Growing up, my parents, particularly my mom, worked to install the Ten Commandments firmly into my moral compass. I presume that my experience was hardly unique. Of course, my mom's favorite was "Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you" (Exodus, 20:12). She would pull that one out any time she wanted to overcome our disagreement about doing something. She would often follow it with a reminder that disobeying could significantly shorten our days in the land.
Like many, I knew what the ten commandments were, but never developed a real understanding of them. After all, they are commandments. You should take them at their face value, right?
I think that Sunday School would have been more fun if I had some of the same perspective and knowledge that I now have. As a child, I took Sunday School with somewhere between a grain and a pillar of salt. From early on, it was clear that I was reverent, but never destined for a life of Christian Evangelical Fundamentalism. Still, I have a rich spiritual life and I am careful not to mix it too much with religion.
So, that brings us to a recent incident where I heard someone talking about the third commandment. In some translations, it reads, "You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not acquit anyone who misuses his name" (Exodus 20:7 NRSV) or "You shall not take the name of the LORD, your God, in vain. For the LORD will not leave unpunished him who takes his name in vain" (Exodus 20:7 NAB).
I was reminded of that commandment by my parents and grandparents more than once. Still, what is "the name of the lord?" For a long time, I assumed that taking the Lord's name in vain when the word "Goddamnit" was misspoken as three words rather than a singular exclamation. In the book of Exodus, God is not the name of the Lord. According to Exodus 3:14, the name of God is "I AM." Given that the commandment is given in Exodus, names in other books are significantly less relevant.
The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the bible translates the text of the commandment as "make wrongful use of..." while the New American Bible (NAB), used by the Catholic Church in the US, uses the more traditional "take the name of..." as the translation for the commandment. It is useful to stop for a moment and think about what it means to "take the name of." Growing up, I thought it meant to utter the name of, but that doesn't really capture the literal meaning of those words. Looking up "take" in the dictionary, we find that it also means "to take possession of," "to claim," "to employ," or "to copy." Thus, when women get married, they are often asked if they are going to take their husband's last name.
So, that takes us to my new understanding of the third commandment and its relevance to building wealth. Forget the exclamations that happen after you stub your toe. How many times do you use the Lord's name in a day? What if those declarations create our experience of life? Modern psychology seems to support this idea. When we say "I am sick," we further that experience. The Lord is unforgiving of this misuse and allows you to create that reality with all of the power of the Lord's name behind it. Financially, we often follow "I am" with phrases like broke, buried in debt, poor.
I won't suggest that we give up taking the Lord's name. In fact, the commandment doesn't even discourage taking the Lord's name. It only warns against misusing it or using it in vain. So, what if we used it more consciously. Become aware of using "I am" and declare good things for yourself. "I am rich." "I am happy." "I am debt free." "I am cared for." "I am better and better." From a biblical perspective, the word preceded creation, so there is no lie in any of that.
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