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well good morning brother and sisters

this week we hope to look at a few excursions into some areas of some of the most beautiful pieces of the divine ethics we could ever perceive of

as we do so i think we'll find that perhaps there is a great deal more historically to the work of god amongst his people than perhaps at other times we might have given credit for hopefully all of us are going to learn something of that nature but basically what we want to do this week is look at the area where law came in relation to israel to the people of gods and see how that law as a system of divine ethics has continued down through generations of time and is just as applicable to us today as a system of divine ethics

to put us back in the context of law

law is itself a restraint made by a power outside man which extraneously operates on him

to control his behavior before himself and in god's law before god

therefore law itself is something which takes on the meaning of god's presence it's god's dealings with us it's the content of the divine revelation and the divine revelation is a revelation of god that he gives to mankind which is over and above anything that we might tend to see of gods by reasoning

the child that brings into you the small flower and says now here mummy is the evidence of god god made that flower that's very true god did make that flower but you see in that flower is the evidence of a divine being a being that is able to create in the uniformity of the nature of creation itself a great deal of dovetailing in where everything is interrelated together for its existence

so if that flower doesn't appear in that fields

neither would mankind walk thereon

that's the evidence of god we might say everything of which we have experienced the whole panoply of space to the vast nebulae of society beyond the stars whatever that society is it is all part of the evidence of god and we can reach that by reasoning by observing by studying and questioning we can see the evidence of gods

but you see a divine revelation is that which is above and over that's which is otherwise seen by reason it is a divine word of god's revelation to us of what he is and what he wants to do with us and the relationship that we might otherwise experience with him these things are vitally important

now in looking at law

and the coming of law

we obviously take our attention back to man's first dealings with gods or to put it the right way rounds god's first dealings with man

when god created man he created him for his pleasure

the father wanted to see a great deal of pleasure in his creation he made before him some human beings who were described as being in his likeness and in his image where the animals of the earth were never so described in that language

the likeness of god in genesis 1 and verse 26

tells us that man is made in the image in the sense of the physical appearance of god therefore man walks as an upright creature he has a head elevated above any other part of his being so his head is at the top

of animals that is not necessarily so

mankind is also made in the likeness of god

and that describes mankind as a creature with a mental affinity with god he thinks like god can think he has a sense of a direction a mentality that refers himself to his god he has a relationship possibility with his god

where no animal can relate to god

but you see man's likeness before god is much greater than just thinking like god

after all we can refer to the serpent in eden can't we

we can refer to a dialogue that took place where the serpent himself says well god knows that when thou eatest of this fruit thou shall be like the elohim you'll be like the angels

that wasn't a false statement it was very true

the serpent was able to reason upon many aspects of of the laws of god that he the particular law of god he gave to adam and eve

but this creature was somewhat limited

because it was an animal because it was not made in the likeness of gods this animal was totally unable to reason in the sense of divine morality

and that was the difference

so the animal had an ability to think a limited ability to rationalize and some scope to be able to make a discovery of its observations

but the animal possessed no morality

the animal was therefore called an amoral creature it is a creature with whom morality has no association whatsoever

in this serpent we see the developments of an animal trying to enter into god's worlds

and we see the disaster of course of mankind accepting the reasoning of this animal

now when we look at creation we see god's dealings with mankind

we see that though god made mankind for his pleasure

and though man was supposed to be a manifestation of kinds of god one of his children in a sense made in the image and likeness of god he was meant to copy gods he was meant to be a reproduction of a limited extent of what god is

so man possessed an ability that no other animal possessed

he also possessed the possibilities that no other animal possessed

that was that there was a tree in the midst of that garden also that was called the tree of lives

and that tree could confer immortality upon adam and eve

when adam and eve had sins

in order to stop them to prevent them from going forth and eating of the tree of life and living forever

therefore the elohim sent him out of the garden

that was a possibility that did not rest there for the snake

though the snake knew i believe the possibility of doing so

god gave to adam and eve commandments but he gave none

unto the animals again the reasons for this relate precisely to the ability and the morality within the creature to be able to absorb the divine commandments to understand what it meant and to become morally related to it in judgments

well we know what happened in genesis

of course the serpent had reasoned unto eve particularly that she should partake of this tree of the knowledge of good and evil because in this sense she would then become like the elohim like the gods knowing good and evil

well eve was acted upon by her own desires

these desires became inflamed to lawlessness

and so she saw that the tree was good

that she would eat of this tree and it would be pleasant to the eyes and it would make her wise

and so we find the entrance of the lust of the eyes the lust of the flesh and the pride of life clearly

into the world of eve

when she partake of the tree

of course she then defiled her conscience before her gods

and adam likewise with a sense of shame upon him feeling exposed as he was made naked by the acts he seeks to cover it with the fig leaf

the fig leaves through scripture yes it does represent israel in some ways but it also represents the covering up of something that doesn't exist

the fig leaf was that which makes a nice display on the outside

indicating yes beyond those leaves is fruits and you go to the fruits you go to the tree you part the leaves and there's no fruits that is hypocrisy that is guile that is deceit and that is sin

so adam and eve in order to try from their own fictitious creation to avoid the shame that they had exposed before god they sought to cover up they sought a cover-up but god was able to expose the cover-up

well when adam and eve were taken of this tree

lord god had walked in the garden in the cool of the evening

and said the lord says unto man who told thee that was naked

hast thou eaten of the tree where have i commanded thee thou shalt not eat and so the man in his mentality he immediately says to to the elohim to the angels before him the woman which thou gave us to be with me she gave me of this tree and i ate it

now we notice a change in mankind's an unfortunate change

this change has brought about a defiled conscience where man now uses guile to cover his sin

so man now blames god

imply unto gods that he had something to do with his own sin

he says the woman that you gave unto me

and so the father goes the through the angels now to the woman and says to the woman well why have you done this and she passed passes the back down the line and says well the serpent he beguiled me he caused me to do this

and say the lord god goes to the serpent in verse 14 and under the serpent he said because thou has done this cursed out thou

etc etc

now you'll notice the difference is this

that whilst the lord god asked the question of adam why have you done this he asked the same question of eve why have you done this

but he didn't ask to snake any questions did he

a snake cannot account for sin

a snake is outside

reproach of sin a snake is a beast of the field a snake has no moral consciousness it has no accountability before god you don't ask the snake any questions

you don't go out to the backyard and ask your dog why he took the turkey off the table

at least if you do you don't expect him to explain the conditions of his sin

you see animals cannot account for what they do

they are amoral creatures

but not so with mankind's

and that's why to mankind he is given laws he has given the mind of god he has given responsibilities that animals don't have

and of course with those laws and responsibilities

come inestimable privileges that animals could never share

so we do have responsibilities and we have privileges

that above all brothers and sisters

we have the possibility of knowing our creator

not only knowing him but understanding him and not only understanding him but becoming a part of him

so not only having life but having it more abundantly that's what's offered to us

and offered to know other living species upon this earth

so clearly brothers and sisters we have some very dramatic very wonderful principles

they all tell us about gods what he thinks

what he does

why he does it and if therefore the character of god is so revealed before us of his infinite greatness and majesty if we look at his nature as being a god who has within himself great mercy long suffering and tender love towards his people but yet will not forgive iniquity he will not feel indifferent to man's sin

then what we are looking at is the being of creator the being as the creator that made us in his likeness and image and therefore tells us what we can become

like god

and that is a very unique being

well god only asks one thing of adam and eve

he placed him in the garden to till it he placed him there not to pull out the weeds and the brides they weren't there but he placed him there to organize the garden he placed him there to be able to manage the affairs of that garden he was the tender he was to be responsible for that garden he had a management responsibility over fauna and flora alike

it was his domain

they all were within his grasp within his control

but man

he was within god's control

and therefore god had to demonstrate this to him and so before him he says in verse 16 of chapter 2 of genesis and the lord

commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat of it but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil thou shalt not eat of it for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die

now this is the only commandment of which we have knowledge concerning the which god gave unto his people

there was only one commandment do not eat of the tree

now you'll notice that when the serpent comes into the woman

the woman answers the servant in the light of this particular law and the woman said yes well we may eat of every tree of the in the garden but in verse three of chapter three she says that of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden of god garden god has said you shall not eat of it neither shall ye touch it lest you die

well i didn't read in verse 17 where god said thou shalt not touch it

the law was thou shall not eat it

but eve added neither shall he touch it lest ye die

what's the addition for

well that addition brethren says this is most important

you see that shows perception of the law

and i believe eve obtained that perception because of her communication with adam

and because adam was able to say to his wife

here is the threat of death before us

we must realize that that tree represents everything that we must totally avoid

therefore don't stroke the fruits or the leaves

don't go near it don't flirt with death

don't touch it

because if you touch it it's probable you will eat it

that is that is good counsel isn't it it wasn't part of the law which we read in verse 17 of the second chapter but it was good counsel and it was counsel that demonstrated that here was a joint perception of the meaning of this law and how in fact this law itself must have created an atom particularly a great avoidance path before him don't go near it

of all the other trees we can freely use

well without going into the details of the events that surround eden the tree of life and everything else there what we can see is this but here was god giving to mankind a law

mankind without that law

would have no opportunity of developing his senses

to understand his god to manifest his god and above all

to love his god

now many people raise the question well

okay we all sin and die today because adam and eve sinned and died

but why why when god possesses the capacity didn't he not make creatures that could not fail that could not sin why didn't he make us robots robots that can go forth and manifest his will wherever it might be why did he give us the propensity to sin

why give to us something that god could have avoided bringing into his own worlds

well it's rather like this

would you like to go to young johnny or jennifer of the morning

and say time to get up kids

so what you do is go over to their bed

and you plug in a new battery

you wind in a position put in daily morning program

right clean your teeth get dressed have breakfast but above all give me a kiss on my cheek before you leave for school in the morning

would you like that kind of child to do that

would we really like our children

to simply be robot organized computers

what would you get out of that as parents what would i get out of it

okay i'd have another toy wouldn't i when the batteries were out you put another battery in

some toys today they change hands out quick that you can't even get the battery out you buy a new toy

you see that is what animation is where man makes it where it cannot manifest him

it cannot show him love it cannot reflect to him his own being and look at our own children as much as we love them we look at them and we see characteristics some of which we don't like because that's me but nevertheless we see some things in them we love

and we see the character of its parents coming out we see a genetic reproduction of a loving human being that we now have the responsibility to organize to train and to manage until they become discretion of adults themselves

we wouldn't want it any other way would we parents

now if you've got that

if you have the value of that

you also have the problem of the cookie jar being stolen upon when you don't want it stolen from

so we all have to face the fact that there will be aberrations in the life of a child in which its growth to maturity will obviously illustrate also the potential for error and whilst it is very true our potential for error and our children's potential for error is much much greater than what adam and eve's word creation

nevertheless the principle is the same

we can fail

but within ourselves we want our children to love us

because of what comes spontaneously from within them towards us as the feeding back of what we have given to them

to me the greatest advantage that i have with my children

is to see that they do what i want not because they know that the stick will come out of the cupboard if they don't

but because more importantly they don't want to caught my disfavor with them

and that's very important to me

very important

that stick that i use that has a little probe written on it foolishness is bound up in the heart of the child's with the right of correction she'll drive it far from him you see and the child must go and get the stick and bring it and read it out foolishness is powered up in the heart of the child

you see it gives us some sort of license doesn't it it gives us the ability to be able to explain to that child why that stick has to be used

but i mean i hope i wouldn't have to do that to an 18 year old

in fact then forget it he'd beat me up

but the point is what the stick is for is to condition the child's thinking to see that by the reward and the punishment structure of law and order in the households the child can grow to appreciate new dimensions of being and what that is is love and responsibility

those two things you never create in robots

and we will never create that in our children unless we start very young with teaching them the same kind of things that god has taught us

so the father did not want an adam or an eve that did not possess the capacity to love him as a father

so he had to give them the volition the free choice the exercising of the mind to grow on his words or to turn the other way

and of course it was a very sad moment to god when he turned the other way

but then the lords

the lord had to deal with his problem

what was he now to do with his erring children

unto whom he had given a commandment and saying that in the day thou eatest then dying thou shalt end in death

what was he to do

well we could look at three possibilities

the god could have said well man kind of sinned against me

it's all gone wrong he didn't do what i asked him to do so i'll obliterate the whole species and i'm going to start again

now he could have done that on the basis of righteousness because he told adam and eve you will die as a result of that sin he could have brought death then and there and expunged the existence of that whole creation wiped it out brought the earth back full of water covering the face of the deep once more and said i'll start again

if he took that option there might be two problems with it

firstly

there was no certainty with god that had he started the whole thing over again the same thing would not happen again

he had to leave that possibility open

secondly

to have done so would have shown a side of yahweh which we do understand he is a wrathful god yes in the sense that he punishes sinners

but he also has mercy

he also has love

and he also has wisdom

and he took the option

to use wisdom and love and mercy

but yet there was another option open that also could have been taken and that was to say well poor adam he didn't really want to do this eve was the one who was deceived and and she therefore appeal to his emotions and therefore i'll have to admit that really it was a very hard thing and in fact if they have had a different circumstance they might have been quite okay and therefore i'll just forgive them for this once and let's pretend it never happens

but what about that option isn't that full of love full of mercy full of forgiveness full of kindness

well i think it might tend to show to us the sign of god that we wouldn't like

god said in the day thou eatest thou shall start to die

had he not done that

then what about god saying today

now if we serve the father today if we give to him the praise and the honor that he deserves if we seek the way of life through christ jesus and seek to model and patent our lives upon his example today if we seek this then we come to the judgment seat and the lord says oh sorry i've just changed my mind

that would be god in falsity wouldn't it we couldn't trust him

we couldn't trust him to do what he says

so likewise if he says something and he changes it can we trust him

there must be trust

as well as love and mercy and kindness

so we look at god again yes he can provide love mercy and kindness but in such a way that he will not show weakness

in consistency or falsehood and that is very very important

so he was a god

that had to somehow find a way around a problem

but in which his justice his mercy and his love would be all pervading

so what did he do

in the process of time

he illustrated before adam and eve that this dying face would end in death that is very true but that death itself does not have to be permanence and here he adds something additional to what was given to mankind in the beginning he didn't say in his law to mankind's here that in that day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die but you don't have to stay dead

that wasn't part of the law was it the law only condemns the law does not give life

and here god now exercises the possibility of saying now if you would appreciate adam and eve that within your life you must now organize your thinking to acknowledge a principle

and in your lives live by that principle

so that now you're going to spend the rest of your days crucifying the source of your sin

then i will acknowledge

in my kindness to you that if you strive to do that i will make up the difference between your desire and your weakness

and then

god could change the outcome of the situation

so god enforced his law all sin is punishable by death

but before adam before he left that garden he took hold of adam and he gave to him coats of skins and he clothed them

the skins of course represented the slaying of the animal

and the covering of the man represented the blood of the slaying of that animal and if we want to know what animal it is i think we need to look to a commentary on this so far as the greek scriptures are concerned which comments that this was the lamb flame from the foundation of the worlds it was a lamb it was a typical lamb it was a lamb by whose offering sin might be covered an appearance and acceptance before god might become possible

therefore the slaying became a typical manifestation of divine salvation

adam had to acknowledge that all his life

and in the hope of that there was the hope of eternal life

of course down the line

god had to bring about the great antitypical lamb the one who would as god's own son as the beginning of a new creation who was a new son of god was able to change the course of history and bring into being the possibility of a new kind of race of people a race of people that would not live after the example of adam's sin but a race of people that would follow after the great spiritual ambitions

of the other son the second adam the lord jesus christ

so from the terrible outcome of the curse in eden

mankind went out

the man

to till the grounds

that through the sweat of his brow

in the rooting out of thorn and briar he might bring forth fruit by which he would live and the woman

the woman whose propagation would now become a somewhat laborious experience

thus started to bring children into this world

which she had to seek a great deal of preoccupation with when those children are young

she must nurture the home

feed those children organize those children and assist in the great work of the domestic program in which the husband also places his portion into

now we have a world a world which is realistically related to sin a world where death is down the line for each one of us a world where we become the victims of foolishness our foolishness someone else's foolishness

a world where we know sin by experience where we get to know the ups and downs of life and the vicissitudes which bring upon us great sorrow

and yet interspersed with moments of great joy

that is real life

and real life is the fact that there's an awful lot of us here

mankind through the woman giving birth to the child started to propagate upon the face of the earth and thus mankind grew as a society of a new kind of animal an animal though in which was morality and moral consciousness

there was also the inevitability of sin

god didn't make us that way

that was a change

now with sin being so inevitable

where we would sin against each other and sin against god

that we have a new dimension of control that must be carefully exercised

take for instance joseph

down in egypt is set upon by potiphar's wife

now is an occasion where joseph as a young man of the age of 17 years must make a decision my flesh yields this way as a 17 year olds

but god's

principles are more important

how can i do this sin against my master and sin against god

you see we sin in two directions

the victim of our sin as the neighbor is and god

before whom all sin

is a travesty of the relationship we might otherwise have with him

so here is mankind

but mankind did not have a great deal of laws to start with

there was no law of moses until well down the line of man's history

so what about before the law of moses came

there was no law

well we do have an idea that there was some kind of law i think if we look for a moment of genesis 26 we can see that here there was restraint exercised upon mankind look at abraham here i think it's in there

verse five

verse 4

i will make thy seed multiply as the stars of heaven and i will give unto thy seed of these countries and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed

because that abraham obeyed my voice

and kept my charge

my commandments my statutes my laws

all of them are in there

now how can we say then that there was no law

let's come over for just a moment then to the epistle of paul to the romans

in chapter five

wherefore verse 12 romans 5 wherefore as by one man sin entered into the worlds and death by sin

and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned

now he says

for until the law that is until the lord moses came

sin was in the worlds

but sin is not imputed where there is no law

but he says nevertheless death reigned from adam to moses

even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of adam's transgression who was the figure of him that was to come

so before the law death was in the worlds and it rained from adam to moses

which is some good few hundred years isn't it

so from adam to moses we have the developments of sin and death

but here he says where there's no law if the sin was not imputed now what does he mean

surely god judged the case of the world of iniquity with sodom and gomorrah did he not

he judged that world of iniquity

he spoke out against pharaoh who would have taken uh sarah to wife

he spoke against abimelech and said if you touch that woman you're a dead man

were there laws of adultery then

yes brothers and sisters there were laws

there were laws of god there were statutes there were judgments the word of god was in the world but what was the difference

there was no stated condemnation

take for instance the sabbath

the sabbath was made a very clear statement in the beginning

mankind was to employ the principles of the sabbath in his life to organize his life around the sabbath keeping

we find the sabbath referred to

but nevertheless it wasn't until you get to the law of moses that the law of the sabbath

became a law implying a judgment if you do not obey it in fact it was more than implying it gave you a judgment you pick up the sticks on the sabbath and you'll be stoned to death

why

because now god was bringing law into a whole new dimension

previously mankind had some responsibility to gods

but he was never shown the dimensions of its condemnation

likewise with any of the things that happened there was no stated condemnation outside what you see in genesis

in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die

and paul's point is here that between that law and moses there was no other stated condemnation

the point is this

the law was there the commandment was there the statute was there all as guides for mankind's

guides it was an oral law passed on from father to son to son

but without

the associated judgments if you disobeyed

a legal system for mankind today is not like that

you see lots of signs around which indicates uh certain things that happen you're like touch these 22 000

volt overhead wires

and in fact it can cause death

and people who do this will be prosecuted

so you see there are many laws that imply to us by the wording of us but there's going to be a judge minimum penalty maximum penalty we must state the outcome and all man's legal systems must state the punishment for disobedience but we don't have that till we get to moses

what do we have before we get to most

yes we have an oral code we know we have that because we know abraham sought to obey us

the jets

abraham is nowhere in scripture criticized by god

but he's criticized by men

for instance abraham is called the father of the faithful

but abraham went down to egypt and he says to sarah oh now sarah look i know you're my half-sister and i know you're my wife but look just emphasize the point of my heart says you're my sister because if i know that you're my wife you're so beautiful that they're going to get rid of me and my life is going to be on the stake and i won't survive in egypt so just pretend you're my sister

was that faith

he goes up to the king of the land again in a case of abimelech you know again the same thing rises

in egypt down there pharaoh took him aside he says why have you done this to me

pharaoh rebuked him

a very just rebuke

and he nevertheless loaded upon him great gifts and possessions and sent him out of the land he goes up to the land and he does the same thing with abimelech

same problem is that faith

after all god said to him abraham

in thee shall all nations be blessed

he promised him a seed and he promised him a national outcome of his own body how could he believe that he would die before he had his own national outcome of his body we know that in scripture don't we but what about abraham he says said in scripture that he obeyed all my commandments laws statutes and judgments

but what happened to his faith on those two occasions

the point being brethren and sisters that abraham was a man of weakness like we are god did not condemn him for his weakness

and he did not bring law against him to condemn him to death because he was not a perfectly sinless man

and in that model

the great covenants of promise and the new covenant in the blood of the lord jesus christ confirming the abrahamic faith is what we live under today same thing

god does not condemn us for human weakness he gives us a code which we must suffer from if we disobey us

he does not condemn weakness

he condemns outright sin and all sin is god is against god we acknowledge that but hence john says there is a there is a sinner to death and there's not a sin unto death what's the difference

the difference is conscious rebellion against god's commandments premeditated presumptuous sin on the one hand

and sins of weakness on the other

so likewise abraham's life was similar

so god does not condemn us by law

as long as we serve the law of christ for the spirits in other words we walk after the spirit not after the flesh if we're walking in the right direction the lord has provided a covering for our sins if we confess our sins unto him we are never indifferent to sin we must never be indifferent to sin

sin is sin

we never make place to fulfill the flesh in any sense of weakness

but we acknowledge the grace and mercy of god on the other hands

so what we have in abraham is the basis of justification through faith

in the presence of divine commandments

but not living under the shadow

of divine judgments because we are less than perfectly following the ideals of god

now these were two different eras

abraham's era was very different to the era of israel under the law

why then was it necessary to bring a law why then could god not take the content of the abrahamic faith and wizard straight through and bring christ instead of moses

why did we need a moses

why was it necessary to have a thousand years of the law before we get to christ

mankind

had another problem

the problem was that

he was not very good at self-analysis

true he knew of the righteousness of god

but he never thought enough about his own behavior

for instance

genesis chapter 37 commences the story of joseph let's just go there for just a moment

now jacob loved his son joseph and of course he gave him a great garment to indicate his love

loving him above all of his other sons but in verse 4 it says when his brethren saw that their father loved him more than all his brethren they hated him and could not say to him shalom yourself

they couldn't say peace

they hated him

again go down through the verse there through those verses you get the brothers again verse 8 joseph gives him a dream and they hated him yet the more for all his dreams which he made against him

joseph again is sent off on a mission to seek his brethren's well-being he takes some food he takes some provision and what do they say in verse 18

they conspired against him to slay him

behold this dreamer comes

and in verse 20 come now let us slay him and cast him into some pit down here and we'll say some evil beast has devoured him and we shall see what'll become of his dreams

and so this trip joseph out of his coats

and they put him in a pit and in verse 25 they sat down to eat bread

and the record later on says

that they didn't listen to the cries of joseph when they put him in that pit of death

they didn't listen to his cries

they sat down and had a party instead

after this

well he's not worth anything in the ground there to us is he so judah says in verse 26 what prophet is there if we if we slay our brother and simply conceal his brother there's no money in that for us is there

so he says come now look i've got an idea let's sell him to the ishmaelites and oh let's let him let us not touch touching with our hands so we wouldn't really want to hurt him would we

so they sell him to the israelites

and so send him down into egypt

and now all these brothers come together back to the old man jacob on all his sons in verse 35 here and all his daughters rose up to comfort him to comfort dear old jacob who'd suddenly realized that his dear son joseph had been slaughtered by some evil beast

and this is all there there now dad don't take it so hard look you've got still got 11 left it's all right

was that

the sort of mentality that god wanted to have as the inheritance of the promises to abraham

was that the mind that he wanted to create in his people

chapter 38

an interlude

judah

goes down now to a canaanite woman

down in verse two judah saw there i wore a certain daughter of a certain canaanite whose name was sure he took her he went down to her she concedes and bear him a son uh call his name earth she conceived again and bear another son call his name on him yet another son and she called his name sheila

and judah took a wife for her of his firstborn whose name was tamar and ander judah's firstborn was wicked in the sight of the lord and the lord or yahweh slew him

what's going on here why this little interludes

well did god really want judah of course which stands for the glory of the hope of israel judah that tribe out of which the lord jesus christ came did he want him going off and marrying the daughters of canaan and producing seeds as profligate as it was which the wickedness was so great we're not even told what the wickedness was he was so bad that that yahweh just finished his life then and there

look again

judah says so honour look go into my brother's wife and marry her and raise up seed to her so anna knew that seed should the seed shouldn't be his

no responsibility whatsoever or love for his brother

and it came to pass he went to his brother's wife and he spilled it on the ground list that he should give see to his brother and the thing which he did displeased yahweh wherefore he slew him also

what a beautiful scene this is

here is the hope of israel here is the glorious heritage proceeding out of the bowels of abraham what a sort of detail

is that what god was prepared to put up with

is this the way they interpret like abraham did all god's commandments and statutes and laws and judgments

something wrong isn't there

where would the righteousness of god be manifested if that there

is the hope of israel

something had to happen

and in the sequence of events that happened

god takes all of those people and though they were tried in the story of joseph though all those brothers came yet to see their sin and bow down before their brother the problem was still in their children

young benjamin of course the youngest that the jenker watches over like a like a hen over her chickens because he doesn't want anything to happen to benjamin

and the brothers

well

the brothers themselves they saw their problems but uh obviously they didn't carry the excitations home to their households

so they end up all down there in egypt they multiply and in process of time they're put into slave ship

and in process of time they cry out to gods now we have a new scene

now we have israel not using

the lusts and affections of the flesh as a means of gravitating and propagating to evil within this earth now

they realize they have a problem

king's sin is dominating our bodies and our minds and is driving us into the grave

now they should have seen that

back there when they thought evil against joseph shouldn't they

king sin was dominating their minds and driving their brother and them into the grave

did it make a great deal of difference oh no let's sit down and have a party instead

they had no moral consciousness of what they were doing

and they were destroying themselves in the process

so you see there had to be something better

we needed a law

a law that was able to teach them something they had never learned before

so you see we really do need the commandments

and in our next session we'll have a look

Transcript

when israel went down into the land of egypt they went into a land which was well known and described as a land of sin and death

it was a land in which they had to abide for some considerable period of time in order that they were able to appreciate the dimensions of what sin really meant in their lives as individuals and domestic societies and in their land as they had to relate to other people outside their immediate domestic scene

what they had to discover was the true results of a certain kind of behavior

all human behavior brings its results

whether they be beneficial or deleterious we must experience that which we sow we must reap what we sow

so israel had to be taken to a land of sin and death that they might appreciate that if they should so behave in such a manner as they did and as they were doing before god then ultimately they must meet the position of their just deserts

so in the land of egypt there arose a pharaoh that knew not joseph

and so this pharaoh could see the growing potential of a real organization of social uh opposition to his regime

the people of israel scented from the land of goshen began to multiply and multiply and multiply

so yahweh had blessed the wombs of their women they had grown as an enormous nation numbering something from 75 people to approximately something like 2 million people in a period of about 260 years

and so this pharaoh said we must put them in service else will they rule us

so here was the first point about the decision that's down here in egypt somewhat like the point of decision that had to be made between goliath and david's the proposition was this

either you will serve us or we will serve you we cannot live in an accommodation any longer and that was exactly how pharaoh also saw it

so the people of israel were there of course growing as a great population they didn't have any military strength but give them enough population and the force of the people alone will create a massive wave as an army

pharaoh could see that unless he put them in subjection they themselves would be in subjection and the hebrews would reign and rule over egypt like the hixos did

and so they had to take the only course of action

slave ship for israel

so israel placed in slave ship they now began to feel the crisis of the age in which they were living in which now they would serve pharaoh and then after a period of time pharaoh would put them out to pasture they would die and be buried in a land of sin and darkness where there was no hope for the people of israel

so this was a state that was new to them

previously they existed and lived in hope of the promises made of god unto abraham to isaac unto jacob but where was the hope of it now

as promised he had said thy seed shall be afflicted four hundred years and afterwards i will bring them back into this land there was a promise of hope which had given to to abraham himself telling him what happened would happen to his seed

then

when the appropriate time came

moses rose up

of course moses sought to do justice by his people he was well trained in the arena of the household of pharaoh himself he became an expert in all matters of the egyptian hierarchy he was fluent in egyptian language he was trained and skilled as a leader but yet he was a man that israel wasn't too keen on

and so when once moses as we know had given justice to one of his own brethren over an egyptian warrior when he sought to maybe get them to stop their arguing and fighting amongst themselves

they said well who made you were a ruler and a judge over us

thus they forced moses exiled for 40

years away from them

in the period of his exile just preceding his returning against the lambs

his god yahweh the god of israel had revealed himself unto moses in a burning bush

burning bush became a symbol of something very important

where there is heat where there is fire where there is trial but in which such affliction the individual is not concealed

the symbol of the burning bush

and so in our lives brethren sisters we have to go through affliction tribulation heat and pressure of every kind for what purpose to purify us by fire that in the ultimate sense of god's acceptance of us he might find in us gold well tried in the fire of the cauldrons of our lives experience that we might see the glory of god and overcome the profligate nature which each of us possesses

so moses was shown a symbol of something that no other servant of god was shown ahead of him there must be tribulation

in order to enter into an acceptable position before god

as paul put those words through much tribulation do we enter into the kingdom of god

this principle was demonstrated to moses and so from there moses takes back the message of hope to israel

and again they say well who will we say has censor has sent me unto them i mean god do which god can i save do they understand thee god

god was known as el shaddai but what now do i say is the name of god and hence the point we have in exodus chapter 6.

here we find god revealing his name and answering the question which moses had posed

verse 1 then the lord or yahweh sinner to moses thou shalt thou see what i will do to pharaoh for the strong hand he says shall he let them go and with a strong hand shall he drive them out from his of his lands and god spake unto moses and said unto him i am yahweh and i appear unto abraham unto isaac and under jacob as will eliminate the term there the name of it's in italics it is not repeating the hebrew script i appeared to them as el shaddai the mighty warrior the mighty god but by my name yahweh

was i not

made known unto them

the significance here is of course the in the word known here it means to make known in the sense of experiencing something

well israel obviously now had not experienced anything to do with the name of god here but back in the days of abraham when abraham himself had made an offering on mount moriah of his own son isaac and when the father stepped in to say don't say your son abraham i will slay mine instead

he called that yahweh yura as an altar

yahweh will provides

so abraham knew the name of god and many other passages of scripture this is recorded also but basically here the message is this

that they did not experience the meaning of that name

and hence israel

as the twelve sons of israel were concerned in the manner of their rather ill-reputed lives in which they acted so aggres egregiously and aggressively against their own brother joseph and how they saw their old father their pining in sorrow for the death of their son and they sat down to comfort him

as heartless individuals who had not the slightest meaning of the sentimentality of godliness

that had to change

now god gives his name

and he says in verse 6 of this chapter

wherefore say unto the children of israel

i am yahweh

now you'll notice that those words conclude verse 8 also the same expression i am yahweh

now why is this incorporated as part of these verses why is he telling us here but by this name was i not made known

unto the fathers to abraham and to isaac and to jacob

because within verses 6-8 is coming up something very very important about the name of god let's look at it

i am the lord or yahweh and i will one bring you out from under the burdens of the egyptians two i will rid you out of their bondage

i will redeem you with a stretched out armor with great judgments and i will take you to me for a people and i will be to you a god and you shall know

that i am yahweh your god which brings you out from under the burdens of the egyptians and i will bring you into the land

concerning the which i'd swear to give it to abraham isaac and jacob and i will give it you for an inheritance

i am yahweh

now what's the point of all that

here was to be the center brethren sisters of a kind of relationship which other people did not possess before this time

god had never so shown himself to any other people as he is now going to show to these people of israel

and as we can see in these verses he has highlighted one important fact he had heard the groaning of the children of israel notice verse 5 there i've heard they're groaning i've heard the affliction in bondage they have appreciated the implications of sin

so it's like us when we came to the truth and we come to god and we say father i hate this body i hate this sin that i have and we cry because of the oppression of sin like the apostle paul could see it oh wretched man that i am he could see what he was like

every person who sees this nature cries to god and we groan because of the oppressiveness of sin over us

then god steps in

then he says yes i've heard your groanings

and i'm gonna rid you of that bondage and affliction unlike the lord jesus christ who says you know take my yoke upon you learn of me come to me and rest from your labor of sin

and so here the father says i will redeem you it is my work of redemption i'll redeem you with a strong arm i'll crush the power of king sin that rules you i'll bring you through the waters of baptism in the red sea and i'll bring you out before the land of the wilderness and i'll take you to my mountain and there at my mountain when i'll show myself unto you and i will take you to me for a people and i will be to you a god

now that relationship

was never seen in any of the other patriarchs it is a relationship now where we look at the father taking them to him as his children

and thus he's going to put his name upon that family and as he said i placed my name upon the nation of israel

they were named by his name

in the sense that they should have been people who in their lives could demonstrate the qualities of the character of almighty god but how could they do that before they knew what it was

look at their own characters

the lack of qualities of god in them hatred malice murder iniquity all of those things how was that the seed of abraham's faith

now they had to learn how it was to be given to them they had to learn the manner of godliness they had to learn by god's own laws what state of righteousness was and what it wasn't

and only by this means

would they appreciate the morality that we must have towards our father

so in that background brethren sisters we can see the foundations of importance for the redemption of israel and after he took them out of the power of king sin he brought them to a mount to give them a divine code of ethics and moral responsibility before god and man

and not until this point in the history of abraham's seed have they so had this revealed

so we go over to exodus chapter 20.

he takes him to the mountain

and on the third ascent of moses

he is given the law

as soon as he goes forth

in verse 1 god spake all these words saying

i am the lord thy god which have brought you out from the land of egypt and out of the house of bondage

he brought them out of bondage to sin and death

now ten commandments in fact ten words they're known as the ten words

one thou shalt have no other god before me

two

thou shalt not make graven images any uh unto the any graven images of any likeness of anything that is in heaven above all that is in the earth beneath or that's in the water under the earth

three

thou shall not take the name of the lord thy god in vain for the lord will not hold him guiltless to taketh his name in vain

4

remember the sabbath day to keep it holy

5

honor thy father and thy mother and thy days shall be long upon the land which yahweh thy god has given thee

fix

thou shalt not kill

seven thou shalt not commit adultery eights

thou shalt not steal

nine

thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor

and ten in verse 17

thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house

thy neighbor's wife his manservants his maidsevens his ox his ass or anything that is thy neighbors

ten commandments

these ten commandments are part of the law of moses

this we find quite conclusively from a number of verses

but anyway what we see here

is the whole ethical approach of gods to his people

under 10 principal headings

and as we find there are numbers the same number of plagues brought israel before god in judgment and brought the judgment upon the flesh

so the same number of virtues now bring us towards god on the other hands

it's very easy to leave egypt but as we see from history it is not easy to enter the land of promise

so when he takes his people to the holy mount he expounds to them this basis of description are describing to them what the meaning of god's moral ethical code is in ten commandments

well true these ten commandments create like what we might say is a synthesis or a a summary of what all the other laws did say

and so we notice in these ten commandments

are divisions of man's responsibility

you will notice in the first five commandments they concern man's relationship to god

that is

that you have no other gods before him that you do not make any graven images that you do not take the name of god in vain that you remember the sabbath before god and in verse 12

it says honor thy father and thy mother

now he was an important comment

well you might say yes but this has relationship to man's relationship within his own people this is not to god true except that

the bridge is to honor god is to honor your natural parents

because then you realize what the relationship is as god said i will take you to me for a people you will be my people he would adopt the people of israel as his own precious precious treasure and therefore he would come before those people in such a way to show to them his character his qualities his love that he wanted seen in those people

if this could be done

then they would honor their parents because they saw their parents relationship before god and therefore they listened to what they had to do before god

in the second phase of the commandments it has to do with our relationship one to another for instance thou shalt not kill thou shalt not commit adultery shalt not steal shalt not be a false witness and shall not covet your neighbor's possessions

so here we have responsibility towards god in the first parts and responsibility towards man in the seconds a very important division

let us notice for instance how in fact under the law of israel in the time of christ this delineation was very clearly observed luke chapter 10.

in luke chapter 10 in verse 25

commencement of the parable

the good samaritan

and behold a certain lawyer a prominent lawyer as that means stood up and tempted jesus christ saying master

what shall i do to inherit eternal life

that was the question of the day

this was a point of course of discussion and and almost disagreement and controversy about what was the means of inheriting eternal life

in the case of the sadducees they didn't believe in it in the sense of resurrection of departed spirits they were getting somewhat more of a of a stoic philosophy into their religion at this time

however here is the question from a lawyer a prominent lawyer one skills

in discussing the law and looking at the law and as basic contents so christ said to him well you are the lawyer what is written in your law

how do you read it how do you interpret the answer to that question

the lawyer was hoping to get christ ensnared in some way

but christ knowing that he was the lawyer put it back on him and says well you're the lawyer you tell me

and he answered and he said

thou shall love the lord thy god with all thy hearts

with all thy soul with all thy strength and with all thy minds and thy neighbors thyself

now why did the lawyer give this answer

what must i do to inherit eternal life from where did the lord get this answer

well he got it from two verses in scripture

which were quite separate one from the other the first comment there you will notice comes from deuteronomy chapter six and verse five right down to as far as the word mind and then he says and thy neighbor is thyself

and he added that from leviticus 19 and verse 18.

here was a brilliant summary by a lawyer and jesus christ says you've said absolutely the right thing full marks

you see his reading was perfect nothing wrong with the analysis and that analysis brethren and sisters is the analysis of the content of the ten commandments

the first group have to do with loving the lord our god with all our hearts

with our soul

with our strength and our minds

and that is exactly what the commandments would say the heart

is that moral portion of us in here

the heart that seeks to pursue something there is then the soul the life itself the life within itself

there is then the strength

the physical ability of a person to manifest his belief and understanding and then there's the mind and that means the intention

the intention of a person

what a vast change this was to be upon the previous nation of israel

now they were brought to a mountain and unto them was expounded the principles of god manifestation

not that god's interested enough to simply save us for our own selfish viewpoints

but that god wants a family he wanted to manifest that family not as the robots but as loving sons and daughters who understanding the father wanted to be like the father and wanted to please the father because they loved the father adopted sons and that's what we all are adopted children into the household and the family name of the god of israel

this is a heritage brethren and sisters that we all have israel were offered the same heritage

and they were offered it by promise if they followed god but they would not

and again the lawyer accurately added the words from leviticus

and love thy neighbor as

thyself

that's a new dimension too isn't it because every man loves himself more than anybody else

here was a comment he was a an occasion for a provocation of his own mind see if you can actually love someone as much as you love yourself if you do you'll respect them in every respect that you have your own self-respect in your own minds

and so this synthesis of the law having been very clearly related the lord jesus christ himself had said then well he said this do

and thou shall live

you see to know what the commandment said was insufficient

it's like saying yes i love god with all my hearts with all my minds i love him with all my intentions but i'm unprepared to love him with my strength

and so we don't do the things that we say we believe

and this is of course brethren and sisters a very adequate exhortation for us isn't it we're very good at quoting scripture we're excellent at telling other people what they should do

but do we do it ourselves as we should

here is the moral force of god's word revealed to his people in such a structured code that by that code they might appreciate god's righteousness

and therefore their own failure before god

well let's move back then just a little further into the book of exodus here just to chapter 21.

at the end of chapter 20 we have introduced here what is called the the book of the covenants

here was the codification now all the principles that might be embodied in what is seen in the ten commandments or the ten words

so in verses 22 to 23 god states his position concerning the book of the covenant and says

and the lord said unto moses thou shalt thou say unto the children of israel ye have seen that i have talked with you from heaven

ye shall not make with me gods of silver neither shalt thou make unto you gods of golds

there must be no deification of anything

and then he brings up the point of the yahweh altar in verse 24 and says an altar of earth i shall make unto me and shall sacrifice there on my burnt offerings with my peace offerings thy sheep and thine oxen in all places where i record my name

i will come unto thee and i will bless thee

it was jerusalem the place where he recorded ultimately his name

and having placed his name upon that city and upon that people that is where solomon had come to rest the permanent altar before gods

and so in solomon's speech in 1st kings 8 all the way through he is making the point the place where thou has chosen to put thy name

this will be the place where a person had to bring his offering before gods to acknowledge the name of god

that in acknowledging the name of god he was acknowledging that he was coming to be part of that name but he should have joined that name that that name was part of him

and so as he comes to the altar he brings of himself and sacrifices himself before the name of god that the name of gods

might continue upon him

well in what follows then in chapter 21

we have various laws given laws which had to do with god's relationship to his people and the people's relationship one between another chapter 21 and in verses 1 to 11

we have the laws here concerning masters and slaves

in which even when israel having ma slaves in their own community we're still given laws as how to they they should treat those slaves they were not able to take those slaves and treat them like a dog in the backyard

to beat them into submission until they were dead and then throw them over the back fence

they were not to do that with their slaves

so god was to control their attitude to the people who were most servile in their communities

and so he gives them what the requirements were

you will notice that if it came time for instance under this first section here if a hebrew servant for instance in verse 2 be six years he shall serve and then on the seventh he shall go out free for nothing that's if you buy hebrew sevens of their own brethren this may be possible because in a great deal of uh of uh difficulties of finances the family may be caused to sell themselves in order to gain life during difficult periods that's why whenever he fought at seven times seven the 49-year cycle it would be a year of jubilee the releasing of all the slaves because every man got his land back again now he could till it now he could go into agriculture

but he may need to sell himself or his family in order to give bart a system for the help that he needed

well after seven years he could go out free

well he says

if he came in by himself he should go out by himself if we were married to his wife he shall go out with him but if his master has given him a wife and she have borne him sons and daughters the wife and her children shall be her masters and he shall go out by himself

and if the servant shall plainly say i love my master my wife and my children i will not go out free that his masters will bring him unto the elohim

that's what it is in the hebrew there the elohim

and it has to do with those judges of israel who should have been acting as elohim before god in other words god was there seen in the judges of his people they were manifesting god's judgments and therefore where two or three of those judges were together there was god in the midst of them

what a wonderful way to go

where in fact the judges of israel had the responsibility of taking the reference of almighty god's mind and morality into the straits of israel's individual judgments

this was a whole new cause

the twelve sons of jacob never acted like this

well as time goes on we see that if they bring him to the judges then what happens is that he shall bring him to the door under the doorpost of his house and the master shall bore his ear through with it all and he shall serve him forever that means he shall serve him unto the unconcealed future

or the concealed future

here it has to do with the work of a slave a slave who wants to lovingly serve his master

then he shall serve him for all time

well this was a very kind requirements because it meant that if he served the master and loved him the master would obviously be of the kind that would love him i mean the master would love the servants the servant would therefore be someone that he would care for that he would be treating with kindness that he would be considered unto

what a wonderful message it is brethren as this is for us to see the morality of that servant there you know that is exactly our relationship to christ

even though he is our lord though he is our husband

though he is our bridegroom we are still the slaves

we are born slaves to the lord jesus christ not just eight hours a day 24 hours a day we are born slaves to christ and we serve him because we love him and we bore our ear through we make our ear part of his

mouth

so that our ear is ever open unto his words

and that's what it meant in the sense of boring his ear through to the doorpost of the house of his master

thus his ear would constantly be owned by the master that he always listened and heeded and thought about what he heard and served his master well

there was a moral responsibility responsibility of a master responsibility also of a slave

the law incorporated that as part of human behavior whereby masters and slaves could live and work happily together

instead of the liberation of the individual who says i shall not serve anybody else but myself

isn't that the problem with this world

people do not want moral responsibility for other people they want to be liberated individuals full of their own liberty fraternity and whatever equality they want to choose to place upon themselves

mankind's world today serves self-first

because i'm all right jack

that philosophy is what is bringing our world to its knees

man has ceased to see his part that he must play

to someone else's requirements in society of which he is an interdependent parts

let's notice the next of the section of laws here verses 12 to 36 concern the circumstances of physical injury

notice these words

he that smites a man so that he die he shall be surely put to death

if a man lie not in wage but god delivers him into his hand then i will appoint thee a place where the he shall flee to this would be the places of refuge or there would be the horns of the altar

but he says if a man come presumptuously upon his neighbor and slay him with guile he determined death upon him he says thou shalt take him from my altar he cannot hold the horns for sanctuary there you'll take him from my altar and you will slay him

this is what happened to job of course as we read in 1st kings 2 verse 34.

now he says in verse 15 and he that smites his father or his mother he shall surely be put to death

no question about that you will notice that there's no accidents about slaying your father or your mother

in the first instance if a man smites another man

he might have some refuge because he may not have determined death upon him but if you touch your parents

you're a dead person

and that was to be laid out further in the laws of god

notice the interesting point of verse 16

here and he that steals a man and sells him or if he be found in his hand he shall surely be put to death

well it's just as well joseph's brothers weren't under that law at that time wasn't it

there was nobody to put them to death

but you see he was the principal

the way mankind without moral responsibility could act as he wished towards his neighbor or towards his brother

now under the divine code of ethics mankind is deliberately constrained of gods

but he might appreciate that he cannot do what he might otherwise like to do to his neighbor

he will be judged of god and therefore to steal a man to sell him is to caught death yourself

well in the next section of these commandments he talks here about a number of points bringing us down then in this uh this division concerning physical injury talking now as he does in verse 22 he says if men strive and hurt a woman with child so that her fruits apart from her and yet no mr follow he shall be surely punished according as the woman's husband will lay upon him and he shall pay as the judge's determined

and in verse 23

if any missed you follow then he shall give life for life

well here is an interesting point a point that perhaps our society could learn much from today

the woman who has a child

the child is in a gestational phase it commences as a very small fetus and commences growth until the time of its birth and then it goes forth and when the umbilical is cut the child stands forth in its own independence from the mother

however the questions have been asked a great deal as to what is the option of abortion what is the morality of terminating the life of a child in the womb of its mother

point of great discussion isn't it probably in this country as an australian elsewhere

what guides our minds to understand when a life is a life before god

well the law of god provides it for us look at it there

you see if the child die in the womb as he says if mr follows then that child has died

and therefore there is a case for retribution upon an unborn child

so god obviously considers that the unborn child is a life in its own integrity

that perhaps should be put into the question of abortion and when is a lie for life

there is another interesting point that emerges too uh let's start for a moment just in judges 13 verse 4 upon this issue this concerns the the birth of samson and samson who was of course to be a nazarite before gods

charges 13.

so we have the angel's visitation to manoa's wife

and says to her in verse 3

behold now thou art barren and bearest not but thou shalt conceive and bear a son now therefore beware i pray thee and drink not wine nor strong drink and eat not any unclean thing for low thou shall conceive and bear a son and no razor shall come on his head for the child shall be a nazarite under god from the womb and he shall begin to deliver israel out of the hand of the philistines

there is an interesting comment also

samson was to be a nazarite from the womb so his mother was not to have of any drink or a fruit of the vine because that was part of the nazarite vow

in other words the nazirite had three things upon him he was not to cut his hair he was not to partake of the fruit of the vine and he was not to touch any dead body

so in these three instances

samson was to be a nazarite from the womb and because the woman by virtue of the placenta and the umbilical cord by which she passes the content of her own blood through to the child she was not to take of any wine nor eat of any unclean thing

which shows us that again the child in the womb has its own integrity before god

two important references brethren that show us a moral responsibility to an unborn infants

now the world is in a great dilemma what to do about abortions

termination of life is it moral is it not moral who chooses to do it is it the woman who makes the choice of the father who makes the choice is it both of them and does the child have any consideration in the picture look at the chagrin that the world has placed with about that problem look how clear it is under the law

that child's has the integrity of its own life form to god

and if you bring upon a woman a cause whereby through violence be whatever means it has reached a woman that child dies that person is held responsible for the death

and so the law went on to say back in exodus 21

eye for eye

tooth for tooth

burning for burning wounds for wound and stripe for stripe

hence the law is not saying here

that there was an absolute demand that you must take the eye for the eye or you must take the tooth for the tooth

but it said if you are going to take it that's all you can take

and that has its own justice

so you see here the lord jesus christ expands upon this of course does he not over in matthew chapter 5 talking about he talks about the eyes of the eye and the tooth of the truth the law of moses was here regulating human practices of justice that the crime would be matched by a punishment suitable to it

but christ re-looks at the law and he gives to those who will come into his commission a much greater responsibility than what those under the law of moses even had they have greater privileges why should they not also have greater responsibilities

so we notice again going through this chapter verse 28.

if an ox score a man or a woman that they die

then the ark shall be surely stoned and his flesh shall not be eaten but the owner of the ark shall be quipped but if the ox will want to push with his horns if you knew that this ox was a violent creature

and is testified to by the owner and you haven't kept him in

but that he's killed a man or a woman the ox shall be stoned and his owners shall also be put to death

certain justice and that isn't there

again what's it reminding us about brethren it's reminding us about how extensive must be our consideration for the neighbor and as the lawyer rightly interpreted to love a mother man like he loves himself

would we expect to walk out in the backyard

and see out there

an ox

which was as violent as they come

with a raging torrent of strength in him as he paused the ground and charges for your back door as you walk out would you walk out through that back door

well do you expect your neighbor to walk out through his back door and sit and confront the same neighborly companion that you've sent over to him

you see we have a need to consider the outcome of what we do

isn't it so brethren that we can argue the point and say look i have a right to own a violent ox well maybe you do but keeping hedged in don't let him affect anybody else because if he does then you're a dead man

what does it mean to talk about rights and responsibilities together

it's the old question isn't it about the

the person living at number 52 graham street that says i have the right to

to wash my clothes on a monday and hang them on the line outside to drive

man number 54 says i have the right to burn all the rubbish from the beer cartons and everything from my previous weekend's experience

do they both have rights

i don't think they both share the same privileges at least not at the same time

now what should decide that

where does the statue of liberty starts and where does it ends

you see it should start at the point where we think now what is my behavior going to be in terms of its affliction or effect upon someone else

isn't that the basic teaching of christ

do unto others as you would have them do unto you

well of course joseph's brethren had no thought like that did they not the slightest thoughts about the implications of the crime they were creating not the slight of thought even for their love for their own father

who at this time was pining himself away to death he said i shall go to my son in the grave

and they pat him on the shoulder and say they're their dad it's not so bad but any one of those boys could have hopped on his camel or his ass or whatever and gone down and brought joseph back and said we did a terrible thing boys we got to bring him back dad we did the wrong thing here's joseph

they could have done that couldn't they

they could have even told their father well dad i'm sorry we've sold him

at least it was honest

and at least it would have given their father some hope that maybe one day when this glorious zaphnath panera emerged from the land of egypt and looks at jacob

that jacob

would not have had the pain that he did through those many years

where is the moral sense of responsibility

the law of god was simply to show them that so if you've got an uncontrollable ox in your backyard make sure you hubble him well because the effects of our own dangerous weapons

can affect other people and that must be looked into

so as you go down here you'll see in verse 30 again now he he talks again about this ox and he says and if they've been laid on him a sum of money then he shall give for the ransom of his life whatsoever is laid upon him whether he have god a son or of god or daughter according to his judgment shall it be done unto him and if the ark shall push a man's servant or a maidservant

he shall give unto their master 30

shackles of silver and the ark shall be stones

he was a law that had importance to it

someone else's master

might become affected by an ox that would gore them

and so a payment of 30 pieces of silver had to be made

it's not very surprising is it brethren and sisters when you come down along the line of israel's history that you get to the point where the pharisees and sadducees unto the priests together had conspired against the lord jesus christ as the the subject that they as oxen would go

that now comes forth judas

and for 30 pieces of silver negotiates payment to him to enable them to go by as the ox the son of gods

who was also the servant of gods

the suffering servant of god

isn't it a strange part of the mysticism of man's iniquity

that he can pay 30 pieces of silver to give himself an opportunity of goring the son of god

the bulls of bation and campused him around

look at the strange situation that emerges in god's people

where they know what the love of the law says we're here before the lord jesus christ a very eminent lawyer says yes i know what the law says thou shall love god and love your neighbor as yourself

and that the eminent lawyers the ones who went through the law the priests who themselves had studied law from from a child's age they are the ones who now place the whole law in the scrap heap while they proceed with their murderous plot against the lord jesus christ

what a terrible part of human nature we have that that can happen but yet their brethren and sisters in the justice of the moral code of god's ethics from sinai to israel

he taught them everything but the love of christ might also teach

they had a moral responsibility not only to god

but to their fellow man

and hence of course the parable of the good samaritan who was the neighbor who is my neighbor who has this responsibility to me or to whom do i have the responsibility to do a navally thing they debated over who the neighbor was

and you know who the neighbor was christ told them

the one who is near you

that's a definition of the neighbor the one who is near you and it so happens that in most of our life's experience and our lifestyle our brothers and sisters are the nearest ones to us but

that's not always the case

we often meet someone in the streets who has a need

we're driving along in the car and we see someone in difficulties with maybe a burden of some kind they cannot lift or someone who is suffering from some kind of problem oh we drive on by don't we

in case there might be some risk

of getting out and help them

well the neighbor is the person that we see in trouble that is a definition of the neighbor and christ's example gives us that picture

remember the words of the apostle 2 do good unto all men but especially they are the households

there is a primary responsibility to our closest neighbor to our family in the truth and in the home

but thereafter as we have opportunity and as we see need we do it

if we have the right attitude of mind of course that will not be a problem love becomes something spontaneous not something about which we look through a series of commandments say oh yes clause 23

section b number six yes i can do this for him

love has to drive us to our actions of love not conscription

and therefore brethren sisters the high morals of moses law

is something that reminds us all of one great message

you cannot love the lord your gods with your hearts with your minds with your soul or with your strength if you cannot show it

so the brothers and sisters of which family we form the part of god's name

if we do that god shall bless us if we don't do it

with there's no way that god can know we have the slightest love for him

or that he has love for us

Transcript

well what we're doing brother and sisters is surveying some elements of the law of moses uh looking at the moral content of the law and therefore looking at the high ethical structure of god's commandments to us as his people were able to see in our last class how that god had shown to israel his own people a time when they must and are forced by the law to follow a way of godliness which previously they had been uninformed of i mean they should have known it they should have known it by looking purely at the character of god but because they were too concerned about what they wanted and what they wanted their own avaricious flesh to achieve what they wanted to covet in another man's possession the the anger the jealousy the envy that they showed all of this they put first and then simply believed in god as a second option almost as if religion had become to them what it is to most people today a social crutch or maybe a cultural family background

and in all of this israel had to know and had to learn the nature of their god so far as his character was concerned that they might be able to see the purpose of god manifestation in this world

so we saw in the demonstration of the ten commandments the way in which by ten divisional sections we could see the structure of man's responsibility towards god and his neighbor to love god with everything he possesses and to love his neighbor in every respect that he places upon himself as an individual in that sense we can see the power of the morals of moses law making the impact upon a people who otherwise would not tend to think about their behavior as a contrast to god

but instead would think about their behavior as a contrast to the nations about them

remember when habakkuk raised this question himself

when he had said lord what is the justice in effect what is the justice when you bring a nation less righteous than we are against us was this just you see the difficulty was that israel had to understand that as far as god is concerned there is not less righteous and more righteous before him

righteousness is only what god possesses

and only what was manifested in the lord jesus christ

if we compare ourselves with ourselves

then we simply lower the standards of righteousness for two reasons firstly

because we're comparing ourselves against something which is much less righteous than god or someone that is much less righteous than god

and secondly because we are comparing ourselves by the things we want to remember

that is we say well yes i don't do those sort of things

the sins of commission we are all very ready to think about that we don't do

but what about the sins of omission the things we should have done that we didn't do what about all those thousands of mistakes that we happen to forget quite easily but try to remember the virtues instead

it was by this rather ridiculous approach to righteousness that paul said concerning the law he was righteous how is he righteous concerning the law when he gives an exposition in scripture showing that the law made no man righteous

well he meant that he was righteous by the way in which the judaizers looked at righteousness

the leaders in israel are the priests and the jewish echelon class they were the ones who thought well they must be more righteous but if we run stringently by the law of course no man is righteous so they forgot about that principle and said now we will redefine righteousness

if my good works

are more weightier than my evil works then i am righteous

and on that basis they established their righteousness

and of course as we said we are very ready to remember good works but to forget evil works

the sins of omission brethren and sisters are sins that we may never be aware of

but they are still sins

and as we grow in our knowledge of the truth as we appreciate the personal failures that we may have one towards another as we realize the limits of our dedication to god which should be improved upon in all these things we constantly from the word of god grow we grow in our consciousness of his righteousness in our knowledge of his power and his of his righteous acts that he has done in scripture all these things improve by our knowledge and absorption of this word according to the exposure we give to this word in our lives

this is growth

these are real patterns of development this is the maturity unto which we must grow and become those who are integral parts of the unity of the faith

so as we get older in the truth we become more aware of sins of omission that we did earlier in the truth

but can any of us ever stand up and say yes

i have reached the righteous proportion before god

just to ensure brethren and sisters that we never did reach that stage

god sent the law

that by that law

should no man stand before god justified

because man had great difficulty in understanding the only true yardstick to measure righteousness and that is god

and his son

in that sense only brethren sisters do we see the power of god's righteousness in this world compared of course to our failure

now to what extent does failure manifest itself what do we consider sin and what do we not consider sin again we must be guided by scripture so in what we want to look at this morning in just a few verses that we have in exodus 22.

yesterday we looked at a few of the lessons that emerged in exodus 21

concerning the uh the laws there of masters and slaves of of instances of physical injury

now in chapter 22 we come to look at a section here concerning property rights

concerning the laws of theft

laws concerning plunder the laws of deposits

and then we look at verses 16 through to the 23rd chapter here which we'll consider some of these tomorrow which looks at laws concerning various moral attributes

moral demands that god makes upon us he made them to israel very truly he made to israel but we have to be very careful brethren sisters that we do not see that these are the laws that jesus christ took out of the way at his cross

he didn't take the laws of god away

he took the condemnation away

this must be defined however to say well are we obliged to obey the law of moses today no we are not obliged to obey the law of moses today we are obliged to obey the law of christ

but what he did not take away were the ethics of this law the high moral contents

the consideration that one must have for one's neighbor in every respect these things were not eradicated they were redefined and given more power by christ

what christ removed

was the basis of potential of righteousness by obedience to law that system he removed

so therefore he took away nailing it to the stake the principle by which man might feasibly try and find life by law but law could give no life to a man but condemned him for breaking it and that was the principle of law that we see in paul's expositions but the ethics remain

and to demonstrate that that is why in our bible today we have all these details there are perhaps many other aspects of the details of the law of moses which we do not contain which we don't have

they are related to a society in a given period of time and cannot be be reproduced in any other society but so far as what we see here is what god has left on record specifically for our benefits there are lessons there there are morals there there are principles of god's righteousness there and when we think about it we can often perhaps improve our own performance before god's

and before our brethren and sisters

we'll notice just in this first section here he talks in verses one to four about the laws concerning theft

verse two for instance he says in chapter 22 of exodus there if a thief be found breaking in breaking up means breaking in literally in the hebrew it's digging in of course in those days they had stone walls and you had to dig your way through the walls to get in and he says if he'd be smitten that he die there shall no blood be shed for him

if the sun be risen upon him there shall be bloodshed for him and then it says and he shall make full restitution if he have nothing then he says he shall be sold for his theft

just a small law there again it says verse 4 if the theft be certainly found in his hand that is if he's caught red-handed

alive whether it be ox or ass or sheep then he shall restore double what he has taken

of course the illustrations of those things which would be stolen in these days have to do with a pastoral small domestic society they don't talk about whipping out television sets and other things there of course but in this world today thieves are everywhere we know that and thieves have to be controlled by society

look at just the ethics of this

if the thief comes in at night

and the thief be smitten that he die

then shall know blood be shed for him

why because the principles are that if the thief broke in to a house digging through the rocks at night when the man was in there with all his children

all at stake in this darkness

then if in a struggle the thief was smitten the man was seen as simply struggling for the survival of his children his home life and he could not in fact see what he was doing

so it wasn't going to be a case of premeditated murder

if it is daylight however

and the thief be smitten then there may be a case for the avenger of blood to come forth and demand some retribution for the life that has been lost after all the man was there to steal lots of murder

there is some sense of justice in that isn't there

after all otherwise men might see a thief there and say oh terrific we've got a chance of gaining another mascot

take his head off and hang it on the village center

you see that would be aggression far beyond any crime that was committed

and therefore there would be retribution for that notice how delicately god showed to man even against his aggressors and the thieves around him that he had a moral responsibility to that man

he was not allowed to do anything that might not match the measure of the crime

well concerning the laws of plunder then we have in verses five to six some very interesting little relate related laws here concerning what man would do in the case of plunder

now if a man shall cause a field or vineyard to be eaten and she'll put his beast and shall feed in another man's field

then he says at the best of his own field and the best of his own vineyard shall he make restitution

well here is an illustration of a law which of course was important in those days

there being a pastoral community very largely which they were if a man was

happening to get his his own sheep out of the fold or it so happened that he did not repair his fences or his gates or whatever it was then as a result of his neglect

his neighbor could be deprived

of his own requirements of food for his own flock which from which of course he gained his welfare and his liver

so again the law came in there and says if a man shall cause a field or a vineyard to be grazed over

or he shall put his feast until she'll feed in an arm in another man's field then let me read what these sets two injured in search of this points

it says he shall surely make restitution out of his own fields according to the yield thereof and if the whole field be eaten now we come back in in the text then it says of the best of his own fields and the best of his own vineyard shall he make restitution

so you see here was a point where man was not allowed through his sheer neglect

to bring deprivation upon others

and therefore it reminds us of a principle that we must seek to control that which is ours to be responsible for its potential to affect someone else in some deleterious manner that would of course deprive your neighbor in some way

well the apostle paul reminds us of a little principle like this let's go back for a moment just to romans chapter 13.

romans 13 the apostle brings many beautiful lessons of personal responsibility that we have before christ

in the 13th chapter

he highlights the expression now just read verse 10

love

worketh no ill

to his neighbor

therefore love is the fulfilling of the law

so if love does not work any ill to his neighbor

it means that there will be consequent upon us an obligation to to ensure that anything within our positional control cannot create ill to our neighbors

and that is a point that we often overlook but you have the law of moses

therefore by that operation is the law of god fulfillments

it shows to us brethren sisters that between our own communities and those with whom we have frequent contact we have an inexorable obligation

to ensure the safety of other people from what we do

and if in fact we play that down to even the words we speak we shall see a great demand of responsibility that we have before god notice the next verse we have back here in verse 6 of exodus 22 if fire break out and catching thorns so that the stocks or the shocks of corn the heaps of sheaves or the standing corn or the field he says be consumed therewith

he that kindles the fire shall surely make restitution

frequently over there in the middle east as they still do today they have to burn off the stubble in order to make way for the future growing harvest period in this country probably it's the same practices and also in my country but if those fights get out of control

it is our responsibility ensure that they don't but if they do they can ruin not only the next door neighbors property but of course vast thousands of acres and last year in australia we experienced enormous bushfires

there was a law made that any person who lights a fire when a fire danger season is on for a fire danger day is on then there is a fine of a thousand dollars or six months jail although

the reason for that would have been seen as very just because you see what happened when those fires got out of control in south australia and victoria they burned thousands and thousands of acres killing stock to the value of billions of dollars

destroying some 60 people's lives

and something like 1

500 homes were birds

or because somebody two people

so irresponsibly lit matches where they shouldn't get

that shows us how great a matter a little fire can look

which of course brings us to that verse in james james chapter three

in the third chapter here james is of course giving us some very important lessons here about the destructive power of the tongue

but you'll notice how he says here in verse 5 even so the tongue is a little member and it boasts great things

behold how great a mata a little fire kindleth

and the tongue

the tongue is a fire a world of iniquity so is the tongue among our members it defiles the whole body it sets on fire the course of nature and it's set on fire of gehenna as if we have a perpetual burning incinerator by what we starts those messages brothers and sisters show us the importance

of looking after fire and how if we play with fire

of course our fingers can be burnt

a fire to us brothers and sisters is that which can create a very damaging results

by the things we say by the little things we might say flippantly about someone else where we shouldn't say it to someone else

take the issues for instance where well we could see a failure of a particular brother in regards to ourselves so we go and tell everybody else about it except him

it was really a misunderstanding perhaps your misunderstanding and then you go and spread something we spread something amongst our community which then defaces and and brings distribute upon that brother's personality

and then once that rumor goes out it finds its way all around the worlds

that's how easily we can disregard the principles of god's law here if we start a fire

make sure that we counsel ourselves to contain that fire within the constraints that it should be it's too easy brethren and sisters to say things flippantly to talk out of turn to use the word out of season against those who become the victims of our ill-gotten words

and thus a whole world of iniquity can start from a very simple striking of a match like the tongue starts to work

perhaps james had in mind this principle of the law when he wrote one who was a member of christ's community thought much upon the principles of the law and the and the and the law itself and its moral ethics he frequently alluded to and here is an example

example brethren sisters of moral responsibility that we have

towards our neighbor

if only we would think of those things when we should

perhaps our community could be a lot happier than it otherwise is

when we destroy a brother or a sister's self-respecting reputation we may as well destroy them

and as we shall see in our study tomorrow

the great responsibility we have towards other brethren sisters in the truth is very large and we must never forget how extensive it is

so in our practical dealings with our brethren sisters or those within the world let us ensure that we see the moral responsibilities we are under in all our dealings with them surely we want them to look upon us as a community and say well look true he did the wrong thing but he made full recompense for that

or else he might say well i very much appreciated the way in which he pointed out that he was remaining solely responsible for what he was doing

it's in ethics like this that it causes others to see our good works and glorify our god in heaven in the day of the situation

if our community instead tends to be self-seeking self-centered and selfish in the nth degree then we're going to find ourselves being most unpopular with the people around us uh having very little to redeem us at the time of the judgment seat of our lord jesus christ

well let's look at a couple of other features of this 22nd chapter here

you'll notice for instance that uh in verse 8 here we had the judgment of the elohim and it was there to determine of course the matters of trusteeship

but look down in just in verse 7 he says if the man shall deliver unto his neighbor money or vessels stuff could be rented vessels to keep and it'd be stolen out of the man's house and if the thief be found let him pay double

but he says

if the thief be not found then the master of the house shall be brought unto the judges that's the word elohim again the those who should have represented god in judgments to see whether he have put forth his hand unto his neighbor's goods

well this was open for possibility and therefore it was to be examined as if this did happen so if a neighbor has left his goods with you you have a responsibility to ensure

that those goods are looked after and that those goods return

well if a man delivers verse 10 says unto his neighbor an ass or an ox or a sheep or any beast to her to to keep and it die or it'd be heard or driven away and no man sees it if there's no witnesses there he says then shall an oath of yahweh be between them both that he has not put his hand unto his neighbor's goods and the owner of it shall accept thereof and he shall not make it good so therefore if there is no witness he should accept that what he has learned to his neighbor is in fact happened by accident to have become lost

well in verse 12 he says and if it be stolen from him he shall make restitution unto the owner thereof that is the theft may have been prevented by adequate care and that is important again adequate care of somebody else's possession

verse 13 points out as an expansion of verse 10

that in fact if there is a witness for the event then something else should happen if it be torn in pieces then let him bring it for witness

and he shall not make good that which was torn if he demonstrates that he hasn't put his hand to us

again moral responsibility for the owner verse 15 says but if the owner thereof be with us he shall not make it good or if it be a hired thing it came for his hire now let's just uh amplify those verses a little so far as the meaning is concerned if the owner thereof be with it that is if the owner happens to be associated with the goods at some time which were in somebody else's responsibility then for the time he is with those goods he takes over responsibility for it and then he says inverse in that same verse he says but if it being hired thing it came for his hire now what he's saying there if you have not loaned this outs but you have leased it out or rented it out and therefore you're charging money for that rent

then he says the damage to that must be included in the price of attire

so all these issues you see become very plain common sense issues much of our society is structured in a similar way today

but again we have to look at how well we treat other people's things that we might get

by circumstances over the years i have accumulated a library of books some four thousand in number which is a collection very much of the historian the history of the christopher nelson community and of many other expository and reference words

of course we do become conscious of the materials that are resources for the truth because they're all very valuable

but frequently when i have learned books outs

they have come back with

coffee stains

and peanut butter in between the pages

and uh and even raspberry jam

and i've wondered where on earth they do their study of these books it's nice to see that the breakfast table is a source of communication in the word of god but wonder whether that should be the place where we put possessions

i think often too we might borrow books and i know that we we're a very studious group of people and we borrow books from our brothers and sisters but sometimes we don't give them back

uh i often find the brother comes to my house and he goes through my bookshelf looking for his books to wonder if i might have somehow got his books on my show

i think in areas like this we just need to exercise obviously a lot of caution as far as i'm concerned if i lend a book out i'll make it my responsibility to get that book back

i write the record that has been loaned out and therefore it's up to me to chase it okay the brother who has borrowed it he obviously needs a book for some purpose in the truth and we're willing to lend all of our resources for that purpose but again

we can sometimes be very forgetful because we are busy in the truth the book is put down on the shelf it's forgotten about the one who loaned it to you didn't make a record to whom it was loans and therefore there's no outstanding advice as to where that book has gone small point isn't it brethren very small by lending books but look at the principle behind it if we borrow something look after us

put a plastic cover on it and make sure you write the brother's name in it from whom you borrowed the book

so that you'll remember where it came from

because hang on to that book for long enough and you'll end up writing your own name minutes

because you'll forget where you got it from

you see these are small principles of of developing moral responsibility to one another concerning those matters which we help each other in

but nevertheless this was indelibly impressed as part of the law of moses so when we see these small things which are done which can often cause unnecessary offence between brethren sisters we should rebuke ourselves and say those principles were clearly laid down in the law of moses why should i ignore them now simply because i'm under the law of christ but you see the law of christ said anyway

do unto others

as you would have them do unto you

and that law in fact brethren sisters incorporates every detail we are looking at doesn't it

but how dull we are at times to perceive what that law is saying to us in its practical outworkings yes we think about the large issues of interpersonal problems we think about the big issues of human communication but the small moments those moments which cause the biggest problems we end up completely forgetting about because we say they're not important the fact that we cause offense in a small way doesn't matter it's only the the big ways that we're concerned about

and this is why this law of moses in its highest ethics was developed to show israel as a people and to us as a people of spiritual israel today that it's in the tiniest matters of our behavior patterns by which we make the truth stand or fall

and hence the moral issues that appear before us here

well let's look for a moment then at a couple of other points which now brings us into laws concerning moral laws

well verse 18 there's a very small comment made there

which says

thou shall not suffer a which to live

a comment appears right in the middle of sundry laws concerning god now what do we mean by by this law coming in here suddenly and how do we understand this moving suddenly into such a position like this that should not suffer a which to live doesn't this sound as if you know here is a thief breaking into your home

and if that thief breaks in in daytime what he has to do is replenish double what he's about to take

or there might be a man who has

maybe grazed over your place and you think well this is terrible look what he's done and then uh nevertheless it's something that he must make

repayment for he must give you the best of his own a produce to replace what he's done

but here is a witch now what's a witch i mean to ask a witch is somebody who

might have put hands on a gretel in an oven

or maybe she's a person who wears a funny hat and has a funny nose uh which in these days brethren and sisters was with somebody of particular kinds

of profession

and it sounds very aggressive doesn't that shall not suffer a witch to live but it was very important

you see the witch had great power let's notice also what the law said concerning witches let's go to deuteronomy chapter 18 for just a moment

deuteronomy chapter 18 here is a section in verses 9 let me see 9 through 9 10-11 where he says there

moses of course

when thou had come into the land which the lord thy god giveth thee thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations

they shall not be found among you anyone that makes his son or his daughter to pass through the fire or that uses divination or an observer of times or an enchanter of a witch or a charmer or a consultant with familiar spirits or a wizard or a necromancer a person who talks with the deads

now you will notice that all these things today we would consider them just the mild arts of sophistry that only very superstitious people would ever become involved in

but the law there

said alongside witches

were people who put their children into the fires of moloch

doesn't seem reasonable as a comparison does it

until we realize what the witch is

you see the witch was one who sought to deceive the people of gods

by telling them about things which supposedly she had seen in the heavens heard of whispering spirits over their back at some time had received visions concerning people's destiny was reading in their palms concerning things that were going to happen to their children and it's telling by the stars simply what would happen whether it's virgo or ares or somebody else and they base their advice on those ill-gotten sources of information

and thereby proceeds

to deceive people

so that they destroy their lives before god and that is importance

you see god made it very clear that so far as his gospel was concerned and so far as the law was concerned there was only one source

one source of divine revelation and that is the word of god

but today brethren and sisters

our community faces and other threats

yes i treat it like witchcraft i treat it like necromancers i treat it like those who look to the stars

the thought that in fact

an experience that a person might have

having been associated with some pentecostal or or advanced uh fundamental sect that is involved in the areas of um

of maybe holy spirit power as they believe

who can then come and tell me

i have seen a vision i know it's right and if you pray about it you will know it's right too

another form of witchcraft

that which is right brethren sisters is only that which we can demonstrate according to the law and the testimony of almighty god

if it is not demonstrable in that source it is not tenable as divine revelation

and worse still what can happen is that some of our members can be deluded to think that well if there are other people who experience these uh kind of feelings from above a wonderful ecstasy a feeling of warmness with jesus an uttering of of of the sounds from their mouth which

is actually unintelligible gibberish but nevertheless said to be the sounds of talking to god in spirits

here is the evidence of another source of divine approval

and if we were then to say the next stage on well if these people out here who believe in the trinity and the devil and we go to heaven when we die and everything else is a deviance of christian theology today but yet they have an acceptance before god then why is doctrine so important

and so witchcraft

breaks down rational understanding of the word of god

it's that area brethren and sisters that in the law of moses god considered vibrantly important because if there was another source of divine revelation like a witch claims to have

then now you have denuded the power of almighty god's word and if you do that you will eventually destroy your children and you may as well pick them up and throw them into the mouth of molok and incinerate them

and that's what we would do brethren sisters if we broke down the standards of doctrinal understanding and belief in the word that we have today that is ascertainable by a rational process

of understanding

and keeping the words of god

if we remove that

we have no peg for our faith we have no viable source for belief we have no communicable record to spread to the world with the gospel

and that is why that is why you can't suffer a which to live

no that's not a law for us to take away the lives of witches it was a law to israel that within their community they should promote not permit a witch to do her work and to ensure that she did not do her work they had to destroy her

but the ecclesia today brothers and sisters is such that we should ensure that in our communities anything else but the clear word of gods

does not take on any sense of divine revelation or any gesture of divine approval and that's what that law was getting

there is only one source of divine revelation

and everything must be established upon that and if god says if they speak not according to this light and to this lawn of this testimony it is because there is no light in them whatever they say whatever they say they experience whatever they claim to believe it has no essence of efficacy for us if it is not according to this word

so thou shalt not suffer a which to live

and god did not want to see his people destroyed by this

ultimately hundreds and thousands of jewish people

lost their lives

in the invasions of assyrians and of babylonians and of romans that came against their lands

they because israel refused to acknowledge the power of this world

and therefore witchcraft took them over

at the time of christ what was he battling with what was he talking about when he had to talk about the the problem of healing a person they talked about christ and says oh well he does this by the power of the elizabeth the elizabeth the god of the cron

as if the god of ecrum was a reality was israel preaching the god of echoing was a reality yes they were preaching that

where did they get that from

they got it from the canaanites they got it from the babylonians and they also got the immortal soul from the babylonians look in the jewish writings look in the jewish scripture the hebrew bible there is no mention of immortal souls why did then did they believe it in the days of christ because then they had taken the greek philosophies and the babylonian philosophies and they came to believe in the hades and the netherworlds as well

how did they get in that state

by using sources other than the word of truth

as the knowledge of god

and that shows us the danger brethren and sisters that we have to look at today

well he then goes on to tell us in exodus 22

about the beasts and he says whosoever lies with the beast shall surely be put to death

of course this would be about the most immoral of the illegitimate sexual practices of the people of israel but this was bred amongst the societies in which they lived and moved

in sodom and gomorrah in the terrible ritual rites of the canaanites and of those others who came into the land beasts were involved bestiality other other incredible forms of that which god hates his abomination

thus he says anybody who does this must also be utterly destroyed

this would bring in the very basis characteristics of that which would deprive israel from their basic morality before god and destroy their heart and soul in the midst of that community

and hence god would judge it in this way

well from here brethren sisters we see now another points of a law that god made to them in verse 21 notice this as a sense of an empathy verse 21 that thou shalt neither vex a stranger nor oppress him for you were strangers in the land of egypt

once you were slaves in the land of egypt you of course were given much oppression much vexation of spirit should you therefore retaliate as if you feel you must be uh somehow revenge because of this period that you went through

not according to god's law

that experience should not have given you aggression that experience should have given you sympathy and understanding

and yet it was christ who said render not evil for evil

it was christ who said if thou be smitten on one cheek turn to him the other also

look what the law is saying

if you were constantly put in a slave ship let that be come to you a reason for feeling the position of someone else that they were in

not a reason for you to seek opportunity for for revenge on what position you had before

empathy brethren sisters means

to stand in the shoes of someone else

sympathy means that you stand in your shoes and take pity on the person who's in the other shoes

it can be condescending it can be distant sympathy is feeling for that person over there but empathy is getting in issues with it

and feeling what he's feeling

there it is in the law of moses

there was the moral contact there of loving your neighbor as yourself did christ really give anything new or did he rather bring a new concentration upon old ethics that were there for many hundreds of years

here is an ethic brethren sisters we need to consider in our own communities often because we feel deprived in some way even as a young person we later on might seek to to lash out against that and maybe deprive other young people of situations

many things in our lives we have to question

but god's ethical principle remains strong

now notice in verse 22 here he says ye shall not afflict any widow or fatherless childs

if thou think them at any wise and they cry at all unto me i will surely hear their cry and my wrath shall wax hot and i will kill you with the sword and your wives and your widows and your children shall be left fatherless

why was god so concerned about widows and fatherless children

because brothers and sisters god saw himself

as a father and as a husband

he said to israel i am your husband but you have played the harlots

he calls israel his father as he says in jeremiah he says he has been a father unto us says jeremiah

god is a father and he's a husband

in other words he is the male to secure the interests of the wife and the children

so god appreciates how great that responsibility is

well we as people of a society where we also understand as males the responsibility as a husband to provide for the wife or with the children to provide a source of of constant welfare keeping and education for them

if you take the mail out of their lives

then there is some depravation

well says the women's liberation community no there's no deprivation at all we go out and do exactly the same thing that we want to do you see they have changed the role structure and in fact they earn the deserts of that too

but look at the principle of god's life working with us christ jesus himself i think it was in matthew 23 that he speaks to the scribes and the pharisees and he says well under you scribes and pharisees for you oppressed widows houses

what were they doing playing upon the widow the widow didn't have a male to defend her to defend her in court to defend her with any uh form of self-defense

and so they played upon the widow's houses why so that they might uh drip them dry of all their material resources

the same also as christ had repudiated the practices of the scribes and the pharisees there who they would uh come upon a young man who would say well i don't want to support my parents

and uh so they would say well why not because well uh perhaps i can put this money into the treasury and say oh well in that case it's all right you don't have to support your parents

and so this law of corba came in you see the substitutes

give the money to the church give the money to the system of israel's temple offerings and of course it liquidates any moral responsibility you have towards your uh your your father and your mother

of course this was directly against the commandment number five of the ten commandments and we can see how they rationalize the choice of doing this

and now instead of seeing the widows were people who particularly need a a form of help and survival here we find that the jewish leaders in israel were instead

plaguing the widow's house to get all they could in the treasury to build up their own power and prestige before the people

but what did james say about this look over in james chapter one

james definition of what pure religion really is before god's he says in verse 20 26

if any man among you seems to be religious and bridleth not his tongue but to see with his own heart this man's religion is faith

pure religion and undefiled before god and the father is this

to visit the fatherless

and the widows in their affliction and to keep himself unspotted from the world

again the two groups the fatherless and the widows and this was called pure religion

this had the sense of a man seeking the good of his neighbor in devotion to his god in its most pure state is to put himself in the position of a child without a father

and a wife without a breadwinner

what was the good of any religion unless it could be seen in practical sacrifice were its leaders

as james also says earlier on in the chapter well here's the occasion rather chapter two he says here's a case where one comes to you at the door he desperately needs food he's hungry he's starving his colds

and you say well brother nice to see you

biggie warm and filled with the spirit of the truth

oh i've got an appointment for the meal now see you later and you slam the door instead

you see this is why god had faced under the law of moses

such an important dimension of personal responsibility what's the good of worshiping god says james even the madmen the maniacs say i believe in god so what's that make you

if we believe that the truth means something let's put it into application let's strive to see that that word of truth is going to mean something to god not just to us it's not a delightful philosophy it's not just a nice ideology that you can demonstrate as true it's not just the truth that you go to the platforms and debate the errors with it is something that transposes itself into our bodies through our hearts because we feel for people because we make their concerns our concerns

and then for those who might be bereft of some particular need some kindness some love some affection some security we can give it to them

but remember

keep yourselves unspotted in the worlds

in the process whereby we can give ourselves to the needs of others there can also be hidden traps in it

we can become involved emotionally with those people which can be hazardous

we must be careful and prudent in what and how we do it

we can become involved in their lives to an extent that the uniqueness of our life and the truth can be detracted and instead we might as well put on the uniform of the salvation army than dress for the meeting of a sunday morning

you see all these things brethren are part of living the truth where the moral integrity of the truth becomes a way of life that shows that god is in us

and that's why god had said to the hebrews when he took them out of that land of egypt he says i will take you to me for a people and i will be to you a guards

that relationship can only work

when we put our hearts and our minds and our actions at one with god and with his character and the beautiful qualities of a loving father all of these things should come to us as his children and therefore we should do the things that our father does that's the family characteristic

but if we forget that brethren what is the good of religion

we can become tinkling symbols sounding shells when we listen to our own lovely voices we simply go and make euphemism and lovely comments about how great god is and how great we are

instead of talking about how great the needs are of others

this is the power of the law of moses and it's these great morals that christ never took away

and it's these lessons

that we most often forget

because we too like israel

have bad memories

and we lose sight of the struggle against the old man of the flesh in here

let's watch him he's ready to destroy us

as he destroyed israel

Transcript

the law of moses was of course known only to israel it was only intended for israel

the law of moses was something that was not moses law as such it was not there because moses brought it moses was simply the vehicle through which that law was created and brought to bear upon the people so israel was the community unto which god had addressed himself more so than any other nation around him because this community was one community that he said i will take you to me for a people and i will be to you a gods and thus shall you become part of my family and part of my name as we shall see in this chapter we look at this morning in chapter 23. here he was giving to israel now a series of laws that involved moral responsibility in judgments

this was an area where frequently of course mankind

does create travesties of justice where because he does not give a totally impartial approach to judgments he therefore has his minds diverted away from the power of justice before the people

so in the 23rd chapter he gives to us here now these laws concerning the the falsehood and the injustice that can emerge and look how important these laws are in terms of making society operate as basically the fabric that keeps those people together

verse one we read in chapter 23 of exodus

thou shalt not raise a false report

put not thy hand with the wicked to be an unrighteous witness

here the expression says that you shall not spread a false reports

the word false there means a report that is incorrect that is vain that has nothing behind it it has no substance you shall not spread abroad a report that has no substance

and put not thine hand to the wicked to be an unrighteous witness or literally a witness of violence

now this is very important for israel as a nation

and also brethren and sisters it's very important for us as people

spreading spreading a vain senseless and substance-less reports

i only wish we could read those words more carefully when we hear some of the things go around that we do

christodolphians of course are a very close community

because we are close we take a very great interest in each other and that is of course very important also

it's important that we consider each other's welfare the circumstances of life that might affect us whether it be god or whether it be bad are usually points of interest between our community this is good

but let's notice one of the problems that emerged with it

often because our christadelphian communication is so intense we become more intense than perhaps we should about talking about what is affecting our community or did you hear about sister sanchez did you hear that brother such and such did this

and it becomes that sometimes which i fearfully observe is that we tend to be wanting to see as if we are going to be the ones that are keeping up with the latest information about the gossip of our community

sometimes i hear things said about brethren and or sisters which rather strikes me as thinking well i wonder if that report is true i wonder if that report has been checked out

after all there's a sister's name at stake behind this report

the thing is the the more juicier some kinds of pieces of information seem to be the more they are likely to be propagated through our community we've got a very efficient community as it might well be said if you want to get something to somebody really fast you send a telegram

faster still you use the telephone but the fastest method is to telecrystallthin and it gets there quicker

we have a very good grapevine system don't we and this is because we are interested in one another and this is good but brethren don't use that communication system to spread reports that have no substance and no value for the person about whom that report is referring to

this was a law in israel it was a very important law in israel and god said don't spread it if you spread it i will see that this is creating a witness of injury against my people

and so god was very sure that he put that down in here as part of his law do not spread it if a person did

there would obviously be some judgment upon them by the judges of israel the elohim that he administered the affairs of judgment before the people

but in our community

it's not judged is it

there's no control upon gossip

upon words of injury that might be spread upon unkind words that affect brethren and sisters personality and and their respectability

and the point is to bring a false report against someone is almost to bring a sword against someone because destroy a man's reputation and you destroy his life who will trust him

who will give him any honor

who will give him some trust that yes what he says might be true

to vilify a man

is to crucify his personality and his respectability before others

and it's a shame to do that it's like killing somebody

and so the law also said there

put not your hand to be a witness of violence someone who will witness against another person to bring violence upon them for what purpose

maybe for political expediency maybe for envy maybe for hatred

maybe because we just can't be bothered thinking about what we sought to do in justice and truth and goodness to some person instead we think only of how we can create injury and show our power in what we do

some terribly injurious things have been said in the past shamefully so against the brethren

and once of course that fire is starts and we light the match and it starts moving out it grows in power it grows in energy it grows in furiousness of heat

and that little tongue was started at all has created a mammoth problem for individuals in the occlusion of god and that is a very great shame

so he moves in in verse two now to talk about the multitudes and he says now verse 2 of exodus 23

thou shalt not follow a multitude to do evil neither shalt thou speak in a cause to decline after many to rest judgment now let's just give a bit of a paraphrase there

following a multitude he says don't follow the multitudes

to do evil

and neither he says nor shall you bear witness at a trial so as to side with a multitude and therefore pervert justice

the multitude

it's a very powerful pressure group upon people isn't it numbers the numbers game the numbers issue very powerful

i guess we can see this also at our own

ecclesiastes we have within our society a democratic process of the governing of our autonomous communities called ecclesias

brother roberts in his very wise book called the guide for the establishment and the performance of ecclesias the ecclesial guide as it's called then in this little book he outlines for us a sequence whereby we can act towards others to preserve the majority rule in a collegial life but also to preserve love in such a community

we can nevertheless within our communities see that because the majority is thinking this way that we'll go with the majority

but in fact as the wise proverb has said

if 20 million people believe a foolish thing it's still a foolish thing

and if we've got 800 million catholics who believe that that mary is up in heaven now and to be worshiped then does that mean it should be believed

you see the majority does not indicate truth

it indicates only one thing

that's that with what what the majority think

that's all it tells us

now here we have an occasion to make a decision a decision may be on a brother's welfare maybe a brother is called in question in regard to his status in fellowship

we have to make a decision about him

the majority of the ecclesia says oh well i think we should withdraw fellowship from it

well what's your decision

should we make a decision if we don't know the facts

should we simply go with the majority and say well if i stand up i'm going to the odd man out so i won't say anything in defense of that brother it's a big pressure isn't it a pressure upon individuals who might not want to be associated with somebody who appears to be out of favor lest we end up out of favor also

the kind of decisions we might make at occasional business meetings when we don't vote anything do we see what everybody else is voting first or we're seeing how rather such and such votes and i'll follow him or if we see how the rest of the family in the meeting votes and we follow the party line

it's a shame when that happens it is really a perversion of justice

but because we are human beings living in a human society of which we have all the consequent affections and and allegiances that exist within societies and pressure groups

we tend to follow it

the law said don't

don't follow a multitude for evil and he says do not cause

to arise a case of a perversion of justice simply because you're following the leader

remember also the scripture said broad is the way that leads to destruction and many there are that go therein

the many there is clearly condemnable what about our lives what about our experiences in the truth

many of those things can also be condemnable if we simply follow a multitude to do something but after all the reason why some of us may choose to adopt a certain decision is because it represents less work on our part to adopt that decision

remember this the law also said to israel if you hear a false report then go and diligently make inquiry

ask questions to see if it's so question all people involved in it if you have found the matter to be true and the accusation to be sure then go to action that was what the law said

sometimes brethren we go into action at the smallest of the pieces of evidence and say so

and justice is thereby perverted

now he mentions another dimension in verse 3.

neither here says shalt thou countenance a poor man in his cause that is neither shall you be partial to a poor man in his trial just because he is poor

again the tendency to support the underdog isn't it

we have legal

hassles over the the poor man who takes his case to court and the and the rich organizations that uh that might be oppressing him

the power of oppression is very great with some of our corporate authorities in this world today corporations with millions of dollars behind them that are able to uh to create a a great legal witness a legal punch when it gets to the courtroom

so that the poor man in fact has no chance

because he can't afford the best of the lawyers solicitors those who will go and argue his case and bring out legal precedence

in this case he says there is a tendency also for others to support the the man who's the small man you know like supporting the david in the david and goliath battle

there might be a tendency for us also to say well here is this brother in the ecclesia he this brother is very well off you know financially he's quite comfortable but he still contributes a great measure of support to the truth and there's another brother over here who has a dispute with him and he doesn't have any money and we tend to say well let's let's get the rich guy instead

and so we tend to think that we can support the poor man because he's poor just because he's poor irrespective of the issues that are at stake for judgments

that of course is another privacy of justice

of course in our brotherhood brethren and sisters we have to make decisions frequently when we must use justice as the basis of decision incorrectly inquiring into the matter in seeing what the problem is in digesting the problem in investigating potential solutions to that problem

instead of setting up the party line

very unfortunately ecclesias do this they have groups of brethren and sisters that think in particular ways

some who will yield more to this kind of you and others who will go over to the other side to to another kind of view

and therefore we end up with this this canning of the results in the equation almost along party lines

the political side of the occlusion work very unfortunate isn't it that it happens that we cannot resist the tendency

to be clear in our own thinking logical in what we see

not just to follow what others see

and how important that is to make our equations operate properly

so he says now in verse 4 he brings the dimension now again to the individual responsibility and says if thou meet thine enemy's ox or his ass going astray and thou shalt thou shalt surely bring it back to him again returning thou shalt return it that's what the hebrew says

well you're walking up the street there

and you see uh jim carter's cow going down the other way

and you say ah that's jim carter's cow

oh but he's my enemy he's my oh i'm glad he's lost that cow

that'll get him back for the time when he said something to my cow

and so we look for moments of retaliation

so we sit back and we gloat when we see it happen

but the law said you can't do that you can't do that for your brother he says but he says what about your enemy your enemy if your enemies cow gets out

go and get it and take it back returning you shall return it and if you see the ass of him that hates you lying or under his burden and what is for bear to help him he says thou shalt surely help him as he says thou thou shalt not leave it to him alone but you'll surely get out there and you'll help him release that that ass from his burden

imagine the scene

here is the ass it's over burdens the load is falling off

and as the the ass goes down the street here coming up towards you you're going the other way of course on your own business this asses is falling under the loads and it's owner who has spoken words against you you see

he hates you

he's spoken against you

and you see him like that what's your reaction

well i hope it all falls off on the grounds

hope it costs him a couple of hours in time to get it back on again

this is so easy it's like seeing your neighbor next door with whom you've had frequent quarrels because he won't turn down his television set at nights

how's it going till two and three in the morning watching these crazy midnight movies

and because he disturbs you you pass him out on the street there

and he's got a flat tire you see and his jacks broken on his car and you say hmm

serves him right

you won't turn that television down that's god's judgment on it

easy to say isn't it

because we can sometimes justify

things in the name of god

can't we

oh it's not me doing anything wrong just that god's eventually he says vengeance is mine i'll repay there it is vengeance it's getting him back

well that'll teach you now he'll turn his television set down

well let's look at it logically would he turn his television set down if you walk by grinning like a cheshire cat say hi there

and he is in trouble with his if his jack is broken and he can't fix his car's broken tire

i would suggest that your next night might see the television left on all night and he goes to bed

you see how do we deal with the enemy this is an issue which is most important you know the law of god told us how to deal with the enemy how to use moral responsibility to those people who otherwise

would try and destroy us if they could what what should we do to them how ought we to treat them i just want to take you over for a moment to uh

proverbs 25 where here we have an illustration of what to do the best way to deal with the enemy

of course these words are all belonging remember to the law of moses we are not talking about the law of christ

well known as verse 21 here in proverbs 25 it says here concerning your enemy if thine enemy be hungry give him bread to eat

and if he be thirsty you give him water to drink

for thou shall heap coals of fire upon his head and yahweh shall reward thee

now what's this point about getting a bucket of coals and pouring it over his head

you see what this is here brethren is a piece of the most adept psychology that you can use against your enemy if your enemy hates you and if he has done evil against you and you do something evil to him the psychology is very simple

he simply says well i feel quite justified in doing that evil to him because look what he's now doing to me

you reinforce

his feeling of animosity towards you because you've done something evil to him

so therefore he feels more justified in doing something evil in the first place

now if you do something kind to him

what happens says the proverb you heap coals of fire upon his head what it's saying in the hebrew is literally this you produce the penetrating pain [Music]

of a burning shame and guilt in him

so on his head he feels so terribly pain that he has given you evil and you have given him goods

and that's a big difference

now he doesn't feel justified for having done something evil to you now he feels the heel that that shouldn't have done something evil to you you have consumed him with guilt and shame because he's an ordinary human being in most circumstances and he will understand his feelings and he will respond by saying oh what have i done that for look what he's done to me he could have really taken me to the cleaners but he didn't

and what do you do

well if you really want to hurt your enemy that's how you hurt him

don't make him feel happy make him feel sad

but in the process of making him feel sad you destroy your enemy and turn him into your friend and that's a better proposition of relationship isn't it

so you see the law of moses was just not moral ethics only it had to do vitally with what concerned the relationships of individuals and how to keep the fabric of the jewish society together

to make them the ecclesia of god after all if god says i take you to me for a people and you become my sons and daughters he wants the sons and daughters to treat each other like he would treat them

and therefore in this relationship if in fact you do good for these people

if you help them

it turns enemies into friends

and that's vitally important

now he goes in again now to talk a little about justice back in exodus 23 and in verse 6 where he says thou shalt not rest the judgment of thy poor in his cause that is thou shalt not pervert the justice due to the poor in his cause

now you you can't get lost in two extremes here you don't support the poor because he's poor

and you don't uh simply go against the poor because he happens to be a person that is less acceptable to the majority of your people in this society which you were parts

what he says here is you look clearly and do not pervert justice and do not become unbalanced be in one direction or the other be just in your decisions be conclusive in your analysis and above all make sure that you serve the cause of god in what is done not the cause that you want out of the decision you make

whether it's going to please you down the river or not doesn't matter it's whether what happens to this brother and sister now that's what's important justice must not be perverted keep thee far from a false matter he says in verse seven that the innocent and he says in the innocent and the righteous slay thou not for i will not justify the wickeds keep well away from matters of falsehood and god addresses accuses witness and judges in this way make sure that you consider carefully that you do not have anything to do with something that is not true

and sometimes that brethren says that means we must do a little more analysis too

sometimes we say well if brother such and such says that it must be true

after all he's a very respectable brother recording brother he's got the wrong information at his fingertips well i'll just take what he says to be true and i won't bother reading any of the occlusal correspondence myself i'll i'll leave it to him to to tell me what's in there and he can make his judgments on it

well that is giving to one brother an enormous responsibility

and a collegial business meeting is one of the greatest factors

that have preserved the autonomy of aeroclesial organizations

because an ecclesial business meeting is where every brother and sister has the right to question anything in that ecclesia and there is no totalitarian powers

and no member of the arranging brethren can stand up and say well look you're not an ab so you can't decide this matter the business meeting is where everything is level and open and you can question anything you wish about that ecclesia of course using wisdom and care to do so

that is a great system and it must not be abused and that privilege must be preserved above all

but we ensure that all the decisions that are made are as just as possible and always in the interests of the majority of that equation sometimes we're going to be in the majority sometimes we'll be in the minority but either way we must accept that justice must first be done

do not let self-interest affect the outcome of a decision

we all do that

when we shouldn't

and it hurts and harms our brethren and sisters

and it works towards the destruction of the system by which our ecclesiastes are preserved

by mutual love respect justice mercy and truth so do not support anything that is false

well in verse 8 he says talks now about the bribe

and he says and thou shalt take no gift a bribe that means

because he says the bribe binds the wise it blinds the wise and perverts the words of the righteous people

so the bribe here translated actually as such on number of occasions becomes a fact that a person now because he's influenced like this he has become blind

it's been unfortunate at times in the past when i have

heard discussions concerning collegial business meetings

and one brother says look if you'll support me in this i'll support you in that

and that's a bribe

it's nothing short of a bribe

it's saying well you scratch my back and i'll scratch yours

it means if you will help me here i will help you there because i want to get this i'm not too interested in the outcome of yours i'll support you there because it doesn't affect me but i want you to support me over here in my area and therefore you get the context of a bribe set up in which your clear mind for justice mercy and truth has been put aside

and i feel that's a shame when that happens

every issue in decision brethren made in the judgments of our community the spiritual israel today are to follow the morals and at least the ethics of the truth true christ didn't say this did he christ did not say to us

don't go to a business meeting and if a brother says to you will you support me in this and i'll support you in that don't agree to it he doesn't say that does he

christ in many ways extends the power of the law into the in inner part of a man so he can appreciate dimensions of law which are far higher and stronger than anything the law of moses said but in some areas it does not and that's why here this law is left as part of our bible today because we need that we need that to pick up areas where we might forget the power of christ's words christ's words are very clear do unto others as you have them do unto you that's very clear but we don't know sometimes how to interpret it

and that's why these sort of little helpful hints do give us some assistance don't they

never follow the tit for tat proposition you scratch my back i'll scratch yours do not rest judgment with that kinds of wheeling and dealing it is not rights

but it happens

and we become blind in our judgments

israel were told they must not do

it well in verse 9 he says verse 9 now through in a few verses he talks now about the the stranger and he says thou shalt not oppress a stranger for you know the heart of a stranger you understand the mind the feelings the expressions of a slave in a strange country you were slaves yourselves once you understand that again the point emerges from yesterday the empathy of the slave knowing what it's like to be a slave must surely teach us

to understand the mind of those who might be our slaves

it doesn't give us license to injure and to abuse slaves because we might once have been abused it gives us a responsibility not to do so

and therefore says the law don't you do it to your slaves

well now he introduces here a remarkably

well intense law that has to do with with the mercy of god seen in its most extensive direction look at these verses here verse 10 onwards and six years so thou sow thy land and shall gather in the fruits thereof but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still

now what's he mean here literally from the hebrew he says let it drop and abandon it

that's the land he says and that the poor of thy people may eat

and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat in like manner thou shall deal with the vineyard and the olive yard also

what an amazing law this was

today we try and tax our grounds

all we can

keep feeding back in all the minerals we're taking out super phosphate everything else we pour it back in the land to make that land work hard for us

here says the lord his judgments

work the land for six years then leave it

leave it grow

not only is the land going to recuperates but what the land does grow of its own accord is going to help to feed the poor in your community and once the poor have taken off what they need put your beasts into it also

look how god even thinks of the beasts

the beasts of burden those creatures which are under the control of mankind and again the law said thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treateth out the cord

what a beautiful merciful consideration god is concerned about animals

so that the ox is able to eat while it works and get its energy we are not allowed to abuse animals or people

sometimes we need an rspca to tell us that

well society for the prevention of cruelty to animals

such a society like that has sometimes to bring to mind the fact that you don't treat animals with cruelty

true animals are under our under our control we know that but god didn't do it he told man to administer the animals

but the thing is if you beat the dog up in the backyards

probably you'll beat your wife up tomorrow

because you see

if you cannot think sensitively about an animal a defenseless animal

then how can you think sensitively about people also

if we are our violence towards animals do we imagine that violence will only be towards animals perhaps the violence upon the animals is is there the poor animal gets it because we're not to we're not prepared to be violent to a human being because that's got more ramifications to it

and so we can end up getting stuck into animals because we want to get rid of our frustrations and our furies

god didn't think that way

god even thought that the land needed its rest and a land is totally an inanimate thing it is simply mineral it is simply vegetable it has no life it has no pain it has no being of suffering

but you see if we understand from our minds point of view what god considers to be just and good and kinds

then that will be seen in every respect of our lives that is the point brethren

we cannot expect to treat with violence that community and turn around and smile nicely at the next community

well that's hypocrisy

and it certainly isn't gross in the mind of god

he goes on and talks about other things he talks about the stranger again of course talking as he does in verse 13

and all these things he says that you should be circumspect you should be cautious he says you should be careful and make no mention of the names of other gods neither let them be heard out of thy mouth

will you see other strangers that were in the lands were those who had brought in most commonly the the names of other gods

so he says you do not treat those strangers with violence but you shall not mention the names of their gods either you shall not flow towards

their godly way which they think is godly

you must not mention them they're not to be heard out of your mouth you are not to bless nor are you to curse with these gods and therefore he says you will preserve my position in caution and circumspection notice how that word is introduced there be cautious be careful be circumspect why because in the saints of god unto israel at this time they had to use caution in other words they had to use discretion they had to be people that could use intelligence and analyze things without necessarily going to the law and saying well i can do this or i can't do that look at it carefully way the matter up and see what the demand is on you

this becomes god's remain god's remedy to us of how we can treat better the people of our community and work more lovingly towards relationships which foster god is our father and we as his children

well

he talks now about the festivals in verse 14.

part of this very important book of the covenants and says three times shall you assemble all the males before me he says you shall have a feast there shall be a great pilgrimage feast down to the appointed place of my alterings and offerings rather from the altars in verse 15 and thou shalt keep the feast of the unleavened bread the hamazots the unleavened bread he says because i wanted you commanded thee that at the time appointed in the month of abim for in it he says thou camest out of egypt

and none shall appear before me empty you'll come you'll bring forth the unleavened bread he says then there will be the feast of the harvest the feast of first fruits the pentecost or the feast of weeks

and thirdly there would be the feast of the inn gathering the feast of tabernacles hell at the end of the year

three occasions should all these males come before god on three occasions with this this great feast be celebrated that you might bring before me these fear the feasts which acknowledge my work amongst you

well the feast of unleavened bread

a feast recognizing that god is the one who saves us he saves us out of egypt and egyptian oppression he brings us before his altar and he accepts us

then the feast are the first fruits

the first fruits belong to gods

the first fruits of everything belong to god the first out of the womb the firstborn all of these firsts belong to god and we must give them and dedicate them to gods under the law israel were taught that principle the very best of our produce comes before god and god wants the very best from us also he wants the best of our time the best of our energies the best of our labors

and very often brethren assist as we rise in the day and we get involved in everything in that day that we have to do

but we remember god's

just before we go to bed

we remember god

and we give to him our tiredest exhausted hours of the day

and we often start a prayer

of when our heads on the pillow

because we haven't really found time to pray before that

and there are very few our men said to prayers started on the pillow

and yet we can give god the very worst of our time or the very best of our time the first fruits belong to god and he also says in the feast of the gathering here the feast of tabernacles that once we have harvested the good works that god has given to us the good substance of his fruitful growth in this earth let us come to god with thanks and praise for all the blessings we have received

that's what he asks of us again

our moral responsibility before god

by showing to him that everything of which we have is derived from him and we should give our thanks to him for every detail of its

that's what builds love between families isn't it the parents and the children the children have to learn to say thank you

and as you're training the child you say to the child or say thank you

and the child shakes their head or says nothing you say you don't get this unless you do say thank you and the child learns to say thank you

human beings are a bit the same aren't they this is what's going to happen in the kingdom age you see the nation that doesn't come up to worship the lord in zion they'll get no rain

and so this becomes the force now saying well if there's no rain

i don't eat i didn't say thank you well i better get up there and say thank you or i won't have anything to eat next year

you see the nations have to be trained the same way israel was trained the same way we have to be trained the same way our children have to be trained we have to show them what thank you means saying thank you by the feasts of god before israel at this time this is what saying thank you meant

and if israel didn't learn that they'd of course never learn

that god expected from them a response for his goodness that he gave unto those people

come over now to um to verse 19

exodus 23

he says here the first of the first fruits

of thy land thou shalt bring unto the house of the lord thy gods

the first of the first fruits you will bring unto the house of the lord thy god that means that we would must we must bring to god to his house the very best that we can and hence highlighting the point already mentions god's house is his ecclesia is it not

and we have to bring to his ecclesia the very best that we can the best of our education that we have the best of the resources god has blessed us with the best of our waking hours the moments when we believe that we are best suited for a collegial work

we've got to bring to god's holy temple within that ecclesia the best of our kindness our sympathy our thankfulness our love our responsiveness all of those things belong in god's house

instead of feeding ourselves at home on everything good that we can get and then throw along the scraps to the equation of a sunday morning

to take no care nor thought for the needs of that meeting or the financial requirements that the truth has in order to continue the work of a light stand in this area or that area

all this is vitally important

but let us look finally at another point here which he drops in almost as if to say well what on earth does this mean thou shalt not see the kid in his mother's milk why say that thou shalt not boil up a kid in his mother's milk

very interesting law isn't it

why would this be so why would this slide in here as having any sense of moral responsibility or any restraint upon israeli in any way why this peculiar law

well to analyze it a little bit more is of course to find what become the keys of understanding

look at what is happening the mother the mother gives birth to a kid

that kid grows off the mother's milk

and then you take that kid and the mother's milk and you boil the kid to death in his mother's mouth

well it's sort of reversing things a bit isn't it it's telling us here do not destroy the young

by that which is intended to nurture them in life

an illustration

the wicked sons of eli we read about them in samuel

they would see the offerings that the israelites would bring unto them and the offerings of meats the wicked sons would plunge in the three prong flesh hook and take out the meat what they pulled out from that from that meat became theirs

and instead of burning the fat at the altar when they would bring the fat up they would say give us of the fat or we'll we'll take it by force from you instead of burning it at the altar of yahweh so what had happened was the altars of yahweh which should have become the means of life and the first principles of life to israel had now assumed the dimensions of death

the first principles of the law of moses were being overthrown

because here these people were not being nurtured in life by the lawful offerings they were being destroyed by so the people hated the altars of god

that's a shame that happens

they were destroying the people with that which should have given them life

another example over in the days of christ let's go to matthew 23 for a moment

here of course the lord jesus christ is making his tirades against the profligate rulers of israel

verse 13 he says to the jewish leaders

but woe unto you scribes and pharisees hypocrites for you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men for ye neither go in yourselves neither suffer ye them that are entering to go therein

notice verse 15

where to use scribes and pharisees hypocrites for you compass sea and land to make one proselyte and when he is made you make him too far more the child of hell than he than yourselves

what's the points

again notice now in verse 23

he says woe unto you scribes and pharisees hypocrites for you pay tithe of mint and aniston coming and you've omitted the weightier matters of the law judgment mercy and faith these your not to these ought ye to have done and not to leave the other undone ye blind guides which strain it and that and swallow a camel

well unto you scribes and pharisees hypocrites because you may clean the outside of the cup and of the planter he says but within you full of extortion and excess these things were what israel was doing

what were they doing

using the first principles of the law by which they should have been given life

and instead it gave them death as blind guide to the blind and both fall into the pit and destroy themselves

this is so easy to do

to take up the first principles of the truth which we are told by the apostle when he writes to the hebrews is the milk of the word of god

he tells them that in hebrews chapter 5 he laments the fact that they should have been having strong meat but now they had needed the milk of the word of god and he says these be the first principles of the law of god

and they were destroying them those first principles which should have given israel their love and holiness in the truth was being destroyed instead of giving them life it was destroying the jewish people themselves

so thou shalt not see the kid

in his mother's milk

to do that you see to see the kid in its mother's milk means that one becomes insensitive to the principle and so the law was made brethren that the principle might stick

like we teach our children many different little acts to perform in order that they can understand principles concepts in their minds

yes you must share those those candies with your brother and sister why because you must learn to give them candles but mommy they had candies yesterday yes i know they had candies yesterday but you give them one today because you have to learn to give

so we treat our children in such a way that we want to give them an experience in their lives that is going to help their little minds to gel to what the meaning of these principles really are

and so we teach your child accounts

by putting various blocks and pieces of fruit together they get the idea of of the notion the the the idea of an abstract figure in their minds it grows by doing things with your hands

and so by motor mechanism of education by teaching people to do things they learn things the whole of the law of moses was that to israel it was a school master unto them to bring them to grace they were children and the law was the school master but the law became that which was a cause of death and hatred and animosity in the in the kingdom of god at this time it was moving against their wholeness of life it was destroying them as christ says

those very things that he had intended to give life were now giving death

and seething the kid in his mother's milk

is an example

of using that

to destroy the young which god had intended to give life with

and how easily we can do the same thing

if we brethren so distort the principles of the first fundamentals of the milk of god's word and if ever they're broken down

they sometimes come under fire quite heavily if ever we break down the defenses of the walls of our faith if ever we throw away a statement of faith we have broken down the walls of the defense of the truth by which first principles are retained in our community as a minimum requirement of truth not the maximum

and if we throw that away we destroy

the substance of the truth by which otherwise some will come to life and life immortal in the kingdom of god

so just a little law like seething a kid in his mother's milk has got such a big lesson for us a lesson for us a lesson for israel a lesson to apply in our lives

this is what the law means the highest ideals of god's morality

were to find their way through

to the smallest customs of an agrarian-based society

and that's important and god left it on records that you and that me might come to understand

the way whereby god deals with us

that in the weightier matters of mercy justice and truth

we might see the application of god's divine code of ethics and apply it in the smallest places of our lives

that we might please our gods

that he might look upon us as his children and that he might take us to him as our father

it's all brethren based on principles as simple as these