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Preamble: Interstate I-95

Well, most of you know that I was born and raised in the city of Philadelphia. I grew up just a few miles from one of the busiest entries onto Interstate I-95. If you don’t know, I-95 is one of the busiest interstates in the United States. It goes all the way on the East Coast from the northern part of Maine down to South Florida. It is one of the first freeways built when the freeway system was established in the mid-1950s. I-95 is a free interstate from Maine through the New England states into New York. But then you get to New Jersey and something happens. The state of New Jersey has determined that I-95, the road as it goes through the state of New Jersey, will be the New Jersey Turnpike. So many states have a turnpike, but New Jersey didn’t build a new turnpike. They commandeered the federally funded preexisting road and said we’re going to add a bunch of rules and regulations to I-95. We’re going to rename it and we’re going to change how it functions for this period of time. So while you’re driving through New Jersey, it is the New Jersey Turnpike. And then when you get out of New Jersey into Delaware, I-95 then throws off the shackles or extra elements of the New Jersey Turnpike and it becomes just I-95 again. It’s not a perfect analogy, but it’s how I see the old Covenant.

In the old Covenant, God gives humanity certain commands, expectations. From the Garden of Eden down through the pre-flood world to Noah, all the way down to Abraham, and down to us today, through the ancient world, through the medieval era, all the way down to the modern world. God has certain commands that all people everywhere are responsible for obeying. That’s what theologians often call the moral law. These are ideas that everyone is accountable to. It goes from beginning to end. It’s sort of like I-95 from the very northern part of Maine down to South Florida. The entire East Coast has this one interstate running through it. However, for a brief season in history, God added some extra stuff to the moral law. So the moral law, like I-95, goes all the way down. You get into one moment, there’s a bunch of stuff added to it. Then, when you get past that into Delaware, those are set aside. 

The old covenant is this: God gives the moral law. He says, All humans everywhere, this is what all humans must do. But then, for this brief season, God takes this nation called Israel and he establishes a covenant with them, a sacred contract. He says to Israel, for this period of time, you people, you Israelites, I’m gonna give you some extra stuff. So Israel is like a New Jersey turnpike. And then when you get into Delaware, it’s like Jesus rose from the dead. Delaware is the new covenant.

Introduction: Moral Law vs. Mosaic Law

Anyway, this morning, what I wanna do is two major things. First, I want to make sure we understand the distinction between the moral and Old Covenant laws. What is that which God has given us from the beginning that passes through time, that we’re all accountable to, versus what was given just to the Israelites for that period? From the time they came out of Egypt to the time Jesus came, that period of time, the old covenant was only for a certain group of people for that certain period of time. We need to understand the distinction between those two things. And then the second thing I want to do is, I want to give us some understanding of why. Why God did this? Why did God create a turnpike in this place we call Palestine in the land of Canaan? Why would God have done that for those people at that time period? And why did he bring it to an end? Why did he do this?

It doesn’t always seem to make sense to us. And so that’s what our goal is. And as we understand the reasons why, the purposes, that will give us some practical application for our own lives. So that’s our plan for this morning. First, I want to examine the distinctions between the moral and the Old Covenant laws. And then I want to give us some practical reasons and give us some purposes of the Old Covenant Law. And as we do that, we’ll see some practical examples for our own lives. Let’s pray one more time, and we’ll dive in.

Lord, we thank you for the moral law. We thank you for. Thank you for the interstate that allow us to travel around this country. We thank you for Interstate I-95 being a silly illustration that can maybe help us understand a little bit more of what you’ve done. As we examine things we see in your word, help us to understand you more. May that stoke our affections for Jesus. Maybe walk out of this place loving you more than we walked in. I pray in Christ’s name. Amen.

The Moral Law

So, God expects all people to follow the moral law. All people everywhere. That’s I-95. That’s the transcendent morality from start to finish, forever and ever. The moral law is, in essence, what we would call objective truth. Objective right or wrong. There are some things that are intrinsically right and some things that are intrinsically wrong. There are some things that are inherently good, right, and beautiful, and some things are inherently wicked and evil. How does this come about, though? How do we know who gets to make the call as to what is inherently good and what is inherently bad? What’s good, what’s evil? Well, it comes from God’s character. He is the standard. God has certain moral inclinations. There are certain things that God leans into or leans towards. There are certain things that God desires, that God likes, that God prefers. God has various opinions on things. Well, his opinions in essence become what is right and wrong. If God prefers one thing over another, it is wrong to prefer the thing he prefers less. Or said another way, if God wants something, we should want it too. It is a sin not to want what he wants. God loves certain things. We should love what he loves. God hates certain things. We should hate what he hates. 

The problem is we often don’t love the things he loves enough. We often don’t hate the things that he hates enough. God has various opinions and friends, If your opinion is different than God’s, something’s got to shift. If you disagree with God, it’s not God who is wrong. The moral law comes about by examining the character and nature of God and reflecting him. So any behavior or any ideology that does not reflect God perfectly and accurately is wicked and evil. If you behave in a way that does not reflect God, you should behave in such a way that other people could look at you and go, Oh, that’s exactly how God would behave if he were in that situation. So any behavior in your life that does not match God exactly is evil. 

There are a lot of things I do that are not quite like God. Every minute of every day, something is going on in our hearts and our minds and our lives that doesn’t reflect God. That is wicked. It’s not just kind of off. It’s not just, well, you made a small mistake. No, it’s wicked, it’s evil, and it’s deserving of the wrath of God. The moral law is huge, big, magnificent, glorious. It reflects who God is, his character, and his moral inclination. He expects us to fall in line with that. And the moral law has always been in play, as I mentioned a moment ago, from Adam and Eve through history till today.

The Summation of the Moral Law

But as I said a minute ago, there’s this unique moment in history where God rescues the Israelites. The Israelites were slaves in Egypt for about 400 years, approximately 1800 BC to 1400 BC. Scholars differ on exactly when it happened, but around that time period of history, this true story actually happened. These Israelites were slaves in the nation of Egypt. Then God miraculously rescues them through an incredible series of events. He pulls them out of Egypt and he brings them into this wilderness land, modern day Middle Eastern region, northern parts of Saudi Arabia.. He says to them, I’m going to take you into the promised land. The land of Canaan which will later be known as Judea. Many people today would refer to that land as Palestine. That piece of land was going to be given to these Israelites. God says you’re going to go. But before you go, God has them wander around the wilderness for a while, and he brings us to this mountain known as Mount Sinai.

At Mount Sinai, he gives them this thing called the Decalogue, or you may know it better as the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are, in essence a very brief summation of the moral law. So the moral law from Adam and Eve all the way down, it’s going on forever and ever. This is what’s right or wrong. This is how we should live our lives. Then he says, I’m going to give you these ten commandments, this decalogue. It is, in essence, this very simple summary of the moral law. Now the moral law is so, so huge. It’s every behavior or idea ever, all of who God is, wrapped up into the moral law. There are not enough books on the planet to contain all the things that can be written down about the moral law. But God, in his kindness, says, I’m going to try to make it simple for you. Here’s ten. These ten sum up all of the moral law. 

Jesus will give us an even simpler summation of the moral law in the New Testament. He’ll say all those ten, all those commandments, and all the moral law, it’s wrapped up in these two things. He’ll say in the New Testament, love God and love people. Love your God with all your heart, mind, and soul. Love your neighbor as yourself. Because the ten were too difficult. So let’s get down to two. In essence, the Ten Commandments are split into two categories. The first four are basically what theologians call the first table. That’s referred to as the first commandment Jesus gave when he says, love God with all your heart. That’s the first four commandments. They correspond. The second table of the law, commandments five to ten, they corresponds to the second commandment Jesus gave to love your neighbor as yourself. So God says, here’s the whole moral law. I’m going to narrow it down. Just give you ten commandments, make it simple. And then Jesus is like, I’m going to make it even simpler. The first four commandments basically say, love God with all your heart. The next six commandments are to love other people. That’s the summation. The moral law, to the decalogue, to the great commandments from Jesus, that’s the summation of it. That’s the process he gives us. 

Then, at Sinai, after giving him the decalogue, God says to them, I want you to take these ten Commandments, and I want them to govern how you run your country, Israel. When you go into the promised land, these ten commandments are going to be the law of your land. They’re gonna be the constitution, the framework that governs the land when you go into it. They should govern the way you live and treat one another, and should govern how you interact with other countries and other people groups. That’s what he gives them. What God would prefer is that he wouldn’t have to give them any additional rules and regulations. I’ve given you the Ten Commandments, the decalogue. That should be more than enough. Here’s what God would prefer: I want you to spend time with me, hang out with me, get to know me, enjoy me, and I will enjoy you. We will have this incredible love affair, this vibrant friendship, and you will get to know me and my desires and my preferences, and you will know how to apply these Ten Commandments to your life, because you’re going to know me.

I remember, early in my marriage, my wife and I would frequent Chipotle. I would always forget what my wife wanted. I forgot regularly. That’s why I wrote it down. I put a note in my phone. I still have it. But over time, I spent enough time with this woman whom I love, that when we go to Chipotle, I now no longer need to look at my phone, because I love her, because I know her, because I spend time with her. I live with her, I share a bed with her. We raise kids together. I know her. I know her Chipotle order. I don’t need to look at the law anymore. That’s what God desires for his people. Spend time with me. Know me. So you don’t have to look at the rules anymore. The more you know me, the more you love me, the more I will be in you. And you will know how to take the moral law and apply it to your life. Because you will know me. And you will know what I would do if I were in your situation because you spend time with me.

Mosaic Law

But the problem is that God knows these Israelites really well. He knows he can give them these Ten Commandments and tell them to know him and love him and apply them, but they’re probably not going to get it right. These people were quite ignorant of the truth. They were unaware. So God gives them these rules and regulations. In addition to the Ten Commandments, He gives them more than 600 additional specific rules and regulations. And they’re very particular about, rules. Very specific expectations around worship and religious rituals and animal sacrifices and lifestyle and behavior and relationships and political policies, and food restrictions. Certain foods were unclean, others were clean, sexuality, all sorts of things. There’s all sorts of stuff in these 600-plus laws. Very, very detailed and in essence, what they are, what they are designed to do for Israel is to help them understand how to take the Ten Commandments, the decalogue, and apply it to their life and their context as they enter into this brand new nation called Israel. 

So God makes this serious contract, this covenant with his people, gives them the decalogue, the Ten Commandments, and then he gives them all these extra laws. He’s like, they are now in New Jersey, here’s a bunch of extra stuff. You’re on the turnpike, okay? And he tells them, I want you to follow these rules to a T. There were significant consequences for disobeying God. But he tells them, as long as you guys follow these rules, you’re going to enjoy special blessings and special protections that none of the other nations enjoy. There’s going to be some unique things that happen in Israel through you, so long as this covenant is in play. Through you, the Messiah is going to be born, and he’s going to bless all the nations. What an amazing privilege Israel had. 

These extra set of rules, this spiritual New Jersey Turnpike. We often refer to that as the Mosaic Law or the Law of Sinai. Sometimes, because it was given at Mount Sinai, sometimes its just called the law. So the contract that God makes with Israel is the Old Covenant, the Mosaic Covenant. The laws that went along with that contract are what we would call the Old Covenant laws or the Mosaic Law. Sometimes people use those words interchangeably. Old Covenant or Mosaic Covenant, Mosaic Law. They are distinct. But people use those terms sort of interchangeably. The law, the Mosaic Law, the Old Covenant Law, was only for the Israelites for that period of time from Mount Sinai until the coming of the Messiah. That’s it. It’s about a 1400-year period. But none of the other people in the world were actually expected to follow that law. They were expected to follow the moral law. Everyone follows the moral law. But only the Israelites were expected to follow the Old Covenant law.

We know this specifically because there are later moments in the Old Testament where God sends prophets to other nations. He does not rebuke them for disobeying the Mosaic Law. He rebukes them for disobeying the Moral law. He sends the prophet Obadiah to Edom, and he tells the nation of Edom, they’re not Israelites. They’re not under the Old Law. They’re not under that Old Covenant. But he says, You’ve sinned against God, repent. We see this with the prophets of Jonah and Nahum. Later on, in the Old Testament, they go to the city of Nineveh, which is in Assyria, and they say you need to repent of your sin. Side note, there’s this idea that people say only God’s people are expected to follow his law. No, all people, everywhere. Someone who’s not a Christian you can’t expect them to follow God’s commands. Well, God disagrees because God goes to people who are outside of his people and says, listen, you follow too. So it’s absolutely appropriate for me to look at anyone living in Winter Garden and say, you are commanded to follow the moral law whether you are a Christian or not, and God will hold you accountable for that. But only the Jews, only the Israelites in the Old Testament, were expected to follow the New Jersey Turnpike expectations, the 600-plus specific laws. That was only for them, and it was only for a period of time. It was going to come to an end when the Messiah came. This is explicit in the New Testament.

Released from the Mosaic Law

Let me give you a couple of examples. In Mark, chapter 7, verse 19, Jesus says, Now all foods are clean. In the old Covenant, certain foods were clean and unclean. You only ate the clean ones. You didn’t eat the unclean. Jesus said, Now all food is clean. In Acts chapter 10, Jesus commands Peter to eat some foods that Peter thought were unclean based on the Old Covenant. And Jesus is saying, no, those rules were for a period of time. Peter, that time has come. It’s come to an end. Go ahead, pick up that shrimp taco, brother. In Acts 15, the apostles tell the churches, You are no longer under the old covenant law. It’s explicit in Acts 15.

 In Romans 7, Paul says, that we are released from the law, but he will imply later in Romans that we are not released from the moral law. In First Corinthians, Paul says that we are not under the law, referring to the old law, but we are under the law of Christ, referring to the moral law. So there’s one law put away, but there’s one law, a higher law. You’d better never get off that interstate. In Colossians chapter 2, the apostle Paul is talking to them about the different convictions. In the church of Colossae, a bunch of these Christians they have different opinions on what they should or shouldn’t eat. They have different opinions on the festivals and the holidays. What festivals and holidays should Christians celebrate or not celebrate? And in the church, they disagreed. They argued about it. It was a big deal. Paul says to them, Listen, you have freedom. You don’t have to all agree on this. If some of you don’t want to eat that shrimp taco, go ahead, you don’t have to eat it. Some of you want to eat the shrimp taco, you can eat it, but don’t make your brother eat it if he doesn’t want to. Be kind to one another in this process. He’s making it very clear that the Old Testament law is no longer the rubric by which we measure our behavior.

That’s not our standard. That’s what he’s telling them. Then, of course, most famously, the entire book of Galatians is all about this same issue. The entire book of Galatians is all about the fact that circumcision and the rituals of the Old Covenant no longer apply to God’s people. We have gone out of New Jersey and into Delaware. Why are you still driving in Delaware like you’re in New Jersey? Why would you do that? New Jersey has a high sales tax. 8%. Delaware, no sales tax. Come on. We throw that off. Why would you want to insist on paying the sales tax when you’re in Delaware? You don’t have to anymore. So Galatians is all about that. That’s his message. Sort of a ridiculous, crass summation. In essence, that’s what he’s saying. And then, of course, we have the book of Hebrews. For those of you who have been with us for the last few months, we’ve been traveling through the Book of Hebrews. In Hebrews chapter seven, the writer of Hebrews talks about the weakness of the Old Covenant. He’s implying that there are some elements of the covenant that are useful, but there are also elements of the Old Covenant that are useless because it can’t go on forever. In Hebrews chapter seven, at the end, he talks about the inadequacies of the priests. Daniel preached about this for us two weeks ago. The priests were inadequate. Therefore, their priesthood is inadequate to go on forever and ever.

Then in Hebrews chapter nine, we’ll see this, God willing, in two weeks, he talks about the sacrifices that the priest offered were also woefully inadequate. You can’t rely on that forever, so don’t even try. Then, of course, we come to the end of Hebrews chapter 8. Frank, read it for us earlier. In Hebrews chapter 8, verse 13, the writer of Hebrews says the Old Covenant is obsolete, outdated, fading away. It’s like a VCR, like a cassette tape player, like Blockbuster Video, like going to get your film developed at Rite Aid or CVS. It’s faded away. It is like an old-school original Click wheel iPod from 2001 that could hold a thousand songs. Oh, that’s lame. Because my iPhone at the current moment has access to 100 million songs. Why would I go back to the Click Wheel iPod? It’s obsolete. No speakers. You had to have corded headphones. The message of the New Testament is explicit. The Old Covenant regulations they’re no longer in play. And they’re not even in play for modern Jewish people. Sometimes I’ve heard Christians say this. The Old Covenant doesn’t apply to Christians, but it still applies to Jews.

No, it doesn’t. I can read the New Testament and see how Paul lived his life. Paul clearly is not living under that covenant. Paul was the Jew of Jews, the best Jew ever, and he no longer followed the covenant as he lived his life. Why would he expect modern Jews to follow? If you want to follow the law, there’s nothing wrong with that. But there’s no obligation whatsoever, and there’s no spiritual value from that. We are all free from New Jersey. That’s the Old Covenant law versus the moral law. Those are the distinctions. I want to make sure we understand. 

Purposes of the Covenant Law

The second thing that we’re going to do this morning is, I want to help you understand what the purposes of the law. Why was the Old Covenant Law given in the first place? I’m going to give you five reasons this morning.

1. Prophecies of Jesus

I’m going to give you five reasons why the Old Covenant Law was given. Number one, the prophecies of Jesus. There are over 300 prophecies of the Messiah baked into the Old Covenant law. More than 300 of them, Jesus meets every single one of them. It’s remarkable. It was predicted in the Old Covenant that Jesus would be crucified 500 years before crucifixion was invented. Crucifixion was invented by the Persians around 500 BC, picked up by the Romans around 300 BC, and they perfected it. Jesus is predicted to die by crucifixion in 1000 BC. Or how about today? Daniel talked about Palm Sunday a moment ago. In Zechariah 9, we see that there’s this clear prophecy of the Messiah coming into Jerusalem and people greeting him with palm branches, shouting, Hosanna, Savior, the one who can save. Would you rescue us? Hosanna in the highest. These were all predicted, and they’re baked into the Old Covenant. So one of the reasons why God gave the Old Covenant in the first place is because he wanted us to be able to see and recognize the Messiah. Look at all these things the Messiah was prophesied, predicted about. That’s him. This bolsters our faith today in the modern world, where people want to give us reasons for why we ought not believe in God or we should question the authority of Scripture. We can look back at the Old Covenant and say, but look at these prophecies that are so clear and specific, pointing to Jesus. It’s a great apologetic for the Christian faith. 

2. Help Govern Themselves as a Nation

The second reason the Old Covenant was given was to help Israel govern itself as a nation. Remember, God wants to bring them into the promised land for them to have a nation. The ultimate goal is for the Messiah to be born into this nation, and then through that nation, all the nations be blessed. But for that to happen, we’ve got to make sure this nation actually survives. The ancient Near East world in which they were living was crazy chaos, all sorts of disgusting sins, pagan rituals. God is saying, I’m going to take you to the Promised Land. I’m going to create you as a nation. We want to make sure you actually survive until the Messiah shows up. So we’re going to give you these specific laws to govern you so that you know how to function. Remember, they had never been a nation. These Israelites had been slaves under Egyptian tyranny for over 400 years. They had never governed themselves. There’s no scripture, there’s no biblical teaching, there’s no religious practice, or very little. Most of them have very little understanding of the moral law or the truth. They live amongst a bunch of pagans. So there are all sorts of bad pagan ideas.

Then, when they go out into the wilderness, scholars tell us it’s maybe on the high end, about a million people. The low end, maybe 700,000. You have hundreds of thousands of people leaving Egypt. But with them, it’s not just the Israelites, A bunch of Egyptian pagans, after they’ve seen how God rescued them, they abandoned Egypt, they abandoned the pagan gods, and they follow Israel. So when they go out into the wilderness, it’s a mix. It’s a bunch of Israelites and a bunch of Egyptian pagans kind of mixed together, and none of them know anything. So God’s like, if I give you the decalogue, you guys ain’t gonna figure it out. So I’m gonna graciously give you these very particular laws for you to know exactly how to govern yourself so that you can function for a season, to make sure your country doesn’t implode, so that we can make sure we have the Messiah born to bless all the nations of the world. The giving of the Old Covenant law is incredibly gracious. We all think of the Old Covenant law as oppressive or bad. It’s the exact opposite. It was God being kind to them.

The Apostle Paul says this in Galatians chapter three. He says that the Old Covenant law was like a guardian in Galatians 3. Another word for that would be a babysitter or a nanny. The Old Covenant law was like a babysitter. So, imagine Malaina and I go out for dinner on a Friday night. We hire a babysitter to hang out with our three-year-old and our one-year-old. So you have the babysitter who stays with them, but eventually they’re going to be old enough and mature enough where Malaina and I can go out and we don’t have to hire a babysitter. If Leti is 17 years old and we still need a babysitter for her, something has gone seriously wrong. The Old Covenant was a babysitter for them, for the Old Testament Israelites. 

So Paul’s saying in Galatians 3, you needed it for a while to kind of keep you on track, but eventually you should sort of know how to govern yourselves. You shouldn’t need this Old Covenant. Jesus comes in the New Testament and says the New Covenant is here. The world is mature enough and ready to receive the Messiah; the guardian, the babysitter, is no longer needed. Thank you. You were helpful to us in your day, but you can go home now.

3. Help us Apply the Ten Commandments to our Lives

The third reason why God gave the Old Covenant is that the Old Covenant helps us today apply the Ten Commandments to our lives. You heard Malaina read it a moment ago. First Corinthians 10. When Paul says all these things in the Old Testament happened and were written down for our instruction. So be careful. If you think you know what to do, be careful lest you fall. Paul says in First Corinthians 10, Be careful. Paul says listen, the moral law is still in play. But don’t just run off and think you know exactly what to do. You should consult the Old Covenant because it gives you the wisdom to know how to apply the Ten Commandments to your life.

I’m gonna make a side note. Christians sometimes debate this. Are the Ten Commandments still applicable to Christians today? There’s a pretty strong percentage of evangelical Christians who would say no. And I gotta be honest, I don’t understand that. Because if you understand what the decalogue was, the Ten Commandments are a summary of the moral law. To say the Ten Commandments don’t apply is to say the moral law doesn’t apply. But the moral law always applies. So the Ten Commandments are absolutely still in play for us. We are to obey the Ten Commandments. 

But the way the Israelites obeyed the Ten Commandments is different than how we obey the Ten Commandments. Those 600 laws, we do not have to abide by those. That was for them to take the Ten Commandments and apply them to their lives in their context. We are to take the Ten Commandments and apply them to our lives in our context. That will look different than how Israel did it. But we can go read about what it was like for Israel, and that will give us wisdom to know how to apply it to our lives. 

Let me give you an example. The fifth commandment says, You shall not murder. So there are all sorts of laws in the Old Covenant; of those 600-plus laws, there’s a whole section that helps them abide by that. All of the laws in the Old Covenant, all 600, each one of them ties back to one of the commandments. These 600 are, in essence, an exposition on the ten. And so every law of the 600 helps you obey one of the ten. So there’s this whole section of the Old Covenant about murder. But the law doesn’t merely say, don’t commit premeditated killing. It’s more than that. 

Let me give you another example. One of the Old Covenant laws says, that everyone must put a parapet around their roof. You know what a parapet is? It’s like a fence. In the ancient world, most people had flat roofs. People would hang out on the roof, and it was cool. In the evening, they would go up there. That was the family room. That was where you had guests over. You’d hang out on the roof. It was very normal. So the Old Covenant said, make sure you put a fence around your roof, because if someone falls off the roof and dies, even if it’s an accident, you are guilty of violating the fifth commandment. Do not Murder doesn’t merely mean don’t kill someone. It also means make sure you live your life in such a way that you don’t unintentionally cause someone to die or be harmed. So am I required to put a fence around the roof of my townhouse that I just purchased in Claremont? No, that law doesn’t apply to me.

But I want to pause and ask myself, why did God give that law to them? Because that does apply to me. God gave them that law to ensure they did whatever they could to protect human life, to protect people from getting injured. Well, that does apply to me. That should govern how I cook, how I drive, how I operate machinery, and how I interact with kids. We should not just blow off the Old Covenant, which is what a lot of American Christians do. We should ask ourselves, Why did God give that to them? 

Let me give you another example. God gives them this long list of foods they can’t eat. Why? Scholars debate the reason why. But there’s one reason we all agree. The primary reason is that God was demanding they look different. All of the nations around them all ate certain foods, all of them. Those foods participated were a part of various pagan religious rituals. And God is saying to them, I want you to live amongst pagans, and I want your lifestyle to look different. That’s the moral law. And they’d be like, well, I don’t know how to do that. And God’s like, okay, fine. Don’t eat shrimp. Okay? Don’t eat shellfish. Don’t eat this, don’t eat this. Nothing with scales. Nothing. Bottom feeders. He gives them the rules. Don’t do this, don’t do this, don’t do this. Don’t do this. But the higher precept, the higher moral law is, look different than the culture you live in. So, can we eat shrimp? Yes. Praise be to God. Can you eat bacon? Absolutely. But the moral command to look different is absolutely still in play. If one of your unbelieving friends and family examined your life, how different would it look from someone who’s not a believer? If they looked at your bank account, would it look different in the way that you give how much money away? You’re here on a Sunday morning. That’s different. Lots of people are at soccer, take kids to soccer games or are sleeping in. That’s good, but it should go way beyond just Sunday morning. Does your life look really different?

Jesus ups the ante on this commandment. He says this in Matthew 5. He says, 

“You have heard it said, you shall not murder. But I say to you, everyone who is even angry with his brother will be liable for judgment. And whoever insults his brother will be liable to the fire of hell.”

You’ve heard the fifth Commandment, Don’t murder. I’m telling you something much greater than that. If you even insult your brother, you’re guilty of violating the fifth commandment. Does Jesus sound like he’s throwing away the Commandment there? I don’t think so. He’s taking the Commandments and he’s upping the ante on those commandments. He’s saying, let’s stop worrying about this particular nature of the Old Covenant and let’s think about the moral law, the higher law, the law of Christ. 

4. Helps Us See How Sinful We Are

Number four, the law helps us see how sinful we really are. Imagine you’re driving down Plant Street and you get pulled over, like me on Tuesday. You’re going down Plant Street, and the motorcycle cop waves you over. No sirens, no lights, just a dude in boots just pointing you over. So, imagine you get pulled over. The cop says to you, Do you know what the speed limit is here? Sure, you know how fast you’re going. Imagine he says to you, You’re going 45 on this road. And I go, oh, is that bad? He goes, well, you see that sign right there? It says 25. You see that sign right there? You see that building? That’s a school. And right there it’s 15. Oh, like, I knew I was bad. But I didn’t realize how bad I was until the law was put in front of me. Like, 45. Probably not ideal in this neighborhood. But then, when you see the sign that says school zone 15, you go, Oh, I’m worse than I thought.

It’s exactly what the law is for us as New Testament believers. The Apostle Paul says this in Romans 7. For if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. I would not have known how egregious and sinful I was. And so I looked at the Law, and so it’s a model for us. We should look at the law. The law is like a mirror. You don’t realize you got something in your teeth until you look at the mirror. You don’t realize your hair is all jacked up and disheveled until you look in the mirror, and the mirror shows you how gross you really are. You think you look one way, you actually look another. That’s what the law gives us. Paul says we’re not under that law, but we can look at that law, and it’s a mirror. God expected a lot from them. Man, I thought I was doing okay, but I’m actually worse than I thought. Much worse. 

5. God’s Kindness to Us in His Response to Sin

Number five, in the Old Covenant, we see God’s kindness to us in his response to sin. We’ve talked the last few weeks about how much of the Old Covenant points to Jesus. Last week, we talked about the idea of types, these shadows, these little hints, these Easter eggs in the Old Covenant that foreshadow Jesus and his work. God put together this entire elaborate, detailed system, and he did that to show you that he hates sin, but he is simultaneously very serious about dealing with your sin on your behalf. When you look at the Old Covenant law, you read through Leviticus. It feels boring. It feels laborious. But what you get in Leviticus is instruction. Detail after detail explaining God’s plan to deal with your sin so that you don’t have to. And that laborious, boring, seemingly legalistic book called Leviticus is actually a grand, beautiful picture of God’s commitment to rescuing you.

Closing

Today is Palm Sunday. As Daniel talked about 2,000 years ago, Jesus walked into the city of Jerusalem, and a bunch of Jews shouted Hosanna. With palm branches waving at him, shouting. Most of the Jewish people in Israel would turn on Jesus just a few short days later. They would disrespect him, they would disappoint him, they would betray him. Ultimately, they would blaspheme him and they would murder him. Yet he responds by humbly submitting himself to that. He says, I will do it. When we study the Old Covenant and we understand how it points to Jesus, it gives us a picture of God’s redemptive love. What is he willing to do?

He is willing to do more than you could ever imagine. God’s redemptive love, his commitment to rescuing you, is baked into and woven into the Old Covenant law. Christ the Lawgiver, the One who gave the Law, the Judge of the universe, the maker of all things, the Creator of everything visible and invisible. He could have just tossed us into the flames of hell, but instead, that Lawgiver came, lived among us, and died a brutal death on a cross in our place. God put your sin on him. It should have been you on the cross, should have been me on the cross. But he dies in our place because he loves us. And the Old Covenant, if we examine it rightly, shouts to us, one of the major themes of the Old Covenant, that the one true God loves you and is faithful to you even when you are not faithful to him, that he is committed to dealing with your sin so that you don’t have to. This Easter season, we celebrate. We celebrate that redemptive love on display in the Old Covenant. We praise God for that.