Top X June 7, 2025 Devotional
June 07, 2025
DEUTERONOMY 5:20 | 20 Neither shall you bear false witness against your neighbor.
For me to be free, I must not be a slave to my desires, my fears, my doubts, or my ambitions. This means freedom is a gift but also a task. This is true at the personal and social levels.
The Ten Commandments provide both direction and limitation for this reason. These “uses of the law” are traditionally called the usus normativus and the usus civilis. The law shows what to love and desire and warns us of the costs of disobedience. For instance, the ninth commandment, against false witness, teaches us to love and seek truth and to avoid lying. A society that did not value truth could have no meaningful politics or viable economics; it would devolve into manipulation and deceit. Thus we see freedom requires shared goals and accountability at the level of society as well as the level of the soul.
Look at the other commandments to see these principles at work.
Gracious God,
We pray for a society where there is generational responsibility, where we forsake theft and envy in the name of sharing and mutual success, where violence gives way to respect and where we keep and seek the truth.
Amen.
