READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Exodus 20:1-17
Romans 6:3-11
- St. Matthew 5:20-26
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord
Jesus Christ. (Eph 1)
Who speaks to you today, saying:
“You have heard
that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders
will be liable to judgment.”
“You have heard it said to those of old”, says Jesus. As in,
that was for them and not for us. And so begins the descent into dozens of
other excuses we offer to God for why His Commands are no longer useful, valid,
or applicable to us. Not that they are outdated, but that we have evolved
beyond them. There is no need for such vengeance, violence, and pettiness from
people or God, as expressed in the 10 Commandments. We’re better than that,
now.
Our Old Testament reading only gives two examples of this
“violence”, but there are many more in the Bible we would label “unreasonable”.
Being angry 3 or 4 generations down the road? What did they have to do with
anything?
What if I’m not tired on the Sabbath or there’s an
emergency?
In light of that unreasonableness that our sin, the world
and the devil love to capitalize on, let’s understand our Commandments a little
better so that we are not fooled by the world’s foolery and continue to honor
our Lord. Let’s start with Dr. Luther’s hymn which we sang first, today.
What we hear in stanzas 1, 11, and 12 are his commentary on
the Ten Commands. Let’s make one small correction to our hymn: in the first
place it is true that Moses did bring the commands off the mountain of God to
us, but it was God’s Hand that wrote them. From God, to Moses, to us. This is
and remains God’s pattern: that He does His work through men.
And God did write them for our good, though His Law always
accuses us in our sin, it was Moses’ obedience to God’s Will that got them
here. Now, as Lutherans, we tend to run from the word “obedience”, but there is
a Gospel side to the Law among us. If your pastor did not obey God’s will and
preach and teach the forgiveness of sins, would Jesus find faith on earth, when
He returns?
So there is a benefit to obedience, but the true obedience
is found in hearkening, listening with strong intent, to what God is saying and
doing first. Moses’ obedience was hearing God invite him up to the mountain to
receive good things at His hands. THEN, Moses delivered the goods to the
congregation. An important point and order of things to not forget.
Why? Because in the 10 Commands God presents Himself, in His
full glory, and He reveals the righteousness that exceeds the Scribes and the
Pharisees. In, what we sinners call, His Holy Law God shows us the life He
lives in purity and holiness and just how free from sin we have not been.
Repent. With Jesus on the scene to explain Exodus 20 to us,
He only makes things worse. His catechetical teaching on the 5th Commandment
takes God’s goalpost of following His commands, which we thought was close, and
reveals that it is further away than we thought. Jesus teaches that our own
works only take us further and further from this holy and godly life.
The “last penny”, Jesus speaks of then becomes less and less
of obedience and more and more of life-force. Meaning, it is not about us
giving 110% or all of ourselves to Jesus. How preposterous and impossible!
However, it is about spending our very last breath paying for our sins. The
“last penny” is that last piece of life in us until we die, as St. Paul says, “he
who has died has been set free from sin”, from our Epistle (Rom 6:7).
Jesus is the First and the Last (Rev 22:13). He is the First
Payment, that is the Creator of all things, giving of His very Self to bring
all things into being. And He is the Last Penny, He Who’s imprisonment in
death, destroys death. That Last Penny frees all from the slavery of death and
pays for our fulfilled and perfect righteousness.
Does it not make sense that He Who gave the Law is the only
One Who can fulfill it? Is that unfair to you, that God would give a Law that
can’t be followed? Is that unthinkable? Illogical? Maybe, just maybe if we
think beyond ourselves and our fragile feelings for one second, maybe God gave
the Law for something, or someone else.
Dr. Luther has said, our Old Testament reading “makes it
clear that even the Ten Commandments do not pertain to us. For God never led us
out of Egypt, but only the Jews. The sectarian spirits want to saddle us with
Moses and all the commandments. We will just skip that. We will regard Moses as
a teacher, but we will not regard him as our lawgiver—unless he agrees with
both the New Testament and the natural law.” (AE 35:165)
Remember these words? “Do not think that I have come to
abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill
them” (Mt 5:17). Not, “I have come to have you fulfill them”. Not, “I have
come to explain how you can do better”.
No. I have come so that I can fulfill them. Complete them.
Bring them to their intended perfection.
“For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in
Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done
what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in
the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom
8:2-3).
We sorta knew it all along, but were too afraid to admit it.
Too afraid to admit that Christ really has accomplished everything. Too afraid
to be the “do nothing” church. Too afraid to be labelled as the “faith without
works” church to turn to our Servant God Who does these wonderful things for
us.
Faith is not ashamed of the Gospel. It is not afraid to take
a back seat to the Jesus Show. Our own work is a hopeless thing. ‘Tis wrath
alone it can bring. But Christ is our mediator in such a thing. He shows us our
sin and gives us that life before God, in Him. And in Him we have His works and
His faith.
Romans 8 goes on: “He condemned sin in the flesh in order
that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk
not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit”. The righteousness
that pleases God is received by Faith. The holiness that pleases the Father is
found only in the Son. The purity of thought, word, and deed is only given by
the Holy Spirit.
Despair of your own works. Christ works in you now and lives
in you. For your old self was crucified. We live with Him and we will live with
Him forever. Trust in Christ. Not as a Helper, to give you a leg up on the
Commandments nor as a “get out of jail free” card, a pass for not following the
Commands.
Trust in Christ as your redeemer, who redeems you from the
pit to live today. Yes, He forgives your past sins. Yes, He has secured your
future by His work alone. But there is still today. The Day which the Lord has
made for you to commune with Righteousness Himself. The Fulfillment of the Law
has come down all glorious just for you, today. He comes to His Church to tend
and feed with His Holy Life.
So the Commands, the Law, is to be heard. And our response
is: “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for Him, that He might save us.
This is the Lord; we have waited for Him; let us be glad and rejoice in his
salvation” (Isaiah 25:9).
We have waited for Him and His fulfillment of the Law. We
have waited for Him for three days, to see His Resurrection Day. We have waited
for Him for our whole life to be glad and rejoice in His Divine Service where
He once again tells us the Greatest Story of how He defeated death and turned
His victory into a victory feast, where the fulfillment of the 10 Commandments
in put onto lips and into mouths.
From Psalm 45:2 “You are the most handsome of the sons of
men; grace is poured upon your lips; therefore God has blessed you forever.”
They are the Ten Words from God and show His total dominance
over all humanity and our total dependence upon Him. For us, they are given in
a four-fold way: instruction, thanksgiving, confession, and prayer. But there
are so much more than 10. Every command, every Word from God should be heard
and used by us this way.
For, the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. The Word is
the Command.
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