WSC Q&A #42

Q: What is the sum of the ten commandments?
A: The sum of the ten commandments is to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind; and our neighbor as ourselves.
Matthew 22:37-40: And he said to him, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets."

I'm certainly thankful for how Jesus Christ summarizes the law for us here in Matthew 22. Remember the context of this passage. First the Sadducees came to Christ hoping to ensnare him over the idea of the resurrection of the dead. The Sadducees only accepted the first five books of the Bible as Holy Scripture, and because these books make, in their understanding, no direct reference to the resurrection of the dead, the Sadducees rejected the idea of the resurrection. So Christ, in his response to them, quotes Exodus 3:6 by saying, "Have you not read what was said to you by God: 'I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'? He is not God of the dead, but of the living." This response effectively silenced the Sadducees, and now the Pharisees want their turn at trying to ensnare Jesus. This all comes from an attempt at making Jesus look like a false teacher by entangling him in his words (Matt. 22:15). Which commandment in the whole law is the most important, the Pharisees asked him backhandedly. Christ's response here is beautiful. Instead of picking one commandment, he summarizes the first four commandments, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind." This is exactly what the first four commandments teach us. They teach us how to worship and glorify God. Think about it. You shall put no other gods before the one true God, you shall not build idols or make graven images of God, you shall not take the Lord's name in vain, and you shall keep the Sabbath holy. These commandments instruct us on our attitude and posture towards God.

But Christ doesn't stop there. He then effectively summarizes the second six commandments, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." By doing this, he is showing that the commandments are all interrelated. Part of loving God with all our hearts and with all our souls and with all our minds includes loving our neighbors (which includes our enemies) as ourselves. The ten commandments can't be separated. It's, as we said before, a complete summary of the law of God. At it's most basic level, the question of the Pharisee is dubious because it is trying to get Christ, in essence, to quantify God's law. All of God's commands are related to one another, all of them teach us and instruct us how to live lives that bring glory and honor to God. None of God's commands are to be dismissed as a "lesser command". This is why Christ's summary is so helpful to us. He takes the ten commandments and summarizes them succinctly so that we can see and understand the very heart of God's commandments, and what role they are to play in our lives as we seek to live in a way that glorifies and honors him.

Love and Mawwiage

Lord willing, this Sunday we will consider what Jesus has to say about marriage in Mark 10:1-12 as we continue our series through the gospel of Mark. There is a lot of talk about marriage these days, and we will address some of that on Sunday as we seek to listen to what Jesus has to say about it.

It's natural for people to associate love and marriage. One of the many memorable scenes from the cult classic film, The Princess Bride, is the marriage ceremony of Prince Humperdink and a very reluctant Buttercup. The priest begins the service by saying:

Mawwiage. Mawwiage is what bwings us togethew today. Mawwiage, that bwessed awwangement, that dweam within a dweam. And wove, twue wove, wiww fowwow you fowevah and evah… So tweasuwe youw wove

But what is true love? And what role does love play in marriage?

Paul Tripp has an excellent definition and explanation in his book on marriage, What Did You Expect? 

Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation or that the person being loved is deserving.

He then goes on to unpack the definition (pp. 188-189):

Love is willing.

Jesus said, “No one takes [my life] from me, but I lay it down of my own accord” (John 10:18). The decisions, words, and actions of love always grow in the soil of a willing heart. You cannot force a person to love. If you are forcing someone to love, by the very nature of the act you are demonstrating that this person doesn’t in fact love.

Love is willing self-sacrifice.

There is no such thing as love without sacrifice.

Love calls you beyond the borders of your own wants, needs, and feelings.

Love calls you to be willing to invest time, energy, money, resources, personal ability, and gifts for the good of another.

Love calls you to lay down your life in ways that are concrete and specific.

Love calls you to serve, to wait, to give, to suffer, to forgive, and to do all these things again and again.

Love calls you to be silent when you want to speak, and to speak when you would like to be silent.

Love calls you to act when you would really like to wait, and to wait when you would really like to act.

Love calls you to stop when you really want to continue, and it calls you to continue when you feel like stopping.

Love again and again calls you away from your instincts and your comfort.

Love always requires personal sacrifice.

Love calls you to give up your life.

Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another.

Love always has the good of another in view.

Love is motivated by the interests and needs of others.

Love is excited at the prospect of alleviating burdens and meeting needs.

Love feels poor when the loved one is poor.

Love suffers when the loved one suffers.

Love wants the best for the loved one and works to deliver it.

Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation.

The Bible says that Jesus died for us while we were still sinners. If he had waited until we were able to reciprocate, there would be no hope for us.

Love isn’t a “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours” bargain.

Love isn’t about placing people in our debt and waiting for them to pay off their debts.

Love isn’t a negotiation for mutual good.

Real love does not demand reciprocation, because real love isn’t motivated by the return on the investment. No, real love is motivated by the good that will result in the life of the person being loved.

Love is willing self-sacrifice for the good of another that does not require reciprocation or that the person being loved is deserving.

Christ was willing to go to the cross and carry our sin precisely because there was nothing that we could ever do to earn, achieve, or deserve the love of God. If you are interested only in loving people who are deserving, the reality is that you are not motivated by love for them but by love for yourself. Love does its best work when the other person is undeserving. It is in these moments that love is most needed. It is in these moments that love is protective and preventative. It stays the course while refusing to quit or to get down and get dirty and give way to things that are anything but love.

There is never a day in your marriage when you aren’t called to be willing.

There is never a day in your marriage when some personal sacrifice is not needed.

There is never a day when you are free from the need to consider the good of your husband or wife.

There is never a day when you aren’t called to do what is not reciprocated and to offer what has not been deserved.

There is never a day when your marriage can coast along without being infused by this kind of love.

May you rest in the love Jesus has for you and may our marriages reflect his love.

WSC Q&A #41

Q: Where is the moral law summarily comprehended?
A: The moral law is summarily comprehended in the ten commandments.
Deuteronomy 4:13: And he declared to you his covenant, which he commanded you to perform, that is, the Ten Commandments, and he wrote them on two tablets of stone.

I think it is an important distinction as we move into the catechism's section on the Ten Commandments, that the commandments are viewed as a summary of the moral law. The Ten Commandments cover every sin imaginable, but they do this by painting with broad strokes. They are not only addressing outward actions (as I think the Scribes and Pharisees understood them), but also the underlining heart issues of a person. Jesus shows us this in Matthew 5 in the Sermon on the Mount. He himself shows how the commandments are a summary. "You have heard it said, 'Thou shall not murder'...But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be made liable to judgment..." or, "You have heard it said, 'Thou shall not commit adultery'...But I say to you whoever looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart..." Christ was not adding to the Ten Commandments, rather he was getting to the core of what the commandments were summarizing. The catechism, just as Christ did in his teachings, will begin to expand upon each commandment and show us how comprehensive the Ten Commandments really are. When we begin to understand all that the Ten Commandments are summarizing and addressing, then we begin to understand how deep our sin truly goes, then we will understand all the more just how dependent we truly are on those indicatives in our desires and attempts to uphold and keep the imperatives of God's law!

WSC Q&A #40

Q: What did God at first reveal to man for the rule of his obedience?
A: The rule which God revealed at first to man for his obedience was the moral law.
Romans 10:5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them.

Now we're getting into the meat of God's holy and good law. Again, I remind us of our path up til this point. We've already talked about the Fall and mankind's depravity. We already know that we cannot earn our salvation by keeping the law of God. We've also talked about God's gracious act of election, justification, and sanctification. Remember, with sanctification, we talked about the indicatives and imperatives in Scripture. We have the promises of what God has already done and will do for us, and then the imperatives of how we are to act and live in light of those great truths. The indicatives empower the imperatives. You can re-read the post on sanctification here if you need a refresher.  It's in this light that we're now talking about obeying the law of God.

Because of what God has done for us through the life, death, resurrection, and glorification of Jesus Christ, God's law no longer becomes a burden for us, but rather, a delight. We should delight in and strive to keep the law of God so that we can live lives that are a sacrifice of praise.

God did not leave us without clear moral direction. The "moral law" of God that the catechism refers to here is, as we'll see next week, summarized in the ten commandments. So as we move forward the next couple of weeks, the catechism is going to begin unpacking the ten commandments with the hope that we as God's people would truly come to understand and love God's holy law. But as we go forward with this, again, I want to remind us that we do not keep the law in order to earn our salvation, but rather, we strive to keep the law because of our election, justification, adoption, sanctification, and glorification! If we want to avoid the trappings of legalism, if we want to avoid slipping into a works-based salvation, we must keep this distinction in mind. If we do not keep this distinction, God's law will become a burden to us. Jesus Christ has removed that burden from us, so let's not place it back on our necks!
 

WSC Q&A #39

Q: What is the duty which God requires of man?
A: The duty which God requires of man is obedience to his revealed will.
Deuteronomy 29:29 The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law.

I really appreciate the verse for this week. It seems that many, many times, we as Christians spend a lot of time pondering the "secret things of God". What does God have in store for my life? What am I "called" to do? Where should I go, what should I be, all these questions that Christians and non-Christians ask constantly. But the plain and simple fact is, we can only answer these questions in light of God's revealed will. And where is his will revealed? It is not revealed in some subjective impression or feeling that we may get. Statements like "I feel like God is telling me..." for example, are not a good guide for living our lives. It is not revealed in some special, secret revelation that God gives you. No, rather, God's revealed will is found in his Word. Deuteronomy 29:29 makes that clear, "but the things that are revealed belong to us...that we may do all the words of this law". God has revealed all we need to know concerning how to live lives in obedience to him, and it is found in his revealed, holy Word.

Now I realize this may seem like a cop-out, or at least it may seem like none of the questions we deem as "the big questions of life" are truly answered here. The Bible doesn't tell you whether or not to take that job offer. It doesn't tell you who to marry. It doesn't tell you where to go to college. But what it does tell you is how to live a life that is obedient to God. It tells you how to glorify and obey God in all walks of life, in all decision making, in all questions of calling and purpose, and this is what should consume our minds. "The secret things belong to the Lord our God". Can we trust God with them? Can we let God be God and trust that he has revealed all that we need to know? Can we trust that "the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law"? This is what God requires of us. He requires obedience to his revealed will. He does not require that we solve or figure out the secret things that belong to him, even as it concerns our own lives. Rather, he requires that we submit to and obey what he has revealed in his holy Word. When we strive to do this, when we strive to obey and submit to what God has revealed in his Word, then and only then are we truly living up to our calling as followers of Christ. Then, and only then, are we living up to the duty which God requires of us.