Outlining a People

Christian Community Presbyterian Church
Bowie, Maryland
September 22, 2024

Outlining a People
Exodus 20:1-5a, 7-10a, 12-17
(Video may be viewed at https://youtu.be/H7cD6shs0xA)

I am an avid reader of comic strips. One of my favorites, alas not in the Washington Post, is “The Born Loser” In one strip the title character, Brutus Thornapple, is sitting in his chair reading the Bible. One of his nemeses, his wife’s mother, Mother Gargle, walks up and says, “Well, look who’s reading the Bible! Har-de-har-har!” “I’ll have you know, you old barracuda,” Brutus replies, “that I’ve followed the Ten Commandments all my life!” She walks away saying, “Too bad you never managed to catch up with them!”

    We have heard of the Ten Commandments all our lives, but do we really “catch up with them”? Do we understand what they are and why God has given them?

    The Law was part of the ongoing blessing with which God embraced the people of Israel. Remember that God singled out Abraham and Sarah and gave them a blessing-filled future for Abraham’s descendants and for all people. When Joseph was trafficked to Egypt he flourished because God pre-positioned him to take care of Egypt, the surrounding countries, and his own family in the famine. As the children of Jacob endured enslavement by a Pharaoh who did not know Joseph, God prepared to create a people who would be outlined by the commandments. The liberation from Egypt was followed by the blessing of the commandments which were to be guides for living the meaningful life God intended for them as the chosen people.

    Let’s reflect on the presence of the Law in scripture. Here are words from the first Psalm:

        Happy are those
            who do not follow the advice of the wicked
        or take the path that sinners tread
            or sit in the seat of scoffers,
        but their delight is in the law of the Lord,
            and on his law they meditate day and night. (Psalm 1:1-2)

And these words from Psalm 119:

        Oh, how I love your law!
            It is my meditation all day long....
        How sweet are your words to my taste,
            sweeter than honey to my mouth!...
        Your word is a lamp to my feet
            and a light to my path. (Psalm 119:97, 103, 105)

When Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, he summed up the Law:

    “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.... The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mark 12:30-31)

All the rest of the laws in the Torah were commentary on those two commandments.

The apostle Peter summed up the creation of a people by God through the Mosaic law and embodied in the risen and reigning Christ:

    You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people. (1 Peter 2:9-10a)

    The “People of the Law” were to be exemplary. They were to be a light to the nations and a blessing to the peoples of the world. God didn’t call them to be superior, to raise their noses in the air and snub all the other peoples. God called them to be an exemplary people, to show the world how to worship God, how to behave, and how to get along with each other. God intended the “People of the Law” to be the standard by which other people could improve themselves. They were to be beacons of praise and propriety.

It is interesting to me that people who don’t believe in evolution nonetheless believe in a form of socio-political evolution that through the ages enumerates God’s chosen people as merely a few who are the best and most superior. People believe that about different countries or different forms of religions or different patterns of faith within a religious system. That’s not what God intended. God called Israel to be examples, not lords. “I have come to serve and not to be served,” said Jesus. Israel was to be a servant people whose lives were to be lived by the commandments in such a way that other peoples would be drawn eagerly to them.

    Christians are heirs to the law and to the calling to be exemplary people. We are blessed people, like all those listed in the Beatitudes, so that we may be a blessing to others. As exemplary people we are to stand out. The world we live in today is constantly assaulted with words and images intended to skewer anyone who disagrees. People are twisted with conspiracy theories; they tell cockamamie stories about immigrants, they rob women of their personal sovereignty, they pander to people who have more than they need and trample those who have nothing. People are at psychological war with perceived enemies. Is that the way Christians are to stand out?

    Christians are called to be exemplary people, not superior people. The covenant of the law outlines a people – for the teaching of the nations, not for their destruction.

    Israel was living up to its name. Remember that God had renamed Jacob after Jacob’s wrestling match at Peniel. He would be called “Israel” – for he had striven with God and prevailed. Israel was excited about leaving Egypt, but then they started behaving like a gang of terrible two-year olds. They saw the Reed Sea as a trap to recapture them. They whined about the lack of water, the short supply of bread, the absence of meat, and the time that Moses spent away from camp in God’s presence. They challenged God through Moses every step of the wilderness way.

    For God, making light from darkness, dry land from watery expanse, human beings from soil seems like child’s play compared to making recalcitrant Israel into an exemplary people to be a light to the nations. Perhaps if they hadn’t been so obstreperous, the Law might have been stated positively:

• You shall honor and respect those in authority, from your father and your mother to those who lead the nation.
• You shall respect the life of all people.
• You shall celebrate and respect human relationships and sexuality.
• You shall respect and honor the property of others.
• You shall respect, honor, and protect the personhood and character of your neighbor.
• You shall respect and honor your neighbor and all he or she has been entrusted with from God’s bounty.

    Whether you go with the dos or don’ts, God outlined a people with the commandments and God covenanted with them to be their God so that they would be an example to others.

Pastor Kori highlighted the first commandments in her recent sermons. Let’s look at the remainder.

    The fifth commandment, honor your parents, more broadly describes how we honor and love our neighbor. Love of neighbor begins at home with that first relationship most of us have – our parents. God gives parents authority over children in order to protect, teach, and nurture. To honor parents is to honor God who gives them.

    The sixth commandment bans murder, which is the opposite of love. All life is a sacred gift lent from God and is to be respected. To take a life is to take something that is irreplaceable and is not ours to destroy. Human life is to be valued, cherished, protected, enriched, and enhanced. People murder not only with lethal weapons but also with hateful words and with physical and emotional abuse. Jesus did not destroy people. He built them up, made them whole, preserved their dignity.

    No adultery is the seventh commandment. It is aimed at protecting the bonds of the family where love is learned. Adultery is more than sexual flings, it is about violating the sanctity of relationships. People commit adultery when they extol some people and demean others or when they betray someone for personal gain. Intimate human relationships honor the intimacy that God has with creation, a love that was embodied in the fully human and fully divine Christ.

    The eighth commandment prohibits stealing. This has to do with human life and property. A common practice in biblical days was person-stealing, that is, making slaves of people. Today we call it human trafficking. That practice steals the dignity of personhood and life. The theft of personal property can become a matter of life and death when someone steals food and puts a family in peril. God’s people show love for our neighbors when they respect the property that belongs to them because that respect has to do with their God-given humanity.

    The ninth commandment is about lying or bearing false witness. Justice depends upon truth telling. The well-being and lives of many people depend either on not withholding testimony or on not giving false testimony. If we love our neighbor, we will be careful what we say about them. We will not engage in unkind gossip or malicious innuendo. We are not to fabricate stories that raise ourselves and lower others.

    Don’t covet is the last commandment. To “covet” means to “desire.” That’s a euphemism for greed. Greed leads to broken relationships with others and shows a basic dissatisfaction with what God has given. Other commandments warn about what not to do to someone; this one is deals with attitudes as well as actions.

These commandments all have to do with human interactions. But they go much deeper than that. They point to something more fundamental. The covenant of priority established by God in the Law says that respect for God and the holiness of everything that has to do with God is to be above all. The traditional language is that there is to be nothing “before” God. That means nothing in the place of God, or nothing alongside God, or nothing between you and God. These commandments circle us back around to the top of the list:

• I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery; I am the only God.
• You shall worship me with God-filled lives rather than lifeless forms or ideas. And I will show steadfast love to the thousandth generation of those who love me and keep my commandments.
• You shall celebrate the name of the LORD your God and use it respectfully.
• You shall celebrate God and creation with the sabbath, for the LORD honored creation with a cycle of work and rest.

    With ten commandments God has outlined a people. We are part of that people. May we be exemplars of all that God intends for creation.

    Amen.