The Pastor's Windshield article for June 2023

What do you think of when you hear about the Ten Commandments? Are they a relic from the past? Truths that need to be recovered? Oppressive rules? 

In the view of many people, the Ten Commandments represent a harsh, judgmental, impersonal God who is basically a cosmic killjoy, wanting to stamp out all the fun in life by telling us not to do all the things that we want to do. But is this really the case?

What about you? Perhaps you’re unfamiliar with the Ten Commandments, or it has been so long since you’ve looked closely at them that you’ve largely forgotten their details.

Whatever your first impressions, level of familiarity, or past experiences, I want to invite you to explore the Commandments with me on Sundays this summer at St. Matthew. On June 18th (Father’s Day), I’ll have an introductory message about the Ten Commandments with specific focus on the context in which the Lord first taught these words to His people. Together, we’ll see that the Commandments have much to teach us about God our Father and about our identity as His children.

Now it is true that the Ten Commandments are mostly arranged to state what we shall not to – “You shall not steal” (Ex. 20:15), for example. And, you shouldn’t misuse the Lord’s name, be unfaithful to your spouse, tell lies or spread gossip about your neighbor, and so on. 

These are prohibitions. We need them, even though our human nature is inclined to resist prohibitions. For a historical example, think of the Prohibition era in American history. Prohibiting the sale of alcohol was well-intentioned by some, but vehemently resisted by many around the country and subverted by the widespread production of homebrewed alcohol. 

We naturally don’t like to be prohibited from doing whatever things we might feel like doing. We love our independence, and yet, as creatures, we are dependent upon our Creator for life and all that fills and sustains it! Everything that we are and have and anticipate comes only from His generous, fatherly hand.

So, if God is so generous and caring, why does He give us these prohibitions? The important thing to remember about the Ten Commandments (and godly laws in general) is that they are given to protect us. God first wants to protect our relationship with Him. He wants to protect our families, marriages, and relationships with our neighbors. And ultimately, God wants to protect our hearts, as He tells us in Proverbs 4:23, “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”

As we focus on the Ten Commandments this summer, we’ll do so through the lens of both God’s Law and Gospel. We’ll consider what the Commandments are prohibiting and what they are protecting. We’ll see how the Commandments show us our sinfulness (and societal sins as well), but we’ll also see how Christ alone fulfills the commandments in our place and provides the life-saving forgiveness and deliverance we all desperately need. 

In general, the Ten Commandments reveal what is good and God-pleasing (God’s will for our lives), and they simply remind us of what is good for us. They don’t provide a path for saving ourselves, but they do show us how to respond to our Father who lovingly saves us through His Son Jesus Christ our Lord.

These are at least some introductory thoughts about the Commandments. I invite you to join us this summer at St. Matthew as we rediscover our Lord’s “Ten(der) Commandments”!

Peace in Christ,

                        Pastor Kory Janneke