DEUTERONOMY 5:32-33; 6:24-25
FULFILLED? OR FRUSTRATED?
“You shall be careful therefore to do as the LORD your God has commanded you. You shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. You shall walk in all the way that the LORD your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess.”
“The LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us.” [1]
People must imagine that the Word of God has been superseded by the “wisdom” of this age, (which really isn’t all that wise after all). At least that is the way it appears, if my assessment of the attitudes displayed in this day approximates reality. Nevertheless, we are assured both by the Word of God and by multiplied ancient divines that because the promises of God are true, people will find personal fulfilment only in obedience to the Lord and to His precepts. However, modern philosophies appear to teach that we are assured of fulfilment through pursuing self-esteem and through seeking to fulfil our personal desires. According to the former perception, man is responsible to the Creator first, fulfilment and purpose thereafter flowing from obedience to God Who gives man his being. The latter view holds that people are first responsible to seek self-fulfilment through building self-esteem, after which obedience, whether to the Creator or to their own conception of what is right, is incidental.
Obviously, these are two radically different ideas concerning fulfilment and how to achieve the same. It should be obvious that it will be impossible to reconcile the two views—they are diametrically opposed to one another. Resolution of the question raised by the conflict between these differing viewpoints is determinative to our sense of being, and it is certainly vital to our ultimate fulfilment. Nothing less than our happiness now and our ultimate fulfillment are riding on the manner in which we decide the issue.
Let’s think about this issue in an honest fashion. If the contemporary view is correct, if fulfilment is to be found through exalting self-esteem until it becomes the ultimate good or if we are to engage in a determined search for self-fulfilment while jettisoning every other pursuit that normally occupies mankind, then it must of necessity follow that this present generation has to qualify as the happiest, most fulfilled in all history. Alternatively, if the ancient view is correct, then we can never be fulfilled until we have turned to the Word of God. If this is in fact the case, it must mean that this present generation is miserable, and we are exposed as a people “having no hope and without God in the world” [see EPHESIANS 2:12b].
Reality demands that we acknowledge that contentment is clearly not a hallmark of this present generation. Despite what any happiness index may assert, there is a marked restlessness throughout contemporary Canadian society. There is a nagging sense that something isn’t quite right, a worrisome thought that for all our possessions and for all the “freedoms” we suppose we have, we are not really free, we actually possess nothing.
There must surely exist for most of us an unrecognised flaw in our worldview, a flaw that though it may be obvious to a few discerning individuals, has yet to be discovered by the most. Without doubt, Augustine was correct when he wrote his paean of praise to the Lord, “Great art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and Thy wisdom infinite. And Thee would man praise; man, but a particle of Thy creation; man, that bears about him his mortality, the witness of his sin, the witness that Thou resistest the proud: yet would man praise Thee; he, but a particle of Thy creation. Thou awakest us to delight in Thy praise; for Thou madest us for Thyself, and our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee.” [2] Augustine was confessing that fulfilment is to be found in embracing the will of God. Our frustration is the result when we reject the will of God. And people have known this conclusion to be accurate for millennia, as our study today will reveal.
THE COMMANDMENTS OF THE LORD — “You shall be careful … to do as the LORD your God has commanded you. You shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left. You shall walk in all the way that the LORD your God has commanded you, that you may live, and that it may go well with you, and that you may live long in the land that you shall possess” [DEUTERONOMY 5:32-33].
“The LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us” [DEUTERONOMY 6:24-25].
We have two passages which are before us this day, and these two passages deliver the same identical message. I believe it is fair to say that most Christians realise that God’s commands are given for our good and for His glory. They would also confess that failure to obey the Lord God invites His rebuke, while obedience to Him ensures His blessing. In the two passages before us today, obedience to the LORD’s commands are promised to result in a long life, in a life filled with blessing, and to ensure that those who are obedient will enjoy a life marked as righteous. Length of days, divine blessing, and righteousness—these are not inconsequential benefits of obedience to the Lord GOD.
The idea that the Faith consists of a bunch of rules which cannot be kept in any case, seems to have prevailed even among the faithful. If we are under the Law, it is true that there are a number of rules that must be maintained. The number of laws is reputed to be six hundred thirteen. [3] I confess that I have not counted all these laws, but that is the number that has been bandied about for centuries. The point I’m getting at is that the laws given by the Lord GOD are numerous. Has anyone ever maintained these laws? It seems doubtful that this could be the case.
You may recall how Peter stood to challenge those gathered during the debates of the first congregation, the New Beginnings Baptist Church of Jerusalem, concerning whether the Gentiles needed to keep the law. Peter challenge those gathered at that time to think, saying, “Why are you putting God to the test by placing a yoke on the neck of the disciples that neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear? But we believe that we will be saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, just as they will” [ACTS 15:10-11].
Peter, standing before the Judaizers, the elders of the congregation, and the Apostles, confessed that none of those gathered had been able to bear the yoke of the Law. This was an open confession of the impossibility of keeping the law. If even one of the six hundred thirteen commands was broken, the one breaking that command was guilty of violating all of the commands! There can be no exception.
That this is the case becomes clear when we hear James, the half-brother of our Lord, cautioning those earliest followers of the Christ, “Whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become guilty of all of it. For he who said, ‘Do not commit adultery,’ also said, ‘Do not murder.’ If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty” [JAMES 2:10-12].
The Apostle Paul registered his agreement with this understanding of the necessity of keeping all the commandments when he wrote, “All who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, ‘Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them’” [GALATIANS 3:10].
In making this statement, Paul is simply reaching back to what was written in the Law. You will recall that Moses had written the words which Paul paraphrases. According to Moses’ instructions, all Israel would stand on either Mount Gerizim or Mount Ebal to recite the words of God which Moses had written. Half of the people would stand on Mount Gerizim to pronounce the blessings of the Lord, and half of the people would stand on Mount Ebal to pronounce the curses for any who violated the Law of God. And the final curse specifically referred to the failure to perfectly maintain all the Words of the LORD. “‘Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen’” [DEUTERONOMY 27:26].
Jesus Himself makes it clear that one must never think that these commands of God are inconsequential, when He says during the Sermon on the Mount, “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. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” [MATTHEW 5:17-20].
Of course, we know that the righteousness of any one of us will not exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees. Among other reasons for this failure to exceed them in this area, none of us can even begin to name all six hundred thirteen commands. Fortunately, I don’t have to depend on my righteousness to satisfy the just demands of the Lord GOD. Nor are you required to be righteous through your own efforts. I hear what the Apostle has written as he reviews the reasons he might have once considered himself righteous. His curriculum vitae lists—eight day circumcision, an Israelite of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee. All this should stand him in good stead in the realm of righteousness according to religious Jews.
However, the Apostle testifies, “Whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” [PHILIPPIANS 3:7-8a]. The things that we would imagine to be valued hold no attraction for him—nor should we be enamoured of these things!
Aspects of life that are highly valued by people living solely for this world are ultimately meaningless. How does your pedigree benefit you when you are dead? Of what value is your education and training after you have departed this life? The wealth and the goods you may have accumulated have no eternal value when your days on this planet have at last ended. Paul continues his review of those things that once held sway in his life, contrasting them to what is of eternal worth and thus truly valuable. He writes, “For [Christ’s] sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead” [PHILIPPIANS 3:8b-11].
My righteousness will never suffice to please God. Though I can never be sufficiently righteous to meet the demands of Holy God, I can nevertheless be clothed in the righteousness that does meet God’s just demands. The righteousness that fulfils God’s just demands does not come through some supposed effort on my part. Rather, the righteousness from God comes by faith. If I will please Him, it must be that I will stand in the righteousness of His Beloved Son, Jesus. This is Paul’s assertion when he writes, “The righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it—the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins” [ROMANS 3:21-25].
Though I am anything but perfect in my efforts, in Christ I am able to stand perfect in the presence of God. This truth is emphasised repeatedly in Paul’s writings. For instance, in his Letter to Roman Christians, we witness the Apostle testifying, “Since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” [ROMANS 5:1].
His testimony as he wrote the Christians in Philippi was that he prayed for them constantly, and his prayer for them was recorded in the opening verses of the letter. “It is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God” [PHILIPPIANS 1:9-11].
Listen as Paul opens the Ephesian encyclical. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.
“In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory” [EPHESIANS 1:3-14].
So, through faith in the Risen Son of God, I am already declared righteous before the throne of the Father. I cannot keep God's commandments, nor is it necessary that I do so. I must walk in the Spirit, honouring the Father by permitting Him to guide me into paths that bring glory and honour to His Name. As I walk in the Spirit, as I seek to do that which honours the Lord, I fulfil the Law of God and thus fulfil all righteousness.
Can we agree that the commands of God can be summed up in the thought that this is the law of Christ? If this is the case, then fulfilling the law must be witnessed in some fashion in my life now. Listen again as I point to the Apostle’s repeated emphasis on fulfilling the law.
In the Letter to the Churches of Galatia, we witness the Apostle admonish Christians, “Bear one another’s burdens, and fulfil the law of Christ” [GALATIANS 6:2]. This admonition follows hard after an earlier admonition that “The whole law is fulfilled in one word: ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself’” [GALATIANS 5:14]. Thus, fulfilling the law of God, meeting the demand to obey the commandments, is related to the active participation in the Body of Christ, the ministry to one another that calls us to love one another deeply from the heart. Paul states the matter in this manner, “You were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another” [GALATIANS 5:13].
Allow me to nail this matter of the laws of God by pointing to a couple of other instances when we are taught how to fulfil the law. Writing the Christians living in Rome, Paul insisted that we must love one another. He wrote, “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, ‘You shall not commit adultery, You shall not murder, You shall not steal, You shall not covet,’ and any other commandment, are summed up in this word: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfilling of the law” [ROMANS 13:8-10].
When I love my fellow saints as much as I love myself, God’s Apostle teaches that I am fulfilling the law. I am not going to attempt to tell you the specifics how that love is to be demonstrated, except to say that loving my neighbour, loving my fellow Christians as myself ensures that I will do no wrong to my neighbour.
There is one further passage that I will point to at this time. Again, in the Letter to Roman Christians, we read, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 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, 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” [ROMANS 8:1-4]. The righteous requirements of the law could never be fulfilled through our own efforts. What we could not do, however, God has done for us by sending His Son to die in our place, setting us free from the demands of the written commands of God.
FULFILMENT SHALL SURELY ACCOMPANY OUR OBEDIENCE — If the commandments of God can be summed up through bearing one another’s burden, by loving others deeply from the heart, and by walking by the Spirit, what difference will my obedience to the will of the Master make in my own life? At the heart of these questions is a more personal question that each of us must answer. Will we be fulfilled? Or will we be frustrated? The answer is revealed in the text that lies open before us in this message.
Some may imagine that obedience is defined by mindlessly performing assorted tasks as though to be a Christian requires that an individual must cease thinking. The view of many people is that we have to check in our mind at the church door if we wish to follow Christ as Lord. To be certain, we who are determined to follow the Lord seek to discover the will of the Lord and we then obey what He wills, but this obedience is anything but mindless. We are not mere automatons without any ability to think.
Writing to the Christians gathered in Corinth, the Apostle Paul testified of himself and those who laboured with him, “We are God’s co-workers” [1 CORINTHIANS 3:9a ISV]. The Apostle would declare the grace of God, and in doing this, he was confessing that God had privileged him to share in the divine work. In fact, elsewhere, Paul testifies, “Working together with [God], then, we appeal to you not to receive the grace of God in vain” [2 CORINTHIANS 6:1].
And what the Apostle was saying in these passages was nothing less than a verbal confession delivered by each of the Apostles anticipating the experience of all who follow the Christ. After His resurrection, the Word of God tells of the life of the early Christians by pointing to the joint labour we share as servants of the Risen Saviour. This is the statement penned by Mark, “The Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And [the disciples] went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs” [MARK 16:19-20].
It was precisely because the Master ascended into Heaven and is now seated at the right hand of the Father that the disciples embraced the labour of preaching the message of grace, as they walked in the power of the Spirit of Christ. It is precisely because the Son of God is seated at the right hand of the Father today that we are assured that the message entrusted to us will always work powerfully in those who hear us as we preach.
I never preach a message without confidence that the Spirit of God will work through what is said to accomplish the will of Christ Who appointed me to His service. Whenever I go forth to do the work God has assigned, I am assured that I am not alone—God is with me! He enables me to do all that He has commanded. He assigns the task, and then He gives me the strength to do what He has commanded. He gives me wisdom so that so there is no need to question how to perform what He commands. Perhaps you will recall the statement the Psalmist makes as He presents the Shepherd’s Psalm.
“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil,
for you are with me;
Your rod and Your staff,
they comfort me.”
[PSALM 23:4]
I know that many people are prepared to disregard the power of Christ’s Word. Nice people, even kind people, are known to ridicule the message of grace and to dismiss the need for salvation. This is not some new phenomenon in our world, for ridicule of the message of Christ has been a feature in the world since the earliest days of the Faith. Disregard such as revealed by those inhabiting the darkened world does not invalidate the Word; all such people reveal is their own ignorance. The rock which is the Word of God is not shaken by the puerile efforts of ignorant people.
You may recall that the LORD, speaking through the court prophet Isaiah, has said,
“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven
and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.”
[ISAIAH 55:10-11]
I have witnessed numerous people who worked at ridiculing the message of Christ; just as you no doubt you have witnessed such people at some point in your own walk with the Saviour. Those who mock the Faith appear to imagine that they are the sum of wisdom, and nothing will happen because of their attempts to mock the Living God. Still, God’s Word does accomplish what He pleases, and it shall return to Him having either set the prisoner at liberty or condemning to eternal banishment one who rejected His grace.
And yet, the promise of God stands, a promise which may be readily verified by anyone willing to test what has been written. If we heed the Word of God, seeking His will and then doing what He commands, we have every reason to expect that we shall live and we shall prosper, that it may go well with us, and that we are able to live long in the land which God has given us. If we do what He commands, we should rightly expect that His righteousness will be revealed through us as we conduct ourselves according to His will. Have you tested God to see if He is true? As Paul asserts, “Let God be true though everyone were a liar” [ROMANS 3:4a].
I am fully aware that the promises given in either of the texts under consideration this day speak to Israel's national welfare. And I should anticipate that the nation that honours the Lord God by doing what He commands can anticipate His blessing, even in this day. Moreover, I am confident that the blessings promised apply in a general way to the individual who seeks to follow the Lord God, doing what honours Him. Amen.
FRUSTRATION MUST ALWAYS ACCOMPANY OUR DISOBEDIENCE — Can we please God if we ignore Him, refusing to do His will? James asks, “Does a spring pour forth from the same opening both fresh and salt water? Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives, or a grapevine produce figs? Neither can a salt pond yield fresh water” [JAMES 3:11-12]. Isn’t it obvious that a polluted heart is incapable of honouring God? A soul seeking satisfaction only for itself can never please the Lord.
Frustration awaits our disobedience. The disobedient soul has an almost universal anthem for life, the disobedient will always be singing, “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction!” Perhaps the obstreperous person has a fleeting glimpse of what could be, but he or she will forever pursue a phantasm, merely hoping to somehow capture a will-o-the-wisp. God, speaking through His servant Moses, promises that those who walk in obedience to His will can anticipate life, can anticipate a lack of complication in the challenges faced, the obedient can expect a long life. By contrast, the insubordinate individual can expect to complications for which she or he can find no solution. That rebellious soul will face multiple threats to enjoyment, and possibly threats even to life, because they are acting contrary to the will of the Lord. Above all else, the contumacious individual has sacrificed any right to expectation of God’s protection.
I understand that these statements present a dark and threatening side of the Lord GOD. As He prepared to deliver the promise of rich blessing for obedience, the LORD called on those who heard Moses speak on that day to look back to one event in order to think through the consequences of disobedience to His will. We read in DEUTERONOMY 6:16, “You shall not put the LORD your God to the test, as you tested Him at Massah.” What happened at Massah? The answer is found by reviewing what is written in Exodus.
In EXODUS 17:1-7, we find the account that informs us of what took place at Massah. “All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the LORD, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, ‘Give us water to drink.’ And Moses said to them, ‘Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the LORD?’ But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, ‘Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?’ So Moses cried to the LORD, ‘What shall I do with this people? They are almost ready to stone me.’ And the LORD said to Moses, ‘Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go. Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.’ And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the LORD by saying, ‘Is the LORD among us or not?’”
By compelling the people to look back to the events at Massah and Meribah, God is reminding His people that they had a long way to go before they qualified as a godly nation. Every time they confronted a new obstacle, or new challenge, the people appear to have failed the test. The trials they faced only brought out the worst in the people. They had just failed a test when they were hungry. The account of that failure is given in the previous chapter of Exodus. Now, they were confronted with a lack of water. And their response was to complain, to gripe, to condemn Moses as the cause of their trial.
The thing that we must remember concerning the complaining that arose from within the congregation in the wilderness is that while they appear to have focused their anger on Moses, really it was the LORD Who had become the object of their outrage. The people were charging God with malfeasance; they claimed God was acting improperly. Consequently, they placed themselves in opposition to the Living God. They exalted their own opinion as superior to that of the Lord GOD. Moses recognised what had happened, and confronted the people of Israel, asking, “Why do you test the LORD?”
Before the matter would be concluded, many people would die, and even Moses, moved with frustration at the insubordination of the people, would act rashly, dishonouring the LORD. The takeaway for us is that consequences of sin are always wide-ranging and dreadful to relationships and yes, deadly even for persons. Here is a truth that must not be ignored: When grumbling goes unchecked in the community of Faith, it contaminates every person within the community. When discontent is allowed to continue without stern and immediate exposure for the evil that it actually is, it will contaminate even the godly. The consequences of discontent are far greater than we might ever imagine. Neither implicitly nor explicitly, we who follow the Risen Saviour must never allow ourselves to slip into a position where we begin to charge the Living God with impropriety, with malfeasance. The assembly of the righteous must never tolerate grumbling within the membership.
As a lad, my dad warned me that there were two things for which he would definitely punish me—if I came home crying over something that couldn’t be changed, or if I came home crying over something that could be changed. If the situation was unable to be resolved, then I needed to seek out an alternative and do what was necessary to implement the alternative. If the situation could be remedied, then I needed to remedy the problem. There was wisdom in that position which my dad instilled in his sons so many years ago. Something like that must be implemented within the congregation of the righteous today. Each member must accept responsibility to hold one another accountable for refusing to surrender to an attitude of fostering discontent and tolerating complaining.
A CALL TO OBEDIENCE — “The LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day. And it will be righteousness for us, if we are careful to do all this commandment before the LORD our God, as he has commanded us” [DEUTERONOMY 6:24-25]. And here is the command which Moses delivered. This was not a suggestion or even a recommendation; he begins by stating, “The LORD commanded us!” His words are effectively a statement that there can be no tolerance for complaining or for refusal to do what is commanded.
What is “this commandment” that the Lord GOD delivered to His people Israel? In the previous chapter, Moses had recited the Ten Words, the Commandments which God had given earlier. Consequently, this is the basis for the naming of this Book “Deuteronomy,” the “Second Law.” This is the second recitation of the Law which God gave. You will see this recitation in DEUTERONOMY 5:6-21. However, Moses condenses the commandments of the Lord into a concise reminder of what is necessary to honour God. He writes, “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” [DEUTERONOMY 6:4-5]. Amen.
On one occasion Jesus was challenged to name the greatest commandment of all. He pointed back to this summary statement. Here is the account as Mark provided it. “One of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that [Jesus] answered them well, asked him, ‘Which commandment is the most important of all?’ Jesus answered, ‘The most important is, “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength”’” [MARK 12:28-30].
However, you will no doubt remember that Jesus wasn’t finished instructing this scribe, and therefore instructing us, for He chose to provide a corollary to this first and greatest of all commandments. Jesus said, “The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these” [MARK 12:31]. With this, the Lord taught us that a proper relationship with the Father will of necessity lead to a proper relationship with mankind. What is stunning about this is that a proper and lasting relationship with others can never be achieved without a proper relationship to the Living God. Submission to God, embracing His revealed will as regnant in your own life, is necessary to a right relationship with others.
The Lord, speaking through His servant Moses, made the case simpler still, when He said, “It is the LORD your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by His Name you shall swear” [DEUTERONOMY 6:13]. Live for God. Live in such a way that it is evident that you seek Him and always long to do His will. Live in such a way that it is evident that God reigns in your life, that you love Him supremely, and that you want to serve Him by knowing and by doing His will.
Moses would make this very case when He admonished the people he had led for those many years through the desert. “You shall not put the LORD your God to the test, as you tested him at Massah. You shall diligently keep the commandments of the LORD your God, and his testimonies and his statutes, which he has commanded you. And you shall do what is right and good in the sight of the LORD, that it may go well with you” [DEUTERONOMY 6:16-18a]. Be diligent in keeping the commandments that the LORD has given. Know His testimonies and statutes, and do what is right and good in His sight. Doing this, God has given His Word that it will go well with you.
Perhaps we can make what was written fresher by translating into somewhat contemporary language the concept that was stated by Moses. We saw the understanding Jesus gave when He was challenged by one of the religious leaders in Israel. He pointed back to the words of Moses that are recorded earlier in the sixth chapter of Deuteronomy. There, we read, “You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” [DEUTERONOMY 6:4]. The LORD was commanding in essence that we who would honour Him are responsible to ensure that He is central to our lives. We are to consider what pleases the Lord, and then boldly do all that He has revealed as His will. What was taught at that time is incumbent upon us to this day. We who follow Christ Jesus the Son of God are charged to seek Him will and to do His will in all things.
Above all else, we honour the Lord God when we honour the sacrifice that He has provided. You know very well that Jesus gave Himself as an infinite sacrifice because of our brokenness. You know that He was buried and that He rose from the dead on the third day, just as He said He would. Now, the Word of God calls us to believe this truth, receiving this Risen Christ as our Saviour. The Word of God promises, if you agree with God that Jesus is Master over your life, believing that He has be raised from the dead, you will be set free. It is as we believe that we are made right with the Father, and as we agree with Him that we are set free [see ROMANS 10:9-10]. The Apostle simplifies what is stated here when he cites the Prophet Joel, testifying, “Everyone who calls on the Name of the Lord will be saved” [ROMANS 10:13]. Therefore, you are invited to life in the Beloved Son of God as you place your faith in Him, receiving Him as Master over your life. Believe this message and be set free from all condemnation, free of all guilt, and accepted into the Family of God with a full inheritance, just as promised. Amen.
[1] Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible: English Standard Version. Wheaton: Standard Bible Society, 2016. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
[2] Saint Augustine Bishop of Hippo, The Confessions of St. Augustine, E. B. Pusey (trans) (Logos Research Systems, Inc., Oak Harbor, WA 1996
[3] “The Law: All 613 Commandments,” Gospel Outreach, https://www.gospeloutreach.net/613laws.html, accessed 14 April 2022
