Speaking of Faith:
Morality
Matthew 7: 12
Introduction
“If
there is no God, then everything is permissible.”[1]
If
there is no God, what is the foundation for moral values? I would argue that without God, there is no
foundation for morality. Yet, it would
be difficult for someone to argue that morality does not exist.
A
popular point of view in Twenty-First Century American culture is to claim that
everything is subjective. There is no
such thing as objective truth. Reality
is what I define it to be. Reality for
me is not necessarily reality for you.
Leave me alone. You have no right
or authority to tell me how to live my life.
There
are several problems with the subjectivist point of view. The main problem is that there is really no
such thing as subjectivism. On one hand,
the people who promote subjective values are doing their very best to convert
others to their point of view. If truth
is subjective, then you should allow me to believe whatever I want to
believe. On the other hand, there are
Moral Values and Universal Evils that even people who claim to be subjectivists
affirm and commit their lives to follow.
For
example, we could open up a conversation between Christians and non-Christians
in the United States
The
best way I know to illustrate this is to quote from the TV show “Judge Joe
Brown.” In one episode, a man was suing
another man to recover the cost of stolen stereo equipment. The defendant admitted that he had stolen the
stereo equipment. The problem was that
he had already sold the equipment and no longer had the money. Judge Joe Brown asked the defendant to hand
over the keys to his house to the bailiff.
The defendant said, “Why do I have to give you my keys?” The judge said, “I’m going to give them to
the plaintiff so he can go take some of your stuff to cover the cost of what
you stole from him.” The defendant said,
“That’s not fair!”
Protecting
private property is a Moral Value.
Stealing is a Universal Evil. No
one—including a thief—wants someone to steal their personal property.
Where
do these universal Moral Values come from?
How do we determine right from wrong?
What basis can we use to define murder, dishonesty, stealing and sexual
immorality as evil?
Perhaps Moral Values and Universal Evil are
the products of the human conscience.
After all, everyone would agree that one should never willingly disobey
their conscience. But where does the
human conscience come from?
There
are four choices for the source of the human conscience: Something less than
me, Me, Society, or Something greater than me.
I
don’t believe the conscience comes from something less than me, because my dog
doesn’t have a conscience. Dogs do not
value the property rights of others—especially when it comes to food. Shauna and I had a dog one time that ate an
entire pizza while we were in the other room watching a movie. (We came back for a second slice, and the
pizza was gone!) I think we are all
better (more moral) than my dog.
I
don’t believe the conscience comes from me.
How could I ever believe that I am an absolute authority over other
people, or even an authority over myself?
It is also problematic to think that I have made the rules I am required
to follow. If I locked myself in, I have
the power to unlock the door and walk away.
I
don’t believe the conscience comes from society. What right (or authority) do other people
have over me? Also, we have discovered
through racial inequality that millions of people can be wrong. There may be strength in numbers, but
strength does not guarantee that the majority opinion is necessarily the right
choice.
This
leaves us with only one good source for the human conscience. It must come from something greater than
me. There must be an objective
authority. God, or something like God,
must be the source of the human conscience that helps each of us to discern
Moral Values and Universal Evil.
The
Christian view of morality is based on the character of God. This God has revealed himself to us in
several ways. First, he has revealed
himself as Creator and has left us clues in the created universe which point us
toward God’s goodness. Second, he has
revealed himself through Scripture which contains narratives about the way God
continues to work in his creation as well as moral teachings about right and
wrong. Third, he has revealed himself
through the life, crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. In the Person of Jesus, we can understand
(perhaps only imperfectly) the mind of God and God’s desire to have a
relationship with us, his special created beings.
There
is a place in Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount where we can find the entire moral
teachings of Jesus summed up in one short verse. We call this verse “The Golden Rule.”
Matthew 7: 12
12 So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
(NIV)
One
view of Jesus’ Golden Rule is to say that Jesus promotes an entirely new
morality over what we might find in the Old Testament. Some people like to point out Old Testament
references like Exodus 21: 23 – 25, “But
if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth
for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise
for bruise (NIV).”
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth is
often interpreted as the basis for a barbaric society…But that is not the case
at all…Believe it or not, this is actually GRACE…
An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth
actually limits the punishment that can be carried out when someone commits a
crime against you. For example, if
someone knocks your tooth out, the law allows you to knock his tooth
out…Nothing more…The punishment cannot exceed the crime.
Also, notice the high value placed on the human
life. A human being has intrinsic value
as one who was created in the image of God, and there is no compensation
sufficient to repay for a lost human life.
If a man is guilty of murder, then an eye, a tooth, even a hand cannot
repay for the loss of another human life.
Of course, the opposite of that is also true—Human life is too high a
price to pay for the loss of an eye or a tooth.
Imagine how barbaric the ancient world would have been without these
kinds of limits…
Another view of Jesus’ Golden Rule is to say
that it really wasn’t original to Jesus.
Some people say Jesus took a familiar proverbial saying and used it in
his Sermon on the Mount. Over time, we
forgot about the familiar proverb and attributed it to Jesus as an original
quote.
The closest we can get to the Golden Rule before
Jesus, comes from a story about the rivalry between two Jewish rabbis, Rabbi
Shammai and Rabbi Hillel.
One day a certain heathen approached Rabbi
Shammai while he was working and inquired about becoming a Jew. He said, “Make me a Proselyte, on condition
that you teach me the whole Torah (Law) while I stand on one foot.” Rabbi Shammai chased the heathen away with
the ruler he had in his hand.
The same heathen made the same proposal to Rabbi
Hillel. The gracious Rabbi responded by
saying, “What is hateful to you, do not
do to your neighbor: that is the whole Torah (Law), while the rest is
commentary thereon; go and learn it.”
Many scholars have noticed that Rabbi Hillel’s
Rule sounds very similar to Jesus’ Golden Rule.
It is close, but not quite what Jesus said. Rabbi Hillel’s Rule is often referred to as
The Silver Rule.
It is Silver, because it is Negative—Do Not Do
Hateful Things…
It is Silver, because it can be kept by doing
virtually nothing. If you do nothing
toward your neighbor, you are sure not to do anything hateful.
By contrast, the Golden Rule is a positive
command—Do unto others as you would want them to do to you. And, the Golden Rule cannot be kept by doing
nothing. It is wrong to withhold the
good from other people you hope they will extend to you.
It is interesting to me how Jesus lays the
groundwork for his Golden Rule. Jesus
does not offer us this teaching on morality by itself. It appears in a context. In fact, Jesus gives us three reasons to
believe the Golden Rule is a good way to live our lives.
Jesus’ Golden Rule Can Be Proven from Human
Experience.
One
foundation for the Golden Rule is the way many of us have already experienced
the Golden Rule at work in our lives.
The Golden Rule fits with our experience of good and evil in day to day
living.
Jesus
tells us to think of the way parents have a natural desire to bless our
children. Parents do not normally want
to cause harm to their children. Parents
want to do what is best for their children.
Jesus
gives us two examples of hungry children.
One child asks her parent for bread.
The other child asks his parent for a fish. When children ask for bread, parents do not
give them rocks. When children ask for
fish, parents do not give them snakes.
Bread and fish are good gifts to hungry children. Rocks and snakes are evil gifts which can
cause harm to a child. No one thinks it
is OK to harm a child.
We
know the difference between good and evil.
We know to expect good from other people, and not evil. And we know how to treat other people in the
way we want to be treated.
Jesus’ Golden Rule Can Be Proven from Old
Testament Law and Prophets.
Another
foundation for the Golden Rule can be found in the Old Testament. Jesus indicates this at the end of Matthew 7:
12 when he says this sums up the Law and the Prophets. More than likely, Jesus’ phrase “the Law and
the Prophets” is a reference to the entire Old Testament.
Jewish
people divide their Bible into three sections: the Law, the Prophets, and the
Writings. The Law contains the first
five books of the Old Testament—the books that have traditionally been
attributed to Moses. The Prophets
contains the prophetic writings which span from the Book of Isaiah to the end
of the Old Testament. The Writings
contains the poetic writings, the Proverbs, the history, and other books no one
knew what to do with.
In
the books of the Law, we read the Ten Commandments and the entire book of
Leviticus. There are direct commandments
from God about how to conduct worship and practical laws about getting along
with other people in society. There are
even some stories with examples of how God’s commandments are to be lived out.
In
the Prophets, we read the sermons that were preached and lived out by prophetic
spokesmen like Isaiah. They spoke God’s
word to God’s people. In many cases, the
prophets called God’s people to repentance.
God’s people abandoned the teachings of the Law and were chasing after
false gods—or even trying to live as if there was no God.
And,
Jesus says everything we read in the Law and Prophets is summed up in the
Golden Rule. If you don’t want to be
murdered, then don’t murder others. If
you don’t want your spouse committing adultery, don’t commit adultery. If you don’t want people stealing from you,
don’t steal from others. If you don’t
want people to lie to you, don’t lie to them.
If you don’t want people coveting your possessions, don’t covet what
other people have.
Wait,
that’s not the Golden Rule. That’s the
Silver Rule. The Golden Rule teaches us
to value the lives of all people. Give
respect and dignity to all people. Make
your marriage and your spouse your priority.
Value honesty in all relationships.
Be content with your own possessions and recognize that everything you
have is a gift from God. This sums up
the entire Old Testament.
Jesus’ Golden Rule Can Be Proven from the
Character of God.
A
third foundation for the Golden Rule can be found in the character of God
himself.
There
are several things we can say about the character of God. We can use the “omni” words to describe
God. God is Omnipotent—all powerful. God is Omniscient—all knowing. God is Omnipresent—all places at all
times. Or, we can talk about God in even
more basic terms. God is Love. God is Good.
The
overarching story of the Bible is the story of God’s Love for his creation,
specifically his Love for all humanity.
God created humanity and called us good.
God pursued humanity to be in relationship with himself. He called Abraham to be a blessing to all
nations. He chose Israel
Throughout
the Bible we observe God as the source of all good gifts. God sends the good sunshine and the good rain
on both the righteous and the unrighteous.
God is never the source of evil.
Evil is present in our world, but God never causes evil. Instead, God provides us the resources we
need to overcome evil. The crucifixion
and resurrection of Jesus have defeated evil once and for all—sin, death and
Satan still rage against us, but they have already been defeated. The Holy Spirit provides us with the presence
of God in our lives to walk with us, even as we walk “through the valley of the
shadow of death.”
Jesus
tells us that we can know the goodness of God by observing the ways we are
capable of doing good deeds ourselves.
We are sinful. We don’t always do
what we know to be the right things.
But, we have moments of brightness.
Even an evil and sinful person like me can give good gifts. If I can give good gifts, how much more can
God do? After all, God is not sinful,
not evil, and not motivated by selfish ambitions.
Conclusion
For
the past four weeks, I have been emphasizing the fact that Jesus expects all of
his disciples to be on mission to share the Gospel with others. Now, I am giving you some examples of ways
you can speak about your faith. Morality
is one way to engage in spiritual conversations. No one is completely subjective in their view
of morality. There are absolute Moral
Values and absolute Universal Evils. You
were created by a Good God. And you were
created to know and discover the objective values God placed in his creation.
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