Jon Collins

If you want the closest representation that will get you closer than anything else, look into the eyes of your neighbor, your coworker, your family member.

And you will see a reflection of the mystery and purpose of God that you will never encounter in a bronze bowl.

Yeah, that's right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So the 10 commands are some of the most famous verses in the Bible.

I guess they fit that category of the most recognizable but not the most understood.

parts of the Bible.

On one level, they're just 10 words from God of what humans should do or not do.

So in that sense, it feels straightforward.

And it tends to feed into a perception that people have about the Bible as a divine rule book or behavior manual.

So what we started with was looking at the theme of God telling people what to do in the Bible, which goes back to

In the Genesis scroll, the word command appears for the first time in the Garden of Eden story.

Then it appears again in the story of Noah and the flood.

It appears again with reference to the story of Abraham.

And then you get to the story of Israel at Mount Sinai with the commands, Ten Commandments.

So we looked at those first three stories.

And what we found was this pattern that God's commands are first and foremost directing God's human partners about how to enjoy and discover life.

God's commands are for life.

So the first command for life is Adam and Eve.

Enjoy all the trees of the gardens.