True North | Week 4 | Bill Bush

related to the part in the story of Exodus where the Israelites are given the 10 Commandments.

The 10 Commandments, that's where we're at, where we've been in this story of True North, where we're looking at the story of Exodus of how God guides His people and how we should chart the course of our life by the True North of God, of who He is. And so we've been looking at the story of how God leads His people. Now we're at the point where we're gonna be in Exodus 20 where He gives them

this list, the 10 Commandments. But what we're gonna see is it was never meant to be a honey do list. It was never meant to God to say, here's the list you got to do and if you do that I'll be happy. And if you do it then you can have some expectations. Because whenever you make it about a list and not love,

you turn everything into a contractual business like legal kind of thing. A forensic type of relationship. So the big idea we're gonna see in the story is simply this. The 10 commandments are about love, not a list.

Same thing. They're about love. It's not a list of honeydews where God says here's what you must do to make me happy and then you can have your expectation of what I'm going to do for you. It's about love and not a list. And you're like, does that even mean?

And how we're going do this is we're going to look at the 10 Commandments, read the passage in Exodus 20, but we're not gonna start there. We're gonna start in the New Testament in the book of Matthew chapter 22

because Jesus talks about the 10 commandments and explains what they're about. And when he has a man come up to him ask him a question, he goes, hey, what's the most important commandment? He's kinda like us guys. Like, alright, I can't get 10 things done, but can you give me the top two that'll give the most bang? Like, how can I do these? I would need the Pareto principle. I need the 20% that's 80% effective. Okay? Can you just give me that? That's what he's kinda asking. And he goes, no, I'll give you I'll just tell you the most important. This sums up the whole thing. And here's what he says starting in verse 37.

Jesus replied, you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. The next, the second, is equally important. Love your neighbor as yourself. The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.

He said it's about love God, love others. It's all about love. But you know what he just did there? Jesus just gave him the cliff note summary of the 10 commandments.

The 10 commandments are about loving God and loving others. The first four deal with loving God. The last six are how to love others.

That's the 10 Commandments. And Jesus just said they're about love. They're not about a list. Because what I mean, list is, like I said, it's a legalese. It's like this law. It's like I have to do this and then I can expect something from you. That's not what God is doing. When he gives them these commandments,

he is doing something that's very loving. So what do we mean by that? Well, let's go through. What I want to do is just read Exodus 21 through 17. Just read the whole part. And then I'm gonna point out three things that make this why the 10 commandments are about love and not just a list.

So here we go. Exodus 20 starting in verse one. Then God gave the people all these instructions. I'm the Lord your God who rescued you from the land of Egypt, the place of your slavery.

You must not have any other god but me. You must not make for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of anything in the heavens or on the earth or in the sea. You must not bow down to them or worship them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God who will tolerate your affection for any other gods.

I lay the sins of the parents upon their children. The entire family is affected, even the children of the third and fourth generations of those who reject me. But I lavish unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my commands.

You must not misuse the name of the Lord your God. The Lord will not let you go unpunished if you misuse his name.

Remember to observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. You have six days each week for your ordinary work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath day of rest dedicated to the Lord your God. On that day, no one in your household may do any work. This includes you, your sons and daughters, your male and female servants, your livestock, and any foreigners living amongst you.

For in the six days, the Lord made the heavens, the earth, and the sea, and everything in them, but on the seventh day he rested. That's why the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and set it apart as holy.

Honor your father and mother, then you will live a long, full life in the land that the Lord your God has given you. You must not murder. You must not commit adultery. You must not steal. You must not testify falsely against your neighbor. You must not covet your neighbor's house, your neighbor's wife, male or female servant, ox or donkey,

or anything else that belongs to your neighbor. There you have it, the 10 commandments. You probably already knew a lot of them. Some of you probably learned them growing up. You might have seen them posted. And what's crazy about how the first kind of

evidence to prove that this isn't about a list, a legal kind of a law of a demand, a contractual type of thing that hey, this is the business arrangement we're gonna make. You do this, I'll do that, is the fact that that's only two ninety seven words. Two ninety seven words. The Gettysburg Address is two sixty six words.

That's some powerful words, but Lincoln was not laying down policy or law when he spoke the Gettysburg Address. But I saw that there was a while back a national law that was put into place to to talk to put into effects on price controls for CABG. It was 26,911 words. That's what law is.

That's what law is. In order to be really technical and accurate and everything to say we're gonna control the price of cabbage, and if we're gonna have a relationship that's all about the law, you do this, I do that, or this happens or that happens, You need a lot more words than two ninety seven.

That's why Jesus said you didn't get it. The most important command, those 10 commandments, were meant to show you love God, love others. It's about love, It's not about law. So what does that mean? What does that even mean? Well, three things that we're gonna go back in this passage and show you. It means first

that they are rooted in a relationship with God.

The 10 commandments start and are rooted in a relationship in God that comes from God.

What do I mean by that? Let's look at verse one and two again and see something you might have missed every other time you've ever heard this preached or read it yourself or or heard about it. He says that God gave these people all these instructions. That sounds like a honey do list. But then look what is the first thing he says. I am the Lord your God who rescued you from the land of Egypt, the place of your slavery.

So if you're making a list, if it's all about I do for God, and then he loves me and I can get my expectations met, what did God do for his people before he even gave them these commands? He already rescued them. He already saved them multiple times at this point. He already guided them,

And He already called Himself the Lord your God. That's a relational term, a personal term. He's you are already my people. Before they even knew this stuff. See, God is the actor. We are the reactors. If you make it a list, it becomes about us. And what we're trying to do is I have expectation.

I'm going to go do these things for God. It's a checklist. And then I can expect these things from God. The problem is what I expect from God is my version of a blessing.

But God was already loved him. God acts first. God us. We can love God only because He loved us first. We'll see that in a minute. It's in the New Testament. And so when you make it about a list, you make it about I have to do the things in order to receive the things.

And it's not that way. God wants to be in a relationship. It's about a relationship with Him. It's where it starts with Him. It's rooted in that relationship. And not only is it rooted in relationship, the second thing is it's connected with the character of God.

This relationship, 10 commandments are connected to the relationship. It's about a relationship, but it's also connected to his very character.

Look in verse three. You must not have any other God but me. So he's talking about idolatry, putting anything else in front of your relationship with God. And he gets and then the second commandment is even clarifies it even deeper. Don't make for yourself an idol of any kind or an image of anything in heavens or on earth or the sea. Because what they would do is literally if they're gonna worship another god as well, you would have these idols that a lot of people would carry around idols. And you actually knew that a lot of gods were territorial.

They had like this god is the controlling god here. So you would have some of these gods and you'd go into that land. All right, we better pray to this god, it is his house. You know, it's kind of a deal. And God's saying that's not how it works. Don't put anything

in front of the relationship that you and I are to have. Don't trust anything more than me. And he explains it here. Look what he says. He goes, you must not bow down and worship them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God who will not tolerate your affection for any other gods. So he's saying, hey,

God's revealing his character. He's revealing who he is. I am the only God and here's who I am. I'm a jealous God. I'm not into open relationships.

I am in very He says he's jealous. Now if we imprint how we are human frailties of emotions onto God, when you hear jealous you think that he's saying, you can't look at any other gods.

Only look at me. I saw you looking at Tony at the party the other night. You know, that's not what he's saying. That Hebrew word there for jealous means zealous or intense. So it's not our kind of jealousy like you're threatened. Oh, I'm so threatened that they're No, what he's saying is I am intensely focused,

singularly focused on loving you. That's who I am. And that's what I need back from you, because I made you. And I made you to be in that kind of an intense relationship. I made you for that. And so what he's revealing is himself. See, this is kind of a deep thought.

Sounds like it makes sense, but sometimes it blows my mind when try to think about it. You see, God didn't make the 10 commandments as a list of rules, kinda like if you're gonna move in with somebody.

Well, now that you're gonna hang out with me and we're gonna go on the road together and we're gonna go get our house in the promised land, if we're gonna be roomies, we gotta have some some rules. Rule number one, don't touch my stuff in the refrigerator. Rule

number two, we share cleaning the bathroom. Rule number three, you know, that's what you think God's doing. He's like, here's the rules if you're gonna hang with me. No. If you read down this list, what he's revealing is who he is.

To love him and to love others is to understand the very character of who God is. God didn't make a list of rules. Do this, don't do that, because that's the way I like it. He is the list. To worship only him is because there is only him. To be singular focused on him and with him is that's the only way you can love.

Because he is love. He is perfect and holy and righteous, and He is perfect in all of the attributes. So God can actually be just and merciful at the same time. We can't do that as human beings. We can't figure it out. We can be just, we can be merciful, but not at the same time. We find it almost impossible.

God is perfect in His attributes, so what He's revealing is I am love. And you need to love me and you need to love others. The Bible says that God is love, Right? It says He is love.

Now a lot of people mistake that for we say, so anything we define as love in our world, well you can't say that God's love. And what you're using as an argument is the world's way of defining love, you're putting on God. God is love. Love is not God.

God is more than love. But what love is, he defines it. We don't take our definition of love, and then you hear God is love, and go, well if God is love, then he wouldn't do that. Why wouldn't he do that? Well, that's not love. By whose definition?

You see, God doesn't give us a list based arbitrary on what he wants or doesn't want, based on what we think definitions of words are. God is the list. He's revealing his very character. So he's saying this is what it means to love me because this is who I am.

And this is what it means to love others because I'm the one that designed love. I know what it is. And so you understand that when you read these things it's meant to be that way. It's meant to be connected to His very character. But see, if I make it a list, I turn my relationship with God into this contractual

kind of a thing where it's like you have an expectation, I do this, what you asked, and now I have an expectation. We have an agreement. We kind of work together on this, right? But that's not what God is saying it is.

You see, because when you make it that contractual end, you're gonna go okay, what is, how do I just fulfill the contract to get what I expect? If you have a business relationship with someone, you go how do I just make sure I delivered on what was expected and then I want to make sure I get what I wanted?

But you can do that without love.

You see, what these first three commands, this couple commands here where God's revealing Himself is saying, I'm an allegiant God. I have allegiance.

And the only way your life's gonna work is if you have allegiance to me. That's a weird term to say because you don't even think about it in a relational term. But allegiance is critical. Allegiance is so important. He's saying without allegiance. You can have activity, but activity without allegiance leads to emptiness.

Okay, let me go back to my original illustration and prove my point to you. You know why you end up fighting in those honeydew moments and lots of moments where you're like getting mad, and especially from a guy's perspective. Guys, when your wife gets mad at you because you did what she wanted but she's still mad,

she might not even know this. You know why she's still mad? It's not about the list. It's about that you've put her in second place somehow. You have other things that are more important to you. See, a kid even knows. It's like, I know it.

But that is a good reminder. Guys usually get the other way. It's like you know why your husband gets mad even though you have a kid and you feel like you're doing the bulk of the work and then he feels left out and you get frustrated and say are you kidding me, look at all this work I have to do? It has nothing to do with the amount of work. It has to do with the fact that you actually did make Him number two.

It's about allegiance. Allegiance is about who really has all of your heart. So here's a good little mini marriage ceremony for you. A little marriage, not ceremony. I declare you husband and wife. No,

it's a little marriage point here, good for your marriages. That's why we fight in those moments. Because you've to understand this, guys, what we fight about is not really what the fight is about. Almost every fight you ever have, what you fight about is not what the fight is about. And that's why you keep fighting.

And 99.9% of what the fight is really about is the reason why you can never make her happy with the honey do list and the reason why your husband's always mad when the kid's around and you think he doesn't love you or care about the kids is 100% I feel like you've put something else in your heart that's above me.

Does that make sense? That should help you. I won't charge you for counseling for that. But that's what God is saying here in the 10 Commandments.

We're not gonna argue over a list. I've given you all of me and I've built you. I made you to need to give yourself all to me. That's the way it works. But if you try to do the list without the love, you do the activity without the allegiance, it leads to emptiness. And that's the problem with idolatry.

You see the problem, when he says, we think we don't carve gods, he's saying anything you put ahead of You would ignore God, go around God, make God not number one in your life. Anything that you would do or you would not listen to God because you're like, I'm not gonna trust you God because I want this so I don't even believe I trust me over you. Anything like that is idolatry. We do this all the time. And here's the problem with idolatry. We think of idolatry as finding some pagan god that's different than God. No, the main way we do idolatry is usually good things.

And it's anytime you take anything, even a good thing, and make it the God thing, now it's idolatry. That's what idolatry is. Anything that you make the God thing, you put in the place of God in your life is now an idol. So a lot of the fights you have is because sometimes

you're mad at your spouse too. The second reason is, first one is they don't have all of your heart. The second reason is you expect them to be God in your life.

To fulfill there's things that only God was supposed to fulfill in your heart and in your life. It's only a relationship with God that can take care of it. We look for a person to take that place, and that's not gonna work out really well. You you look for that person to fulfill that place, your kids. You can put kids

in a place that only God's supposed to fulfill. We can make idols about really good things. We just put them in the God place. And especially if you put your other person, they're never gonna, they're gonna fail you.

There are things you were never supposed to get out of your marriage you were only supposed to get from a relationship with God. And if you try, it's not gonna work. I mean my wife Carrie has the closest thing to it with me. But you guys are

all right, good, you're still listening. You're like, did he just say something really arrogant? Yes. I was joking. If anything, it'd be the other way around. But it's connected with the very character of God. Activity without allegiance produces emptiness. So think about it. You could show up at church here

but if you have a list mentality towards your relationship with God, it doesn't matter how many times you come here, it's not changing your life. It's not helping. And yet you wanna say, see, God's not helping me, it's not working. That's not what's happening. It's you have a list mentality with your relationship with God.

And you have a weird expectation of what God's supposed to be doing. So it's

rooted in relationship with God. It's connected with the character of God. And then the last thing is the weirdest one, because the way it sounds fine, but how it plays out is different than what we expect, is the 10 commandments bring the blessing of God.

This is how it's about they bring the blessing of God. In verse five, the second part, in verse six it says this, I lay the sins of the parents upon their children. The entire family is affected. Even the children in the third and fourth generations of those who reject me.

But I lavish unfailing love for a thousand generations on those who love me and obey my commands. Now that part's weird. That sounds really list like, doesn't it? That actually sounds very threatening. Sounds like God is like, you know what? If you don't do this list, I'm coming for you and I'm gonna hose your kids,

your grandkids, your great grandkids, and their kids. Because that's how jealous. I am so mad I will wreck you for generations. That sounds like the Hatfields and the McCoys right there, doesn't it? Some of you are like, I have no idea what that means. Look it up, history's awesome.

But you would think that's what he's saying but he's actually saying it brings blessing. He says of course there is a little element of this saying, if you do the things you were built to do, like if I eat better and exercise, I'll get healthier.

He's saying if you honor me and live out life the way it was meant to live, it will go better for you. Not always, but generally speaking, if you do dumb things, your kids end up being kinda dumb. If you do good things, your kids end up dumb anyways. That's not what it says, I just wanted to say that.

No, it's just saying there is that part of it, but it goes deeper than that, especially when you see two things. First, the exaggeration. In Hebrew, when they exaggerate, they're trying to say something. He's saying, If you reject me, four generations. If you embrace my love, thousands of generations.

He's trying to say something deeper than just it's guarantee. It's not this business thing. It's something deeper that goes, you can see on into the New Testament what

he's talking about. It says something much deeper than that, much better than that. How? How? How is it really different than just that? How is it something more about this eternal thing? Well, first look, it says, you've got to catch a few things you might have missed. It says,

when he says, You'll be affected, even the children of the third generation, of those who, the fourth generations of those who what? Says reject me. You notice he didn't say you'll be, you'll have a tough time for up to four generations for those who don't do this list.

He said you reject me. And then when he said the blessing comes to the lavish and unfailing love for a thousand generations for those who love me and obey my commands. All right, so they have to not reject him, so they accept his love. Then love him back. When does commands, obeying his commands come? Third,

he says right in there, the system is you have to know God's love. That enables you to love God back. And now you're able to serve Him and follow Him because He already loves you and you know that and now you choose to love back. And so it's saying it's a blessing but in a different way than we think of a blessing.

See, the 10 Commandments is a blessing. Not the way. When you think list mentality, you think the blessing is I do the list and then I get what I expect. But remember the first week, how many of heard of the first week when Pat preached? He said the big idea was God is totally consistent but absolutely unpredictable.

Here's the thing, is anyone in this room a business person that's gone into business with someone else and put whole life savings and just put it on the line to go into a business relationship with someone else? Have you done that?

If you were talking to these people about like finding out, getting to know the person you're gonna go into business with, if everyone told you one of the prime things about this other person is they are absolutely unpredictable, is that a red flag or a green light? It's

a red flag, isn't it? The last thing you want in a legal business relationship where you're investing and they're coming in and you're going, I'm gonna do this, you're gonna do that. The last trait you want in your business partner is they are absolutely unpredictable. You want that's why you have 27,000

words to control the price of CABG. You want the least amount of predictability in that moment. If it's a business transaction, when we take list mentality in relationship with God, we actually say, I'll do the list and then you have some expectations. Well, what if God doesn't meet your expectation,

but actually blesses you by meeting your need, but in a very unpredictable way? You miss the blessing and you're mad at God. Because you're looking at it wrong. We're looking at it completely wrong. You see, how is it a blessing? God blesses us most often by giving us what we need,

not just what we want. What we want is driven by our brokenness and our sin. What we want can be something very temporary. We want stuff that God knows that you know, kids get. You know, when you have kids you know that a lot of stuff they want, they don't need it all and some stuff they want so badly you know is not good for them. They'll shoot their eye out. Want They that red rat.

But can you imagine if you took your kid, it's their birthday, they're like seven, eight years old, and you're like, I'm taking your birthday and I'm gonna spend thousands of dollars on you today. And you take them out and you buy them all new clothes, underwear, socks.

You take them to the dentist, get their teeth fixed, braces put on it. You take them to a doctor to get all the shots they're supposed to have. You take them for a checkup. You take them to a special program that makes them an accelerated reader and

you spend thousands of dollars and you say and the last thing is look I've even set up this scholarship fund for you for college and all this stuff for you to go to school. I bought you brand new books. How happy with you are they gonna be in that moment?

You know why? They have a very different expectation about what being blessed on their birthday means. It means getting the toys I want. You know what? We've grown up age wise but I don't think we've changed. We're still like little kids.

So what is the three ways that this brings the blessing of God that immediately doesn't feel like a blessing? But you realize for thousands of generations it's an eternal blessing from God. The first thing the 10 Commandments do is they reveals our sin, our separation, and our suffering.

It reveals our sin, the fact that we're separated, we can't do the list. And we're separated from God because of that. Now our suffering is ultimately we will die and spend an eternity without God if we keep trying to think we can prove our love to God.

Because we'll miss it. Let me show you some verses. Romans three ten. Romans three ten first says, there it is. As the scriptures say, no one is righteous, not even one. Righteous would mean I can do this.

Righteous is perfectly holy and right. It'd mean right saying you have to be just like God to stand in His presence. So righteous would mean this list that reveals who he is and what it means to love him and love others.

It it it would mean you you would have to be able to do the whole list exactly right. Let me let me explain it further. Verse 20 in Romans three goes on to say, for no one can ever be made right with God by doing what the law commands. The law simply shows us how sinful we are. And then if you jump over to Galatians three verse 23,

it says, before the way of faith in Christ was available to us, we were placed under the guard of the law. We were kept in protective custody, so to speak, until the way of the faith was revealed. So he's saying that there's this idea that reveals the fact that we can't

just be good enough. We can't sit there, and that's what most people are, all religions are the same. It says you just gotta be a good person. And even a lot people in church goes, well God's not, I'm a pretty good person. You know what the problem with saying you're a pretty good person is?

Guess who decides what good or bad is in that situation? You do. And think about it, we just naturally think we're good people, right? For the most part. And most of us think I'm a good person. And you know how you evaluate good and bad? Anything that's me is good. Anything above me is saintly. Anything below me is bad.

And that's how I judge the world. So the problem is without the 10 Commandments and this thing showing us that we can't, God says this is good. This is what love is. You need to know me and you need to love me and love others, and here's the examples of what it looks like. And the problem is when you try to take that list, you can't live out that list. Because here's the problem, in the New Testament, every one of these gets upped in its ante. When it says not to murder, it's not just talking about not killing. He says if you murder someone in your heart, you're so angry, you want ill will, and you hold bitterness in your heart, you have murdered them in your heart, you're guilty of murder.

So think about it. When you look at this list, it actually is a blessing because it shows us that we're trying to make it on our own and we can't make it on our own. And we need to know that we can't make it on our own. It's like the old story of the man who fell off the really tall building.

And as he fell the windows were open in this building and people heard him as they passed each floor. And each floor he kept saying, so far so good.

You know why? The feeling of falling is actually kind of fun. That's why people skydive. That and they're crazy. That's why we like to have high dives. Jumping off rocks. That's why kids like to climb on stuff and jump. We like the feeling of falling.

The problem is if you fall far enough that sudden stop isn't very pleasant. And a lot of us are falling through life thinking I'm a good enough person and you think your relationship with God is this expectation,

I do the list and I can be pretty good, and you're trying to make it, you're trying to be self righteous, self justified, do it on your own. That's what you thought, that's what you've been taught, that's what you think church is about, that's what you think it is. And you're just so far so good, but what the Bible says at the end, you will die. For the wages of sin is death. You're gonna hit the ground and splat,

and through all of eternity you're gonna be separated from God. And all because you thought you can get there on yourself. So this is the blessing of God. He doesn't want you to be eternally splatted. He wants you to be with Him. So He had to show you that your idea that you think you're good is so far off.

I mean, look at this list and let's give yourself a self test here on this list. I'm just gonna run down the list of the 10 commandments. The first one, no other God before you, don't make an idol, don't put anything in God's place in your life.

How many of us have put something else in God's number one spot? You've ignored Him. You've ignored His word. You've done it your way to make you happy. All right. Unless you are psycho, crazy, narcissistic and don't understand, we all got that one wrong. So now we're all idolaters.

How many have taken the Lord's name in vain? Which is more than just saying His last name is damn. It's about this idea of misusing it. Meaning underwhelming God, giving God credit, blaming God for stuff He didn't do. It's like just having an attitude that misrepresents God, that's blasphemy.

If you've ever done, missed God can't do this or God better do this or God, you know, and you've been angry, right? So far we're idolater blasphemers, idolatrous blasphemers.

Have we ever not chosen to take special days to set apart and rest and focus on worship of God? We've just blown that off consistently to go do our own thing? Well, now we're idolatrous, blasphemers, basically disrespecters.

How about honor your father and mother? Have you, did you always honor your father and mother growing up? Now we're idolatrous, blaspheming, disrespectful, dishonoring. You must not murder. I do find it's funny that right after honor your mother and father is do not murder. I think there's a parenting lesson in there for us.

When they don't honor you, you can't kill them. But like I said, Jesus said murder is in your heart. You have actually just been so bitter at someone that you were just gonna wish them dead. You've murdered them in your heart. Well, now we are all idolatrous, blasphemous, disrespectful, dishonoring murderers.

Then you go, let's not commit adultery. Adultery in this phase meant just don't sleep with someone you're not married with. Jesus restated because he said it's about love, not lust. It wasn't about the legalese, it was about if you love you're gonna do this. But he says if you look on someone with lust, if you look at someone else's spouse and go, sure wish I was married to them, not this guy.

That's adultery. I'm sure every one of us has thought impure thoughts about somebody at some point. So now we are all idolatrous, who is like blaspheming, disrespectful, dishonoring, murderous, adulterous, you must not steal thieves

because everyone of us has stolen something at some point in our life, taken something that wasn't ours. You know, some of you still have something you borrowed from someone twenty years ago and they're not saying anything so you're not saying anything. You know. So now we're thieves.

You must not bear false testimony, testify falsely against your neighbor, talking gossip, ripping on someone, you know? Let's we all have done that. And then do not covet your neighbor's house or anything of theirs. This one we break all the time. All you gotta do is watch a home improvement show.

Or go to models. My wife used to have fun going to models. And I go, you really like this? He goes, why? I go, it's just that they look so good. I go, so you love making yourself absolutely discontent with what you have because that's all it does. We loved our house this morning

and now you're like, why does God hate me so much?

Every time, every time we loved it this morning and now you hate it.

This is not the test you want to get 100% on, but we're all 100% on that. That's the blessing. The blessing is we can't do it 100%. And now we know. Now we know. And what do we know? The second thing is it reveals our need for a savior.

In other words, when we realize we can't do this of ourselves it reveals our need that we need something outside of us to actually save us. And that's why right after they had these commandments, not too long ago, they'd be at the tabernacle, then they had the temple, and they had to do these sacrifices.

They'd bring in these sacrifices because it says without the shedding of blood there's no remission of sin. What God was saying is, I will judge all sin. When God forgives us through Jesus, He didn't forgive like, God, don't worry about it. He worries about it because God is perfect and He is holy and righteous and will judge every sin ever committed. The question is, are you gonna answer for your own sin or is the substitute

gonna take your place for the sin? That's why God can't blow off sin, because He won't. So they had to do these sacrifices to show that there had to be a substitute. Something had to die. Something innocent had to die to take your place. But they knew God's not blood God, killing little lambs was not satiating

a God who was bloodthirsty. That was supposed to show us just how dark and bloody sin is. And that's what it takes to rectify it. Death.

And that's what the 10 Commandments reveal to us, is that sacrifice that needs to happen. Let's go back to Galatians three. I wanna read verse twenty four and twenty five. Because he says, let me put it another way, the law was our guardian until Christ came. It protected us until we could be made right with God through faith.

He goes, and now that we have the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian. Does that mean we don't need the 10 commandments? I told you the 10 commandments. That actual list is not about law. That's about love. There's a whole bunch of laws they had. They had the sacrificial system. They had all these things to do. We don't need that anymore because Jesus is the lamb of God. He came and died for us. He's the substitute that we have faith in now. But the 10 commandments are principles of love. We're still oh, now that Jesus died, I don't have to love him or others

anymore. That's not what it's saying. What it's saying is it reveals that need. Now that we have the need, what it does do

is the third thing is responding to that love of Jesus. Just like he says, I'm the one that saved you from me, the one that already came and died for you. You didn't do anything to make him come. The only thing that made Jesus come and die for us is us sinning.

And he goes, now when you respond, responding to Jesus' love frees us to love. That's the point. That's the blessing. The blessing is by looking at these commands and knowing that we can't do them on our own pushes us towards Jesus.

And God will do whatever it takes to show us. He's trying to discipline us. He's trying to, like a kid, like God's not looking to punish you. When He lets things go that kind of point you to your brokenness, that kind of take you to those moments, He's not punishing you. God doesn't punish His children,

and neither should we, parents. You're like, I shouldn't spank or I should No, that's not what I said. We shouldn't punish. But you know what God does do for His children? He disciplines them. What's

the difference? I'll tell you the difference. It's simple. Get out a pen, write it down, live this out, you'll be way better parents. You don't have to read 700 books, just do this. Punishment is focused and concerned with the past. Discipline is about tomorrow. Punishment's about yesterday. Discipline's about tomorrow.

What that means, if you do something, you say, you go to your room, you're grounded, you just whatever it is that you do, but you're only doing it because you're mad, you're angry, they made you ticked off, and you're getting payback. That's punishment. It's a terrible way to parent.

You should choose a disciplinary action, and the discipline you choose needs to be focused on pushing them forward, not putting them down.

Does that make sense? Because that's what God does. God will discipline us, and discipline feels like punishment. It's painful. He'll let things in our life that we don't like, but His concern is to push us forward, not punish us for where we were. And that's what he's doing.

And that's why responding to his love now, when we realize this, we can now embrace the love of Christ, and because we have the love of Christ we can love him back. It says that in scripture and then once we know god's love and can love him back, we now have the power of the holy spirit.

We have god's word and we have the power of god living in us and that enables us to then love people around us. Let me show you. First John four nineteen says this,

we love each other because they have the same political views as us. Oh, no. Wait. We love each other because they believe the same thing about masks as us. Nope. We can love each other because we do these lists and we manipulate them into giving us what we want first. Doesn't say any of that. How can we love each other?

Because he, God, loved us first. You realize we can do the world's view of love. But if you want to have God's view of love, who created love that really is love, the only way you can love someone around you is by being filled with the love of God in you. That's the only way it works. You have to embrace His love.

You have to And the only way you can do that is to confess and profess. That's what the 10 Commandments thought. You gotta confess that I am a broken sinner, that's an idolatrous, blasphemous, disrespectful, murderous, liar. That's who we all are.

And you gotta quit your dumb line in the sand. This is why I haven't actually killed people. That person does this. They're worse than me because of this. And we gotta know, yeah, in our own little measuring stick we are, but in God's view, we are all infinitely away from his righteousness.

We don't deserve anything but eternity in hell. But Jesus chose to die for us anyways. You know why? Jesus loved you and me because Jesus loves you and me. Think about that. That's pretty deep too. We want to say Jesus loves me because and then we fill in something else.

Jesus doesn't love us because of us. Jesus loves us because of him. Because He is love. And we need, and the blessing is if you don't embrace that and don't understand that, splat so far so good until you run out of floors to fall past. That's what it's really saying.

It basically is saying, I do this from love, not for love. And you know, in these moments what we really need to do to wrap this up is I think we need to, what Jesus said is we should have the faith of a child. And we misunderstand that. He didn't say act like babies.

I've seen a lot of that in 2020, a lot of Christians acting like babies. We need to embrace the faith of a child to move forward. And what do you mean by that? Is that these children have, there's something about a child. They're

broken in sin too, but there's something, don't know if they're just still more connected to that image of God in them or whatever. But they have some natural things that kids do that we actually unlearn for some reason that's bad. For example, if you have a little three year old

that's sitting there and they're constantly grabbing something you know is gonna hurt them,

and you say no no no no no no no no no You pick them up, move them, they keep going back, pick them up, move them. So they are constantly being absolutely disobedient, dishonoring, not honoring their mother or father. They're not listening to you. They actually don't agree. They don't believe that what you know is better for them and safe for them. They're like, I don't believe you. I I think this is the better way. This feels better to me. You know, none of us do this with god by the way, right? And they keep going back to it and keep going back to it, and you keep moving again. And then they finally pull that book and the whole thing falls off and hits them on the head and they get completely hurt and now they're crying.

Who's the first person they run to?

You. Mom or dad who is constantly telling them no.

Why do they do that?

Because in their heart they know that you actually love them. And they know that's the safest place to go. Somewhere along the line we stop thinking that when it comes to God. We keep ignoring Him, telling us go this way, go this way, go this way, And then it hurts. And yet we still run from God.

Because somehow we think God's like us. We think He's like the typical adult. I have so offended Him that God's probably like, I need a space. I can't even with you right now.

No, God's like you are, mom and dad, who can't wait for your kid to run to you when they've hurt because it's not about a list, it's about love. Let me sum up this way and then we're gonna pray. Story time with Bill. It's a quick story. Be personal about it when it comes to the faith of a child. I remember

when we first started Rock Point, we were going through it. It was just tough, tough times. There were some rough moments there because it's just hard. And I remember

there was a day as I was sitting there because part of the hardness was I had to work out of my house all the time. A lot of you understand this better now with this last year. You have little kids. You're trying to work out of the house. It was just difficult. And the problem is my my oldest daughter, she was, like, six

then. And she was at that age where, you know, you just keep talking around kids because you forget they're not forget they're there, they just they're there. But they get to that age where you realize they're not jumping in the conversation, they're listening.

But they're now old enough that they kind of do hear what you're saying, so to speak, but you don't realize. So my wife and I had this big conversation about how rough it was and how I was just so frustrated and almost defeated

and I went to sit in my big comfy chair to try to get away from the office. The problem is where my comfy chair is and the house I lived in at the time if I looked left I could see all the way through the house down the hallway and there was my desk. So if I just turned left I was like

and I just remember so many things coming at me, so much like I think a lot of us feel even right now that I just felt like, God, I'm doing what you asked me to do. I'm doing and I was kinda leaning into that expectation mode, like I have sacrificed.

I moved to Arizona from the beach. I I gave up my good job. I cashed out all my retirement to do this. I don't even really have a salary right now. And I'm doing all this to serve you God. You know, had that kind of that mentality. So I was getting really up, just depressed

and I was talking about that to my wife and I was just being honest and I sat down and I finally just said, and ironically this chair was all gonna be sinking, I felt like that's what I was doing it like, it's quicksand just sinking in. And all of a sudden my daughter Micah climbs up on my lap, puts her arm around me,

looks at me, and actually kids know instinctively to like grab my face to make sure I'm looking right into her face. And I'm like she goes, daddy, you know Jesus loves you.

So serve him and help people like you always do.

I know what she meant. She said what I just spent fifty minutes babbling on about.

God loved you first. Serve him. Love him back. Help others. Love others.

That's what the 10 commandments are about.

That's what God wants in our lives. Embrace Jesus' love for you. Embrace His unpredictable way that He's gonna push you forward.

And by embracing that love he has for you, choose to love him back. Have allegiance to him first and foremost above anything else and allow that to unlock your heart to be able to love others in the way God actually defines love. Amen? Let's pray together.

For those of you that know the Lord, just start praying right now. It's something that maybe he's talking to you about that you need to run back to him on. But there's some of us in this room and online that you've been trying to live out a relationship with God that's list version, not love.

And if that's you, you can surrender to the love of Christ right now. Just pray with me, but make it your own words in your heart. Just pray something like this. Just pray, dear Jesus, thank you. Think that you love me because you love me. And I thank you that you came and died for me even though I sinned against you,

even though I violated everything on the list. But right now, in the best way I know how, I wanna turn from my own actions to make my life work, and I wanna ask you to forgive me of my sin and put my faith

in what you did by going to the cross and dying as a substitute for me, and then coming back to life to bring life to me. Thank you. Help me to go from here each and every day and embrace your love even more. Understand it even more so I can grow in my love for you and in turn unleash that love that's from you through me

to the people around me. Thank you. I pray this in the mighty and holy name of Jesus. Amen. Hey, guys. If you just prayed with me, if you're online, you can go to rockpoint.io and hit I said yes.

Same with you guys in this room. We would love to know about it. We have a team that would wanna pray for you if you just said yes to Jesus with me. Also, you need to pray with someone, there are prayer rooms open. We online, you can go to the.io

and hit the need to talk. But one last thing, I know we're a little bit long here. I just need to tell you something. One last thing before you go. Hold on. Is you saw the video how we've been blessed? God's worked in an unpredictable way. Our church is back up to about the same attendance it was before COVID already

and even though we still have a yeah we still have probably a thousand people staying away the reason we're back is we've grown by over a thousand people have started attending our church just in a short period of time yeah That's an awesome thing. But here's the problem we have.

The Bible says the harvest is plentiful, the workers are few. We've had more people come back to church than come back to serving.

And we have a problem right now. This room we're limiting. It's like it's about 50% full. We can actually fit almost twice as many people in this room. And we are closing every kid's classroom every week. It's not because we don't have the space. It's because we don't have the people that will volunteer.

And we have that with guest services. We have that in so many areas.

So I'm gonna ask you and challenge you to say that one of the best ways that if you know God's love to choose to love him back and love others is to volunteer in your church in spreading the love of God so people can come in here and their kids can hear about Jesus and you can hear about Jesus and people can find their way in.

So I'm just gonna ask you to be willing to to to volunteer and a couple ways you can do it. You can go to our website and you can find there's a tab where you can click in to find out where you want to volunteer.

Or the easiest way would be you can go out here to our New Here Start Here and tell them I want to volunteer and you can either tell them where, they'll hook you up with the right person, or if you don't know, they'll talk to you about how you can find some different ways to plug in. Amen? Hey. I love you guys. God bless you. Yay, Jesus.