Source of Morality

Exodus 20: 1 – 21.

Introduction.

I have been preaching every Sunday for 11 years. I have been preaching every Sunday in this church for almost 5 years. And, this is the first time I can honestly say…I am disappointed to see you this morning. It would have been much better for us to have been “raptured” out of the earth and into the presence of God.

In fact, I had planned to entitle my sermon “If you are reading this, the world did not end on Saturday.” But, I didn’t think that would be an appropriate sermon for Baccalaureate Sunday…It would probably not be the best idea to preach about the end of the world on the Sunday we call a new youth minister.

Instead of the “end of the world,” I would like to preach about something safe… Like morality and how we can determine if our actions and choices are moral.

There are several options for determining moral behavior in a purely secular sense.

Some people determine morality based on logic or reason. Morality and right behavior is what makes sense logically in different situations. When faced with a choice, a person should think about each option and choose the one that makes the most sense to them.

Another option is to determine morality based on emotions. If you are facing a difficult decision, imagine yourself making each decision and imagine the outcome of each decision. Then, you should ask yourself how the imaginary decision and the imaginary outcomes make you feel. The right thing to do is the thing which will make you happy. Closely related to this is to base morality on what is called “creative emotion.” This view states that your emotions are capable of creating reality. For example, a musician may find it joyful to play an instrument or to sing. Therefore, the musician’s emotions are capable of creating something good.

A final option is to determine moral behavior based on what will bring more pleasure than pain to the rest of society. In other words, if no one gets hurt by your choices and your actions, then you are acting in a moral way. This method seems to place little emphasis on the things a person does in the privacy of their own home. If no one knows what you are doing, and if no one gets hurt by your actions, it is moral.

None of these options reflect a Christian view of morality. For Christians, morality includes the things which are pleasing to God. Morality is not always the most logical choice, or even the choice that feels good at the time. And, Christian morality certainly does not depend on societal norms.

This leads many Christians to a very simple view of morality. Morality is doing what the Bible tells us to do.

Josh McDowell published a book in 1994 entitled, Right from Wrong. The first half of the book publishes the troubling statistics about how Christian youth think about ethics. In a survey of “churched” teens, they discovered over 60% of our teens do not believe in absolute right and wrong. What is right for some people is not necessarily right for everyone.

The second half of the book describes a method for reading the Bible and determining absolute right and wrong. McDowell proposes a three-fold approach: precept, principle and person.

Precept = the biblical teaching.

Principle = the universal principle of right and wrong behind the biblical teaching.

Person = the character of God.

Let’s look at some of the moral teachings of the Bible and see how they fit into this pattern of Precept, Principle and Person…

Read Exodus 20: 1 – 21.

1 And God spoke all these words:

2 "I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

3 "You shall have no other gods before me.

4 "You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.

5 You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me,

6 but showing love to a thousand of those who love me and keep my commandments.

7 "You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

8 "Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.

9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work,

10 but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your manservant or maidservant, nor your animals, nor the alien within your gates.

11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

12 "Honor your father and your mother, so that you may live long in the land the LORD your God is giving you.

13 "You shall not murder.

14 "You shall not commit adultery.

15 "You shall not steal.

16 "You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.

17 "You shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his manservant or maidservant, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor."

18 When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance

19 and said to Moses, "Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die."

20 Moses said to the people, "Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning."

21 The people remained at a distance, while Moses approached the thick darkness where God was.

(NIV)

Do you remember when I taught you how to memorize the Ten Commandments in order? It’s a very simple way to remember. There are ten commandments…You have ten fingers. That is one commandment for each finger.

Hold up one finger…God is number one…No other gods before me.

Hold up two fingers like scissors…Like cutting out paper dolls…Do not make an image of God…

Hold up three fingers…Three fingers looks like the letter “W”…Take the word “God” seriously…Do not take the LORD’s name in vain.

Hold up four fingers…When we hold up four fingers, something is missing… When we skip church on Sunday, something is missing…Remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy.

Hold up five fingers…Like taking a pledge or being sworn in in a court of law… On my honor…Honor your father and your mother…

Hold up six fingers…Point the one finger at the other five like shooting a gun…Do not murder.

Hold up seven fingers…Two fingers are separated from the rest…Like a husband and wife who are separated from all other people…Do not commit adultery…Always keep your marriage promises.

Hold up eight fingers…Four fingers on each hand…You are missing your thumbs… In some countries, thieves are punished by cutting off their thumbs…Do not steal.

Hold up nine fingers…It is possible to hide your thumb…Hiding something from others is like lying…Do not lie…Do not bear false witness.

Hold up ten fingers…Make a grasping motion with both hands…Give me, Give me, Give me…Do not covet.

Each of these commandments is a commandment God made to his people. The Ten Commandments reflect God’s will for his people. There is a universal principle behind each commandment—a principle that applies universally to all people at all times in history. Behind each universal principle, there is a characteristic of the Person of God.

Another way to say this is to say, these commandments apply to us, because they are in the Bible. AND…These commandments are in the Bible, because they reveal something about the character of God.

Commandments 1 – 3.

There is one universal principle behind each of the first three commandments. There is only one God.

A popular view among non-Christians is to say that all religions lead to the same God. It doesn’t matter if you worship Yahweh, Jesus, Allah, or even Buddha. Each of these gods reflects a different expression of the same religious reality. However, that view cannot be supported by the first three commandments.

Exodus 20: 2, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.”

There is only one true God. The only true God is the God who saved his people from Egypt. God’s character is salvation. And we are to worship the only God who can save us and who has saved us.

There is only one true God. The only true God has revealed himself through his word, and not through images. Therefore, we are not supposed to worship gods who can be captured in visual images…And, we are not supposed to create an image for God. Worship God in the way he has revealed himself.

There is only one true God. The only true God works on our behalf to bring about our salvation. However, God cannot be controlled by invoking his name. Therefore, we are to be very serious about the times when we invoke the name of God.

Commandments 6 – 8.

These three commandments seem to be the most obvious commandments. Most people will acknowledge murder, adultery and stealing as immoral behavior. In fact, we can apply some secular sources of morality…Logic / Reason…Greater Good… The emotional views of morality could go either way. A person could feel emotional happiness or satisfaction from murder, adultery or stealing.

The fact that these commandments can be supported by a logical view of morality proves that there are universal principles behind them. Don’t kill other people, because you don’t want other people to kill you. Don’t commit adultery, because you don’t want your spouse committing adultery. Don’t take stuff that belongs to other people, because you don’t want other people to take your stuff.

There are logical reasons and universal principles behind these commandments. However, these also reflect characteristics of God’s nature.

God is the source of life. As God gives life to his creation, we are to give life to other people and not take life away from them.

God is faithful. As God is faithful to us, we are to be faithful in all of our relationships…Faithful to God…Faithful in our marriages…Faithful in our friendships…

God gives blessings. He sends the sunshine and the rain to provide for his creation. Just as God is generous to us, we are to be generous in all our relationships. Generous to God and his church…Generous to people who are equal to us economically, above us economically, and below us economically…

Commandment 9.

This commandment can be deconstructed and qualified to the point that it is completely watered down. We can interpret the phrase “bear false testimony” to be a reference to the activity of a witness in a court of law. We can interpret the phrase “your neighbor” to include only a limited number of people who either live in our specific area or to include the people who are related to us by nationality, race or religion.

However, even if we view this as a commandment about a specific action against a specific group of people, we can still relate it to a universal principle. God wants us to tell the truth. This applies to a witness in court as well as a person talking on the telephone or even sending out an email. Tell the truth.

God wants us to tell the truth, because Truth is very basic to the character / Person of God. God always tells the truth and places high expectations of truth-telling on all of God’s people. We see this in the Old Testament teachings about prophets and prophecy. If a prophet claimed to speak in the name of God, and if his prophecy proved to be false, there were severe consequences. This was a capital offense. The Law required that false prophets be put to death.

God always tells the truth, because God’s character is truth. God’s character is truth, therefore, all truth belongs to God. We see this concept show up in the New Testament teachings of Jesus. In John 14: 6, Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

Conclusion.

Everything in the Bible points us toward the character of God. True ethical behavior is found in a life patterned after God. The best place to find the character of God in the Bible is in the life of Jesus.

Jesus is the One and Only, Unique Son of God. Jesus reveals the character of God to us in two ways.

First, Jesus teaches us how to live in his words, spoken to his original disciples and recorded so that we might know God.

Second, Jesus teaches us how to live in his life as an example for us. Jesus upheld all the Precepts and Principles of the Old Testament. Jesus reveals what a moral life looks like.

This means Jesus is both our teacher and our subject. Yes, we learn the words and the teachings of the Bible. However, ultimately we are learning Jesus. The only way to learn Jesus is through a relationship with Jesus.