Turn to Exodus chapter 20, Exodus
chapter 20. The title of the message is the giving
of the Ten Commandments, giving of the law. The law of God is good. I read to you in Psalm
119, it said, Oh, how I love thy law. Sometimes in the Word
of God, when the word law is used, it means the whole Word
of God. Sometimes it means the Ten Commandments
or ceremonial law. But the law of God The law of
God is good. The law of God is perfect. As we go down through these commandments,
these first seventeen, eighteen verses, nineteen verses, we will
see that the law of God is good. You know, if we could, if it
were possible, That we could keep this? You realize what a
place it'd be here to live? To love God with all your heart,
mind, and soul? To love your neighbor? To do
all this? The law of God is good. There's
nothing wrong with it. Over in Romans 7. Over in Romans chapter 7. Romans chapter 7 and verse 12. Wherefore the law, this is Paul
speaking, wherefore the law is holy. It is a holy law. It is a perfect law. And the commandment holy, just,
and good. That's God's law. God gave it.
It's like Him. It's like the one who gave it.
You see, like the ones we make up, it's got loopholes in it.
We have to make laws to cover laws. But not God's law. God's law is holy. Perfectly. There's no loopholes in it. There's
nothing wrong with it. The problem is with this flesh.
With this flesh, look over in Romans, back over here in Romans
chapter 8. Let me find this, over here in
Romans chapter 8. Here's the problem in verse 3. Let me read from
verse 1. There is therefore now no condemnation
from the law of God to them which are in Christ Jesus. who walk
not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. Now, what is it to
walk after the Spirit? It's to believe. It's faith. Walking after the Spirit, it's
not like we walk in the flesh today, then the Spirit. No. Walking
in the Spirit is believing God. It's believing. It's faith. That's
what walking in the Spirit is. For the law of the Spirit of
life And Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and
death. But what the law could not do,
what could it not do? It could not justify me by my
merits, by my obedience. It couldn't do it. My obedience
is shot full of holes in that it was weak through the flesh.
But here's the remedy. Here's the remedy. God sending
his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemns
sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us. We walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit, believing God. We walk by faith. That's
what that is about. So God's law is good. It's holy. It's perfect. The problem is
not with God's law, it's with us. And this law that I'll read
to you is written on every human being's heart. This law is written
on every human being's heart. Turn back to Romans again. Why? Why is it that you can go to
the darkest part, the most unenlightened part of this earth, and men and
women and children know it's wrong to kill? They know it's
wrong to steal. They know it's wrong to lie.
Children at a very young age know it's wrong to lie. Their conscience tells them that's
not right. Something's not right. They know
it's not right to kill. And the reason they know this
is because the law of God is written on the heart of every
human being. Now, Romans 2, look in verse
7. But when the Gentiles, which
have not the law, the Gentiles were not given the law as Israel
was given the law. They didn't have it. It was given
to Israel at Mount Sinai. Well, they do by nature that
things contained in the law, these having not the law, are
law unto themselves. They know right from wrong. They
know right from wrong. They know it's not right. They
know it's wrong to steal and kill and to adultery. They know
these things are wrong. Which show the work of the law
written in their hearts. It's written in the heart. Their
conscience also bearing witness and their thoughts to meanwhile
accusing or excusing one another. This law is written on the heart
of every human being. So now let's look at it. Verse
1, And God spake, God spake all these words, saying, listen,
this law that we have here is not man made. Man had nothing
to do with this law. This law is perfect. It's perfect. And all the words of this book. David said, I love thy law. All
the words of this book are perfect. And there he is. There's no error in this book.
This book is God's law. It's God's word. And that being so, we must listen
to it. as the Word of God. Now, when we come to this place,
and I stand here, and we open this book, this is not a dictionary. This is not just a history book. This is the living Word of God. If God takes this Word, which
is called the seed, and plants it in your heart, you're going
to live. This is God's Word. This is God's
law. And he says to them in verse
2, and there's one thing he makes very clear to these Israelites,
is this, I am the Lord, Jehovah, the self-existing One. I'm thy
Savior, thy Redeemer. I am the Lord, thy God. This God who gave the law He's my God. He's my God personally. He's my God. He said, I am the Lord thy God.
He identifies himself. Which have brought thee out of
the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Now the first
thing that struck me as I read this was that He lets them know, before the giving of the law,
before any law was given, I am the deliverer. You see that? I'm the one who brought you out
of the house of bondage. Not your keeping. You know the law
is said to have six to seven hundred precepts. You think you're
going to keep ten of them? You read the scriptures and they're
six to seven hundred precepts. But before he gives a law, the
law here at Mount Sinai, he lets them know, I, the Lord, Jehovah,
am the one that delivered you out of the house of bondage.
Not a law, not some keeping of a law, I did it. I did it. I brought you out. Make no mistake,
salvation is of the Lord. It's not of the Lord in my cooperation. If that was so, not one of us
would be saved. We wouldn't cooperate. We would
not cooperate. If He did not give us life, if
He did not command life and give us a new birth and a new heart
and faith, if He did not do that, we would not. We would not come
to him that we might have life. It would not happen. Now here in verse three, the
first table of the law, we are given our relationship
with God. The second table is our relationship
with one another. So here we have, and it starts
out properly. Our relationship with God, because
if that's, I'll tell you what, if our relationship with Him
is not right, if it's messed up, our relationship with one
another is going to be messed up. It will be messed up. I have learned that if the Lord
will increase my love to Him, I will automatically love you
more. I'll love you more if I love
Him more. If I seek Him more, I'll seek
your good more. Or more of your good. That doesn't
sound grammatically correct, but you get it. I seek Him. The more I love Him,
the more I love you. Lord, increase my love to Thee.
Because the response to that is going to be more love to You.
More care for You. Now he says in verse 3, Thou
shalt have No other gods, and that's a little g. That's a little
g. It's amazing how many little
g's are in our lives. Really. You should let God send
some trials along and take some things away from you. Let God
send some trials along and take some little g's away from you
and see how much it hurts. You don't realize. We don't realize. We don't realize what a grip
these things have on us until the Lord removes them. Thou shalt have no other gods
before me. Why is that? Well, first of all,
because there is no other. There is no other god. There's
only one God. There is only one God. And then
secondly, He will not share His glory with another. God Almighty
is not going to share His glory with a little gene. It's not
going to happen. And this, thirdly, whatever we
put before God becomes our God. It becomes God to us. Our Lord
said this, He that loves mother, father, sister, brother more
than me, is not worthy of me." You put mother, father, sister,
brother, or the children, you put them before God and they
become your God. Whoever or whatever you put before
God becomes your God. He said, thou shalt not have
no other gods before me. Now, before I go on, let's remember
this as we go through this. The law of God is spiritual. It reaches to the heart. You say, well, I don't fall down
and worship other gods. It's what we love. It's what
has my affection. What has my heart? Paul said this, the law is spiritual,
but I'm carnal, soul under sin. Then he says here in verse 4,
Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. What did they
do before Moses even came down off the mount? They made a graven
image, a golden calf. Thou shalt not make unto thee
any graven image, any likeness, if Jesus Christ God Is he God? Then why in the world do we paint
a picture and call that Jesus Christ? He just said, don't ever
do that. He said, don't do that. Thou shalt not make unto thee
any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven
above where God sits, or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under
the earth. Do not carve out anything. Do not make a picture of anything. And call it God. Call it Jesus. Don't call that picture Jesus
Christ. That's not Him. That's not Him. What He's doing here is he that
forbids idolatry. What's the scripture say? God is spirit. What are you going
to liken him to? Look over in John chapter 4.
I like to move along here tonight on this. John chapter 4, verse
24. God is a spirit. And the better
rendering of this is God is spirit. He's not a spirit as among many
spirits. God is spirit. All other spirits,
angels, are spirit. God created. But God is spirit. He's uncreated spirit. The old
writers would say uncompounded spirit. God is spirit. You can't make,
if God is spirit, What image are you going to make? Listen, let me tell you this.
Whatever image you do make will be less than God. It'll be less
than He is. I promise you. It'll be less. And that will be the becoming
of our God, and not the God of heaven and earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself
to them? I thought of Shadrach, Meshach,
and Abednego. Those men would not bow down. And because of that, they heated
the furnace seven times hotter than it ought to be. And they
took those three men and cast them in the fire. But they came out of that fire
and not even a hair was singed. Can you imagine that? Not even
a hair was singed. Not even the smell of smoke was
upon them. But it burned up those who cast
them in. Thou shalt not bow down thyself
to them, nor serve them. Don't give them the time of day. Do not give them the time of
day. Don't bid them Godspeed. For I the Lord thy God, listen
now, am a jealous God. There is a proper jealousy. If
you love your children, you're jealous over your children. You
love your wife, your wife loves you, you're jealous. There's
a proper jealousy. God said, I'm jealous. over my children, over my bride,
and I will visit the iniquity of the fathers upon the children
unto the third and fourth generation." You know what that is? That's representation. Representation. He said, I'll visit the iniquities
of the fathers, of them that hate me, upon their children.
upon their children's children for generations. God is a just God, and He's a
jealous God. But now, listen, He delights
to show mercy. He delights to show mercy. He
says He's showing mercy unto thousands of them that love Me. Peter, do you love Me? I remember when I heard the gospel
from Henry preaching on television, I don't remember the message,
but I remember one time in a message he said, Do you love Jesus Christ? It never crossed my mind. I mean,
I never thought about that. You know, love, to love someone,
that's a relationship. That's affection. That's a union. That's more than just, well,
you know, he's okay. I like him. I mean, but to love. Peter, do you love me? If you love Christ, you'll be
sold out to Christ. And you'll keep his commandments.
You'll actually read this book, not to see what to do next, but
for guidance. You'll seek it for guidance and
instruction and to be fed. To them that love me, he says
here, showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, keep my
commandments. He delights to show mercy. I'll
tell you what, those who love Christ delight to keep his commandments. And he said, Christ said this,
this is my commandment. that you love one another. You
don't need any more than that, do you? You do not need any more
commandment than this, that you love one another. You have to
take care of it. You can give ten million laws
if you don't love one another. It's not going to help. But if
you love one another, it'll be all right. You'll take care of
one another. Then he says, verse 7, Thou shalt
not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, in a vain manner. Don't use God's name in a way
that is disrespectful to Him. He says, don't do it. Don't say,
oh my God, or Lordy, Lordy, or don't say those things. I don't
know how many people now that say, well, Jesus Christ. He said, don't say that. To say
that is to use the Lord God's name in vain. For the Lord will
not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. And that still applies. That still
applies to this day. You know, to take God's name
in vain shows that we don't fear Him. And if we don't fear Him,
it's because we don't know Him. The way to use his name is to
be with respect and awe and fear. This is God. You don't use your
name in vain, do you? Why not? Then why use God's name
in vain? I wouldn't use my mother and
father's name in vain. I always speak respectfully of
my parents. Why would we use God's name in
vain? There's only one reason why. You don't know him. You
don't know him. Those who know him speak respectfully
of him and are careful how they use his name. Now, there's something
interesting here. I never really saw this before
until I was going over this. In verse 8, we have a ceremonial
law right in the midst of the Ten Commandments. Right here
in the midst of the Ten Commandments. Remember the Sabbath day to keep
it holy. You know, people think, well,
the ceremonial law is done away with, but the moral law is still
in effect. Listen, God's law is made up of laws. We've got
ten here given to us that we're going to look at tonight. But
it's only one unified law. It's only one law. To break,
to offend, to offend in any part of God's law is to break the
whole law of God. And the law of God is fulfilled
in Christ, and the Sabbath This day of rest is Christ. That's why Paul said, to the
Galatians, we've been looking at. It's just providential to
have these things keep correlating as we go through the Scriptures.
He says, do you not hear the law? You who desire to be under
the law, do you not hear the law? If you break or offend one point
in the law, You have broken and offended the whole law of God. The whole law. I haven't shot anybody. Oh, you've done a lot of other things.
Or just to do one thing. Just to do one thing, you broke
the whole law of God. Remember the Sabbath day to keep
it holy. Six days shalt thou work, and
do all thy work, but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord
thy God. And if thou shalt not do any
work, thou nor thy son or thy daughter, the manservant, maidservant,
cattle, stranger, that's within thy gates. For in six days the
Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is,
and rested the seventh day. Wherefore the Lord blessed the
Sabbath day, and hallowed it, and set it apart. But that they
represent, that Sabbath they have represented was a tiger
picture of the Lord Jesus Christ, who kept the law of God perfectly
in every jot and tenor. He never broke one law of God. Now we come to the second table
of the law. This is how we deal with each
other. Honor thy father and thy mother. that thy days may be
long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee." Honor
your parents. Honor authority. Honor all authority
is what he's saying, and it will be well with you. Tell you what,
you teach those kids as they grow up to respect authority,
and it'll be well with them. It'll be a whole lot better for
them if they respect it, if they don't respect it. Teach your children this. Paul
said over in Ephesians, Children of valued parents. He said this
was the first commandment with promise. Oh, in Psalm, I read to you,
I delight in thy law. I delight in thy law. The only
ones who do delight in God's law are those who are saved by
Christ. The Pharisees delighted to use
it as a whip. They delighted to use it to stone the adulterous
woman. You delight in it because it's
holy, it's just, and it's good, like its giver. Then he says,
thou shalt not kill. And there's a lot of people that stand in judgment that never
actually shot anybody, but guilty of murder. Turn over to Matthew
5. God looks on the heart. And our Lord shows us here that
the law reaches to the inner man. You see, He's talking to these
Pharisees. They thought they were pretty
good guys. Look in verse 21, Matthew 5. You have heard that it was said
by them of old time, thou shalt not kill. And whosoever shall
kill shall be in danger of judgment. But I say to you, the interpreter
of the law is the lawgiver. He says, but I say to you that
whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger
of the judgment. And whosoever shall say to his
brother Rucka, shall be in danger of the council, but whosoever
shall say thou fool shall be in danger of hell fire. But whosoever,"
he said, is angry, angry with his brother without
a cause. You know, and I have to say,
I don't know that I ever have a cause to be angry with you
to the point I'd like to shoot you. I don't have that. Look down at verse 27. You have heard
that it was said by them of old times, Thou shalt not commit
adultery. But I say to you that whosoever
looks on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with
her already in his heart. Before God you're guilty. Paul said in Romans, thou that
sayest thou shalt not steal, dost thou steal? And what he's
saying is, you do steal. You say you shouldn't commit
adultery? Do you commit adultery? I tell you, what goes on in here,
that's what God sees. God sees what goes on in the
heart of the man and the woman. You and I see the outside. We
see what people want us to see. God sees who I am. God sees my
thoughts. And that's what you stand in
judgment for. That's what men and women stand in judgment for. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt
not commit adultery. The law is against sexual sins
outside the marriage. In the marriage, it's the gift
of God, but outside of it, he said, don't do it. Don't do
it. Thou shalt not steal. Do you ever give, let me have a
word of this. Do you give the employer eight
hours of perfect work? You didn't stay up too late.
You didn't drag into work and try to get going and just tired. That's stealing time. That's literally stealing. I don't care if it's a pencil. If it's not yours, it's not yours. And God's law is so strict. God's
law is so strict, you were charged for stealing and you have to
die for that, taking that pencil that you just thought, well,
I'm just laying there. That's not yours. You didn't buy it. Oh, the strictness of God's
law. The purity of God's law. Covers a lot, doesn't it? Covers
a lot. Thou shalt not bear false witness
against thy neighbor. You know, there's six things
God hates over poverty, and one of them is a lying tongue. A lying tongue. Don't bear false
witness against your neighbor. And then he says, Thou shalt
not covet thy neighbor's house. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's
wife. nor his manservant, nor his maidservant,
nor his ox or his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's. It's
idolatry. Covetousness is idolatry. Paul
said this, I had not known lust, except the law said thou shalt
not covet. Paul said, I didn't even realize
what lust was. I didn't know it, except the
law said thou shalt not covet. The coven is to lust. It's to
lust after something that's not yours. It's to crave it. You know, the Scripture teaches
us, be content with such things as you have. Wouldn't it be great if all the beautiful cars could
pass by and you just not want one of them? You can pass by
all the nice homes and you not want one of them. You say, I'm going to a city
who built her maker's God. I'm content with Christ. Until
a man or woman is content with the Lord Jesus Christ, until
that happens, you'll never be content with anything. Not until
you're content with Him. When you can have, when you literally
have, give me Christ or else I die. When that becomes real. When that becomes like a thirst. When that becomes like a hunger.
And you can say, take it. But was that what Mephibosheth
said? Let Zabba have it. I have the king. I have the king. So then maybe before we die,
he'll let us get there. Now after reading that, after reading that, you and I know by the grace of
God, we can't keep that. No son of Adam has ever been
able to keep the law of God perfectly, but the Son of God did. Listen now, The Son of God is
my law keeper. I have kept the law of God perfectly
in Christ, and that's how God sees me. And the way God sees me is the
way it is. In Christ we have kept the law
of God. He is my righteousness. He is
the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes. We have honored, we have magnified
the law in our substitute, in our representative. And we delight in the inner man,
that new man. We delight in the law of God.
I wouldn't change anything I've read. Would you? That's a perfect
law. That is a perfect law. We love God's law, but now God's
law can't save me. At the very beginning of this,
God said, I brought you out. I love His law, but His law can
only condemn me apart from His Son. That's all it can do. I have to perish. Christ is my
law keeper. He's my righteousness. He's my
all in all. And I look to Him. By faith in
Christ, we fulfill the law. It's fulfilled. We truly delight
in God's law after the inward man. I won't close here. It's taking
too much time, but I want you to notice something. Verse 18,
after this was given, this perfect law, and all the people saw the
thunderings and the lightnings. That's what surrounded the giving
of the law. And the noise of the trumpet
and the mountains smoking. And when the people saw it, they
removed it, stood it far off. In the face of the law, we find an example, a type of
the gospel. Look in verse 19. And they said
unto Moses, Speak thou with us, and we will hear, but let not
God speak with us, lest we die. Moses, and I hope everyone here realizes
this tonight, we need a mediator. We need someone to stand between
us and God. We can't keep this. We can't
keep this. We need a mediator. And Moses
said to the people, fear not for God has come to prove you
and that his fear may be before your faces that you sin not.
The people stood afar off and Moses drew near to the thick
darkness where God was. Where is our Lord? Where is our
mediator? Seated at God's right hand, making
intercession for transgressors like us. And the Lord said to
Moses, Thus thou shalt say unto the children of Israel, Ye have
seen that I have talked with you from heaven. Ye shall not
make with me gods of silver, neither shall ye make unto you
gods of gold. And then he speaks here in verse
24 of an altar and a sacrifice. An altar of earth thou shalt
make unto me, and thou shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings,
thy peace offerings, and oxen, and all places where I record
my name. If you were able to keep it, you wouldn't have to
do that. Would they? If they were able
to keep the law, they wouldn't have to build an altar. They
wouldn't have to kill an ox or a sheep and shed blood. They
wouldn't have to do that. God gave this holy law. And they
said, Moses, you be the mediator between us and God. Here's the misalter, the sacrifice. He said, wherever you go, this
is what you do. Christ is our righteousness and will
always be our righteousness. He's our law keeper. In Him we've
kept the laws. In Him we literally live and
move and have our being. The Lord give us that mediator. Give us that mediator to stand
between us and God. We have it. We have it in the
Lord Jesus Christ.