Preaching the Ten Commandments: Timeless Truths for Modern Living

by Jeffrey A. Ingraham

Overview

This book examines the Ten Commandments to see how they are relevant for us today. Initially presented as a series of sermons delivered in an African American congregation, the author offers new ways of understanding and applying these universal and timeless truths first given to Moses on Mt. Sinai.

In some of the chapters, Dr. Ingraham defies political correctness in offering his personal convictions. In the chapter dealing with the commandment forbidding murder, he challenges the fallacy of those who advocate abolishing capital punishment because it does not stop the commission of that crime. He retorts, Why not abolish speeding laws since people continue to speed!

In all the commandments, the author provides practical ways for Christians in particular to fulfill them. In the chapter forbidding adultery, he presents ways that couples might foster their relationship. In the chapter forbidding the desecration of Gods name, he presents alternatives of the kind of speech we should engage in.

The book is reader friendly, and each chapter concludes with questions for discussion. It is an excellent resource for both personal and group study.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781973602071
Publisher:	WestBow Press
Publication date:	10/30/2017
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	108
File size:	259 KB

About the Author

The Rev. Dr. Jeffrey A. Ingraham has served as a Pastor of the Calvary Baptist Church, Norwalk, CT for over twenty-five years. He holds graduate degress from Yale Divinity School, New York University and Hartford Seminary.

His background includes leadership in a variety of ecclesiastical organizations: The Connecticut State Missionary Baptist Convention, the Judah Baptist Association, American Baptist Churches USA, the American Baptist Churches of Connecticut, the Interdenominational Ministers’ Fellowship of Norwalk and Vicinity, and the Norwalk Clergy Association.

In addition to having served on a number of local boards and commissions, he has served as First Vice-President of the Norwalk Branch of the NAACP.

Dr. Ingraham is married to the former Cynthia Ruth Grant and they are the proud parents of two daughters.

Editorial Reviews

2018-04-06
A compact sequence of sermons on the meaning of the Ten Commandments.Debut author Ingraham begins his fast-paced overview by asserting that the country is currently embroiled in a "religious war"—specifically, an "effort to distance the United States of America from its Judeo-Christian beginnings despite the abundance of evidence contained in the writings of the Founding Fathers." He ignores the explicitly secular principles that the Founding Founders wrote into the First Amendment, instead launching into a full-throated defense of the Ten Commandments and a lament about the removal of a monument commemorating them from public grounds in Alabama in 2004. "How much safer we would be if only we obeyed [God's] commandments," he writes. "How better this world would be if only his commandments prevailed." Some commandments, of course, such as injunctions against killing, stealing, and bearing false witness, do prevail in most countries of the world. The author's main focus is on the first commandment ("Thou shalt have no other gods before Me"), and the book hardly acknowledges that billions of people adhere to non-Christian religions or no religion at all. Each successive chapter, however, goes on to explicate a single commandment in great detail, employing copious, well-chosen quotes from Scripture and anecdotes drawn from history. Ingraham is skillful at weaving the commandments into the broader context of the Old and New Testaments; he richly deepens his comments on "Thou Shalt Not Covet," for instance, by discussing St. Paul's teachings to the Corinthians. Other material is less comprehensible, however, such as "Put God first, and your mouth will be satisfied with good things such that your youth is renewed like the eagles," which is no more understandable than its reference, Psalm 103:5. But for the most part, his preaching has a bluff, accessible air of long experience ("As our Creator, God knows what is best for us," he points out. "His intent is not to be a killjoy"). Each chapter ends with a list of discussion questions, designed to prompt deeper examination of finer points.A sometimes-rousing call for Christians to remember the commandments' wisdom.

Kirkus Reviews