Do you ever catch yourself looking at a mirror and think to yourself… Am I being a little narcissistic about my appearance? We’re only human and we always want to see what we look like before we head out the door. Try covering all the mirrors in your house before you go to bed. When you wake up the next day, TRY to leave the house without looking in a mirror. You will be incredibly self-conscious ALL DAY LONG… NOT GOOD. 

Spiritually speaking, we don’t need to step out into the world “self” conscious. NOT GOOD. Instead, we need to step out of the door every day totally God conscious, Spirit filled, Christ controlled, and totally confident that the day we are about to live is not from us but from HIM! In order for us to do this, God has given us HIS mirror, but it is not a mirror we will look at all day long focused on ourselves. Instead, it is something we glance at a few times a day, to see what we look like and make quick corrections. What is the mirror you ask?!?!?!?! First, a little introduction…

Everyone loves David Letterman’s top 10 lists… some are certainly crude, others are downright funny. But Letterman is two millenniums behind God in terms of having a top 10 list! God published one and wrote it in stone – twice! It could be said that the Ten Commandments (found in Exodus 20) are the “top 10 ways humans mess up the image of God in their lives.” If this is true (Paul and James agreed it is) then the Law (Ten Commandments) is a mirror. When we look in that mirror soberly, we see our flaws as God sees them. When we become aware of our flaws, we can respond; and it’s how we respond that keeps us “looking good” and not focused on ourselves but rather on the task at hand – glorifying God with our lives. 

So in Letterman fashion, here are “The TOP 10 WAYS HUMANS MESS UP THE IMAGE OF GOD IN THEIR LIVES.” 

Number 10… (Exodus 20:3) “You shall have no other gods before me.”

We put “other gods” before our relationship WITH GOD... replacing God with god(s) is built into our fallen DNA. I’ll start a list of the things I have been guilty of replacing God with... see if you can come up with a few more: me, my wife, my job, money, other’s opinions of me, education, sex,

Number 9… (Exodus 20:4-6) “You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below. You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commandments.”

Actively changing the identity of the True God is misrepresenting God. When I engage in sinful behavior, am I not denying with my life that “God is not sovereign; He can’t see me in my sin”? If I complain about something, am I not ultimately saying “God is not good – He doesn’t have my best interest in mind”? When I don’t pray constantly, am I not acting as though God isn’t near (omnipresent)? What attribute does God reveal about Himself as He shows us this angle in the mirror? None other than “I am a jealous God.” (This gives me the goose bumps!!!) He wants my full attention focused on His true identity – not the identity I want Him to be! My sinful nature wants a god that overlooks my pet sins. God wants that image I’ve made of Him to be destroyed, and He is willing to tear up my world to get my attention! He is a jealous God. He wants a PURE relationship with us and He will not share that relationship with anyone or anything else – not even our misguided imagination of who He is!!! 

Jot down a few of the ways you actively deny God’s character with your life: I don’t love others because I think my love supply is finite. I curse when something bad happens and deny that God can work His sovereign plans out even when bad things happen.