Hello, you are listening to Second City Sermons,
a ministry of Second City Church in Midtown Harrisburg.
It's our hope that these sermons will draw you
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you enjoy this sermon. God bless. Let's pray
again. We pray that your words this morning for
us would bring life. Where so often our words
are used to bring death, to cut down, to destroy,
to deface. Gotta pray that your words to us would
bring life in us and that we would be those who
love life, who cherish it, who delight in the
life of others, the life of your world. that
we would see that you're the one who spoke goodness
over the world. And you said it's very good when
you made mankind, humankind, male and female
in your image to bury your likeness into the
world. And so I pray Lord that we would be people
that love life, that cherish the life of others.
And you speak to us this morning, Lord, through
this commandment. That we would find your commands
to be those that give life to our bones. That
we speak of them on the way, that we teach them
to our children, that we live into them. For
your words are life. Praise in Jesus name, amen.
Right there, there's a cartoon, and in this cartoon
there are two school administrators. And what
they're doing is they're watching as children
entering the school, kids are entering the school,
and as they're having to enter the school through
a metal detector. Some of you likely went to
schools that had those kinds of devices where
you had to go in and you had to walk through
something. And one of these school administrators
is talking to the other and he says, it's the
latest school safety device. That light and that
horn will go off as students try to smuggle in
a gun or a knife or a bomb or the Ten Commandments.
Which is to say that some people think the Ten
Commandments are dangerous. Of course, right?
Many people think religion is very dangerous.
I'm sure you've heard that. It's one of the great
sort of objections to Christianity. how violent
religions are in general. They promote violence,
and it's even worse than promoting it. They do
it in the name of God, a divine sanction for
it. You can think of how people think of the
Ten Commandments as dangerous. The First Commandment
rules out other gods. How can that be used, right?
For violence it has been. People are confused
maybe about the day of rest, but we certainly
want to indulge a little bit here and there,
sexually. I don't like people to tell us what
to do, God included, with our bodies. But most
people, interestingly, I think most people agree
with the sixth commandment. Most cultures have
laws against taking of another's life. Murder.
David Paulson some of you are familiar with his
work. He wrote a book called good and angry good
and angry and He has a chapter in that book.
It's titled. Do you have a serious problem with
anger? Y 'all thought about that probably some
of you It's the shortest chapter in his book
It is one word Yes It's kind of simple yes Now
I've suggested to you that part of what we do
at the Commandments is we simplify them. We simplify
them so that we can check them off, right? We
want to define them in such a way that we can
meet them. Check. And this is the way of the
human heart. But Paulson's answer, his long chapter,
doesn't really give room for that. Doesn't allow
for that kind of simplicity. A few weeks back,
about a month ago, I said that we ought to do
this approach, take this approach to the Ten
Commandments as sort of a checklist so that we
can hang our heads high and we can look down
our noses at others. We can say, I am among the
righteous. Of course, this often leads to a kind
of hypocrisy that invites so many others to dismiss
Christian faith. I'm engaging with the law of
God in a way that is for them and not for us.
Because as soon as we see the commandments as
the one, as soon as we see us as the one who
keep the commandments and others as the one that
we don't, we often inflate ourselves and deflate
the image of God in others. We live life properly,
so we think, and so we can diminish others who
do not. We can deface them. Now here's Here's
an odd thing. So this morning, I actually want
to start with the idea that there is a simplicity
to this command. I said our inclination is to
simplify them, but in a way, this is actually
kind of a simple command. Partly it's simple
because if you were listening as Chuck read it,
the first five commands are decent. They're not
long, but they're more than two words. And you're
like, well, maybe this is this. You shall not
murder. It's actually, that's just two words
in the Hebrew. Low rot suck No murder don't murder
Don't do it now That's kind of simple. All right
We say this there's actually eight words in Hebrew
that we might trans kill Okay, there's quite
a few words that That talk about this idea of
killing in the in the Bible in the Hebrew Bible
And this word is not one of the ones that's used
a lot. It's used number of times it's used here
it has a specific meaning this word is not the
one that is used for hunting or for killing animals
it's actually not the one that for the vast majority
of the time is used when you talk about the law
of god when there's certain types of killing
that happens or even in the context of war it's
not one of the ones that's used in the context
of the military now this is a malicious this
is an unlawful taking of the life of another
It's talking about the taking of a life of another,
whom God has given life and who God is sustaining
life in them. It's saying, it is not yours to
take. It is unjust to take another's life. It
is wrong. No, Ratzach. It's manslaughter. Now
this is kind of, so there's a way that we can
kind of... What does this mean, right? Well,
one thing that it doesn't necessarily mean is
that this is a prohibition against self -defense,
okay? Just a few chapters later, actually, like,
you know, we're in Exodus 20, if you just go
two chapters later in Exodus 22, you can read
in verse 2, if a thief is found breaking in and
is struck, meaning actually somebody strikes
him because he's breaking in, and he dies, there
shall be no blood guilt. Meaning the blood is
not on your hands and you actually won't be liable
to judgment Your life will not be demanded This
is something I have to skirt very carefully around
because it's very complicated which I'm going
to kind of get to that a little bit But it's
also not a complete prohibition against capital
punishment Meaning that one's life is not taken
when they take another's life It's not at least
an outright command against that. Genesis 9 verse
6, maybe some of you remember this, we went through
Genesis, the beginning of Genesis a couple years
back. Genesis 9, 6 says, whoever sheds the blood
of man, by man shall his blood be shed. Why?
For God made man in his own image. The command
is actually an upholding of the reality of the
sanctity, the beauty, the gift of God making
humankind in this image. It's precisely because
murder is an assault on the image of God that
some forms of punishment are properly administered.
It's actually a defense of the image of God in
Genesis 9. Human life is so precious that taking
it was to be severely punished. Cannot take human
life and think that it is just something easily
done and to be dismissed and to be sort of let
go In some ways, this is what's at play actually
in the famous Principle of the Lex talionis,
which is the law of retaliation, which is actually
in the very next chapter in Exodus 21 An eye
for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, a wound for
a wound, which is the principle that the punishment
actually must fit the crime. Something that we
still uphold to today. But we also have to admit
that to a degree Gandhi was absolutely right,
that an eye for an eye makes the whole world
blind, right? If we keep gouging out each other's
eyes, nobody's gonna see. But here's what you
have to understand in the ancient Near East when
that was written in Axis 21. The law of the world
was not eye for an eye. It wasn't actually a
proper judgment on the deed done. Instead, it
was your head for my eye, your family for my
tooth, retribution. The command also doesn't
prohibit all war. Once again, I actually think
we need to be extremely careful here. Peace is
always the goal. To live at peace is always the
goal. But God does send Israel to battle. That's
hard. Romans 13 tells us that the state does
not bear the sword in vain, which means it does
bear the sword. And also it actually says more
specifically, it is not a quote, terror. to good
conduct, but to bad. The state actually has a
level of terror to bad conduct. When Jesus met
the centurion, he did not say, go and sin no
more. And part of your sinning is that you are
a centurion and you must exit the Roman army.
John the Baptist had the same thing. He had soldiers
that came to him because he was calling to repentance
and they were like, what do we have to do? And
he says, don't extort. What he doesn't say is,
leave this whole sordid army thing. He doesn't
tell them they must resign. Which to say, in
a way, there's a simplicity to this kind of,
and that this is focused on manslaughter. The
intentional premeditated taking of a human life
that God has given into the world. My mother's
womb you formed me. my inmost being, that the
image of God is always given by God into the
world. But what's interesting is this command
also does seem to include a sort of a negligent
homicide. In Deuteronomy 22, the guilt of blood
was upon your house. The same kind of idea, the
guilt of blood. So you were going to be liable
for shedding blood. If you didn't put a parapet
around the roof of your house. Here's what would
happen is that people would often, in the cool
of the evening, they would go outside and they
would hang out on the roof of their house, kind
of like another room. And if you didn't put a
fence around it so that your neighbor wouldn't
fall over and die, you would be blood guilty.
If your neighbor fell off that negligent homicide,
you'd be blood guilty. In Exodus 21, again the
very next chapter from what we're looking at,
if your ox was known for being violent and you
did nothing about it, you would be blood guilty.
What I'm saying is that in a way there is a simplicity
to this command to say all of human life is sacred.
All of human life is sacred and no human life,
not one single human life is exempt from that.
All are made in the image of God. Therefore,
murder is prohibited. Here's the thing, is that
at this point, you're looking at the checklist
and you're going, right. I don't have a parapet
around my roof. I don't need one. I don't have
any ox. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know,
you make your list. But do not be so quick because
the parapet and the ox may be far from our experience
But the principle is that we must do all that
we can For the well -being of others lives all
that we can to protect the life of another to
protect to love the life of your neighbor You
cannot just look at this command and see it as
a prohibition to cold -blooded premeditated murder
that can't be allowed from the Old Testament
itself. You can't just look at this command and
look at those who practice suicide or euthanasia
or abortion and feel good about yourself. You
can't. You also can't just look at this and say,
I get a stamp on state violence. You can't. You
cannot look at this command and say, I get a
stamp on capital punishment. You can't. Why do
I say that? If I start out with the idea of it's
sort of simple, and you're like, well, it's getting
a little more complex. It is simple because it's
a rather specific word in a way. But how the
Bible applies it is so vast. For the one, let
me give you a few examples. For the one who committed
unintentional murder, for the one who had blood
guilt because of their unintentional murder,
meaning that their life could have been demanded
of them, there were six cities of refuge throughout
Israel, strategically placed, geographically
spread out so that you could flee there and you
would not die. It was not just the case. Look
at what you did. You allowed your ox to gore
people. We're going to take your life. Your life
could be preserved because the desire was always
peace. The desire is always the well -being of
our neighbors. The passage that I read from Exodus
22 about self -defense, right? And how it said,
and you will have blood guilt on your, you know,
you won't have blood guilt if you're acting in
self -defense. That's verse two of that chapter.
The next verse says, but if the son has risen
on him, meaning the one who you acted against
in self -defense, the son came up and he's still
living, there shall be blood guilt. Meaning if
you didn't do all you could to actually spare
the life of the one who was coming into your
house, you were not loving your neighbor. You
were not promoting life. And even for war, the
Israelites were commanded to offer sacrifices
before going to war. Partly they were seeking
God's blessing, but also it is a truth that we
find all throughout in the wars of the Bible
that so often the innocent blood is shed. So
often. And it's actually something that happens
quite a bit in the Bible to Israel that they
are punished because of how they enacted wars.
It is not so easy. Murder may be a fact of life.
War is a reality of life. Jesus says in Matthew
24, that we will always have wars and rumors
of wars until the end has come. But let's not
pretend. That the difference between murder and
war can at times be paper thin And the Bible
I think seems to make this rather clear The truth
is that untold multitudes of human beings have
had their lives taken away from them by crimes
or war And sometimes this difference seems we're
not sure always where the difference is Let me
give you an example. A few decades before the
birth of Jesus, Julius Caesar spent 10 years
in Gaul, modern -day France. He made a great
name for himself. He became famously wealthy
during those 10 years. What did he do? Well estimates
is that he killed upwards of a million people
in this conquest. People against whom the Roman
Empire had no specific grievances He kept because
by killing them he gained power he gained wealth
People people don't really think back on Julius
Caesar as the mass murder we might put Nero in
that category But he was Murder always seems
to be this selfish action. And here's the thing,
Christians, it's sort of easy for us to look
at the massive bloodshed that happened with the
rejection of God and the communist revolutions.
And by the way, there actually is something really
important to hear in this. If you get rid of
religion, it does not mean you get rid of violence.
And part of the hope many have I'll do away with
religion. It's a violent thing what we have seen
is when that happens exactly Violence seems to
skyrocket, but it may be easy to kind of look
upon those We think of the 21 60 million people
who died under Stalin the 40 to 80 million under
Mao Zedong One and a half to two million who
died in the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge
And we may go look at all that those people out
there But Christians we have we have to actually
also say if we are going to tell history Well,
we have to also recount the wars of religion
in France in the 16th century They did their
own killings two to four million people the French
Huguenots the Protestants against the French
Catholics in the name of Christ There's a book
that I read about I did not read titled a distant
mirror the calamitous 14th century And it recounts
how noblemen fought untold wars to gain land
against each other. How they sent their men into
others' lands to gain power and to gain wealth.
How they taxed their citizens beyond their livelihood.
They were dying so they could pay for their war
to gain power and to gain wealth. And this was
done by one Christian nobleman against another.
It's titled A Distant Mirror. Why? Because we
need these mirrors to see what would we do if
we had this kind of power? What could we do if
we ordered people around and they did what we
said? And the truth of history seems to be that
we diminish. We deface. We take the lives of
others made in the very image of God. This is
what we do. It's what we do with power. What
I'm saying is that this may be a simple command
in some regards, and in some regards it is. But
it is far from simple, which is why one of the
things that our Lord is saying is that we all
break it. What Jesus is saying there in Matthew
5 is that murder is just the most obvious violation
of something that is so all -encompassing, so
much bigger. And partly that's because the thou
shalt nots in the commandments are always accompanied
by the thou shouts. And the command throughout
the Bible is always to seek the well -being of
your neighbor, to love. to act for the good of,
to love your neighbor as yourself. If you found
your neighbor's lost animal in the Old Testament,
you were to return it. There were no finders,
keepers, losers, weepers. If you plowed your
field, you were commanded to leave some of it
for those who did not have food. Why? So they
could live. They could have life they would starve
Get this if you gained a slave because a man
had debts that he could not pay There are a number
of specific ways that you had to look out for
the interest of that person and Actually went
beyond this because when he was able to gain
freedom, you were actually supposed to set him
up so that he was financially better off than
when he had to go into that kind of slavery.
Why? Because you were to love your neighbor as
yourself. You have to lift up the image of God
and others. You had to be generous, not just
fair. You had to be generous. Life from conception
to the grave. Life to be loved and delighted
in and cherished protected the prohibition of
murder Was not just the prohibition to not harm
but to love protect To care for to tend to feed
to nourish to seek life To love others as you
love yourself Listen to some of the passages
from the New Testament that were commanded This
is from Romans 15. We who are strong have an
obligation to bear with the failings of the weak.
I mean, if you look at history, for the most
part, the strong have abused the weak. Romans
tells us you have an obligation to bear with
the failings of the weak and not to please ourselves.
That's what it says, not to please ourselves.
Let each of us please his neighbor for his good,
to build him up. That's what we're commanded
to do. 1 Corinthians 10, let no one seek his
own good, but the good of his neighbor. Philippians,
do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility
count others more significant than yourself.
It's not just fair, but generous. Titus, show
perfect courtesy towards All people. We still
want that to say people that look like me and
vote like me and all the rest. All people! But
the consistent thing of the Bible is that life
is given by God, that there's no one who does
not bear his image, and there is no one for whom
you are not to lift up, to care for, to tend
to. Of course, Jesus' own words, which may be
the hardest, Matthew chapter five farther along
than what we read, love your enemies and pray
for those who persecute you. Love your enemies.
And none of this is in contrast to the words
of the Old Testament. that Jesus is expounding
upon there in Matthew chapter 5. None of this
is sort of fighting against what we had in the
Old Testament. Jesus says, you've heard that
it said, thou shalt not murder. What people were
doing is they were trying to take that command
and say, well, if you just do these things, then
you're fine. No, His words are not against the
Old Testament. Not against it when He says that
if you harbor anger against your brother, You'll
be liable to judgment and to the council. When
he says that when you call somebody fools, you'll
be liable to the hells of fire. It's not against
this command when Jesus tells us that we ought
to actually go and be reconciled to our brother
when we're going to offer our gifts. Stop if
you have something against your brother, make
amends, live into peace. None of that's opposed
to this command. This is actually the right outflow
of this command. Because your brother, the one
that you are tempted to say, you fool, use your
words to cut down is made in the very image of
God. No, this is a command to live in peace,
to seek life, to love life, to cherish it. There's
a... It's kind of simplicity of this command
that you might use to let yourself off the hook.
I think if you simplify it too much, actually,
what you may be able to do is write others off.
Because that's what we can do. When we can check
it off, we can say, I can check this off and
you can't. And then I can begin to actually look
down on you and write you off. I did not commit
manslaughter. We can simplify others. We simplify
others all the time, right? We put people into
categories. Racial categories, of course. Age
categories. These people are too old. They're
a strain financially on society. Maybe we can
decide when they live or when they don't. These
people are so young. They're a strain on society.
Maybe we can decide when they live and when they
don't. These people vote that way. I can use
my words however I want. There's a simplicity
to this command. If you take it that way, you
can speak to your wife in that tone of voice,
those harsh words. You can tweet and post and
say whatever you will about those people, those
political enemies. But there's another kind of
simplicity of this command, I think, that invites
us into this all -encompassing thing. And the
simplicity of this command is the dignity of
every single human being and the call for every
single one of us to love life, to pursue the
well -being of our neighbors, that we are to
actually love them, as Jesus says, as ourselves.
And if we look at it like this, it's almost impossible
to not see that each one of us is blood guilty,
right? That each one of us breaks this, that
each one of us should actually, that it could
demand our life. If we understand this command
rightly, we may want to be the ones who bar it.
from the entry of schools and of our houses and
of our hearts, because what if it demands our
life? What if it makes us blood guilty because
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves,
us all? Because the real right answer to the
question of, do you have a serious problem with
anger is what? Yes. Yes, we do And I've got to
tell you about good news or he does not tell
you about good news It's been mentioned this
is Trinity Sunday One of things that we see when
we reflect on the Trinity is that the Trinity
Father Son, the Holy Spirit is the God who loves
life just consistently God loves life. We can
read of God the Father that He gives everyone
life and breath and everything else in Acts 17.
We can read there in that same passage, but also
elsewhere, in Him we live and we move and we
have our being. But there is no life that does
not exist without the will of God. We can read
Jesus say in John chapter five, for just as the
father raises the dead and gives life to them,
so also the son gives life. That's what it says.
That's what Jesus does. That's what the father
does. Gives life, loves life. Of course, we can
recount as we have so many times the Nicene Creed.
And the very first thing it says about the Holy
Spirit, is that the Holy Spirit is the Lord and
giver of life. It is who God is, the one who
loves life. Of course, when we look at the life
of Jesus, we see that the command of Jesus is
also, it's not just His command, it is His character.
If we look at the Gospels, we don't just see
that Jesus commands us these things, but He lives
them. It's His character. It's who God is incarnate.
I shall not kill. God does not assault the image
of God. What does Jesus do? He doesn't assault
it. He restores it. He doesn't take life. Jesus
doesn't take life. What does He do? He gives
life. Jesus doesn't wound. He heals. His life
not only generally, but he says he gives it abundantly.
He just loves it. He's always promoting life,
life to the fullest. Jesus does not oppress others,
but he liberates them. His words, even his harsh
words, which are harsh at times, are words for
life and repentance. He does not will that any
should perish, but that all should come to life,
everlasting life. Friends, Jesus had all the
reason in the world to seek vengeance, to seek
retribution, right? Blood guilty. He had all
the reason in the world to exercise ultimate
judgment, to say, you're liable. You're liable
to the council and to the judgment and to the
hells of fire, as he says. But what does he do?
Said he suffers Instead he is murdered his life
is taken unjustly He dies that we who murder
might live Murder in our hearts murder in our
words murder in our writing Sometimes murder
in our hands He dies that we might live. He doesn't
murder, but he dies the victim of murder so that
we who are the murderers might actually have
some life because why? He loves it. He loves
life. He's restoring the image of God in the
world. That is all throughout the Bible. It is
central to the scriptures that God loves life.
The lover of life is who our trying God is. From
beginning of the Bible to the end of the Bible.
This is who he is. It's also who he calls his
people to be. What he's doing in Christ and through
the work of the Holy Spirit is he is recreating
us into his image. What happens when we reject
his image in the garden, the first sin after
they are expelled from God's presence? Murder.
And then Jesus comes to restore this reality.
of the fullness of the image of God in His creation.
This is who we are called to be. And as sordid
as Christian history has been, the truth is there
has also been vast multitudes of Christians who
have sought to love life and to do it in the
name of Jesus. And as they have done that, a
cruel and a violent and a murderous world has
seen it. and has given their life to Jesus, or
has at least questioned what's going on. Let
me give you a couple of examples. Julian the
Apostate, some of you are familiar with that
name, no friend to Christianity, writing in the
fourth century said, let us consider that nothing
has so much contributed to the progress of the
superstition, which is what he called Christianity.
Now, nothing has so much contributed to the progress
of the superstition of Christians as their charity.
love to strangers, and he didn't like it. But
people came to know Jesus because they loved
their strangers, people that weren't like them.
The 4th century church father Basil said that
nothing had rendered the Christian faith more
famous in those early times, and it made for
more followers of Christ than the bounty of Christian
charity. Let's fast forward a bit to the 19th
century. Charles Darwin, no friend of Christianity,
again, he observed the inhabitants of Tierra
del Fuego, which is on the far southern Pacific
coast of South America. So they were degraded
people, violent and miserable. And then some
years later he came back after some missionary
work had been done there, after Christians went
there to love them and to tell them about Jesus.
And some of those missionaries gave their life
to do so. So he stops again on one of his expeditions.
He sees how completely changed these people are,
from their violent ways to living a life of love
for others. And so he actually writes to the
missions agency that was caring for these people.
And he says, the success of the Tierra del Fuego
mission is most wonderful and charms me. As I
always prophesied, utter failure. I always prophesied
to be utter failure to go and work with that
violent people. He says it's a great success.
I shall feel proud if your committee think it
fit to elect me an honorary member of your society.
He wanted to be an honorary member of the mission
society because God's people went and loved life
and brought peace into a violent world. Is that
not beautiful? It is. It's lovely. So what should
we do? Will we find, as so many Christians have,
that this command is just the beginning of loving
your neighbors as yourself? Seeking the life
of others? Will we find that our neighbor's well
-being is our concern? Will we find that our
words, spoken and written, our actions, our hands
and our feet, our bodies, are not made for cutting
down, saying, you fool. But that God made us
to reflect Him, to create beauty and goodness,
truth in the world, to lift up life rather than
to tear it down. Will we find? that this command
is sweeter than honey and more to be desired
than gold. I think that if we do this, if we
do this, the Julian apostates and the Charles
Darwins might go, I want to be a part of that.
There is something lovely there. May it be true
of us. Amen. Lord God, may we never use your
law to beat down. May we see it as a lovely call
to love you with our whole heart and mind and
soul and strength and to love our neighbors as
ourselves. May we see the sanctity, the holiness
of you when we are called to love first. and
of those made in your image, our neighbors, who
we are called to love as ourselves. God, I pray
that this would start in our homes, with our
friends, with our children. May it start in our
church. And may it overflow into the world, a
world that is so fraught with violence, so fraught
with power grabbing, pushing others down, angry
words. Would your beauty extend through us? And
as you are the Lord and the giver of life, as
you're the one who authors it, who perfects it,
the one in whom we live and move and have our
being, Lord, would we live into your way? of
loving life. Amen. Thank you for listening to
Second City Sermon's podcast. We hope this sermon
has encouraged you to worship God and to celebrate
the gospel of Jesus. Please consider subscribing
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Sunday at 10 a .m. You can find us online at
secondcitychurch .org and on Instagram, Facebook,
and YouTube. Thanks again for listening. God
bless.