What is the first commandment?

What is the first commandment?

• A. I, the Lord, am your God. You shall not have any other gods besides me.
• B. You shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain.
• C. Remember to keep holy the Sabbath day.
• D. Honor your father and mother.

Answer: (A)

Worship and allegiance to the one true God is the foundation of how we live. The first commandment states that the Lord is your God and that you shall have no other gods before Him. It calls for exclusive worship and ultimate trust in God, ruling out any competing loyalties—whether to idols, wealth, power, or anything else. This sets the starting point for the whole moral life: keep God first, and let that relationship shape everything else. The other commandments—reverence for God’s name, keeping the Sabbath, honoring parents—flow from that primary commitment. They are important expressions of faith, but they presuppose and follow from recognizing God as the supreme Lord to whom we owe our worship and love.

Worship and allegiance to the one true God is the foundation of how we live. The first commandment states that the Lord is your God and that you shall have no other gods before Him. It calls for exclusive worship and ultimate trust in God, ruling out any competing loyalties—whether to idols, wealth, power, or anything else.

This sets the starting point for the whole moral life: keep God first, and let that relationship shape everything else. The other commandments—reverence for God’s name, keeping the Sabbath, honoring parents—flow from that primary commitment. They are important expressions of faith, but they presuppose and follow from recognizing God as the supreme Lord to whom we owe our worship and love.