THE PURPOSE OF GOD'S LAWS
During the season of Lent, Christians often think about God’s laws. Specifically, we might think about how we fail to live according to God’s laws. It is all too easy to think of God’s laws as markers or measures that we fail to live up to. But is that God’s purpose in giving us His laws in the first place? Did God give people His laws only so we could know how poorly we obey them?
Psalm 19 provides us some insight into the purpose of God’s laws. It says the law of the LORD is perfect and revives the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure and gives wisdom to the innocent. The statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart; the commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes. God’s laws are not meant to make us feel defeated or depressed in any way. In fact, just the opposite is true. The purpose of God’s laws is to bless us.
We have all seen skits on TV or the stage where there are two people and one of them is upset, but refuses to tell the other person what is bothering him or her. Living life as a guessing game is not only frustrating, it is exhausting. God does not do that to people! We do not have to wonder what God wants us to do or not do. He has told us what we need to know in order to please Him.
The Gospels tell us of a time when Jesus was asked, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" "The most important one," Jesus answered, "is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these."
When Jesus was being asked His opinion about which was the most important commandment, there is little doubt that He was being asked about the Ten Commandments, which God had delivered to the people of Israel through their leader Moses. It is likely that most religious people, from the period of Moses and even into today, thought of the Ten Commandments as a series of rules against which they could measure their lives. How good or badly did they behave?
Jesus, on the other hand, seemed to have a different sense of the purpose of God’s laws. God’s laws were not intended to be a yardstick of some sort for measuring our behavior, they were given to us to revive the soul and to give wisdom to the innocent. Jesus summarized and paraphrased the Ten Commandments into two easily understood and memorable rules of life for people who care about what God wants and who seek to please Him: "Love God. Love people."
The Ten Commandments that God spoke through Moses are as follows: "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject Me, but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses His name. Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work-- you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and consecrated it.
Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
The Ten Commandments are easy to understand. We might wonder why God gave us some of them, like the Law of the Sabbath, but nevertheless, we can easily understand what God expects of people; the commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes. Because the Ten Commandments are so easily understood, the statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart. We are not frustrated or exhausted, guessing what is right or wrong in God’s sight.
Having said that, it is also true that each of us have parts of our personalities that resist doing God’s will all the time. We may be amenable to doing God’s will some of the time, just not all of the time. What part of us resists God’s will? It may be different things for different people. For example, some of us have a pride component that bucks against God’s will. Our pride insists on us always being right, always winning, never being humiliated, maybe not even being willing to wait patiently for something we want.
When our pride component or other personality factors collide with God’s will, it is often not a pretty sight. The Bible, in Romans chapter seven, describes this phenomenon fairly well for us. Did what is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.
For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin. I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin.
Wouldn’t it be great if God would simply wave a magic wand and eradicate all sin from us? But He doesn’t do that. It took us a long time to develop our sinful natures and ways. God’s goal for us is not to simply change our behavior, but to change our hearts. Jesus said that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks and that a good person brings good things out of the good stored up in him, but the evil person brings up evil things from the evil stored up in him.
In Psalm 19, the Psalmist asks, Who can tell how often he offends? Cleanse me from my secret faults. Above all, keep Your servant from presumptuous sins; let them not get dominion over me; then shall I be whole and sound, and innocent of a great offense. The purpose of God’s laws is to draw us closer to Him, so that with the Psalmist we may pray, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my strength and my redeemer.
Psalm 19 provides us some insight into the purpose of God’s laws. It says the law of the LORD is perfect and revives the soul; the testimony of the LORD is sure and gives wisdom to the innocent. The statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart; the commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes. God’s laws are not meant to make us feel defeated or depressed in any way. In fact, just the opposite is true. The purpose of God’s laws is to bless us.
We have all seen skits on TV or the stage where there are two people and one of them is upset, but refuses to tell the other person what is bothering him or her. Living life as a guessing game is not only frustrating, it is exhausting. God does not do that to people! We do not have to wonder what God wants us to do or not do. He has told us what we need to know in order to please Him.
The Gospels tell us of a time when Jesus was asked, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" "The most important one," Jesus answered, "is this: ‘Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these."
When Jesus was being asked His opinion about which was the most important commandment, there is little doubt that He was being asked about the Ten Commandments, which God had delivered to the people of Israel through their leader Moses. It is likely that most religious people, from the period of Moses and even into today, thought of the Ten Commandments as a series of rules against which they could measure their lives. How good or badly did they behave?
Jesus, on the other hand, seemed to have a different sense of the purpose of God’s laws. God’s laws were not intended to be a yardstick of some sort for measuring our behavior, they were given to us to revive the soul and to give wisdom to the innocent. Jesus summarized and paraphrased the Ten Commandments into two easily understood and memorable rules of life for people who care about what God wants and who seek to please Him: "Love God. Love people."
The Ten Commandments that God spoke through Moses are as follows: "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; you shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself an idol, whether in the form of anything that is in heaven above, or that is on the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.
You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, punishing children for the iniquity of parents, to the third and the fourth generation of those who reject Me, but showing steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep My commandments.
You shall not make wrongful use of the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not acquit anyone who misuses His name. Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God; you shall not do any work-- you, your son or your daughter, your male or female slave, your livestock, or the alien resident in your towns. For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and consecrated it.
Honor your father and your mother, so that your days may be long in the land that the LORD your God is giving you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or male or female slave, or ox, or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.
The Ten Commandments are easy to understand. We might wonder why God gave us some of them, like the Law of the Sabbath, but nevertheless, we can easily understand what God expects of people; the commandment of the LORD is clear and gives light to the eyes. Because the Ten Commandments are so easily understood, the statutes of the LORD are just and rejoice the heart. We are not frustrated or exhausted, guessing what is right or wrong in God’s sight.
Having said that, it is also true that each of us have parts of our personalities that resist doing God’s will all the time. We may be amenable to doing God’s will some of the time, just not all of the time. What part of us resists God’s will? It may be different things for different people. For example, some of us have a pride component that bucks against God’s will. Our pride insists on us always being right, always winning, never being humiliated, maybe not even being willing to wait patiently for something we want.
When our pride component or other personality factors collide with God’s will, it is often not a pretty sight. The Bible, in Romans chapter seven, describes this phenomenon fairly well for us. Did what is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, working death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure.
For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin. I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, with my mind I am a slave to the law of God, but with my flesh I am a slave to the law of sin.
Wouldn’t it be great if God would simply wave a magic wand and eradicate all sin from us? But He doesn’t do that. It took us a long time to develop our sinful natures and ways. God’s goal for us is not to simply change our behavior, but to change our hearts. Jesus said that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks and that a good person brings good things out of the good stored up in him, but the evil person brings up evil things from the evil stored up in him.
In Psalm 19, the Psalmist asks, Who can tell how often he offends? Cleanse me from my secret faults. Above all, keep Your servant from presumptuous sins; let them not get dominion over me; then shall I be whole and sound, and innocent of a great offense. The purpose of God’s laws is to draw us closer to Him, so that with the Psalmist we may pray, let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my strength and my redeemer.
posted by Pastor Monahan at 8:34 PM
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