1. If their is in fact, only One. True. God. Then why is it important to make one of his 10 demands relating to something that doesn't exist?
Mainly because He knew they would try to do exactly that. remember having a god "BEFORE me" can relate to absolutely anything that you put before God. People make jokes about that sort of thing, don't they? If you find x-box is impossible to put down, we say it is your god. Same goes for anything that stands between you and God as more important in your eyes.
2. If a second command is needed to backup the first, then maybe he should have made the first a bit clearer. So are you saying god was worried he wouldn't be believed? Then why didn't he back up all other nine demands with a supporting explanation? confused (He could easily have replaced this one with a marriage equality statement).
Two things here. One is that the second command is abut "idols" specifically, so it's the cousin of having "no god before me". It wouldn't be ok to make an image of God and worship that either. There are great verses in the bible about how people carve idols out of the tree, the same tree they chop up for firewood. It's meaningless and futile. SO it's the same and slightly different. Think of it as more of a "splitting hairs" detail.
Your second point is that you don't find anywhere in the bible supporting same-sex marriage, but you DO find verses placing it in the same camp as adultery, fornication, theft, lies, slander. It's not ok with God, nor will it ever be, and anyone saying it's fine has to cut those pages out of their bible because there is no other way to justify accepting it.
3. So taking the Lords name in vain refers to people making up their own mind what God means rather than accepting the truth of the Bible? Who is it that decides what the Bible means? So its ok for who, the church? to interpret the Bible but anyone else doing that is taking Gods name in vain? And the church is telling us that gay marriage is wrong and we just have to bow our heads and discriminate against some human beings, or be guilty of breaking one of the commandments?
Well like you said it's not actually one of the 10 commandments, and its also not about making up your own mind vs accepting the bible. This is nothing about taking God's name in vain. The here for vain is "shaw" which means vanity, falsehood, iniquity and emptiness. So it covers saying anything against God as well as making up things about him that aren't true.
4. Its still not clear what rest means? Can I chop wood for my fire on Sunday or not? Can I chop wood for my neighbors fire on Sunday and ask him for £10 as a contribution to my general well being? Is shopping rest if I enjoy it but not if I dislike it. What if I am ambivalent?
I think you know when you're resting and when you're not. I think the better question about the man with the sticks is why would he pick them up, knowing the penalty was death? Here we see again, there was plenty of warning first.
If the rest can be any day of the week can I choose Wednesday and work on Sunday. Oh no, wait that doesn't work well because the church supports keeping Sunday special! Is it keep the day holy or just rest, do I have to go to church to be holy? I don't get it, its as clear as mud.
God just says 6 days to work and 1 day to rest. The church keeps Sunday special because most people have that day off. If weekends were moved to Wed and Thur then the church would no doubt move Sunday to a different day of the week. Remember Jesus said "Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath".
5. Do you really think this commandment means you must be honest, fair and act with integrity towards abusive parents? How is this tenable when a child might be in a situation where telling the truth will get them hit with a belt? Why should a child treat abusive parents fairly? So honour an abusive parent but not two loving women when they want to get married?
You can still treat a person in truth and fairness, no matter how horrible they are. We all have our dark moments, you know, the things we say or do that we wouldn't want aired in public because we regret them. None of us is perfect. Abuse is not ok. But you can retain your integrity and not stoop to their level. It's hard but its possible, and this is what is Jesus did to those who tortured and killed him, and this is what is required of the Christian too.
6. It does show where gods priorities are when he places following him above not killing someone or indeed gay marriage.
I am not sure they're in any special order, but I do think that it's more important to follow God than anything else. You might say murder is more important, someone else might say honesty is.
You didn't answer the point about killing verses murder, because depending on which church you are in you will get a different answer and god doesn't tell us how we are supposed to figure out which church is describing the right god. And we can't decide it ourselves because you said in point 3 that would be blasphemy.
Deciding things isn't blasphemy, I didn't say that. Murder is wrong, some say defending yourself isn't. For example, Exodus 22 days "If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no bloodguilt for him, but if the sun has risen on him, there shall be bloodguilt for him. He shall surely pay. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft." So it depends on the circumstances and motivation.
7. A partner cheating on me, yes I have experienced that, but still don't see why I have to wait up to five years (for a divorce) before the church allows me to have sex with another person?
Sorry you experienced that too. Why did you then say it's no one else business, when you know full well you can't help but be affected? Also the remarriage thing is allowed if someone cheats on you. The 5 year rule is a man-made thing and not a direct direction of God.
8. I think we all know what stealing is Life isn't that black and white. You can come up with all sorts of grey areas all night, but you still know when you've stolen and when you haven't. Like I said, if you steal, you must repay. So if you steal taxes, you end up paying them anyway! While we're on the subject of taxes, Jesus said "pay unto Caesar what is Caesars", meaning pay your tax!
9. So are white lies breaking a commandment or not? What if the truth hurts? Life is just so much more nuanced.
The bible says better are the wounds of a faithful friend than the kisses of an enemy, meaning truth hurts but if its said nicely and with best motives, then its much better than people putting on a show and saying what you want to hear but secretly thinking the opposite. If I say "does my bum look big in this" I don't want to be told "yes, go on a diet, you fat pig". I want to hear "yes in truth it does, but I love your bum anyway, and the last time you wore it you looked great, so don't worry"! OR maybe even, "yes, you've put on a lot of weight since you last tried it, are you happy about that? If not I'd happily support you making a change if that's what you really want".
10. Most people sometimes desire a more beautiful partner 'better' life, they envy those that have a better life. Why is that wrong?
Because no matter how much you get you always want more. It's a little thing called dissatisfaction, and it ruins marriages! It also makes people tread on each others toes to get to the top, and pushes people to lying and dishonesty, and all the rest.
Even within the Bible their are 3 different sets of ten commandments which are all different (leaving aside the Muslim ones). Exodus 20, Exodus 34 and Deuteronomy 5. Which set should we follow and which churches interpretation of those 3 sets is the correct interpretation?
Exodus 34 and Deuteronomy 5 are identical. The Exodus 34 you've taken out of context. If you go back and read it you will find God gives some LAWS to Moses, around 15 of them, I think. Verse 10 shows that it was a part of God making a covenant with them. God was regularly giving laws, it's all through the OT interactions with Moses. But the 10 commandments specifically, are only referred to at the end of this encounter, AFTER the various laws had been given. It says how that Moses THEN, after 40 days, wrote out the 10 commandments.
Given you say you can't keep all ten rules then how hard should you try and which ones should you put most effort into trying? Again no one knows. As a parent I would never give my DC a set of rules that I knew they could never keep, its setting them up for failure and very bad parenting.
It is all there is the bible, you just haven't seen it yet. Jesus said that he has come not to abolish the law, but to fulfil it. The law was set up to show people they can't keep 10 rules, rules that SHOULD be kept, so just because you can't keep them doesn't mean you shouldn't make every best effort to. Its called moral living. We are supposed to live morally, even though we recognise we cannot attain perfection, which is what it would take to keep even just 10 commandments. You will be amazed at how many people through history have tried to say they don't ever sin, and this was God's way of saying, yes you do!
But, God provided us with an answer. Isn't that great? God doesn't bring us a problem and leave us there, he provides the solution too. Should we wish to take it.