Why keep them?

I've heard the argument made that the Ten Commandments stand behind our whole system of law, and without acknowledging their force, a stack of laws ten feet high won't be effective.

We can argue about politics where the big defense for wrong behavior sounds like kids on the playground: “He (or she) is doing it too!, so I can do thus and so...”

In the current view, there are no absolutes, only relative advantages.

Let's be honest and give it its proper theological name:

all of this lying, cheating, stealing, murdering of persons or their reputations, etc. etc. is SIN.

It is Sing against one another, and also against God.

That has never been a very popular thing to have pointed out.

There is the famous scene of Nathan the prophet confronting King David about his adultery, theft of the wife of Uriah the Hittite, Bathsheba, his arranged murder, and then lying about it all.

“King, you've been thinking only of yourself, your wants and desires, and not about the lives of others and whether or not your actions honor the Lord God who has given you this office, power and responsibility.”

Notice that King David then gave up his excuses, the rationalizations, and the lies and simply said “I have sinned.”

David is far from perfect.

We can write a long list of his errors, excesses, and sin...and remember, he was regarded as the best king that Israel ever had.

Imagine what the worst were like!

He is great because he comes to understand that God will continue to work through him, bringing him up short when he does wrong, by sending him brave people like Nathan who will speak boldly from the basis of God's covenant in the Ten Commandments, and then redirecting him.

That is now the first purpose of the law; to restrain sin, to disclose evil, to keep us from killing one another in the general society.

We have freedom of speech, but we are not free to yell “Fire” without cause in a crowded theater, because someone could easily be hurt or killed in the ensuing stampede.

The Fifth Commandment is to restrain us from risking a catastrophe.

We can turn the steering wheel of our cars any way we wish, but we will keep to the right side of the road so as not to kill another person and destroy his or her property.

Se how we have moved from a civics lecture to considering our behavior theologically by way of the Ten Commandments!

But there is of course a way to misuse these observations, a way to turn the Ten Commandments into a checklist or scoreboard of self-righteousness.

--I didn't make mother angry today.

--I didn't murder anyone, yet.

--I did not commit adultery today, no not once, today.

--I didn't lie on my tax return, very much....and so on and on.

And as it all goes along, one begins to feel rather smug about it all.

“I managed quite nicely,” each of us could think, “quite nicely indeed, without God.”

It is a lie, of course.

There is no way for us to do anything without God, whether we are conscious of it or not.

Further, all those moral accomplishments of which we are so proud...all of them are flawed.

I remember reading an autobiographical book in which the author related rather proudly that he kept a strictly kosher kitchen, never mixing meat and dairy implements and all the rest of the dietary rules which kosher entails.

But it was only a few pages later that he told about participating in his Bar Mitzvah only in order to get presents, and that thereafter he refused to go to synagogue any more!

It has become rather pointless, hasn't it?

Why bother to keep a kosher kitchen without all the rest of an observant life, which certainly should be centered on worship?

It is much like some of our own students who treat catechetical study as something done once, endured for the sake of honors and presents, and from which one graduates and never deals with again.

The point of it all has been missed!

It is a life which is demanded by God, not a few hours.

It is the same with those other things on your checklist, especially when we review Luther's explanation of the Ten Commandments.

No, we should not rob our neighbor of his money or property, nor bring them into our possession by dishonest trade or by dealing in shoddy wares, but jest by avoiding those gross evils, we have not kept the full intent of the commandment.

We are also to help out neighbor improve and protect his income and property.

There is no room there for the envy or covetousness which is also detailed in the 9^th and 10^th commandments.

There is no room for doing less than one's best in business dealings, doing what is best for both buyer and seller.

We can continue to examine each of our accomplishments in this and in every other area of life, and we will soon discover that each of them is tainted in a variety of ways.

How can we prove our worth to ourselves and to God? We can't!

How can we survive, all on our own? We can't.

Even Stephen Hawking, thinking all his brilliant theories, trying to explain everything without reference to God, was granted life by the very God whom he despises.

Through accident or illness or catastrophe, death is always lurking nearby, ready to claim us.

The second purpose of the Ten Commandments is to demonstrate to us that we can never make it on our own,

so that we come to say that the only thing which makes sense, the only thing that will endure, the only thing that lasts forever is the promise of our Lord Jesus.

When we finally say that Jesus must be Lord over all parts and corners of our lives, then the Ten Commandments have done their most important task: they have driven us to Christ.

That needs to happen constantly.

As Paul saw long ago, all this will seem quite foolish to those who are determined to prove how smart, important, and powerful they are.

They insist on treating the Commands as “Ten Suggestions” which can be ignored.

At length, we will see who it is that is wise and who is foolish.

As one of our favorite hymns concludes:

On Christ the solid rock I stand,

All other ground is sinking sand.

In the meantime, there is yet another propose of the commands.

--as a guide for someone who wants to say thank you to God.

Apart from the faithful community of God's people, the commands simply appear heroic, impossible, or just off.

But the Church, as the community of sinful yet forgiven people who keep coming together to worship and scattering to serve, makes the commands intelligible,

We should put a warning label on the commands: don't try to obey these alone; it's impossible, because these Ten Commandments are about relationships with God and with others.

We need one another,

-- as we attempt to minimize the hurt we inflict on each other and the Lord God (first purpose),

--as we realize that by ourselves we are lost and need someone to point out to us God's forgiveness (second purpose)

--and as we try to puzzle out what to do next because we are forgiven by God and can ask it of others. (third purpose)

It is a treasure, a wonderful treasure, these Ten Commandments.

Instead of pretending that we can ignore it, let's together open the treasure and keep asking what is in it for me, for us, Lord. Amen.

Please note: The preceding sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.