The Third Commandment: Revere God’s Name

You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.

–Exodus 20:7

One evening in 1968, a Maryland man named Irving West attended a high school carnival, where he got into a fight. A police officer seized West, and the man uttered a blasphemous expletive invoking God’s condemnation. The next day, a magistrate sentenced West to thirty days in jail and a twenty-five-dollar fine for disorderly conduct.

Then the magistrate did something unexpected: He sentenced West to an additional thirty days in jail and an additional twenty-five-dollar fine for breaking a centuries-old Maryland statute against blasphemy (which has since been repealed). The statute prescribed jail time of up to six months and a fine of up to one hundred dollars “if any person, by writing or speaking, shall blaspheme or curse God, or shall write or utter any profane words of and concerning our Saviour, Jesus Christ, or of and concerning the Trinity, or any of the persons thereof.”

Some people might think it’s unfair for anyone to spend a month in jail for one instance of profanity. But if West had lived during Old Testament times, the punishment would have been much more severe. God had a zero-tolerance policy for misusing His name–one strike, and you’re out. In fact, blasphemy is the subject of the third commandment: “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain” (Exodus 20:7).

What does it mean to take God’s name in vain? Commentator Eugene Merrill paraphrased the commandment this way: “You shall not lift up the name of Yahweh your God without reason.” The third commandment is not just about profanity; it is about using God’s name needlessly. We may not be in danger of jail time or fines for misusing God’s name, but it is still a serious offense in God’s eyes–and it encompasses more than just profane speech.

This week, we’re going to discover why God places so much value on His name and what it means to misuse it. If God values something so highly, shouldn’t we, as His followers, value it too? We are to revere God’s name.

Today’s devotion is adapted from “The Third Commandment: Revere God’s Name” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2023.

“Constitutional Law: Damning Blasphemy,” Time, May 16, 1969, https://time.com/archive/6638659/constitutional-law-damning-blasphemy; Lewis Mayer, Louis C. Fischer, and E. J. D. Cross, comps., Revised Code of the Public General Laws of the State of Maryland, vol. 1, art. 72, sec. 189 (Baltimore: John Murphy, 1879), 824; Eugene Merrill, Deuteronomy: An Exegetical and Theological Exposition of Holy Scripture, The New American Commentary Series (B&H, 1994), 139.

Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. www.lockman.org.