WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:06.000 Welcome to our adult Sunday school class that we've entitled The Ethics of Life. 00:00:07.080 --> 00:00:12.000 ! Just a bit of housekeeping as we start. Our class is going to end at 9.50, so we can 00:00:12.000 --> 00:00:19.000 head next door from the service. So I'm going to lecture for about 30-40 minutes, and then we'll leave 10 minutes of questions before we break. 00:00:19.000 --> 00:00:24.000 So be sure to save your questions for that last part of the class, and we'll try to cover as much as we can. 00:00:24.000 --> 00:00:29.000 Question-wise, in the last 10-15 minutes of our time together. 00:00:29.000 --> 00:00:33.000 As we begin, let's praise the Lord. 00:00:36.000 --> 00:00:43.000 Father, Son, and Spirit, right in God, we give you praise today, for you are worthy of praise. 00:00:44.000 --> 00:00:48.000 And we ask for your help and your blessing as we begin this class. 00:00:48.000 --> 00:00:57.000 Would all that we say and do be pleasing in your sight, and in line with the purposes of your kingdom and the good news of Jesus Christ our Lord. 00:00:57.000 --> 00:01:00.000 It is in Jesus' name we pray. 00:01:00.000 --> 00:01:01.000 Amen. 00:01:01.000 --> 00:01:02.000 Amen. 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:04.000 Alright, come on in, grab a seat. 00:01:04.000 --> 00:01:07.000 You know, we kind of get the pull up here, but we may transition. 00:01:07.000 --> 00:01:08.000 We are already. 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:12.000 We're going to just squeeze in. 00:01:12.000 --> 00:01:16.000 Next week we may need a lower level of Jesus, and we'll assess. 00:01:16.000 --> 00:01:24.000 But, okay, so as we begin, let me ask, why have you decided to attend a course on ethics? 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:28.000 And what exactly would you mean by that work? 00:01:28.000 --> 00:01:35.000 Well, in this course, I am simply going to use the word ethics in a fairly non-technical way, I think. 00:01:36.000 --> 00:01:44.000 Why ethics will simply mean deliberate reflection on how human beings ought to live. 00:01:45.000 --> 00:01:46.000 Simple enough, right? 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:49.000 Deliberate reflection on how human beings ought to live. 00:01:49.000 --> 00:02:01.000 Isn't it interesting that as human beings, we don't simply ask, what can I do? 00:02:02.000 --> 00:02:04.000 But what ought I do? 00:02:04.000 --> 00:02:09.000 That is, we ask questions about right and wrong, and about good and evil. 00:02:09.000 --> 00:02:15.000 Now, contrast, that very human experience, would say a shark, right? 00:02:16.000 --> 00:02:23.000 When a shark in the ocean gobbles up a school of fish, or a sort of errant server, or whatever it decides to eat up, 00:02:24.000 --> 00:02:29.000 the shark doesn't later reflect and wonder, is that something I want to do? 00:02:29.000 --> 00:02:36.000 Or, is gobbling up fish in this way the sort of shark that I want to become? 00:02:37.000 --> 00:02:42.000 Or, is this the best way I can order my shark community for flourishing? 00:02:43.000 --> 00:02:44.000 No, right? 00:02:44.000 --> 00:02:46.000 The shark just eats the fish. 00:02:47.000 --> 00:02:48.000 It's a good way. 00:02:49.000 --> 00:02:51.000 There's no moral or ethical reflection at all. 00:02:52.000 --> 00:02:55.000 But human beings are unique in this way. 00:02:55.000 --> 00:02:59.000 We do wrestle over whether a course of action is right or wrong. 00:03:00.000 --> 00:03:04.000 Some of us wrestle, whether it's right or wrong, to be fish, right? 00:03:05.000 --> 00:03:12.000 We do ponder about what sort of people we want or ought to become in our character, in our habits. 00:03:13.000 --> 00:03:17.000 We do reflect on what sort of communities we want to build for flourishing. 00:03:17.000 --> 00:03:22.000 We don't just ask, what can I do or what do I want to do, but what ought I do. 00:03:23.000 --> 00:03:26.000 So I'm guessing you're here in this class because you aren't human. 00:03:27.000 --> 00:03:28.000 I don't see any sharks. 00:03:29.000 --> 00:03:30.000 Good. 00:03:30.000 --> 00:03:35.000 And you are interested in engaging in some deliberate reflection on how we as human thought live. 00:03:37.000 --> 00:03:42.000 But at this point, kind of just as we're doing some introductory things, we might ask, 00:03:43.000 --> 00:03:47.000 is deliberate reflection really necessary? 00:03:47.000 --> 00:03:53.000 After all, is it right and wrong or good and evil somewhat obvious? 00:03:54.000 --> 00:03:57.000 Do you remember Jiminy Cricket's advice to Pinocchio? 00:03:58.000 --> 00:04:01.000 After the very mixed Pinocchio into a real boy. 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:04.000 Testing your Disney knowledge right now. 00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:06.000 Yeah, right? 00:04:06.000 --> 00:04:07.000 Well, this is what Jiminy says. 00:04:07.000 --> 00:04:08.000 He starts to sing. 00:04:08.000 --> 00:04:13.000 He says, when you get in trouble and you don't know right from wrong, 00:04:14.000 --> 00:04:17.000 when you meet temptation and the urge is very strong, 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:21.000 interestingly, right, when Pinocchio becomes a real boy, 00:04:22.000 --> 00:04:23.000 he must now face that question, right? 00:04:24.000 --> 00:04:28.000 That is, moral awareness and responsibility goes hand in hand with being human. 00:04:29.000 --> 00:04:31.000 I think that something was right. 00:04:32.000 --> 00:04:34.000 Okay, do you remember how the rest of Jiminy's song goes? 00:04:34.000 --> 00:04:37.000 When you meet temptation and the urge is very strong, 00:04:37.000 --> 00:04:39.000 when you get in trouble and don't know right from wrong, 00:04:40.000 --> 00:04:41.000 give a little whistle. 00:04:42.000 --> 00:04:45.000 And always let your conscience be your guide. 00:04:46.000 --> 00:04:47.000 You see? 00:04:47.000 --> 00:04:48.000 Who needs deliberate reflection? 00:04:49.000 --> 00:04:51.000 Just let your conscience be your guide. 00:04:51.000 --> 00:04:52.000 It's that easy. 00:04:52.000 --> 00:04:56.000 Listen to that little voice inside and it will always steer you in the right way. 00:04:58.000 --> 00:05:00.000 But is it that easy? 00:05:01.000 --> 00:05:03.000 After all, we might ask, 00:05:03.000 --> 00:05:08.000 what is it that informs our conscience, right? 00:05:09.000 --> 00:05:14.000 Where do we learn the values and the goals that really do shape our intuitive 00:05:15.000 --> 00:05:19.000 or kind of pre-reflective sense of right and wrong, good and bad? 00:05:19.000 --> 00:05:36.000 What if the communities and cultures that we inhabit and the common stories that we tell have shaped us to think in a certain way that does not actually lead to the genuine human world? 00:05:36.000 --> 00:05:45.000 Or what if we face a decision where two seemingly good values could lead us in opposite directions if we follow them? 00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:46.000 00:05:47.000 --> 00:05:48.000 How do we decide? 00:05:48.000 --> 00:06:01.000 Okay, so, Pache, Jimmy Cricket, we can't simply just listen to that little voice inside, the so-called conscience, and just do what it says inside. 00:06:01.000 --> 00:06:11.000 And I'm guessing that's also why we're here in this class, because you realize that as human beings, we do have to engage in deliberate reflection of how we often live. 00:06:11.000 --> 00:06:16.000 Now, we could reflect deliberately on lots of human living and being, right? 00:06:16.000 --> 00:06:17.000 We could do environmental ethics. 00:06:17.000 --> 00:06:24.000 That is, how often human beings live with respect to the creative order, with respect to the environment, with the business ethics, 00:06:25.000 --> 00:06:29.000 and how often humans live with respect to the role of business and economics and work. 00:06:30.000 --> 00:06:35.000 But for us, over the course of the next eight weeks, we're going to be doing what we call the ethics of life. 00:06:35.000 --> 00:06:51.000 That is, how, as human beings, ought we to live when it comes to protecting, honoring, or even taking the life of another human being? 00:06:51.000 --> 00:06:53.000 That's going to be our focus. 00:06:55.000 --> 00:07:04.000 Okay, now, before we dive into that topic directly, I want to ask you another question, not just what is ethics, but how should we do this thing called ethics? 00:07:04.000 --> 00:07:09.000 More specifically, how, as Christians, should we do ethics? 00:07:10.000 --> 00:07:16.000 What should shape and guide a Christian's deliberate reflection on how human beings ought to live? 00:07:17.000 --> 00:07:23.000 Well, I want to suggest that there are four things that have to shape our deliberate reflection as Christians. 00:07:23.000 --> 00:07:35.000 First, we must do our deliberate reflection on how human beings ought to live. We must do it evangelical. 00:07:35.000 --> 00:07:37.000 I'm going to use the white word. 00:07:38.000 --> 00:07:39.000 New markers. 00:07:39.000 --> 00:07:40.000 Hey, they're so nice. 00:07:40.000 --> 00:07:42.000 I like this purple, too. 00:07:42.000 --> 00:07:43.000 It's all here. 00:07:43.000 --> 00:07:44.000 Yeah. 00:07:44.000 --> 00:07:56.000 If you've been to any Sunday school classes before where you've had the misfortune of me teaching, you'll know my handwriting is terrible, but I just put it up there to keep you there. 00:07:56.000 --> 00:07:57.000 We have to do our ethical reflection evangelical. 00:07:57.000 --> 00:08:05.000 Now, when I say evangelical here, I don't mean sort of American evangelicalism, that sort of cultural phenomenon. 00:08:06.000 --> 00:08:16.000 Rather, I mean, our thinking must, first and foremost, be shaped by what the New Testament calls the euangelion, the evangelion, the good news, the gospel. 00:08:16.000 --> 00:08:24.000 A truly Christian ethics must be, in that sense, evangelical ethics, ethics rooted in the gospel. 00:08:24.000 --> 00:08:26.000 And what is the gospel? 00:08:26.000 --> 00:08:31.000 The gospel is the person and work of Jesus Christ. 00:08:31.000 --> 00:08:39.000 The incarnation, life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ is the good news. 00:08:39.000 --> 00:08:44.000 Jesus Christ must be the fountainhead of all of our ethical reflections. 00:08:44.000 --> 00:08:45.000 Why? 00:08:45.000 --> 00:08:47.000 The philosophy is why. 00:08:47.000 --> 00:08:50.000 Let me mention this, too. 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:55.000 Because Jesus Christ is a manual, God with us. 00:08:55.000 --> 00:09:06.000 That means in Jesus Christ we see, on the one hand, who God is in all of his fullness, in all of God's grace and truth. 00:09:06.000 --> 00:09:17.000 If we want to know what God is like, what God requires, then we must stare fully in the face of Jesus Christ, the word became flesh. 00:09:17.000 --> 00:09:24.000 Moreover, in Jesus Christ, we see what it means to be truly human. 00:09:24.000 --> 00:09:31.000 In him, and in his teaching, we see how human beings ought to live. 00:09:31.000 --> 00:09:35.000 We see what a truly human life looks like. 00:09:35.000 --> 00:09:40.000 So we have to do this deliberate ethical reflection evangelically. 00:09:40.000 --> 00:09:43.000 That is, with Jesus Christ, et cetera. 00:09:43.000 --> 00:09:59.000 Second, Christians must do our ethical reflection scripturally or biblically. 00:09:59.000 --> 00:10:09.000 If we do begin with Jesus, we're going to be led, inevitably, to consider the whole scriptural witness in our ethical reflection. 00:10:09.000 --> 00:10:10.000 Inevitably, we do. 00:10:10.000 --> 00:10:11.000 Why? 00:10:11.000 --> 00:10:20.000 Because Jesus himself affirmed the truth and goodness and authority of the entirety of the Bible. 00:10:20.000 --> 00:10:25.000 For Jesus, what scripture says, God says. 00:10:25.000 --> 00:10:34.000 And that is true both of the Old Testament, which Jesus repeatedly quoted in the front, as God's word, as well as the New Testament. 00:10:34.000 --> 00:10:39.000 Jesus himself authorizes the apostolic New Testament. 00:10:39.000 --> 00:10:44.000 Jesus stands at the center, affirming the old and authorizing the new. 00:10:44.000 --> 00:10:55.000 Remember how in John 14 through 16, Jesus promises that he will send the Holy Spirit upon the apostles, who will bring to remembrance all that he taught them, and they will bear witness in his name. 00:10:55.000 --> 00:11:04.000 And the resurrected Jesus teaches them and commands them, before his ascension, to go and proclaim his works, and to teach in his name. 00:11:04.000 --> 00:11:05.000 That is, in his authority. 00:11:05.000 --> 00:11:12.000 And that is the apostles' own self-understanding, as well, when you read the New Testament. 00:11:12.000 --> 00:11:22.000 They understood themselves to be teaching not with their own authority, not with a merely human authority, but with the authority of the Lord Jesus. 00:11:22.000 --> 00:11:27.000 In 1 Thessalonians 2.13, in one of Paul's earliest letters, he says, 00:11:27.000 --> 00:11:39.000 You received the word of God, which you heard from us, and accepted it, not as the words of men, but as what it really is, the word of God. 00:11:39.000 --> 00:11:48.000 You see, there Paul is saying, when I came and taught to you in my office as an apostle, it wasn't just merely man's words, it was God's words. 00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:49.000 Again, Paul says, 00:11:49.000 --> 00:11:55.000 If anyone is not a prophet or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord. 00:11:55.000 --> 00:11:58.000 If anyone does not recognize this, he is not. 00:11:58.000 --> 00:12:00.000 That's verse 14. 00:12:00.000 --> 00:12:05.000 And Peter also affirms this when he writes in his second letter. 00:12:05.000 --> 00:12:06.000 Chapter 3. 00:12:06.000 --> 00:12:07.000 Chapter 3. 00:12:07.000 --> 00:12:12.000 Our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. 00:12:12.000 --> 00:12:14.000 There are some things in them that are hard to understand. 00:12:14.000 --> 00:12:15.000 Isn't that kind of not pretty? 00:12:15.000 --> 00:12:17.000 That's a sidebar. 00:12:17.000 --> 00:12:23.000 That even the apostle Peter admitted that there are some things in the New Testament that are hard to understand. 00:12:23.000 --> 00:12:26.000 We have to pause, we have to think, we have to pray. 00:12:26.000 --> 00:12:27.000 Okay. 00:12:27.000 --> 00:12:36.000 There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction as they do the other scriptures. 00:12:36.000 --> 00:12:37.000 Isn't that very interesting? 00:12:37.000 --> 00:12:44.000 There's Peter looking at Paul's writings and saying, they too are the scriptures. 00:12:44.000 --> 00:12:51.000 And I think Peter would have said the same thing about his own writings and John's writings and the other apostolic writings. 00:12:51.000 --> 00:12:58.000 Okay, so our ethical reflection then must take both the Old Testament and the New Testament as God's word. 00:12:58.000 --> 00:13:00.000 Our ethical reflection has to be biblical. 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:06.000 We can't do Christ-centered evangelical ethics without it being scriptural ethics. 00:13:06.000 --> 00:13:07.000 We have. 00:13:07.000 --> 00:13:10.000 Paul says in 2 Timothy 3.16, 00:13:10.000 --> 00:13:16.000 All scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness, 00:13:16.000 --> 00:13:21.000 that the people of God may be completely in the work. 00:13:21.000 --> 00:13:24.000 Now, of course, just a little hermeneutical principle. 00:13:24.000 --> 00:13:28.000 As Christians, we have to interpret the Old Testament in light of the Old Testament, right? 00:13:28.000 --> 00:13:34.000 Just as you would interpret any book according to the whole story and not just the first half. 00:13:34.000 --> 00:13:36.000 I mean, Pride and Prejudice, right? 00:13:36.000 --> 00:13:44.000 Pride and Prejudice would be a very different book if we stopped reading when Elizabeth Bennett rejects Mr. Darcy's first proposal. 00:13:44.000 --> 00:13:46.000 Imagine that... 00:13:46.000 --> 00:13:48.000 I'm getting a lot of blank stares. 00:13:48.000 --> 00:13:49.000 Okay. 00:13:49.000 --> 00:13:51.000 Terrible example. 00:13:51.000 --> 00:13:52.000 You know, we're not going to learn more about it. 00:13:52.000 --> 00:13:55.000 But trust me, it would be a very different book, right? 00:13:55.000 --> 00:13:59.000 Okay, so we shouldn't ignore the Old Testament. 00:13:59.000 --> 00:14:01.000 It is God's word. 00:14:01.000 --> 00:14:02.000 We must listen to it. 00:14:02.000 --> 00:14:03.000 Yeah? 00:14:03.000 --> 00:14:04.000 But we interpret it in light of the name. 00:14:04.000 --> 00:14:05.000 Okay. 00:14:05.000 --> 00:14:06.000 Third then. 00:14:06.000 --> 00:14:13.000 We have to do our deliberate, ethical reflection ecclesiastically. 00:14:13.000 --> 00:14:14.000 Oh boy. 00:14:14.000 --> 00:14:15.000 Ecclesiastically. 00:14:15.000 --> 00:14:16.000 What do I mean by that? 00:14:16.000 --> 00:14:27.000 What do I mean by that? 00:14:27.000 --> 00:14:31.000 What I mean by that is, we have to do our ethical reflection together. 00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:37.000 With and as the church, the ecclesia. 00:14:37.000 --> 00:14:46.000 And that means that we cannot and must not do our ethical reflection alone. 00:14:46.000 --> 00:14:47.000 Right? 00:14:47.000 --> 00:14:54.000 And we have to listen and reason together, not just with our fellow Christians of today, but 00:14:54.000 --> 00:14:59.000 also listen and reason together with the Christians who've gone before us. 00:14:59.000 --> 00:15:07.000 We have to attend to the rich tradition of Christian reflection that's gone before us in the history of the church. 00:15:07.000 --> 00:15:19.000 C.S. Lewis used the phrase chronological snobbery to describe an attitude that views our contemporary age as the most enlightened and clear-sighted in all those generations that came before us. 00:15:19.000 --> 00:15:22.000 And he rightly warns us against that attitude. 00:15:22.000 --> 00:15:30.000 We have to attend to what the church has said in the past on the basis of the gospel, on the basis of the scriptures. 00:15:30.000 --> 00:15:39.000 We have to attend to what the church has said in the past if we were to know what the church ought to say the thing for today and the present. 00:15:39.000 --> 00:15:43.000 Okay, so we have to do our ethical reflection ecclesiastically. 00:15:43.000 --> 00:15:48.000 Last, we have to do this deliberate ethical reflection prayerfully. 00:15:48.000 --> 00:16:02.000 Consider the text that we looked at last week in our sermon in Colossians chapter 1. 00:16:02.000 --> 00:16:05.000 Remember that our Paul says in verses 8 and 9, 00:16:05.000 --> 00:16:27.000 So from the day we heard, we have not ceased to pray for you, asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God's will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding, so as to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing to Him, bearing fruit in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God. 00:16:27.000 --> 00:16:39.000 For Paul, in the rest of the Lord, for Paul, in the rest of the New Testament, the wisdom that we need to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord has to come from God through people. 00:16:39.000 --> 00:16:43.000 We need the Holy Spirit to grant us wisdom and understanding. 00:16:43.000 --> 00:16:48.000 And not just wisdom and understanding, right? 00:16:48.000 --> 00:16:58.000 Not just a kind of head knowledge, but we also have to pray, because we need the Holy Spirit to enable us to actually walk in a manner worthy of the Lord. 00:16:58.000 --> 00:17:01.000 Ethics isn't just about thinking. 00:17:01.000 --> 00:17:03.000 It's about living. 00:17:03.000 --> 00:17:11.000 Deliberate reflection without deliberate walking and letting it be is useless. 00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:13.000 So, we have to pray. 00:17:13.000 --> 00:17:18.000 How easy is it for us to think these things, but not make these things? 00:17:18.000 --> 00:17:23.000 The presence is, don't we have to pray as we do this work? 00:17:23.000 --> 00:17:26.000 Not just to understand properly, but the why. 00:17:26.000 --> 00:17:28.000 The word of it. 00:17:28.000 --> 00:17:36.000 So I think this is a start for how, as Christians, we need to kind of do this ethical task. 00:17:36.000 --> 00:17:38.000 Lastly, I want to just ask why. 00:17:38.000 --> 00:17:40.000 Why do we do ethics? 00:17:40.000 --> 00:17:42.000 I'll be brief here. 00:17:42.000 --> 00:17:45.000 On the one hand, we do ethics for the good of our neighbor, right? 00:17:45.000 --> 00:17:52.000 We want to know what we ought to do so that we can love our neighbors and promote their fruition. 00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:57.000 We also do ethics for the good of self, right? 00:17:57.000 --> 00:18:04.000 We want to live in a way that pleases God and is in line with His purposes and the greater order He's made, and that's for our good. 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:09.000 We flourish when we live as God intends us to live. 00:18:09.000 --> 00:18:13.000 We live whole, satisfying, integrated lives. 00:18:13.000 --> 00:18:17.000 So it's good for us to live this way. 00:18:17.000 --> 00:18:22.000 But ultimately, we do ethics for God's glory. 00:18:22.000 --> 00:18:32.000 In seeking God's will and living according to Him, we demonstrate that God is worthy of our praise and worthy of our love. 00:18:32.000 --> 00:18:36.000 God is our creator and our remover. 00:18:36.000 --> 00:18:56.000 And in order to magnify His great glory and grace, in order to demonstrate how wonderful God is, in order to glorify Him, to show how He's our highest delight and our greatest good, we seek to live all of our lives in a manner that's pleasing to them. 00:18:56.000 --> 00:19:02.000 Jesus said, if you love Him, what? 00:19:02.000 --> 00:19:04.000 You think you might demand us? 00:19:04.000 --> 00:19:05.000 Right? 00:19:05.000 --> 00:19:11.000 That's how we show our great love for God, by living in line with His words and with His ways. 00:19:11.000 --> 00:19:19.000 Okay, now, so much by way of prolonging preamble. 00:19:19.000 --> 00:19:26.000 What this class seems to be, over the next eight weeks, is really an extended meditation on the Sixth Commandment. 00:19:26.000 --> 00:19:32.000 I had a whole thing I was going to do this morning about the Ten Commandments, and it's so great to use them as a structure for ethical teaching. 00:19:32.000 --> 00:19:34.000 But then I realized, I wouldn't even get to the Sixth Commandment. 00:19:34.000 --> 00:19:35.000 Come on! 00:19:35.000 --> 00:19:38.000 If you want to talk about that afterwards, we'll talk about that afterwards. 00:19:38.000 --> 00:19:41.000 God says in the Sixth Commandment, you shall not murder. 00:19:41.000 --> 00:19:44.000 That is going to be the start from where we begin this class. 00:19:44.000 --> 00:19:48.000 We want to explore the theological and practical invitations of this commandment. 00:19:48.000 --> 00:19:50.000 What does it tell us about God? 00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:53.000 What does it tell us about how we ought to order our lives before God? 00:19:53.000 --> 00:19:58.000 Not just what actions are right or wrong, but what sort of character should we cultivate? 00:19:58.000 --> 00:20:01.000 What sort of community should we develop? 00:20:01.000 --> 00:20:12.000 And also we want to ask, how does this commandment flow from and lead us back to the gospel, the saving person and work of Jesus Christ? 00:20:12.000 --> 00:20:18.000 Now, before we dive into specific applications of this principle, right? 00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:26.000 Before we do some applied ethics to things like abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, warfare, all the things that this Sixth Commandment leads us to, 00:20:26.000 --> 00:20:32.000 I want to take the rest of the time today, and sometime next week too, we're going to do this in kind of two parts, 00:20:32.000 --> 00:20:40.000 to simply look at the community itself and some of the biblical tracts that it runs on and some of the different implications of it. 00:20:40.000 --> 00:20:46.000 Now, if you're familiar with the work of John Frank, I'm going to be following pretty closely here his work in the doctrine, 00:20:46.000 --> 00:20:52.000 in his big book called The Doctrine of the Christian Life, which I found very helpful to think about this. 00:20:52.000 --> 00:20:56.000 So, let's do some of that work. 00:20:56.000 --> 00:21:01.000 When we put this commandment of you shall not murder in the context of the whole Bible, 00:21:01.000 --> 00:21:11.000 we see the theological background to this commandment is that God is the Lord of life. 00:21:11.000 --> 00:21:20.000 According to the Bible, God is not just a God, but the living God, right? 00:21:20.000 --> 00:21:28.000 Not static, not impersonal, not a force or an energy or a principle, but the triune God of life. 00:21:29.000 --> 00:21:34.000 And the Bible is all about life and death. 00:21:34.000 --> 00:21:36.000 Think about it. Where does the Bible begin? 00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:39.000 God is the creator and giver of life, right? 00:21:39.000 --> 00:21:42.000 In Genesis, God creates all things, and all things do well. 00:21:42.000 --> 00:21:44.000 He first forced with life. 00:21:44.000 --> 00:21:47.000 God gives to creatures that swim and swarm and fly the breath of life. 00:21:47.000 --> 00:21:51.000 And at the climax of God's creative work is what? 00:21:51.000 --> 00:21:53.000 Human beings. 00:21:53.000 --> 00:22:03.000 We read in Genesis 2 that evocative story of God taking the dust of the earth and breathing personally into it the breath of life, 00:22:03.000 --> 00:22:06.000 so that the man becomes a living creature. 00:22:06.000 --> 00:22:13.000 Life, as it were, sums up the fullness of God's, of man's existence, of human's existence with God. 00:22:13.000 --> 00:22:17.000 Not only physical life, but also spiritual life. 00:22:17.000 --> 00:22:24.000 And that fullness of life in communion with God symbolized in Genesis by what? 00:22:24.000 --> 00:22:28.000 By the tree of life that humans have access to. 00:22:28.000 --> 00:22:29.000 The truth. 00:22:29.000 --> 00:22:30.000 The truth. 00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:37.000 However, the word that most fully summarizes the result of Adam's fall is what? 00:22:37.000 --> 00:22:38.000 His death. 00:22:38.000 --> 00:22:48.000 In Genesis 2.17, remember, God warned that if Adam disobeyed and broke the covenant, that he would surely die. 00:22:48.000 --> 00:22:50.000 And that is what we see in Genesis 3. 00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:54.000 God pronounces a curse that Adam will return to the dust. 00:22:54.000 --> 00:22:58.000 And the following chapters of Genesis begin to bear this out. 00:22:58.000 --> 00:23:01.000 In chapter 4, we see the first one where Cain kills the people. 00:23:01.000 --> 00:23:06.000 But then in chapter 5, what do we read in that book of the generations of Adam? 00:23:06.000 --> 00:23:11.000 Again and again, as each generation is accounted, what do we hear that refrain? 00:23:11.000 --> 00:23:12.000 He died. 00:23:12.000 --> 00:23:13.000 And he died. 00:23:13.000 --> 00:23:14.000 And he died. 00:23:14.000 --> 00:23:15.000 And he died. 00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:16.000 And he died. 00:23:16.000 --> 00:23:17.000 Except for Eno. 00:23:17.000 --> 00:23:18.000 That's a different story. 00:23:18.000 --> 00:23:19.000 But the rest of them died. 00:23:19.000 --> 00:23:20.000 And died. 00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:21.000 Died. 00:23:21.000 --> 00:23:22.000 What a trick. 00:23:22.000 --> 00:23:29.000 The unfaithfulness to God separates us from life and brings death. 00:23:29.000 --> 00:23:34.000 And death pervades human history after the fall. 00:23:34.000 --> 00:23:44.000 And this death, like life, this death is also physical and spiritual. 00:23:44.000 --> 00:23:47.000 Physical death ends our participation in earthly events. 00:23:47.000 --> 00:23:53.000 But spiritual death is a loss of fellowship with God and the Lord of life. 00:23:53.000 --> 00:24:01.000 And unless God's grace intervenes, that spiritual death leads to eternal death. 00:24:01.000 --> 00:24:05.000 To permanent separation from God and from God's blessing. 00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:20.000 To be spiritually dead, that is, broken in our fellowship with God, implies that there's nothing we can do to escape eternal death. 00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:27.000 Now, what does God do about this death that we fall into? 00:24:27.000 --> 00:24:29.000 God sends his son. 00:24:29.000 --> 00:24:30.000 God sends his son. 00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:31.000 Right? 00:24:31.000 --> 00:24:32.000 God gives a promise. 00:24:32.000 --> 00:24:36.000 He keeps that promise to send his son. 00:24:36.000 --> 00:24:43.000 And he sends his son to endure death in the place of his spiritual living. 00:24:43.000 --> 00:24:48.000 When Jesus died, his people died with newness. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:54.000 And when Jesus rose, his people rose with him to the newness of life. 00:24:55.000 --> 00:24:58.000 According to Acts 3.15, Jesus is what? 00:24:58.000 --> 00:25:00.000 The author of life. 00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:13.000 And John's Gospel especially makes clear that fellowship with Jesus, trusting in him, and igniting ourselves to him, leads not just to earthly flourishing, but to eternal life. 00:25:13.000 --> 00:25:23.000 So, throughout Scripture, God continues to offer life, not just earthly life, but life in fellowship with himself, the one who is life itself. 00:25:23.000 --> 00:25:26.000 God delights in life. 00:25:26.000 --> 00:25:29.000 Do you see that? 00:25:29.000 --> 00:25:37.000 You know, it's a measure of the seriousness of sin that death prevails all around sin, all around sin. 00:25:37.000 --> 00:25:46.000 But is it not also a measure of the greatness of salvation that in Christ, death is swallowed up by life? 00:25:46.000 --> 00:25:58.000 So, not only is the Bible a book about life and death, but the Gospel is the good news of how the living God brings life to the world. 00:25:58.000 --> 00:26:12.000 So, ethically, in light of the whole Scripture, in light of this full story of God and the Gospel, we should certainly say that our attitude towards life and death is incredibly important. 00:26:12.000 --> 00:26:16.000 And when we return to the sixth commandment, what does it basically say? 00:26:16.000 --> 00:26:22.000 The sixth commandment is basically saying that life and death are God's provided. 00:26:22.000 --> 00:26:23.000 They are God's business. 00:26:23.000 --> 00:26:24.000 They are God's business. 00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:28.000 God is the Lord of life and death. 00:26:28.000 --> 00:26:34.000 He alone has the right to give and take the life away. 00:26:34.000 --> 00:26:40.000 And we humans may never take life without His authorization. 00:26:40.000 --> 00:26:49.000 Rather, we have to respect life and honor it as an aspect of our reference for God. 00:26:49.000 --> 00:26:54.000 And especially, especially that respect must go to human life. 00:26:54.000 --> 00:26:58.000 Because humans are made in the image of God. 00:26:58.000 --> 00:27:03.000 Alone, among all creation, God says of humans in Genesis 1, 27, 1. 00:27:03.000 --> 00:27:05.000 So, God created man in His own image. 00:27:05.000 --> 00:27:07.000 In the image of God, He created him. 00:27:07.000 --> 00:27:09.000 Male and female, He created him. 00:27:09.000 --> 00:27:11.000 His own image. 00:27:11.000 --> 00:27:17.000 Now, we're not going to get into a full explication of what the image of God means and what it entails in spring. 00:27:17.000 --> 00:27:19.000 We're probably going to do a class on the doctrine of creation. 00:27:19.000 --> 00:27:21.000 We're really deep into that. 00:27:21.000 --> 00:27:29.000 But suffice it to say, at the very least, the image of God means that every human being, every human being, 00:27:29.000 --> 00:27:32.000 we see here in Genesis, male and female. 00:27:32.000 --> 00:27:35.000 We might include young and old. 00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:49.000 Regardless of class, education level, race, ability, regardless, every human being has unparalleled big meaning. 00:27:49.000 --> 00:27:51.000 Because we bear His image. 00:27:51.000 --> 00:27:53.000 He made us in His own image. 00:27:53.000 --> 00:27:55.000 We reflect colors. 00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:58.000 And we represent them in the world of God's image. 00:27:58.000 --> 00:28:03.000 In fact, human beings have so much big meaning of work because of this image bearing. 00:28:03.000 --> 00:28:07.000 Do you remember that after the flood in Genesis 9? 00:28:07.000 --> 00:28:11.000 What is the penalty for taking human life? 00:28:11.000 --> 00:28:15.000 Genesis 6 says, 00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.000 Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall this blood be shed. 00:28:19.000 --> 00:28:22.000 For God made man in His own image. 00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:32.000 In other words, God places the highest sanction on taking human life because they are made in this image. 00:28:32.000 --> 00:28:36.000 So much so the doctrine of creation leads us, right? 00:28:36.000 --> 00:28:37.000 God made all things. 00:28:37.000 --> 00:28:38.000 It is His right. 00:28:38.000 --> 00:28:40.000 We are made in His image. 00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:43.000 Think about the doctrine of redemption as well. 00:28:43.000 --> 00:28:53.000 In the incarnation, God reaffirms the dignity and value of human life in His image. 00:28:53.000 --> 00:28:54.000 Think about it. 00:28:54.000 --> 00:28:56.000 From Jesus' conception in the womb of Mary. 00:28:56.000 --> 00:29:00.000 What do we confess as Christians? 00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:03.000 Not just He showed up one day. 00:29:03.000 --> 00:29:07.000 He was conceived by the Holy Spirit. 00:29:07.000 --> 00:29:13.000 From conception in the womb of Mary, through His bodily death, bodily resurrection, 00:29:13.000 --> 00:29:19.000 Jesus has taken all of human life into God's self. 00:29:19.000 --> 00:29:28.000 Every moment of human life, from conception to resurrection, is now hollowed by the incarnation of God the Son. 00:29:28.000 --> 00:29:38.000 There is no moment of human existence that is not dignified and continues to be dignified by the ascended, embodied Lord Jesus God the Son. 00:29:38.000 --> 00:29:45.000 So we have to especially respect human life, not only by virtue of creation, but also by virtue of redemption. 00:29:45.000 --> 00:29:46.000 Right? 00:29:46.000 --> 00:29:49.000 To summarize, as Creator, God alone has the right of a human life and death. 00:29:49.000 --> 00:29:54.000 As Redeemer, God reaffirms that He alone holds the keys of life and death. 00:29:54.000 --> 00:29:57.000 Is that not what the resurrection shows us? 00:29:57.000 --> 00:30:04.000 Despite human's verdict over the life of Jesus, God reverses it and says, I hold the keys of life and death. 00:30:04.000 --> 00:30:08.000 And Jesus comes to John in the book of Revelation saying, what? 00:30:08.000 --> 00:30:11.000 I can't say that in hell, I am. 00:30:12.000 --> 00:30:16.000 And in the work of creation, God makes human beings in His image. 00:30:16.000 --> 00:30:23.000 And in the work of redemption, God takes human flesh and reaffirms the dignity of every moment. 00:30:23.000 --> 00:30:25.000 God is the only one. 00:30:25.000 --> 00:30:29.000 Okay, now with that theological background, let's return to the Sixth Commandment itself. 00:30:29.000 --> 00:30:38.000 The Hebrew verb, in this commandment, is the verb, is the verb, uh, Bratzak. 00:30:38.000 --> 00:30:39.000 Bratzak. 00:30:39.000 --> 00:30:44.000 Uh, similar English translations, if you like, uh, say the King James version. 00:30:44.000 --> 00:30:47.000 Any, any King James readers here? 00:30:47.000 --> 00:30:52.000 A couple, yes, you're admitting to it, I love that, good. 00:30:52.000 --> 00:30:58.000 Uh, some, uh, older translations, like the King James, will translate that word and translate this command. 00:30:58.000 --> 00:30:59.000 You shall not kill, right? 00:30:59.000 --> 00:31:00.000 Which just sounds kind of general. 00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:06.000 Newer translations, if you pick up one of those, like the ESV that we use on Sundays, will render, you shall not murder. 00:31:06.000 --> 00:31:11.000 Um, okay, well, what do we make of this Hebrew word? 00:31:11.000 --> 00:31:19.000 Well, most often in the New Testament, this Hebrew word, Ratzak, refers to killing that is unlawful or forbidden. 00:31:19.000 --> 00:31:23.000 It's not actually used for killing animals, for example. 00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:25.000 It's not used for killing in war. 00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:29.000 And we're gonna get into warfare and capital punishment as we go. 00:31:29.000 --> 00:31:31.000 But this isn't the word that we use for those. 00:31:31.000 --> 00:31:40.000 So, it probably is a better translation of the term to say you shall not murder rather than nor general kill. 00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:49.000 However, that Hebrew word does differ from our English word murder, and that it applies to a much broader range of things. 00:31:49.000 --> 00:31:55.000 Things that we might call today in our system, manslaughter, or in English, and homicide. 00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:58.000 Now, I know there might be some lawyers in here. 00:31:58.000 --> 00:31:59.000 I know there's at least one. 00:31:59.000 --> 00:32:02.000 You know, what's murder today? 00:32:02.000 --> 00:32:07.000 Murder is sort of, involves both intent to kill and premeditation, right? 00:32:07.000 --> 00:32:14.000 Voluntary manslaughter includes intent to kill without premeditation, when someone, like, kills someone else in rage. 00:32:14.000 --> 00:32:22.000 Involuntary manslaughter means there's no intent to kill, but someone behaves in a way that's likely to kill someone, like reckless drivers. 00:32:22.000 --> 00:32:28.000 Then you have negligent homicide, the just failure to take adequate precautions. 00:32:28.000 --> 00:32:33.000 It would seem that this Hebrew word kind of covers that whole range of things. 00:32:33.000 --> 00:32:35.000 Let's look at some examples. 00:32:35.000 --> 00:32:53.000 Deuteronomy 19.5 describes a case when someone goes into the forest with his neighbor to cut wood, and his hand swings the axe to cut down a tree, and the axe head slips from the handle and strikes his neighbor so that he dies. 00:32:53.000 --> 00:32:54.000 Right? 00:32:54.000 --> 00:32:57.000 Now, the implication there is that that killing is accidental. 00:32:57.000 --> 00:32:59.000 So that's not what we would call murder. 00:32:59.000 --> 00:33:05.000 And yet, the word that describes the person responsible for that is a form of the verb used in the Sixth Commandment. 00:33:05.000 --> 00:33:11.000 The ESV translates it manslayer, which is kind of an archaic term, but it's probably a good translation. 00:33:11.000 --> 00:33:12.000 Right? 00:33:12.000 --> 00:33:18.000 So we see there that that kind of involuntary or negligent homicide is kind of conquered by this term. 00:33:18.000 --> 00:33:21.000 Think as well about Deuteronomy 22.8. 00:33:21.000 --> 00:33:26.000 This is always one that, you know, when you're studying the Old Testament, you're like, what is this? 00:33:26.000 --> 00:33:31.000 God says, when you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof. 00:33:31.000 --> 00:33:32.000 What's a parapet? 00:33:32.000 --> 00:33:34.000 It's like a low wall. 00:33:34.000 --> 00:33:35.000 It's like a retaining wall. 00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:36.000 Yeah. 00:33:36.000 --> 00:33:38.000 Now, why would you have to build a parapet? 00:33:38.000 --> 00:33:42.000 Because they use roofs as fountains, basically. 00:33:42.000 --> 00:33:45.000 And as torches, as places in the evening where you go. 00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:46.000 It's cool. 00:33:46.000 --> 00:33:53.000 When you build a new house, make a parapet for your roof, that you may not bring the guilt of blood upon your house if anyone should fall from it. 00:33:53.000 --> 00:34:03.000 In other words, if you don't take the proper precautions when building your house to make sure there's a guardrail to prevent people from falling on your rooftop patio, you're guilty for that. 00:34:03.000 --> 00:34:12.000 So you see, the sixth commandment doesn't just speak to what we would call to the urn or premeditated urn, and not even just to what we would call insubritable. 00:34:12.000 --> 00:34:21.000 What's the advantage to not taking appropriate caution and care and action to prevent the unjust loss of life? 00:34:21.000 --> 00:34:34.000 So then, what we see is that even in the Old Testament context, the sixth commandment tells us that we do have to guard against the possibility that someone might be killed. 00:34:34.000 --> 00:34:40.000 Being alert to correct those life-threatening elements or situations, right? 00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:47.000 So it's about more than just murdering someone, it's about valuing and protecting life. 00:34:47.000 --> 00:34:52.000 And working to prevent those things that would lead to the loss of life. 00:34:52.000 --> 00:34:55.000 Now, you can already start to see a trajectory here, right? 00:34:55.000 --> 00:35:08.000 When we turn to the New Testament, we see that Jesus is going to trace this commandment, not just in making sure that we're preventing situations, but straight to our hearts. 00:35:08.000 --> 00:35:17.000 He, too, will tell us that the sixth commandment is about much more than simply not murdering, but he goes even deeper into the roots of the commandment. 00:35:17.000 --> 00:35:21.000 Let me read Matthew 5, 21 through 26. 00:35:21.000 --> 00:35:22.000 He says, 00:35:22.000 --> 00:35:28.000 You have heard that it was said to those of old, you shall not murder, and whoever murders will be liable to judgment. 00:35:28.000 --> 00:35:34.000 But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. 00:35:34.000 --> 00:35:38.000 Whoever insults his brother will be liable to counsel. 00:35:38.000 --> 00:35:43.000 And whoever says, you fool, will be liable to the hell of fire. 00:35:43.000 --> 00:35:48.000 So, if you're offering your gift at the altar and there, remember that your brother has something against you. 00:35:48.000 --> 00:35:51.000 Leave your gift there before the altar and go. 00:35:51.000 --> 00:35:55.000 First, be reconciled to your brother and then come and offer your gift. 00:35:55.000 --> 00:36:03.000 Come to terms quickly with your accuser while you're going to the court, lest your accuser hand you over to the judge, and the judge to the guard, and you be put in prison. 00:36:03.000 --> 00:36:07.000 Truly I say to you, you'll never get out until you've paid the last penny. 00:36:07.000 --> 00:36:15.000 So you see, for Jesus, the sixth commandment forbids not just murder or manslaughter or negligence, but anger. 00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:20.000 Not just anger, but contempt. 00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:21.000 Right? 00:36:21.000 --> 00:36:26.000 Whoever says, you fool, right? 00:36:26.000 --> 00:36:29.000 Whoever insults his brother, what are those? 00:36:29.000 --> 00:36:31.000 They're expressions of contempt. 00:36:31.000 --> 00:36:32.000 My badness. 00:36:32.000 --> 00:36:33.000 My badness. 00:36:33.000 --> 00:36:34.000 My badness. 00:36:34.000 --> 00:36:35.000 My badness. 00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:36.000 My badness. 00:36:36.000 --> 00:36:41.000 So you see, Jesus wants us to see what lies underneath murder. 00:36:41.000 --> 00:36:48.000 He wants us to be on guard against the seeds in our hearts that give rise to murder and anger. 00:36:48.000 --> 00:36:49.000 Contempt. 00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:54.000 And we see in the New Testament, picking up that thread, the Apostle John underscores Jesus' teaching 00:36:54.000 --> 00:36:59.000 when he writes, everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. 00:36:59.000 --> 00:37:04.000 And you know that no murderer has a murderer. 00:37:06.000 --> 00:37:10.000 But Jesus also shows us that the sixth commandment doesn't just forbid something. 00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:11.000 Right? 00:37:11.000 --> 00:37:13.000 It also requires something. 00:37:13.000 --> 00:37:17.000 It requires that we pursue reconciliation. 00:37:17.000 --> 00:37:23.000 In fact, according to Jesus, this reconciliation is even more important than the duties of public worship. 00:37:23.000 --> 00:37:30.000 In other words, Jesus is saying, you can't pretend to enjoy fellowship with God while you harbor contempt toward one another. 00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:32.000 We must go reconcile. 00:37:33.000 --> 00:37:35.000 And what enables this reconciliation? 00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:40.000 How can we move past our anger and contempt, especially when someone has wronged us or hurt us? 00:37:41.000 --> 00:37:43.000 How can we then go and forgive? 00:37:44.000 --> 00:37:46.000 Again, listen to the Apostle John in that same passage. 00:37:46.000 --> 00:37:53.000 In that same passage, he says, in that context, he says, we know that we've passed out of death into life because we love the brothers. 00:37:53.000 --> 00:37:55.000 Whoever does not love abides in death. 00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:57.000 Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. 00:37:57.000 --> 00:38:00.000 If you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. 00:38:01.000 --> 00:38:03.000 And he says this, by this we know life. 00:38:03.000 --> 00:38:06.000 That he laid down his life for us. 00:38:06.000 --> 00:38:10.000 We ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. 00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:22.000 So you see, the gospel teaches us not just to refrain from taking the life of another, but to lay down our lives for the sake of the other. 00:38:22.000 --> 00:38:25.000 Please, please lay down his head. 00:38:26.000 --> 00:38:38.000 We don't just seek to rid our hearts of anger and contempt, but we seek sacrificially the other's good, especially that most difficult of acts, which is forgiveness and reconciliation. 00:38:39.000 --> 00:38:46.000 Where we lay down our right to return her to her and instead release the other from what they owe us. 00:38:46.000 --> 00:38:47.000 Okay. 00:38:47.000 --> 00:38:52.000 All of that requires a lot more unpacking, does it not? 00:38:52.000 --> 00:38:55.000 I hope to do that next week. 00:38:55.000 --> 00:38:58.000 So let's pause here and let's have some questions to discuss. 00:38:58.000 --> 00:39:00.000 And then I have no homework assignment for you. 00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:02.000 But first, no questions. 00:39:02.000 --> 00:39:03.000 Any questions? 00:39:03.000 --> 00:39:05.000 I know we covered a lot this morning. 00:39:11.000 --> 00:39:12.000 Matt, yeah, go ahead. 00:39:12.000 --> 00:39:19.000 You mentioned that we should do ethics ecclesiastically and you mentioned the past. 00:39:19.000 --> 00:39:20.000 Yeah. 00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:30.000 Would you say we have an equal obligation to, you know, talk with other contemporary examples? 00:39:31.000 --> 00:39:32.000 Yeah, I think so. 00:39:32.000 --> 00:39:33.000 Yeah, I think so. 00:39:33.000 --> 00:39:38.000 I think I sort of hit on the history of that because I think in our tradition we sometimes overlook that. 00:39:38.000 --> 00:39:41.000 We're good at talking with one another and looking at the contemporary scene. 00:39:41.000 --> 00:39:47.000 But sometimes we're not as conversant with what's come before us as American Protestants would be totally blind. 00:39:47.000 --> 00:39:49.000 So I maybe put the emphasis there a little bit. 00:39:49.000 --> 00:39:51.000 But yes, yes, we should be talking with others. 00:39:51.000 --> 00:39:59.000 And I think it's important too that we're, if we're able to, to be engaging with these questions with others from different parts of the world in this. 00:39:59.000 --> 00:40:06.000 I think oftentimes we're able to see each other's blind spots when we're not from the same cultural location. 00:40:06.000 --> 00:40:09.000 We see things in the gospel and scripture maybe a little more clearly. 00:40:09.000 --> 00:40:13.000 And we need that help to correct our blind spots too. 00:40:13.000 --> 00:40:15.000 Go ahead, Matt. Do you have a follow up? 00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:16.000 Yeah. 00:40:16.000 --> 00:40:19.000 You may be absolutely right. 00:40:19.000 --> 00:40:35.000 But it just appears to me that with the political divide that we have, which extends within, I think, a lot of evangelical churches. 00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:36.000 Sure. 00:40:36.000 --> 00:40:47.000 We, I have in the past and presently assumed, you know, that it's those guys who have blind spots. 00:40:47.000 --> 00:40:48.000 Yeah. 00:40:48.000 --> 00:40:49.000 It's easy to do that, isn't it? 00:40:49.000 --> 00:40:50.000 Yeah. 00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:51.000 And it's hard. 00:40:51.000 --> 00:40:52.000 It's hard. 00:40:52.000 --> 00:40:57.000 You know, we're going to get into some topics in this course that are very emotionally challenging topics, right? 00:40:57.000 --> 00:41:06.000 And it's hard to have conversations about those when we feel like so much is at stake when someone views things differently than us. 00:41:06.000 --> 00:41:17.000 So it does require the Holy Spirit to give us His peace and His patience and His understanding and supernatural love for our brothers and sisters in those moments 00:41:17.000 --> 00:41:22.000 so that we can have peaceable conversations and fruitful dialogue. 00:41:22.000 --> 00:41:24.000 We may not agree at the end of the day. 00:41:24.000 --> 00:41:28.000 And we may be fully convinced that they're totally wrong. 00:41:28.000 --> 00:41:29.000 Right? 00:41:29.000 --> 00:41:35.000 And yet we can still have those conversations respectfully and in honoring way. 00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:36.000 And so it's great. 00:41:36.000 --> 00:41:41.000 And man, if we can model that as the church, goodness, would we not be so blind in our role? 00:41:41.000 --> 00:41:45.000 I mean, imagine, I mean, I bet there's different opinions about some of these topics in this room this morning. 00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:52.000 Imagine if we could talk about those things with dignity without shouting each other out of the room or treating each other with... 00:41:52.000 --> 00:41:53.000 That's true. 00:41:53.000 --> 00:41:54.000 That's true. 00:41:54.000 --> 00:41:55.000 That's true. 00:41:55.000 --> 00:41:56.000 Never going to happen. 00:41:58.000 --> 00:42:00.000 I kill at least 20 people a day. 00:42:01.000 --> 00:42:03.000 31 years, Pastor. 00:42:03.000 --> 00:42:04.000 Yeah. 00:42:04.000 --> 00:42:07.000 The thing is, that brings me to the point where, you know what? 00:42:07.000 --> 00:42:08.000 Sure. 00:42:08.000 --> 00:42:11.000 It's not how I act or how I behave or what I believe. 00:42:11.000 --> 00:42:17.000 It's the completed work on that cross that saves me at the end of the day. 00:42:17.000 --> 00:42:21.000 Because all I can bring Jesus every day is my sin. 00:42:21.000 --> 00:42:22.000 Yep. 00:42:22.000 --> 00:42:24.000 Not just one, multiple. 00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:27.000 But the Holy Spirit does live in you. 00:42:27.000 --> 00:42:28.000 Yes! 00:42:28.000 --> 00:42:29.000 Yes! 00:42:29.000 --> 00:42:30.000 And that's what I take comfort in. 00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:31.000 That's right. 00:42:31.000 --> 00:42:32.000 He's teaching us for glory and glory. 00:42:32.000 --> 00:42:33.000 Yes! 00:42:33.000 --> 00:42:34.000 Isn't that wonderful? 00:42:34.000 --> 00:42:35.000 He is! 00:42:35.000 --> 00:42:36.000 I've seen the change. 00:42:36.000 --> 00:42:37.000 Yeah. 00:42:37.000 --> 00:42:38.000 Amen, you know? 00:42:38.000 --> 00:42:40.000 But if I don't kill 20 people a day... 00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:41.000 Sure. 00:42:42.000 --> 00:42:43.000 I'm a mess! 00:42:43.000 --> 00:42:44.000 We ought to do... 00:42:44.000 --> 00:42:45.000 Thank God! 00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:46.000 We ought to do our... 00:42:46.000 --> 00:42:47.000 You know, maybe I can add a bit from here. 00:42:47.000 --> 00:42:49.000 We ought to do our ethical reflection. 00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:51.000 Right? 00:42:51.000 --> 00:42:52.000 I'm a mess! 00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:53.000 That's for him. 00:42:54.000 --> 00:42:57.000 Maybe time for one more question. 00:42:57.000 --> 00:42:58.000 Jeff? 00:42:58.000 --> 00:43:01.000 There's a difference between temptation and sin. 00:43:01.000 --> 00:43:02.000 Yes! 00:43:02.000 --> 00:43:03.000 Thank you. 00:43:03.000 --> 00:43:04.000 That's a big issue. 00:43:04.000 --> 00:43:05.000 Yeah. 00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:06.000 Because we all grow up in... 00:43:06.000 --> 00:43:12.000 We have certain emotional things that we assume are true and real. 00:43:12.000 --> 00:43:13.000 Yeah. 00:43:13.000 --> 00:43:16.000 So we're all fighting against whatever that disposition. 00:43:16.000 --> 00:43:17.000 Same for other cultures. 00:43:17.000 --> 00:43:18.000 Yeah. 00:43:18.000 --> 00:43:19.000 So that's a big... 00:43:19.000 --> 00:43:21.000 But then the other one is we... 00:43:21.000 --> 00:43:24.000 When we say we live by faith, what is not a faith is sin. 00:43:24.000 --> 00:43:31.000 So the question is, when you come to those conflicts between what I feel is really true and 00:43:31.000 --> 00:43:37.000 right and what is true and right, then I need faith to make that transition. 00:43:37.000 --> 00:43:45.000 It seems to me we're always conflicted and we always have to choose faith, which is, you 00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:48.000 know, Christ says that I never knew you. 00:43:48.000 --> 00:43:58.000 Well, if we don't know him, we need to know him, which means we need to unite the kingdom of God. 00:43:58.000 --> 00:43:59.000 All right. 00:43:59.000 --> 00:44:01.000 It is almost 10 hours. 00:44:01.000 --> 00:44:02.000 We're afraid. 00:44:02.000 --> 00:44:03.000 Here's your homework assignment. 00:44:04.000 --> 00:44:05.000 I can't see my... 00:44:05.000 --> 00:44:08.000 And then come back for forgiveness. 00:44:08.000 --> 00:44:09.000 No, here's your homework. 00:44:09.000 --> 00:44:10.000 Here's your homework. 00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:13.000 We said we have to be doing this work ecclesiastically. 00:44:13.000 --> 00:44:17.000 Go home, get on the Internet, and search for... 00:44:17.000 --> 00:44:25.000 Pick your favorite Reformed or Protestant confession. 00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:26.000 Just start there. 00:44:26.000 --> 00:44:30.000 Like the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Heidelberg Catechism, one of those, 00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:31.840 one of those and look up 00:44:31.840 --> 00:44:34.260 how they expand. 00:44:34.380 --> 00:44:35.380 Why don't you do Luther's 00:44:35.380 --> 00:44:38.000 catechism as well, Luther's confession on the 00:44:38.000 --> 00:44:39.760 ten commandments? Look up 00:44:39.760 --> 00:44:42.079 how they reflect on the 00:44:42.079 --> 00:44:42.739 six commandments. 00:44:43.820 --> 00:44:46.000 And see how they begin to unfold 00:44:46.000 --> 00:44:47.800 and unpack along biblical lines 00:44:47.800 --> 00:44:50.000 and practical lines all that's contained 00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:51.699 in this command. I think that would be a very 00:44:51.699 --> 00:44:53.500 fruitful exercise to begin to think 00:44:53.500 --> 00:44:55.739 ecclesiastically and scripturally 00:44:55.739 --> 00:44:57.360 and even know about these things. 00:44:57.360 --> 00:45:00.579 All right. Speaking of prayer, let me pray 00:45:00.579 --> 00:45:01.300 and then we'll finish. 00:45:02.700 --> 00:45:03.460 Lord Jesus, 00:45:04.599 --> 00:45:06.079 we come to you 00:45:06.079 --> 00:45:08.320 knowing 00:45:08.320 --> 00:45:10.780 that we need your grace to live 00:45:10.780 --> 00:45:12.480 in the way that you've 00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:14.460 called us and redeemed us to live. You set us 00:45:14.460 --> 00:45:15.900 free from death 00:45:15.900 --> 00:45:18.440 that we might live for life. 00:45:19.120 --> 00:45:20.480 We thank you for your spirit 00:45:20.480 --> 00:45:22.039 and thank you for the promise that you've 00:45:22.039 --> 00:45:24.099 made the good work that you've begun in us. 00:45:24.599 --> 00:45:26.220 Lord, help us in these things 00:45:26.219 --> 00:45:27.639 over the next few weeks as we 00:45:27.639 --> 00:45:29.639 engage and wrestle with these 00:45:29.639 --> 00:45:30.559 difficult topics. 00:45:30.759 --> 00:45:32.099 God, help us to do so 00:45:32.099 --> 00:45:35.539 with the love that you've poured into our hearts 00:45:35.539 --> 00:45:36.339 by the love of God. 00:45:37.719 --> 00:45:39.079 God, would our church 00:45:39.079 --> 00:45:40.719 know a deeper unity 00:45:40.719 --> 00:45:42.099 as we've talked about these things, 00:45:42.659 --> 00:45:43.759 a deeper love for you, 00:45:43.879 --> 00:45:45.959 a deeper desire to want to please you, 00:45:46.379 --> 00:45:47.699 and a deeper gratitude 00:45:47.699 --> 00:45:49.799 that you have rescued us 00:45:49.799 --> 00:45:51.159 from death for you. 00:45:51.299 --> 00:45:52.859 It's a love for Jesus our Lord. 00:45:52.980 --> 00:45:54.039 We pray this Father in his name. 00:45:54.139 --> 00:45:54.319 Amen. 00:45:54.319 --> 00:45:54.379 Amen. 00:45:54.379 --> 00:45:54.919 Amen. 00:45:54.919 --> 00:45:55.159 Amen. 00:45:56.219 --> 00:45:57.219 Amen.