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Christian Education Sunday
Exodus 20:1–17
Prayer: O You who are the God of Truth and Light as well as the God of Love and Righteousness, We pray for the schools throughout our world, especially for the schools of our church and synod, that they may be such homes of fellowship and brotherhood, learning and culture and that from them shall come forth a stream of men and women who by the use of their gifts and talents shall show themseleves a blessing to their neighbors, and guide their communities in the way of peace; through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one true God, now and forever. Amen.
In the Name of the One who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel, Dear Fellow Redeemed;
If we were to do some checking, we would probably find that our text for this morning is one of the most printed and displayed readings from the Bible. It is not unusual at all, in fact it is quite familiar to see the Ten Commandments printed on a plaque for display. Even non-Christians will often speak of the universal truth found in the Ten Commandments and speak of their basic importance to society.
That such a text should be so popular ought to strike us as unusual. Because as a rule, we don’t like being told what we can and can’t do. Even as Christians, we bristle at the thought of someone trying to control our behavior and tell us what is acceptable and what isn’t. One of the first words that children learn to use with any frequency is “No”. We tell our brothers and sisters “You are not the boss of me!” And the older we get, the less we like having someone tell us what we can and can’t do. In saying that we may think especially of teen-agers, but the fact is that adults resent it just as much, if not a bit more, when they are told what to do. “Who died and left you in charge,’ we ask, if only to ourselves. We value our freedom, and are loathe to have someone try and take it from us.
Our text for this morning begins on a note of freedom: “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” It may seem like an ironic beginning for what is certainly the most famous list of rules. And yet, God begins the Ten Commandments with this phrase for a reason. He had freed the Israelites from their slavery in Egypt, and now
The LORD Our God Still Delivers From Slavery
That phrase that introduces the commandments often sounds more like a reminder of some imposed obligation than a simple statement of fact, as if God were saying to them, “Look at what I did for you; now you owe Me.” But this is not the purpose of the introduction to the Commandments. God does not here establish His right to give the Commandments and expect obedience. If this were the case, we could argue that the commandments have not hold on us, since we were never “brought out…of the house of slavery” in Egypt.
God’s right to expect obedience does not come from His freeing the Children of Israel from the slavery of the Egyptians, it lies in the simple fact that He is God. He needs no pretense to demand our obedience or that of the Children of Israel; it belongs to Him already as our Creator. As Isaiah says, “But now, O Lord, You are our Father; we are the clay, and You are our potter; we are all the work of Your hand” (Isaiah 64:8). Just as a potter creates things out of clay to serve his purpose, so God has created us to serve His purpose; chiefly to serve Him with our worship.
So if God is not here establishing His right to demand obedience, or trying to guilt us into obedience by showing us what He has done, than what is His purpose in His introduction to the Commandments? It is to tell them and to tell us who He is. It is God identifying Himself, saying “This is who I am; I am the God who delivers from slavery. I am the God who brings freedom.”
And both we and the Children of Israel must be told this, because by nature we do not know who God is or at best, we misunderstand His purposes. I read an article by an engineering professor who noted that with more and more frequency, students try to negotiate their grades. And not on an objective basis, but by telling him things like, “If my average drops too much, I’ll lose by scholarship.” “I couldn’t make the labs because my cat was sick.” “I really tried hard.” “I can’t afford to take this class again.” In other words, the students had this idea that they have a right to a good grade, or at least pass the course, never mind the objective standards set up for grading. That is often our attitude toward God. We see the Ten Commandments, but we tend to view them with a bit less rigidity than God does. (Examples)
These views of God is a testimony to our sinful nature, and the misunder-standing of God that comes from it. Think back to the Garden of Eden, before the fall into sin. When we read in Genesis 2 how God told Adam not to eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, our first reaction is to think, “Isn’t that just like God, to be saying ‘Thou shalt not’? And here is doing more of the same in Exodus 20.”
Yet despite our resentful thoughts, God’s primary purpose in giving the Ten Commandments is not to change behavior. While it is true that the law does curb our behavior, it’s primary purpose is not to change who were are or direct us to better living, it’s primary purpose is to show us what we are, what we have become. As Paul Speratus wrote in his great hymn on justification:
It was a false, misleading dream
That God His Law had given
That sinners could themselves redeem
And by their works gain heaven.
The Law is but a mirror bright
That brings the inbred sin to light
That lurks within our nature.
We are tempted to think that God frees the Children of Israel from slavery in Egypt, only to impose on them a new sort of bondage by giving them the Ten Commandments. But that is not the case. In giving the law God does not put them under a new bondage, but shows them the bondage that still held them.
For this reason, God’s moral law, Ten Commandments, speak to us as well, because in us too they expose the sinful nature and show the hold that sin has on us. We may never have been slaves in Egypt, yet we have been slaves to sin. The law exposes this condition, reminding us that God is not the one who puts us into slavery, He is the one who exposes it, showing us our condition and how far we have fallen from the image in which we were created, how far gone we are into death, how much of a slave we really are.
This is the slavery St Paul speaks of in Romans 6 when he writes “our old selfwas crucified with Him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin.” (Romans 6:6–7). In that section of Romans he is reminding his readers there are only two ways one can be freed from slavery; you can die, or your freedom can be purchased. God, never one to do anything halfway, does both. By God’s grace in Baptism, you are no longer a slave of sin, because you have died to sin, and more than that, in His death Jesus redeems you from sin, paying the price demanded by God.
Yet Jesus does not simply remove the offense of sin, He replaces it with what the Father expects of His creation. He replaces it with perfection. To be connected to Jesus is to be connected not only to the payment for sin, but to be connected to the holy life that God requires. To be connected to Jesus means that when the Father looks at us He sees what He wants: holiness. Perfection.
And this is why “Set Our Hearts to Obey Your Commandments” is a good theme for us to consider during our school year. The theme comes from a phrase in a prayer called the Collect for Peace which is normally used in evening services. The prayer goes like this:
O God, from whom all holy desires, all good counsels and all just works proceed, give Your servants that peace which the world cannot give, that our hearts may be set to obey your commandments; and also that we, being defended by You from the fear of our enemies, may pass our time in rest and quietness.
When we pray to God for peace, we are praying not only for peace among nations and safety for ourselves and our neighbors; we are praying for a peaceful conscience. We are praying for peace between us and God. That is the “peace which the world cannot give”. Having been given that peace in Jesus we now pray for God to “set our hearts to obey [His] commadments” because a whole new dimension has been added to the commandments. They are no longer only little mirrors that show us where we have fallen short, but now also become little guides for us as well, showing us how God would have us serve those around us. As Lutherans we call these rolls in our lives Vocations. Having redeemed you, Jesus sets you free to serve those around you. It doesn’t mean we will no longer sin or always do what is right. It means that when Jesus sanctifies us, He sanctifies our work as well. I may not always enter my classroom with the best attitude, but Jesus forgives me and sanctifies my work. You may not always follow the teacher’s or your parents’ directions the way you should, but Jesus forgives you and sanctifies your work as a student and child. You may not always be the best parent to your child, but Jesus forgives you and sanctifies your work as a parent. You may not always be the best neighbor to those around you, but Jesus forgives you and sanctifies your work. Your sin and your guilt has been placed on Jesus and died with Him on the cross. You are free to serve your neighbor with a clean conscience.
When people enroll in our school we often ask them why they want to enroll here, and very often part of the answer given has to do with morals and morality. They want their children to be taught good morals, or They want their children to be taught the same morals at school as they are being taught at home. And the teaching of morality, the teaching of how God expects people to live and how to treat each other is certainly part of what we strive to do at Parkland Lutheran School. But if that were the sum total of the spiritual education we gave to children here we would be failing. You would be just as well off sending your children to a Mormon school, or an Islamic school. For there too, they will be taught a morality, a holiness, that accords with the Ten Commandments.
But as Lutherans, while we find morality and holiness in the Ten Commandments, we do not find our holiness there. We find our holiness in Jesus, who kept the Ten Commandments for us and now gives us His holiness in His Gospel, in His Baptism and in His Supper. And that is the message we want to impart in our education and in our school.
Jesus, crucified for me
is my Life, my hope’s foundation.
And my Glory and Salvation.
Gloria Patri…
SDG