J. D. Greear and I have collaborated on a six-week study called “God First,” which examines the first four commandments and the difference between religious observance and the gospel. This post is excerpted from the first session, “God First in Love and Pursuit.”
As Christians, we believe God’s law was given out of love after saving His people. Deuteronomy 10 makes this clear.
But take a good hard look at verse 12:
“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God ask of you except to fear the Lord your God by walking in all His ways, to love Him, and to worship the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul?”
When I read that, I think to myself, Oh, that’s all! God doesn’t expect anything of me except total devotion, walking in His ways, and full-hearted worship. It’s like saying to your son or daughter,
“Now, I’m not asking anything of you except for you to obey me and love me every minute of every day no matter what happens. That’s it. All I’m asking is for you to be a perfect child.”
In case you think this is a misinterpretation of the verse, look at the command given in the first verse of the next chapter:
“Therefore, love the Lord your God and always keep His mandate and His statutes, ordinances, and commands.
The Two Scary Words
Two words in this verse ought to strike fear into your heart. The first is “love” the Lord your God. We know from Jesus’ words that obedience is the sign of love. In other words, the way we express our love for God is to obey Him without begrudging or with a bad attitude. We are to do the right thing with the right heart.
And that leads us to the other scary word, “always.” We are always to keep His mandate and statutes, ordinances, and commands. God demands total obedience from a loving heart.
The apostle James gave us another way of looking at this when he claimed that even failing to keep one of God’s commandments—just one—would make us guilty of breaking it all (Jas. 2:10). Disobedience is failure to love.
If love is the beginning of the law and the purpose of the law, then disobeying even one command is enough to bring it all crashing down around us. The demand is total perfection.
Jesus didn’t shy away from this truth either. Far from loosening the restrictions or making the law easier to digest, He commanded us to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect (Matt. 5:48).
Stunning Holiness and Exposed Sinfulness
The law of God shines light on the character of God. The law shows us many things about the God who has saved us. One of the things it shows us is His absolute, stunning holiness. There is no trace of sin or evil in Him. There is no stain of rebellion or wrongdoing. He is holy love.
It’s no wonder, then, that the law of God, because it accurately reflects God’s holiness, immediately shows up our sinfulness. I remember cleaning up a classroom once that had some old carpet. We spent some time arranging the room and trying to make it look as good as possible. Everything looked clean when we were finished. But on the morning our group met there, the sun was shining through the window at a different angle, and the floor looked horrible. There were stains we had not even seen when the only light was fluorescent. Once the sun was involved, the flaws were more visible than ever.
The law of God is like that. It’s brilliant in its beauty, and we’re thankful for what it reveals about God. And yet it quickly shows us how we don’t measure up.
We understand our imperfection in light of God’s perfection, our sin in light of His holiness, our cold, dark hearts in light of His blazing, fiery love. The demand of the Commandments is absolute and total perfection, and that demand drives us to our knees, asking God to uphold His law in some way and have mercy on us as well.
The Beautiful Obedience of Jesus in Our Place
That’s where Jesus comes in. He met the demand of the law. He lived the perfect life we could not live, upheld the law at every point we failed, and loved God and others the way humans were always intended to.
Take the two scary words we talked about earlier: love and always. Apply them to Jesus. They fit. He loved God always. And that’s why He was the perfect substitute for us on the cross.
