The Ten Commandments…



“Then God spoke all these words…” Thus begins this Sunday’s Lectionary reading from the Hebrew Scriptures, Exodus 20:1-20.  And from this beginning, on Mount Sinai, the “history” of the Ten Commandments has taken on a life of its own.  And to begin with, I want to make a disclaimer… I am NOT related to Judge Roy Moore, Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court and I personally think the man is off his rocker and should be removed AGAIN from his office for confusing the law and his personal faith! There! Now that I have that disclaimer noted, I can continue writing 😉

The Ten Commandments have been the subject of arguments, theological parsing, and even jokes very nearly ever since they were written I suppose.  I remember preaching at a church I was in negotiations with in 1987 when I was seeking my first call out of seminary.  After the worship service they had a luncheon in the church basement and a “Question & Answer” session with me.  Knowing that I was in the Air Force Reserve as a Chaplain Candidate at that time, a man asked me a Ten Commandments question.  He asked me how I could reconcile the Sixth Commandment “Thou shalt not kill” with warfare.  It was a difficult question to answer, quite frankly.  I remember vaguely saying something about the intent in the Hebrew being “do not commit cold-blooded murder” and then talking about the Just War Theory of Augustine and the church.  

I frankly didn’t feel very good about the answer I had given and the story has stayed with me ever since then.  Two men of the congregation came up to me afterwards and apologized for this man’s question.  He had, they told me, lost his son in Vietnam and had never really gotten over it.  Did they need to apologize for him? No, I don’t believe so.  Should we have wrestled with the question he asked a bit longer? Perhaps we should have.  Lord knows I have wrestled with that question personally and with counselees who had to pull the trigger and take a life or lives in combat.  And frankly, I wonder how much this moral and ethical wrestling in the soul of a warrior contributes to PTSD.

So what do we do with these Ten Commandments? The church has used them as teaching points in various Creeds and Catechisms throughout the centuries.  They have also become “bumper sticker theology” for so many or an idol that MUST be on the courthouse lawn come hell or high water.  In many cases, we have made an idol of the very thing that tells us we shall make no graven images and we should worship God alone!  Somewhere in between all of these issues we have lost, I believe, the intent and the meaning behind them.  

Jesus made a point of saying that the literal interpretation of them would condemn anyone.  You haven’t murdered anyone? How about anger and character assassination?  (Matthew 5:21-23)  You haven’t committed adultery?  How about those lustful looks and thoughts you had about your neighbor? There, you blew two commands with one act! (Matthew 5:27-28)

So through the years I have heard various arguments concerning the “Ten Big Ones”.  One camp says that Jesus fulfilled the Commandments so we don’t need to worry about them any more.  Others say that we must continue to keep all of these laws since Jesus said he didn’t come to abolish the law, but rather came to fulfill it. (Matthew 5:17)  I believe that somewhere in the middle ground we can find the answer to the question, “what do we do with the Ten Commandments.”  Do you remember the story from Acts 11:1-18?  It is the story of how Peter got in trouble with the good Jewish Circumcised Christians for going into the homes of the uncircumcised Gentiles and eating with them.  And oh boy was he in trouble!  However, God revealed to Peter in a vision that my theologian wife Denise calls the holy picnic how the practices of the Jewish tradition were not to be used to keep the Gospel message from the Gentiles.  And I thank God for that! Otherwise this Scots Irish Padre wouldn’t have been able to be a Christ follower and Padre!

If you look at the Ten, they can be split into two categories.  The first four (no other gods, no idols, don’t take the Lord’s name in vain, & keep the Sabbath) all have to do with how we relate to (LOVE) God.  The next six (don’t murder, commit adultery, steal, bear false witness, or covet) all have to do with how we relate to (LOVE) each other.  That should sound familiar… Jesus said, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength… Love your neighbor as yourself.  There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31)  Jesus was, of course, quoting the Law from Deuteronomy 6:5 (love God) and Leviticus 19:18 (love neighbor).

So, back to the Ten Commandments and our question about what we should do with them.  First of all, I think we should take them seriously instead of making them bumper stickers or lawn idols.  And I do believe we are being called to take them seriously just as Jesus did.  Love God!  Love your neighbor as yourself!  And that includes loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you!

With all of the vitriol on social media and the hatred in places like Washington, DC and our State Capitols, I think we would benefit greatly from a little more love and a LOT less hate.  Have you ever tried to pray for your enemies?  I can tell you at first it is not easy.  We want revenge… We want them to get their “just deserts”… We want retribution…  Remember Jesus on the cross?  Did he say, “God I want you to zap the blasted people who did this to me and I want you to do it NOW”?  No, he said instead, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they’re doing.” (Luke 23:34)

We heard a man called Bill Pelke speak a few years ago in Mobile, Alabama when The Quest for Social Justice, the organization Denise was Executive Director for, invited him to Mobile.  What follows is a short summary of his story (for more info, see his web site http://www.journeyofhope.org). Bill’s grandmother Ruth, a wonderful and lovely woman of faith who would teach anybody about the Bible and Jesus using her felt boards was brutally murdered by four teenage girls in 1984.  Initially, Bill was all for the execution of the young woman who was being charged as the ringleader in Ruth’s murder.  However, in a dream, Bill saw the picture of his Nana which had played a prominent part in showing the world who this sweet woman was who had been murdered.  In the dream, however, Nana Ruth was crying.  The message? Another family losing a loved one, no matter how horrible the crime, will not bring me back.  Don’t make another family go through the grief and loss you have gone through.  Bill Pelke went from being an advocate of the death penalty to fighting for the life of the young girl, Paula Cooper!  Her sentence was commuted and in 2013 she was released and Bill Pelke was there to greet her and help her to begin a new life.

And so my own journey continues as I wrestle with the Exodus passage for this Sunday.  The laws in Exodus, Deuteronomy, and Leviticus have been used to condemn others who are “different” or who somehow deserve people’s wrath.  I am thinking that we need to reclaim the “Big Ten” from the hands of people like Roy Moore and people filled with hate. We need to look at them instead through the eyes of Jesus.  “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength… And love your neighbor as yourself. ” (Mark 12:30-31)  As Jesus said, “All the Law and the Prophets depend on these two commands.” (Matthew 22:40)

As I reflected on the picture at the beginning of this blog which I took at Dogwood Acres Camp and Conference Center last weekend, I thought of the Ten Commandments.  The broken tree represents the fact that alone we will break every rule in the book!  And the burned out stump represents what we have done in the name of God and religion to those deemed different from us.  Yet surrounding the broken and burned trees are the signs of new life.  New life will grow and somehow even the brokenness shall be restored.  That is my hope for each of us, dear reader.  God help us to live the law of Love.  After all, as Denise says, Love Trumps!