Tag Archives: Law

The law and Grace and Truth

Christmastide

January 3, 2021

Scripture Reading:
John 1:(1-9), 10-18

He was in the world, and the world came into being through him; yet the world did not know him. He came to what was his own, and his own people did not accept him. But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God, who were born, not of blood or of the will of the flesh or of the will of man, but of God.

And the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. (John testified to him and cried out, ‘This was he of whom I said, “He who comes after me ranks ahead of me because he was before me.”‘) From his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. The law indeed was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known. —John 1:10-18

The law is not to be disregarded with the coming of the Christ. Indeed, according to Jesus, we would be covering all the others if we always practice two of the Hebrew Bible laws. Those laws are loving God and loving our neighbor as we love ourselves. Called the Great Commandment, it is recorded in Matthew 22:35-40. Jesus did not come to destroy the law but to fulfill it. (Matthew 5:17) I think the Ten Commandments help us know what is loving and what is not. Sister Joan Chittister’s, The Ten Commandments: Laws of the Heart does an excellent job of broadening one’s understanding of love from the Ten Commandments’ perspective. I see that Adam Hamilton has a new book related to the commandments, Word’s of Life, which I look forward to reading.

John is straightforward in recognizing that God gave the law through Moses. How we live the law through our love results from the grace and truth granted through Jesus Christ. I am a morning person and thus arrived at work usually before the required starting hour. At my first office job, a woman I worked with arrived early and took note of those who did not arrive on time. She was an older widow who lived alone, and I was a young recent single college graduate. Neither of us had any real challenges in getting to work on time. Several of our staff were young mothers with children who had to go to daycare or school. While my early-bird co-worked tsk-tsked about those arriving late, she spent much of the day moving from desk to desk, visiting with staff, interrupting their work, and not doing her own. In all honesty, her friendly visits were probably the result of her being lonely and needing love too.

Weaving love through all our relationships as we attempt to follow the guidance of rules and laws blends grace and truth throughout our way of being a part of the Body of Christ.

Prayer: Lord, teach us to love each other following guidance through your grace and truth. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

Order and Law

Lent

March 6, 2020

Scripture Reading: Romans 4:1-5, 13-17

For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation.

For this reason it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to all his descendants, not only to the adherents of the law but also to those who share the faith of Abraham (for he is the father of all of us, as it is written, ‘I have made you the father of many nations’)—in the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist. –Romans 4:13-17

We in the USA speak of law and order while it perhaps she be the other way around—order and law. The desire to bring order out of chaos derives from the needs of basic human interaction. We have traffic laws to help maintain an optimum flow of cars and trucks. While sitting in a traffic jam, it may seem as if those laws were not working but image what traffic would be like if they did not exist. These are formal governmental laws that are updated as needed and if we break them and are caught, we pay the consequences. I got a speeding warning the day they reduced the speed limit on a street near me from 35 to 25 miles and hour. I drive that road several times a day and while I try not to speed, I stopped paying attention to those signs on that road years ago and thus did not notice the new signs.

We also have informal rules, etiquette for example. Some of us were raised with family rules—hang up your coat, homework before screen time. And then there are God’s laws. Depending on how one counts them there are 613 or so Mosaic laws in the Hebrew Bible ten of which Moses reported were given to him directly by God. Jesus picked two from those laws to establish the foundation for all laws—Loving God and loving our neighbors as we love ourselves*.  What we now call the Ten Commandments have served the test of time. Other of the Mosaic laws have modified with cultural changes. Cutting back on cholesterol and salt is more vital to our health today than say not eating pork because we figured out how to cook it without getting trichinosis. While some continue not to eat pork to honor God within their faith system.

God clearly desires that we live healthy, whole lives in communion with God and with one another. God just as clearly wants us to realize that God loves us just as we are and loves to help us grow in wisdom and in truth when we open our hearts and minds to God. One of my college professors drew a line across a blackboard and said that we could obey every rule in the book perfectly and that might help us climb right up next to that line but God’s grace and love fills any gap that exists between our works and God’s love.

Prayer: Thanks you God for filling the gaps that separate us from your love. Amen.

*See Matthew 22:36-40

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

The Law of Love

Living in the Spirit
May 24, 2018

Scripture Reading: Romans 8:1-17

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and of death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. To set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For this reason the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law—indeed it cannot, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. –Romans 8:1-8

Laws exist to bring order to the potential for chaos. Laws are useless if people do not recognize them for the purpose they serve. Traffic laws are a good example. Speed limits reduce the incidence of accidents. Studies measure the likelihood of accidents as they relate to speed and project the most favorable speed to allow traffic to flow meaningfully while reducing the number of accidents. It is science and it has proven to work. The law implementing prohibition of the sale of alcoholic beverages, intended to reduce the harmful effects of alcohol abuse resulted in increased crime and what came to be known at least in Oklahoma as liquor by the wink. The well regulated legal serving of alcoholic beverages seems to be safer than the absolute prohibition of alcohol.

Biblical laws include everything from murder to healthy food regulations to etiquette. While cultures have changed, and we may have identified safe ways to cook pork but now recommend a limited salt intake, the need for some order regarding safety and general order remains prudent.

With the coming of Christ, we learned that laws were not an end unto themselves but that love, caring for one another wanting the best for one another drives all aspects of our lives including influencing our laws. The challenge is to change ourselves into people who love one another, and the laws will take care of themselves. Laws do not matter to those whose intent is selfish gain.

Prayer:  Lord, let our love multiply throughout our world resulting in positive outcomes for all your children. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

Wholeness Leads to Oneness

Living Our FaithEastertide April 17, 2015

Scripture Reading: 1 John 3:1-7 Everyone who commits sin is guilty of lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. You know that he was revealed to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. No one who abides in him sins; no one who sins has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. –1 John 3:4-7

How do we explain a definition of sin as lawlessness, when we have previously discussed sin as separation from God? The English word “lawlessness” is rooted truly in being without law*. My perception, and perhaps yours, is that the word “lawless” means breaking laws, but it actually means not having any law. If sin is lawlessness and sin is also being separated from God then being lawless means we are set adrift in the world rather like not having gravity to keep us anchored to the earth. Thus if we are not separated from God, we are not sinning, our lives are grounded in God. It, of course, would be very difficult to function in society without structure and order. It is just easier to function in community when everyone has at least a general idea of what is considered right and wrong. The laws given to Moses provided that structure.

The Greek word for lawlessness, anomia, has the connotation of negative influence on a person’s soul.** Obeying laws or rules in and of themselves is not righteousness. It actually can turn into self-righteousness that separates us from God. Living in community with one another in the spirit of the laws, loving God and loving our neighbors as we love ourselves, is righteousness and protects our souls from being less than whole.

We have been called to be one in Christ that can only happen, if we each are working individually to be whole.

Prayer: Lord, help us to understand the way we are to live out your laws in righteousness. Make us whole so that we can be one. Amen.

*http://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/unabridged/lawlessness

**http://biblehub.com/greek/458.htm

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of American. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The Righteousness of Faith

Love covers a multitude of sinsLent
February 26, 2015

Scripture Reading: Romans 4:13-25

For the promise that he would inherit the world did not come to Abraham or to his descendants through the law but through the righteousness of faith. If it is the adherents of the law who are to be the heirs, faith is null and the promise is void. For the law brings wrath; but where there is no law, neither is there violation. — Romans 4:13-15

I think we sometimes forget that the Torah, the laws came after creation, came after Abraham’s epiphany of God, even came after the Israelites were taken into and led out of slavery in Egypt. Paul points out in our scripture that faith supersedes all other aspects of our relationship with God and the resulting impact that has on community. Jesus Christ as the incarnation of God with us lifts us above besting ourselves in meeting the letter of the law and frees us to invest those energies in loving God and loving our neighbors as we love ourselves. Frees us to do justice and show mercy.

Now rules and laws have their place, and certainly what we call the Ten Commandments have stood the test of time. While our sanitary practices have evolved with innovation, we still follow rules to assure good health practices not only for ourselves but to protect others. I doubt if our ancient ancestors in faith ever dreamed we would be issuing rules about net neutrality, but they did have ways of keeping people informed. And our etiquette books are a little thicker than theirs but they still exist.

Rules and laws are malleable as the world adjusts to innovation and changes in resources. God’s love never changes. It is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. As we grow in our love and faith in God, we may find that we are living God’s laws of love that cover a multitude of sins.

Prayer: Lord, thank you for the host of witnesses that have gone before us and shared their walks with you as testimonies of your faithfulness. Guide us with the light of your love and let your love shine through us. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of American. Used by permission. All rights reserved.