Think about it, if you were blind, you wouldn’t be able to see to be distracted by anything, and if you had been born that way, you could never have seen and be distracted. At least, you would never be distracted by what can be seen, yet there would still be the other ways to be distracted. All the same, I wouldn’t want anyone to take for granted the gift of sight. Man was created with the ability to see, and even this was called very good; so far be it from anyone to denounce that which has been given by God, to call not good what He has called good.

But, that brings up another point. Yes, all that God created He called good, culminating, of course, with very good on the sixth and final day of creation. Since the fall, however, man gazes upon creation and has a hard time seeing or refuses to see the Creator behind it. The world gazes upon this wonder and says it happened by chance. Fossils found on the peaks of these Colorado mountains is proof for them that the mountains formerly were sea bed, pushed up slowly over many thousands of years by tectonic forces. Similarities between man and primates prove that there is a common ancestor from which both evolved. In fact, the worlds and stars were all formed by the amalgamation of materials that happened to be floating in proximity in space. The complex order in which everything moves and flows happened only by chance, according to the eyes blinded by sin. See what I mean about other ways to be distracted?

It is as was heard from Isaiah this morning: “He sees many things, but does not observe them; his ears are open, but he does not hear.” (Isaiah 42:20) Because of sin, one has eyes but cannot see and ears but cannot hear.

This is the mid-way point in this treatment of the Ten Commandments, and as the treatment of the second table ends tonight, it is done as the first three commandments on that table are considered. What began with looking at covetousness, which leads to and encapsulates sins against all of the commandments, then moved to looking at the relatedness between lying and stealing, will now conclude as you hear of the Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Commandments.

Jesus had finished talking with Nicodemus—one must be born of water and the Spirit in order to see the kingdom. From there, He went into the land of Judea and baptized (though really, His disciples were doing the baptizing)—He made of sinners righteous co-heirs who will see with Him the kingdom. But His time in Judea was short, as it is written before today’s Gospel lesson starts that, “He left Judea and departed again to Galilee. But He needed to go through Samaria.” (John 4:3-4)

He needed to go through Samaria, not around like other Jews who traveled to Galilee, because there was someone else He needed to talk to. He needed to talk to a Samaritan woman—unheard of on two accounts: being Samaritan and being a woman. And she was not any Samaritan woman, but a woman who, it would seem, was looking for love in all the wrong places, having had five husbands (and most likely being divorced from them, otherwise, she would probably be referred to as a widow) and living with a sixth man who wasn’t her husband.

Lie, cheat, and steal—the three seem to go together so well. In light of last week’s sermon, these are the methods often used to get something that belongs to someone else. You lie in order to damage another’s reputation in an attempt to convince yourself and others that they don’t deserve it. You cheat in order to sway possession of an object in your favor. You steal in order to obtain something that isn’t yours.

These are all the active methods you employ to do these things. And in so doing, you have broken two commandments, the Seventh and Eighth.

• You shall not steal.
  We should fear and love God so that we do not take our neighbor’s money or possessions, or get them in any dishonest way, but help him to improve and protect his possessions and income.

and

• You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.
  We should fear and love God so that we do not tell lies about our neighbor, betray him, slander him, or hurt his reputation, but defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way.

You are to be defending your neighbor and his reputation, never lie about him. You should be speaking well of him, not spreading gossip or speaking of him in a way that would bring further shame on him. You are to be helping your neighbor to keep and improve his possessions and income, helping him to defend and protect them from any who would want to steal them, and certainly not steal them yourself.

It was a long, hard trek through the wilderness. It was probably made to feel longer by the fact that they had fled from slavery and had little to nothing with them as concerns provisions. But, there were promises: land as far as the eye can see, milk and honey, fertile soils, and the presence of God…and, along the way, food and drink.

Now, imagine how it must be when you keep doing things—you keep trying things—and it seems like you’re getting nowhere; in fact, you might be rather intimate with that feeling. Recall how it feels when you don’t get your way, and it compounds, time after time. What do you feel like doing? What do you start to do? You start to grumble and complain. You start to play the blame game. You start to gossip and spread rumors. You find yourself in a predicament or some other unfortunate or unwanted or unpleasant situation and you start thinking that it has to be someone’s fault that you’re like this or that things are like this…someone else’s fault, that is. And the whole time, you make stuff up to make it seem worse.

So, you might have an inkling of what things were like for the Israelites during the Exodus. I’m not bringing this up so that you might have some sympathy for them, but a bit of understanding…about yourselves. So, bear in mind a time that they were breaking camp and making their way through the barren wilderness. This particular time, they were leaving Mount Hor, trying to go around the land of Edom. In their frustration at the situation—in their anger toward God and Moses—they cried out, accusing God and Moses of bringing them into the wilderness to die.