Sermon by the Rev. Canon Dr Charlotte Methuen

In the name of God who creates, redeems and sanctifies us.

“The law of the Lord is perfect and revives the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure and gives wisdom to the innocent.

The statutes of the Lord are just and rejoice the heart; the commandment of the Lord is clear and gives light to the eyes.”

Psalm 19 is one of the wisdom Psalms in the Old Testament, one of three Psalms which celebrate the law. We find a similar celebration of the law in Psalm 1: “their delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law they meditate day and night.” And Psalm 119 is an acrostic hymn celebrating the law, with the lines in each of its 22 sections beginning with a different letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Psalm 19, which we have just heard, begins with a hymn to creation, which moves into another hymn celebrating the law, a reminder of the way in which the order of creation and the order of society fit together.

“The law of the Lord is perfect and revives the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure and gives wisdom to the innocent.”

Celebration is not something we Christians – especially post-Reformation Christians – tend to associate with the law. Jewish congregations celebrate the Law every year, when they dance with their Torah scrolls at Simchat Torah. But much of our theology is rooted in the Protestant tradition which is cautious about the benefits of the law. Luther and Calvin and other Reformers in the sixteenth century tended to focus on the way that the law shows up our short-comings: the Law condemns; it shows us our sin; it reminds us of our inability to earn salvation, points to the way that forgiveness comes to us through God’s free gift of grace. And that is an important and lasting insight. Salvation, the expression of the love of God, does not depend on what we do or don’t do. God’s grace is not incumbent on our keeping a particular set of rules, not dependent on a particular pattern of behaviour.

And yet: today we have as our Old Testament reading the Exodus account of the giving of the Ten Commandments. And here is Psalm 19 celebrating the law:

“The statutes of the Lord are just and rejoice the heart; the commandment of the Lord is clear and gives light to the eyes.”

Perhaps it might be useful to stop and ask ourselves what these laws are: what is it that Psalm 19 is celebrating? The Wisdom Psalms use a range of Hebrew terms to refer to the law, but the most important one is Torah. And although English usually translates Torah as law, that is not always a very good translation. Columba Breen suggests that the fundamental meaning of Torah is not “law” in the sense of a legal system, but more like the “way”, “showing the way.”[1] He is a Christian and this surely resonates for him with Jesus as the Way, the Truth and the Life. Breen writes that the Ten Commandments should be seen “not as an absolute moral law prescribing ethics, but as God's programme for Israel’s life as His chosen people; […] a revelation which offered her the gift of life; […] God's great saving act.”[2] The Ten Commandments as a gift of life? Can we see them that way?

In his very helpful book Sabbath rest. Restoring the sacred rhythm of rest, Wayne Muller ponders the fourth commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy.” Sabbath laws have often become overly legalistic, he says, “but beyond the legalism is an idea that by saying no tro making some things happen, deep permission arises for other things to happen. When we cease our daily labour, other things – love, friendship, touch, singing, rest – can be born in the space created by our rest. Walking with a friend, reciting a prayer, caring for children, sharing bread and wine with family and neighbours – those are intimate graces that need precious time and attention.”[3] Read this way, the commandment that we observe the Sabbath becomes not a restrictive list of things we may not go, but an invitation to opportunity, a gift – indeed a gift of life.

Perhaps we can read the other commandments in a similar way. A way that leads us more deeply into an understanding of how having an eye to the commandments might give us a deeper understanding of what life in Christ, life in a God-centred community should be like. Reading for this sermon I came across a re-writing of the Ten Commandments which seems to point in this direction. Counting backwards (and you might want to compare them with Exodus 20):

“10) Stop lusting over what isn’t yours, and imagining that their grass is so much greener than the grass God gave you.

9) Stop lying, gossiping, sniping and sabotaging others – stepping on their reputations to make yourself look taller.

8) Don’t take what isn’t yours to have.

7) Don’t sleep with those who aren’t yours to sleep with.

6) Don’t taking lives that aren’t yours to have, don’t destroy other people’s lives or livelihoods.

5) Start respecting your parents and elders; pray that you too may live long and fruitfully and serve as God’s witnesses as saints on earth.

4) Start respecting God’s day. You've had six days to get all your busy business out of the way. This one is special – for you to spend some time together with God.

3) Stop trying to put words into God’s mouth, or condemn others in God’s name. Don't use God’s name in your petty little interpersonal trust games; your name-dropping games; your self-promotion games.

2) You may love God’s creations and your own, but stop worshipping the created over the Creator.

1) Stop treating God as just one other thing in your life. God is not an option, a fall-back or a supplement – God is the great I AM.”[4]

Put this way, the commandments are not a set of rules that might seem irrelevant – when am I going to murder anyone, after all? – but a way of helping us to think about the proper focus of our lives. It is not just about whether or not we actually commit murder, but about how we live with those around us. Do we do things that demean or destroy other people’s lives or their livelihoods? Luther in his small catechism puts it in a similar way. “We should fear and love God that we may not hurt nor harm our neighbour in his body, but help and befriend him in every need and danger of life and body.” Or pondering “You shall not commit adultery”: “We should fear and love God that we may lead a chaste and decent life in words and deeds, and each love and honour our own spouse.”[5] Calvin talks about the way in which the law can and should bear fruit in a believer’s life. The Ten Commandments offer deep insights into how as believers we might better live our lives, in an awareness of our relationships to others and to God.

The American Episcopal theologian Elizabeth Webb writes that the Ten Commandments show the Israelites that they “are to live as neighbors to one another, the foundation of which is knowing the God to whom they belong.”[6] Walter Brueggemann has said something similar: “Rather than being a short list of legalistic prohibitions and requirements, the commands give shape and expression to the people's relationship with the God … They speak of God's holiness and of love and justice for our neighbors.”[7] There is a real sense here in which the commandments are about learning a way of wisdom – and that points us to our reading from 1 Corinthians, to Christ who is wisdom, who is and who shows us the Way. This wisdom of Christ is not the wisdom of philosophy, but the wisdom of a life oriented towards God, and that is what the Ten Commandments are about too. The psychologist Raymond F. Schmitt writes that a wise person “is usually guided not so much by passions of the moment … as by the realities of his situation, the goals he is pursuing, and the principles and values that he has found trustworthy.”[8] The Ten Commandments are indeed principles and values that have been found trustworthy. They show us a way of living that is not focussed on ourselves, our needs, our desires, but which sees ourselves, our needs, our desires as part of something much larger. They are not about restricting, but about helping us to understand where life in God, in community is nourished.

There is a story about an American rancher who visited an Australian cattle ranch. The American was puzzled; he spent much of his life riding round the boundaries of his property and repairing fences; tedious, time-consuming work. “How come you don’t need to spend all your time mending fences?” he asked his Australian friend. “Fences?” asked the Australian. “We don’t need fences here. We have wells.”

The Ten Commandments: should we see them not as fences but as wells? As life-giving sources of nourishment as we explore our way together and with God? And then we too might say with Psalm 19:

“The law – the way – of the Lord is perfect and revives the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure and gives wisdom to the innocent. The statutes of the Lord are just and rejoice the heart; the commandment of the Lord is clear and gives light to the eyes.”

Reviving the soul; giving wisdom to the innocent; rejoicing the heart; giving light to the eyes. Surely the Law of God is indeed a gift of life, a gift to celebrate.

Amen

[1] Columba Breen, “The Psalms of the Law,” in: The Furrow 15 (1964), 518.

[2] Ibid, 519.

[3] Wayne Muller, Sabbath rest. Restoring the sacred rhythm of rest, Lion 1999, 39.

[4] http://thenakedalien.blogspot.com/2012/03/top-ten-count-down.html; adapted.

[5] Luther’s Small Catechism, http://bookofconcord.org/smallcatechism.php#tencommandments

[6] http://www.workingpreacher.org/preaching.aspx.

[7] Cited according to Kathryn Matthews Huey, http://www.ucc.org/worship/samuel/march-11-2012-third-sunday.html

[8] Raymond F. Schmitt Jr., “Suffering and Wisdom,” in: Journal of Religion and Health 20 (1981), 112.