Hebrews 13:17-19 Obey, Submit and Pray for Your Leaders
Hebrews 11:17-22 Acts of Faith of the Patriarchs
Hebrews 10:32-39 We’re Not of Those Who Shrink Back
Hebrews 10:19-25 Draw Near, Hold Fast, Stir Up Each Other
Obey the laws. Sounds simple enough, but why does it seem so hard? Why do we think that they don’t apply? Why do we think that we are more special and can exempt ourselves? We operate as if we have ‘diplomatic immunity’? Are we really above the law? We are tempted to think we can get away with it. We hear Jesus teach about the spirit of the law versus the letter of the law, yet some of us operate way outside the realm of the spirit and just disregard it altogether! Surely there are immoral laws on the books by which we are divinely instructed to not follow. It is legal to abort a baby, but that does not make it right. It is legal to divorce for any reason or no reason at all, and still that is not a law we can support. Our highest calling is to obey God rather than man, in such situations. But when God gives us his laws, his moral laws, we are told in no uncertain terms to keep his statutes, or commands. The Ten Commandments are moral laws. Yes they were given to the people of Israel, but they transcend the nation state. They are moral laws obligatory, and written on our hearts. “My son, keep my words and treasure up my commandments with you; keep my commandments and live; keep my teaching as the apple of your eye; bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart.”(Proverbs 7:1-3) We ought to study God’s law, obey them and put them into practice. Because it’s not just about writing them on the doorposts of our house, but it needs to be a heart thing. “And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my statutes and keep my rules and obey them. And they shall be my people, and I will be their God. But as for those whose heart goes after their detestable things and their abominations, I will bring their deeds upon their own heads, declares the Lord God."” (Ezekiel 11:19-21) God has given us his word, his instructions, his laws, and ours is not to question but to obey. God says plainly, keep my statutes.
I want to read an illustration I came across. “a coin dealer, John Feigenbaum, who purchased a rare 1894 dime for 1.9 million dollars in 2007. In transporting it by plane cross-country from Oakland to New York City, he carried the rare coin in his pants pocket. After he wondered if the dime might fall out of his pocket, he stuck it in his briefcase. Repeatedly through the flight, he checked the briefcase to ensure that the coin had not vanished.” This little vignette reminds me of the JRR Tolkien series of the LOTR and Hobbit. The Dark Lord Sauron created one ring to rule other rings of power. One character who came to possess this ring, Gollum, grows especially fond and attached to the ring and calls it “my precious.” Other characters in the series do the same. And when they fear they have misplaced or lost the ring they freak out, searching for it frantically, high and low to find it again. Such highly valued is the ring. I wonder if we value any possessions in such a way? I wonder if we could value holiness in that way? Do we prize our call to holiness in this way? Do we recognize that He who calls us to holiness is Holy Holy Holy? Maybe this morning we can come to appreciate and value the extraordinary call to holy obedience.
As we have been studying Leviticus I hope it has become increasingly clear that God is holy and calls his people to be holy. This call to holiness and sanctification certainly involves how we are to worship God. But does it involve our day to day activities? Does living for God extend to what we eat or how we dress, or how we behave? Well the easy answer is yes. But why? In our midweek Bible study we have been in the book of Galatians, where Paul is defending the gospel and telling them not to return under the yoke of the law. We have been set free and are indeed free in Christ. But there are two ditches on either side of the road that we must avoid. We must avoid legalism, where you must do X in order to stay saved, and the other is antinomianism, where there is no room for God’s law. Both of these are mistakes. As we turn to our text we are going to be discussing the dietary laws God issued to the Israelites. Are we still bound by these laws? Most importantly, what is the main concept in the giving of these laws? Let’s find out.