, they multiplied rules for its correct observance.  Yet, when Jesus came to live among them, He had to tell them that in spite of their efforts their way of spending the Sabbath hours was in error.  The trouble was that they had forgotten what the Sabbath represents.  They were simply obeying an arbitrary command to refrain from work.  They had lost sight of the fact that the Sabbath speaks of God, of His goodness and creative power, or they would have trusted Him more and would have recognized His Son."

     "They failed to realize that the Sabbath speaks of God's original purpose for man, of the peace in the Garden of Eden, of the rest that was offered in Canaan, of the Sabbath like rest yet to come when our world is restored.  Instead, they were looking for an earthly kingdom to be set up by force."

     "Above all, they had forgotten that the Sabbath speaks of the Creator's power to heal, that a sinner cannot heal himself, that salvation comes by faith and not by works of law, however good those works may be."

    So confused were some of them as to the purpose of the Sabbath, that on crucifixion Friday they nailed their Creator to the cross and hurried home to prepare for sundown worship.  They cleaned their sandals, tidied their homes, and wished He would hurry up and die so they could bury Him before the sun went down.  He did die in time.  And all heaven watched as those Bible-quoting murderers settled down to keep another Sabbath.

     "The same grave mistake may be made by Sabbath keepers today, if un-thinkingly they merely obey a command not to work from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday.  For no matter how careful they may be, they do not really keep the Sabbath holy, and they miss all the benefits of its true observance."

     "As God designed it, the Sabbath is to strengthen our faith in Him and in Jesus Christ.  It answers our questions about God and the meaning of life.  It sums up the truth that sets us free."

    5. "Love to parents, will honor them."  It will also take care of them in old age in taking care of their needs.

    6. "Hate, not love, is murder."  Mr. Van de Water in his seminar stated that indifference says, "I don't really care about you" that this is a form of hate.  Matthew 5:43-48 N.E.B.  "You have learned that they were told, 'Love your neighbor, hate your enemy.' But what I tell you is this: Love your enemies and pray for your persecutors; only so can you be children of your heavenly Father, who makes His sun rise on good and bad alike, and send the rain on the honest and the dishonest.  If you love only those who love you, what reward can you expect?  Surely the taxgatherers do as much as that.  And if you greet only your brothers, what is there extraordinary about that?  Even the heathen do as much.  There must be no limit to your goodness, as your heavenly Father's goodness knows no bounds."

     We can't be forced to be fond of people, but we can be kind to everyone and treat them with respect.

    7. "Lust, not love, commits adultery."  Psychologist Dr. Richard Nies has broadened this into the principal that an illicit relationship where a person is using another person would violate this principal.

    8. "Love will give, never steal."  Love never takes from another including honor — love would give credit where it is due.

    9. "Love will not slander nor lie."  Gossip—one of the greatest sins that almost everyone gets trapped in.  Love would follow the principal of going prayerfully to the person to reprove of a known sin that might keep them from heaven.  It would not tell others.

    10. "Love's eye is not covetous."  Love never looks at another with eyes of covetousness or jealousy, it wouldn't even want to.

    Ellen White states:  "The law reveals sin to us, and causes us to feel our need of Christ and to flee unto Him for pardon and peace by exercising repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ."

    "We are not to regard God as waiting to punish the sinner for his sin.  The sinner brings the punishment upon himself.  His own actions start a train of circumstances that bring the sure result.  Every act of transgression reacts upon the sinner, works in him a change of character, and makes it more easy for him to transgress again.  By choosing to sin, men separate themselves from God, cut themselves off from the channel of blessing, and the sure result is ruin and death."

    These laws are not arbitrary and they make good sense and deserve to be intelligently obeyed.  Dr. Maxwell in his book "I Want to be Free' states:  "Because these laws make such good sense, it should be no surprise that failure to obey such wise regulations will produce undesirable results—but not at the hands of an angry God.  He is grieved and disappointed when His creatures do not have sufficient faith—or sufficient sense—to follow their Creator's advice.

"Sometimes, to attract our attention, to warn us of danger, to help us to break a destructive habit, God will discipline those whom He loves.  But like an earthly parent, whenever God ventures to chasten His children He runs the risk of being at least temporarily feared, even hated, and perhaps obeyed for the wrong reason.  But because He cares enough, this is a risk He is willing to run.  Then, if we persistently refuse, if we insist on having our own disorderly way, what alternative is there in a free universe than for God to let us go, to give up, to turn us over to the awful but natural consequences of our rebellions choice?"
 
 

Prepared for a morning worship talk in June 1976.

There is more that could be added, but I have decided to leave it as given in 1976, and let you add the details from your own study.

Beginning quotes by D.L. Moody