All right, this is part of the
law, and I want you to notice something. I want to make this
point of emphasis before we read. That is, it is not always those
violent things against the law that we think about, but also
it is the thought of the heart and the speech of the mouth can
be a violation of the law. And I'll remind you of this,
it was not murder or adultery or stealing that slew Saul, it
was the Tenth Commandment With that in mind, let's read our
text of the morning. In Exodus chapter 20 and verse
7, Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.
for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that takes his name
in vain." Flipping then to Leviticus chapter 24 and verse 10 through
verse 16, here's an example of the transgression of that law
and the penalty that was assessed because of it. And the son of
an Israelitish woman, whose father was an Egyptian, went out among
the children of Israel. And this son of the Israelitish
woman and a man of Israel strove together in the camp. They got
in a fight. And the Israelitish woman's son
blasphemed the name, and cursed. And they brought him unto Moses,
and his mother's name Washilometh, the daughter of Dibri, of the
tribe of Dan. And they put him in ward, that
the mind of the Lord might be shewed them. And the Lord spoke
unto Moses, saying, Bring forth him that hath cursed within the
camp, and let all that heard lay their hands upon his head,
and let all the congregation stone him that is put him unto
death. Now, our first text, Exodus 20
and 7, is a part of the law of God, one of the Ten Commandments. In fact, it is the third of the
ten. And the second text that we read,
in Leviticus chapter 24, is an example of the law of blasphemy as it
was instituted and put in force in Israel under the old economy. And with those, also, another
number of texts will come before us today in our study. Our goal
today, our aim, our desire is to show that by the works of
the law there shall no flesh be justified in the sight of
God. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin, as Paul writes in Romans 3 and verse 20, that the law
cannot violate itself and it cannot act contrary to its nature
and justify a sinner. And to do that, it would be acting
contrary to its nature. Also we read in the New Testament,
in Galatians chapter 3 and verse 10, as many as are of the works
of the law are under the curse For it is written that in Deuteronomy
27 and verse 26, Cursed is everyone who continues not in all things
that are written in the book of the law to do them. Still,
there are those in the world and there are those in the churches,
and their number is not small by any means, who say that their
creed is I believe in the Ten Commandments. I do my best to
keep them. I do my utmost best to walk in
accordance with the Ten Commandments. I try to live by the Golden Rule. I treat others as I would want
them to treat me. And from this they have or they
hold an expectation of heaven. You'd be surprised how many people
there are who have this attitude and expect that whatever the
shortcoming, it will be overlooked by God or made up. by the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now, our response to them who
would put themselves under the law, our response to them who
say, I live by and under the Ten Commandments, my response
to that is exactly the same as that of the Apostle Paul to the
Galatians in chapter 4 and verse 21. Tell me, you that desire
to be under the law, do you not hear the law? Tell me, Paul asked
those Galatians. Tell me, are you hearing the
law? Have you heard it? Have you understood
it? Now we see those that Paul here
is addressing, which is a particular class, you. You the ones, you
the ones who, desiring, wishing, willing to be put under the law. John Eady called this, as it
is expressed in the Greek, quote, a strong desire to place themselves
under the law, unquote. A strong desire. He also called
it, and I agree, an untoward impulse. on the part of them,
and no doubt stirred up among them by the teaching of the Judaizer
who had come among them bringing again an attempt to put them
under the ceremonial and the moral law. Now, the phrase there,
to be under the law, refers to one desiring to be there, viewing
themselves as bound to keep and to observe the law. And not because
they love God, and not because they love His law, and not just
because they desire to live a holy life before God, these are not
the considerations that drive many of them with this desire. Rather, in the context, there
in Galatians, these are such as were seeking justification
and eternal life as a reward, a result of their keeping the
law of God that they had bound themselves unto. Paul is not
asking, do you not hear the law read? For they certainly heard
it read every Sabbath day in the synagogue. Acts 15 and verse
21. Some of it was read from the
law, from the psalm, and from the prophet. Paul is rather asking
them, you that are desiring to be under the law? Are you hearing
the law? Are you listening to what it
has to say unto you as it to say unto them? You would not
put yourself under the law. You would not put yourself as
bound under the law if you were hearing the statements of the
law. And next, in Galatians chapter
4, verse 22, and following, he, that is Paul, from the familial
history of Abraham, in an allegory taken from the two sons and the
two wives of Abraham, shows the servile spirit of those who have
placed themselves under the law. And what do we hear the law saying
unto us, as Paul asked those at Galatia? We hear the law saying,
or the Scripture saying, Romans 3, And verse 20, By the law is
the knowledge of sin. We hear it say in Romans 4 and
verse 15, The law worketh right. We hear Paul write in 2 Corinthians
3, 7, And verse number nine, he calls
the law a ministration of death and of condemnation. Romans 7,
he says, it slays the most dedicated zealot of the law by sins becoming
exceedingly sinful in their sight and in their eyes. We'll say
more about that as time permits. Now concerning the ten laws that
were given unto Israel, you find them fully set forth in two places
in the Scripture, in Exodus chapter 20, from which we read, and again
in Deuteronomy chapter number 5. Deuteronomy is the name or
the title that has the meaning of the second giving of the law. It is not a different law, but
a repetition of the same law given again. And the giving of
the law was a terrifying thing unto Israel. Sometime read it
in Exodus chapter 19 and that area. And it was calculated to
make a very deep and a very lasting impression upon them. So great
was the manifestation that Israel actually feared that they would
die. So great was the manifestation
of the glory of God that they pleaded that Moses might speak
to God in their behalf, that God might speak to Moses in their
behalf, and lest they die from the awfulness of the law. And to put it in perspective,
so great was the sight that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and
quake. And you'll find that in the book
of Hebrews 12, verse 18 through verse 21. Now we have the body
of the Ten Commandments or the Ten Laws, It is both interesting
and important to look at the internal principles of each one
of them. And we find that they deal with
man's conduct in a two-fold way. We'll look at that first. First
of all, they set forth man's duty toward God, outlined in
the first four commandments. have no other gods before me,
make no graven images, nor rever them. Do not take the name of
the Lord thy God in vain, And do not forget or neglect the
Sabbath, all of these principally with reference of men unto God. But secondly, we notice then
that the law deals with man's duty towards others, others such
as parents, others such as neighbors. Do not dishonor their parent,
their father, or their mother. to not murder, to not commit
adultery, to not steal, to not lie against another neighbor
or stranger, and not to covet that which is the property or
the belonging of another. But something else is interesting
in making a study of the law, that is, of the Ten Commandments,
as we usually refer to them. And that is that while we have
what I will call the bare statutes in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy
chapter 5. For example, how short they seem
and yet how powerful. Thou shalt have no other gods.
Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. And yet knowing man's willingness
and propensity to pervert and to twist and deny the Word of
God, much like we see lawyers do in our day with the law as
it stands, who will bring a murderer into court and claim his defense
that it was self-defense all along, not murder. Now, a good
example is found in Mark 7, 8-13. As the Lord exposed there a common
method by which the Jew did pervert the fifth commandment in its
application and exposition to the people. You'll find it also
in Matthew 15, 4-6. The commandment said, honor thy father and thy mother."
And yet, as Spurgeon wrote, the Jews of Christ's time had invented
a method by which they could circumvent this law. They had
put in place a method whereby they circumvented the law that
said, honor their father and mother. And so they justified
withholding support from their parents by saying, it is korban
or korban, that is, it is a gift. This is a gift dedicated and
devoted to God. I'm sorry, mama and papa, I can't
help you because this is devoted unto God. And the Lord said,
thus setting aside the commandment of God and freeing them from
obeying and keeping a clear commandment. And as Mark 7 and verse 13, many
such like things you do. That was not the only example. More examples later. Here is
something else about the Ten Commandments that we ought to
catch or that we might not catch unless we look at it very carefully. That is, while the law in its
bare statutes are set forth in their body in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy
chapter 5. Yet, when we carefully study
the last four books of Moses, that is, when we study Exodus,
Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, they all expand upon And an exposition
in more depth is given of each and every one of these laws. And for each of these commandments
there is what Calvin called a supplement, which word I use in this sentence,
additional information, giving the ways whereby a particular
commandment may be transgressed. Not only what each commandment
forbids to be done, but by implication what is required to be done on
the other side, by what ought to be done. And the commandments
are not restricted to the actual outward act or motion. They go further than that. Certainly
they cover that. But they can be transgressed
in word with a tongue. And the third commandment And
the ninth commandment is one that may be transgressed with
the tongue, and one of them being the tenth commandment by the
attitude, the motive, the desire, the lust of the heart. And yet
that be reckoned a sin against the holy law of God, and that
person not be held guiltless before God, but counted guilty
and not innocent. So let us use the seventh commandment
as an example of how many ways it can be transgressed. It says, Thou shalt not commit
adultery. And we learn from later scripture,
those exposition and those openings up of them, there is physical
adultery, there is fornication, there is incest, There is bestiality. There is homosexuality. See that
in Leviticus chapter 18. All of these would fall as transgressions
of that commandment. We might add to that list prostitution,
pornography, sexual assault, and on and on. We remember how
the Lord, do we not, contrasted the way the scribes applied this
commandment with the way that it is actually meant and is to
be viewed. You will find this in the section
that we call the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter 5, verse
27 and verse 28. And the Lord says unto them,
You have heard You have heard it said by them. The margin has
to them. You have heard it said to them
of old time. That is, the ancients, our parents,
our ancestors of long ago, the fathers of old. You have heard
that it was said unto them. It was told unto them. Now, let's digress very quickly
to see that this formula of words is used by our Lord several times
here in Matthew chapter 5. The first time is in Matthew
5 and verse 21. You have heard it said by or
to the ancient. It is used further to make contrast. Verse 27, verse 31, verse 33,
verse 38, and verse 43, all in Matthew chapter 5. You have heard
it said, but I say unto you. Anyway, what we are saying about the seventh commandment
which concerns adultery. And in Matthew 5 and verse 27,
Jesus says, You have heard that the ancients were told, You shall
not commit adultery. And so they were. Exodus 20 and
14, and Deuteronomy 5 and verse 18, as part of the moral law. Thus the Jewish teachers were
teaching in the time of Christ that only the physical, actual
act, only the conjugal union was adultery, only that was a
violation of the commandment. By the way, the same kind of
thinking prevails even today. It's not a sin to think, some
say. It's not a sin to be tempted.
It is only sin to be tempted or to think if you carry it out
and put it into action. Hear what the Lord said to that
congregation, Matthew 5, 27. You have heard it was told to
the ancients, do not commit adultery. And in verse 28, The Lord said, But I say unto
you, Whoso looks on a woman to lust after her, hath committed
adultery already with her in his heart." Now, not to labor
it beyond measure, but it does establish the point made by Spurgeon
and by other brethren that when God gave the law upon Mount Sinai,
It had a wide range of meaning. It had a spiritual meaning beyond
and not limited to the actual acts that are forbidden in the
commandment. We see this more times than one
in Matthew 5, not limited to adultery, such as in verse 21
and verse 22. You've heard it said, Don't kill,
but I say, Whosoever is angry without a cause puts one in danger
of the judgment. And others are like it. Matthew
5, 31 and 32 concerning divorce. You've heard one thing, but I
say another. Verse 33-37 concerning the taking
of oaths. Verse 38-42, the taking of revenge. And verses 43-48 concerning love and faith. Our Lord puts the commandment
in their proper and spiritual life. Now, let us consider the
law and the question. Can any be saved by keeping the
law? No, says the Apostle Paul. No flesh shall be justified by
the works of the law in the sight of God. None at all. Then someone asks, what if one
keeps part of the law? What if one is obedient unto
parts of the law? What if one keeps some of the
law? Perhaps not all of them, but
what if one keeps some of the law and bears that in mind? Is there any credit for partial
obedience unto the law, and Jesus will make up the lack, or God
will overlook the lack. In James 2, I would like for
us to read verses 8-10. if you fulfill the royal law. According to the Scripture, thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, you do well. But if you have
respect to person, you commit sin and are convinced of the
law as a transgressor. For whosoever shall keep the
whole law and yet offend in one part is guilty of all. Again, you have it in Galatians
3 and verse 10. Cursed is everyone who does not
fulfill all things in the law, all things written in them, the
book of the law to do them. Now technically speaking, the
law will curse far a simple or a single violation. A one-time violation of the law
puts one under its curse. Now, most people don't believe
this. Most church-going people won't accept it and don't believe
it. But they should remember a couple
of things. And that is, number one, for
their first sin, the angels were cast out of heaven and down to
hell. We should remember that for their
one and their first sin, Adam and Eve were expelled out of
the garden and the earth was cursed on their account. So with that behind us, let's
settle in this morning on the two texts that we have read here
in the beginning. And let us not think less of
them for the fact that they're found in the Old Testament or
that they fall under the heading of what we call the law. The
first text is the third commandment. Thou shalt not take the name
of the Lord thy God in vain. And to show the gravity of this
command, there is annexed to it this threat, the Lord will
not hold him guiltless that takes his name in vain. Thou shalt
not do it, and he that does it shall not be reckoned innocent. Please notice this commandment
deals not with violence. as the sixth in murder or the
seventh in theft, but this third commandment is a sin that is
principally committed with the tongue, the thought, and the
organ of speech. The Puritan Thomas Watson wrote
in the 1600s, quote, there is no member of the human body breaks
forth more to dishonor God than the tongue, unquote. And he called
this commandment a bridle for the tongue of men and women. and as harmless as words seem
and appear unto most, the Lord will not hold this individual
guiltless. And, of course, we must recognize
that the tongue in taking the Lord's name in vain, or in any
other sin in which the tongue is involved or is complicit,
does not act alone or independently." Matthew 12 and verse 34, "...out
of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." Luke 6 and
45, An evil man, out of the evil treasure of his heart, brings
forth that which is evil. Many of them are mentioned. One
of them is blasphemy. But we must ask, what is it to
take the name of the Lord thy God in vain? How is this done? What constitutes it? What is
the nature of taking the name of the Lord in vain? And since
it involves speech or speaking words, what formula of words
would be a violation of this holy commandment of our God? Likely, most people today, when
they hear the question concerning this commandment would think
first of cursing, of profanity and of vulgarity, bringing in
or using the name of the Lord in vulgarity. No doubt this is
a way of taking the Lord's name in vain. We hear it every single
day of our lives somewhere. But it is by no means the only
way that this commandment is transgressed. It is the essence
of the commandment is, as Calvin wrote, twofold, that God's holy
name only be used in a due and a reverent way, to only be used
in a grave and a serious manner, and only use the name of God
in a religious way, and that it not be used in such way as
would be considered vain. And I think the word vain here
has the meaning of useless or desolating or ruin or guile something
along that line. And so God's name is taken in
vain when someone uses or swears to God's name in order to give
wings to a lie. Many people do that. Many people
lie. They know they're lying and they
swear by God's name so that we won't think that they are lying. Oftentimes people swear by the
name of God in order that they might swindle another out of
their good. They feel that it is convincing,
I guess, to say, I swear to God or I swear on my mother's grave. Sometimes the panhandler on the
corner will say, I swear to God I don't drink or do dope. And
as soon as he gets enough fart, he's off to the liquor store.
But God's name is taken in vain when it is used in idle chatter. You may well hear many a hundred
times a day. You will hear the expression,
oh my God, oh my God, oh my God. We got in the habit in our generation
of saying that to almost everything that we hear. But again, God's
name is taken in vain, I think, when it is attached to a religious
lie. Heresy are the traditions of
men. It is taken in vain by hypocrites
who use His name but honor Him only with their lips. while their
heart is far from Him, as we read in Matthew 15, Mark 7, 6,
taken from Isaiah 29 and verse 13. By those who bow or who promise
or swear by God's name, and yet they have no intention of fulfilling
it. Or by those who bow and bow foolishly
something unto God, and do not fulfill it. Leviticus 19 and
verse 12. You shall not swear by my name
falsely, neither shall you profane the name of thy God. I am the
Lord. And again, in Exodus 23 and 13,
make no mention of the name of other gods, neither let it be
heard out of thy mouth. And now let's move to that passage
which we read in Leviticus chapter 24 and especially verse 15 and
verse 16. And what was to be done when
taking the Lord's name in vain, progresses onto open public blasphemy. When two men here got in a fight,
a mixed race son of a woman of Israel and an Israelite, and
the first one of them we read cursed and blasphemed. Now, we might rightly conclude
that this was the highest form of taking the name of God in
vain. And it seems that this incident,
look at it very carefully, read it very carefully, that this
incident between these two men first raise the question of the
proper handling and penalty for blaspheming. Look at it very
carefully, and I think we might come to that conclusion. They
might not have had such a case before by the fact that they
sought out Moses, who then sought the mind of the Lord as how to
handle it and what the sentence ought to be against this individual. And the Lord spake or revealed
unto Moses, fixing the punishment at death, and the person was
stoned to death publicly. The witnesses who heard, hands
upon his head, and it appeared from this, not only was it perhaps
the first time, but it became a law in Israel and was followed. Now, we hasten to add, Israel
was a theocracy. Keep that in mind. They were
not a democracy. They were a theocracy. That means that the law of God
was the law of the land, and the religious leaders were the
administrators of those laws. Please understand, we have neither
the desire nor the authority to execute people in our day
who violate the law of God. We leave them to the judgment
and the vengeance of God, which will be a fearful thing. We don't
blow up abortion clinics. We don't go out and murder people.
in the name of the law of God. Israel was a theocracy and the
law of God was the law of the land. Now the point to be made
is that the law of God is inflexible and it shows us the holiness
of our God. The Puritan Watson said, quote,
it fetches its pedigree from heaven, unquote. And it exposes
the contrariness of sin to the holiness of God and the holiness
of the law. No sinner has ever been saved
by the law or ever shall be saved by the law. The law was given
to Israel, Paul explains, as a schoolmaster under Christ. in Galatians chapter 3, verse
21-29. He said in Galatians 3.19, it
was added because of transgression. He said in Romans 5 and verse
20, moreover, the law entered in along beside the Adamic transgression
causing the offense to abound. Therefore, to save his people,
the Lord Jesus Christ redeemed them from the curse of the law. Galatians 3, 10-13. And as Paul
teaches us, In Romans 10, verse 4, Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to them that believe. Everything
the law had against us, Christ endured and redeemed us from
in the cross. Now, in winding down our study,
we do find that many only apply the law to outward acts. even
in our day, even those who go under the name of Christian,
that only some actual, visible, outward deed is a transgression
of the law. For example, to bow down to an
idol. or to murder or to commit adultery
or theft in such light. They do not consider the inward
thoughts, the desire, the lust to be a violation of the holy
law of God, especially if they are not acted out into some visible
action. But what says the tenth commandment
unto us? Thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not even have an evil,
wrong, or forbidden desire to raise up in thy heart." I think
the best commentary on this is that passage from Paul in Romans
chapter 7 and verse 7 through verse 14, the one commandment
that convicted him, the one commandment, Thou shalt not covet. Remember, Saul, as he was known,
once thought himself blameless before the law. You'll find that
in Philippians 3, verse 6, as touching the righteousness of
the law blameless. As far as he was concerned, he
kept the law to agree that merited his justification before God. But then came Christ, then came
the law with its convicting power. And what slew him, what slew
Paul, it was not idolatry, it was not sabbath desecration,
it was not murder, it was not theft, it was not parental dishonor,
but thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not lust, thou shalt
not crave, thou shalt not desire certain things. Therefore, this
is the law that slew Paul. It slew me, he said, and by its
sin became exceedingly sinful. Paul once thought himself well
before the law. He thought it had nothing against
him until there was driven home to his heart the commandment,
Thou shalt not even covet. Now every son and daughter of
Adam stands guilty before that holy law. It finds sin in them. It finds sin in us that we were
not aware of. And thank God Christ fulfilled
the righteousness of the law. He endured its curse. and He
saves His people from the curse of the law by the death that
He died at the cross. First of all, He gave it full
and complete obedience. He transgressed it not in any
part at any time. And secondly, He endured the
curse and the penalty of the law in the stead of his people. That's the essence of the gospel. So flee not to Mount Sinai. Flee to Christ, for he alone
has the ability to save one from the curse and from the stringency
and the power of the law. Paul said, he that's under the
law is under sin. You're not under the law because
you are under grace. And sin therefore shall not have
dominion over you. Thank God for him who bore the
curse of that law in the stead of his people.