Loving the Lord Means Obedience!

3rd Sunday in Lent, 3/8/15
Exodus 20:1-17


Loving the Lord Means Obedience!
I. It’s never perfect.
II. It’s never optional.


“Love means anything goes. Everything is acceptable.” That blatantly false assertion has swirled around our sinful world ever since its fall into sin. Read through the book of Genesis and you should be horrified at some of the sins committed under the guise of love. More recently it was a major theme of the social upheaval in our country in the 1960s. “Free love” was a popular buzzword for what in reality was nothing more than immorality of the worst kind. Most recently we hear people object to what they term “hating on me.” It’s their reaction to someone objecting to their behavior. The unstated desire is that the loving thing to do is to let them do as they please. Love means anything goes.

But in reality love means you can and should expect a certain type of behavior. When a couple stands before God and promises to love, honor and cherish one another until death parts them, that implies that each of them is going to behave in a way that reflects their love for one another. Violations of that code of behavior have serious implications for their wedded life. On the other hand, when those behavioral expectations are frequently observed, when they become a way of life for that couple, the marriage bond is strengthened.

The same truth holds for our relationship with our God. We cannot claim to love our God but fail to reflect it in the way we live. We cannot declare our devotion to him and then stomp all over what he desires from us. We cannot proclaim that Jesus is the center of our lives, but live like rank pagans.

Loving the Lord means obedience. That sounds a little harsh, but always remember this: our loving Lord always and only wants what is best for us. His commandments before us this morning in Exodus 20 reflect his loving will for our lives. Let’s examine his will and our lives this morning.

Part I.

It was too cold to play outside, at least too cold for a four-year-old girl all by herself without parental supervision. So she quietly sat down at her little play table in the corner of the room and got out a piece of paper and her crayons. She was determined that afternoon to create a work of art which would express how much she loves her mommy. The 15 minutes she spent on it seemed like a lot longer to her childish mind. She was trying to recreate a nature scene from one of the pages of her favorite book. At first she was confident in her abilities to produce a praiseworthy drawing, but it soon became apparent to her that her efforts were far from her expectations. It wasn’t long before she was crying tears of desperation. Her mother heard her muffled crying and came in to the room to see what was wrong. Little Chelsea explained with tears streaming down her cheeks, “I wanted to draw this picture for you, Mommy, but look at it. It’s not pretty; it’s ugly!” And you can guess her mother’s reply, “No it isn’t! It’s the most beautiful picture I’ve ever seen. I can see all your love in it.” What mother with a heart full of love for her child wouldn’t have said the same thing, right? And the picture immediately gets taped to the door of the refrigerator for all to see.

So, as children of a loving God, can we expect the same thing? Can we sit down and attempt to draw our lives exactly according to the picture that the holy God portrays for us in his holy commandments? You know the answer to that one. You don’t need me to tell you. You can try your hardest to color your life within the lines of God’s holy law, but even our best efforts stray; we transgress the boundaries God has set. We don’t get the colors and the shading just right. And too often, unlike little Chelsea, we don’t begin sobbing over our failed effort. We’re proud of it. We tried harder than all the rest. It might not be perfect, but it’s pretty good. At least it doesn’t look like what they did. Likewise, the holy God is not like Chelsea’s mother who appreciates any loving effort, sinful though it may be. No, the holy God demands perfection. I’m not the first one to state this: these aren’t God’s 10 Suggestions; they’re his 10 Commandments and he demands perfection.

To put it bluntly, we don’t even begin to keep the First Commandment, which is the foundation for all the rest. Jesus once summarized the first three commandments like this, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind” (Mt. 22:37). Again, loving the Lord means obedience. Every time we fail to obey him, we’re putting ourselves or someone else ahead of him. We’re not loving him with all our heart. As our Creator and Redeemer he rightly expects first place in our hearts. Not a day goes by in which we let him reign there unchallenged.

Jesus also summarized the next seven commandments when he stated, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mt. 22:39). The reality is, we don’t even love the people closest to us with a holy love, let alone the rest of the people in our world. And don’t fool yourself into thinking that an act of charity on your part constitutes meeting the demand to love your neighbor. Just the slightest falsehood, just mean thoughts about someone else, just the slightest jealousy or discontentment violates God’s holy demands.

Well, if you weren’t depressed before you got here this morning, you likely are now. Thanks for the pick-me-up, Pastor! Is there any good news? It’s no accident that our God spoke the following words before he spoke one word of the commandments, “I am the LORD your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.” He is the LORD, the God who is loving and faithful to all of his promises. The LORD is the God who is in the business of saving sinners, not damning them. His rescue of his people from slavery in Egypt foreshadowed his rescue of sinners from hell.

That’s a rescue we desperately need because loving the Lord means obedience and our obedience is never perfect.

Would it be acceptable to you if your physician always gave you a glowing health report no matter what he or she knew to be true about you? Would it be OK if he told you that lump was nothing, when in fact it was malignant? Of course not! You want and need the truth so you can deal with it.

Your loving Lord has never lied to you or sugar-coated your problems. He speaks the truth and he does so in order to drive us to him. Countless people take a casual glance at the 10 Commandments and fool themselves into thinking they’ve kept them, when in reality their loving Lord informs them that they haven’t kept a single one and they can do nothing to make it up to him. He tells that very same thing to you and me to drive us to him. Loving the Lord means obedience. But I haven’t given it to him, not a single day of my life. But he has for me. See Jesus obey every facet of God’s holy law for you. His obedience is our salvation! See him sacrifice himself for your sins and believe with all your heart that God accepted his death as the punishment for your sins. How can you not love a Lord like that?

Part II.

A few months ago the concept of executive authority was in the news. The debate revolved around whether or not our US president had the authority in a particular situation to bypass Congress and act on his own.

Although we may act like we possess such authority when it comes to God’s commandments, the truth is that we are never above God’s holy law. We’re always under it, no matter what the situation. We can attempt all the rationalization we want, but this truth still stands, “Thus says the Lord,” and he doesn’t change his mind.

And don’t even begin to think that forgiveness is a license to sin. Just because Jesus has paid for all your sins and God freely forgives all sins, that does not mean you can sin all you want or even just this once. That’s trashing the love of God and the forgiveness he won for you.

So, if we can’t keep God’s commandments, why even try? St. Paul once wrote, “Christ’s love compels us” (2 Cor. 5:14). Theologians debate whether that means Christ’s love for us or our love for him. In reality, it’s both. It reminds me of how often Jesus pictures himself as the groom and us as his bride. His love for us put his life on the line for us. In fact, he crossed that line and willingly gave it up for us, his bride. In return, the only proper response is for us to show our love for him by what we do. I’ll ask it again. How can you not love a Savior who lived and died for you so that you can spend eternity with him? It’s the greatest love story the world will ever know. And loving the Lord means obedience. It’s never optional.

It’s a twisted, dysfunctional relationship when one person states, “I love you” but then unconsciously follows that with, “But I’m going to treat you like I don’t.” I don’t have to remind you what a sin-sick world we live in. The nightly news gives ample evidence of it. But worst of all, that sin-sick attitude lives within us as well. Somehow we defend the concept that we can love our Lord and yet treat him like garbage, that we can dismiss him as not important right now, or casually turn our relationship with him on and off according to our situation. “We’ll listen to you here, Lord, but not over here. We’ll obey you now, but don’t expect it all the time.” But he does expect it all the time. Doesn’t he have a right to? Better yet, doesn’t love for him compel us to obey him? Isn’t that what Lent is all about? Just consider how often Jesus could given up on his work to be our Savior. Consider how often we’ve given him plenty of reasons not to be our Savior. But his love for us compelled him to live a holy life for you and to die a sacrificial death for you. Give that Lord your obedience, freely, from a heart full of love for him. Amen.