God has given us boundaries. Boundaries are designed to protect against harm. To go beyond a boundary is to trespass or transgress. Sin is transgression. 1 John 3:4 reads, "Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law." The Amplified once again does justice to the meaning of this verse. "Every one who commits (practices) sin is guilty of lawlessness; for (that is what) sin is, lawlessness (the breaking, violating of God’s law by transgression or neglect; being unrestrained and unregulated by His commands and His will)." God sets the law and if man violates it by commission or omission, it is sin. Sin does not like restraint or standards. It abhors authority and is in rebellion against it.
Application
To properly understand the Bible, we need to use what is known as applied theology.
Noah Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defines the verb "transgress" as, "1. To pass over or beyond any limit; to surpass. 2. In a moral sense, to overpass any rule prescribed as the limit of duty; to break or violate a law, civil or moral. To transgress a divine law, is sin..." God’s law contains either boundaries in negative connotations or enjoins us positively as a duty or requirement.
Exodus 23:23-24 says, "For mine Angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the Amorites, and the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites: and I will cut them off. 24Thou shalt not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works: but thou shalt utterly overthrow them, and quite break down their images." The children of Israel were going to be coming into the Promised Land. God was warning them about the peoples of the land. He had said this about these people in Leviticus 18:24-25, "Defile not ye yourselves in any of these things: for in all these the nations are defiled which I cast out before you: 25And the land is defiled: therefore I do visit the iniquity thereof upon it, and the land itself vomiteth out her inhabitants." Reading Leviticus 18:1-23 will tell you of some of the wickedness of the "Ites of the land."
Exodus 23:24 is a repeat of the second commandment which says in Exodus 20:4-5, "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me." It is forbidden to make an idol and then prostrate oneself before them and give them homage due only to the Creator. Paul said that if man did not worship God as Creator, he would worship the creation in Roman 1:21-23, "Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened. 22Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, 23And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things." Man without God will make idols of something because he is religious to the core being made in God’s image.
In Exodus 23:24, there are three things that are prohibited. To go over these limits is to transgress God’s revealed law. They were not to bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do after their works. These are clear prohibitions. These are negative commands. These are things forbidden to the child of God. The main reason for this is because idols are dead and false gods. Isaiah 2:8-9 reads, "Their land also is full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made: 9And the mean man boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself: therefore forgive them not." Idols are man made and not God made. They are not living because only God can give life. This is why it is vain to serve the works of man’s hands.
God believes in positive destruction. In the chosen text, He enjoins a positive duty. The children of Israel were to destroy these images and the works of men’s hands. Deuteronomy 7:5 restates this case law with more detail, "But thus shall ye deal with them; ye shall destroy their altars, and break down their images, and cut down their groves, and burn their graven images with fire." The negative commands limit in our actions and the positive puts us into action. Fire was to be used upon these graven images, to burn them into ashes. This is what happened to the magic books in Acts 19:19, "Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver." Here is an example of positive destruction in action.
Conclusion
God forbids transgressing in certain actions. He puts limits on our freedom. This is for our good and not hurt. Those who go beyond the established limits suffer harm. They would not listen to sound wisdom. God also wants us to positively destroy wickedness. His law says in Deuteronomy 7:25, "The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire: thou shalt not desire the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it unto thee, lest thou be snared therein: for it is an abomination to the LORD thy God." We are not to desire what the world has but are to destroy their works of wickedness.
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