In a Hebrew wedding, there were five steps. The five steps were: Lakah, Segullah; Mikveh, Ketubah and Huppah (Chupah).
I'm going to explain this in the natural; and then show it to you in the Bible; and hopefully bring this together to introduce the Ten Commandments.
Lakah: let's say Ali and I were dating, and she's out of my league, but it doesn't matter so - it's just hypothetical. So Ali and I are dating, and there comes a point where we cross the threshold of serious. There's a bit of chemistry going on between us. People are starting to ask her: how serious is this getting? This would have happened all the time.
Once it crosses a certain point, Ali would be longing to hear one word from me, and that word is: Lakah. She'd be longing to hear Lakah from me; so one night we're out on a date, we're down at the pizza place, and she bites into a piece of sausage - just perfect. That sausage fat and juice goes all over her. And I look across that table, and I think: I want to spend the rest of my life with that woman. Any woman that can bite into a piece of sausage like that - oh yeah!
So I take her home, and there's a moment on the porch, and she's still got a little bit of it right there on her face, and I say to her: Ali, Lakah. Well, on the outside she acts excited; but on the inside - she's 100 times more excited. On the outside she hugs me, and there's a moment there; but on the inside she's just clapping and going nuts, and on the inside she's just: OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD! He said Lakah! He said Lakah! So she goes in and she calls her three best friends, and she's clapping... He said Lakah to me! He said Lakah to me! OH MY GOD! He said Lakah to me!
Lakah means: I want to make you my own.
The Book of Exodus is just one big giant marriage proposal between God and a group of slaves. Exodus 6:6 says something like this. He's talking about His accolades. He says: I have delivered you out of the hands of the Egyptians, and from the yoke of bondage; and He's just giving them a ra-ra sort of: this is my heart for you, this is what I've done for you.
Then in verse 7: “and I will take you as my own”. If you look that up in Strong's Concordance, it's just the word Lakah; I will take you as Lakah.
These are Hebrew people, so you didn't have to explain all this to them. They were standing there, and they would have thought: did God just say Lakah to us? Did God - does He want to marry us? Does God want to take our relationship with Him that far?
Doesn't He know we have issues? I mean, these people had issues! He had to tell them things like: don't be intimate with your mother, it's a bad plan. Well duh, right! But He had to tell them - that's how much issues they had. Later He had to tell them: don't throw your children in fire, not a good idea. So He had to tell them all these things, but He is instituted (He is initiating) a marriage with them.
You cannot understand the Ten Commandments outside the context of this: that God loves you so much, that He wants to marry you - Lakah.
So after I've said Lakah; what would be the next word she'd be longing to hear? Segullah!
You guys know how women are right? I don't want the women to turn on me, but there we go right - I'm going to step out there in faith! How long would it be, before Lakah wore off? Not long... Not long!
It wouldn't be too long after that, her girlfriends would be saying: has he said Segullah yet? Girl, is he scared of commitment? He needs to be saying Segullah.
So one night we're out on a date; and on the way to where we were going, she's hungry; and the noises that are coming out of her stomach are something God-awful. It's like a rhino's mating-call (ggroar), and I think to myself: that's the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with - a woman whose stomach can make noise like that. It's like a female drummer - there's something awesome about a woman that likes to beat on things, you know what I'm saying? They just...