Amazing Facts

Doug Batchelor: Tonight we have a very important presentation talking about the Decalogue and God’s dilemma. Deca means ten. Logos means words. The ten words, the Ten Commandments, and the dilemma. Everybody is sort of born into life knowing there is right and wrong. Even some of them who don’t have the law of God, they have that inward law. They know inherently some things are wrong. People seem to sort of understand that murder was wrong, lying was wrong, and stealing was wrong. The Ten Commandments are the best summary of any national law.

The Ten Commandments are the most perfect summary of God's will you can find in the Bible. The Bible says in Romans 7:7, "I would not have known sin except through the law, for I would not have known covetousness unless the law said, 'Thou shalt not covet.'" Here, Paul is quoting from the Ten Commandments, commandment number ten. Now friends, I'm going to say this in as strong a way as I can. I don't mean to be unkind, but I've just got to tell you, there is a false doctrine that I hear repeated over and over, even in Christian churches, that Jesus came and that he nailed the law to the cross, meaning we don't need to keep the Ten Commandments anymore.

That is a doctrine of devils. That is not at all what Paul is talking about. Christ died and kept the law so we don't have to. Have you ever heard that? I have. I've heard preachers say it on TV, and I just think, "Oh, that's diabolical." The idea that God doesn't care whether or not we obey his law is mind-boggling to me. That's what Paul would call a doctrine of devils. Of course, he wants us to keep his law. We cannot do it without his strength. When Jesus saves us from our sin, we are no longer under the law. What does that mean? We're not under the death penalty anymore.

But we're more careful than ever to want to keep God's law because he's shown us mercy. Christians are not just forgiven; we should also be different, right? Romans 4:15 states, "Where there is no law, there is no transgression," right? The law cannot save anyone, but it shows us God's perfection and our imperfection. And again, you read in Psalm 119:96, any sin that a person commits is condemned by at least one of the Ten Commandments. This is why God's law is called broad and perfect. Psalm 19:7, the law is called perfect. The law covers the whole duty of man. Sin is lawlessness, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.

Can God's moral law or the Ten Commandments ever be changed or repealed? No. The Bible says—these are the words of Jesus—"It is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one tittle to pass from the law." A tittle would be like the little crossing of a T. It's the smallest increment of writing in the Hebrew language. Jesus said heaven and earth will have to pass away. Why? You know, God has a copy in heaven of the law. Have you read in Revelation, "I saw the temple of God open in heaven and I saw the ark of the covenant." What's in the ark? The law of God. It is the perfect expression of his character.

And again, you read in Psalm 89:34, "My covenant I will not break, nor alter the word that is gone out of my lips." It is a covenant; he will not break it. You read in Psalm 111:7 and 8, "All of his precepts are sure. They stand fast forever and ever." Malachi 3:6, "I am the Lord. I change not." Now, I need to hasten to add, what confuses people is there were a number of Jewish ceremonial laws that were nailed to the cross. These are laws that came later. They came after the time of Moses. But follow me. I'm trusting you know your Bible a little bit.

When Joseph was tempted to sleep with his master's wife, Potiphar, he said, "How can I do this and sin against God?" Did Joseph live before the Ten Commandments were spoken or after? Before. Did Joseph know that it was a sin to commit adultery before Moses wrote it down? Yes. When the Bible tells us that God said to Cain, "Sin lies at your door," he was thinking of murdering his brother. Was murder a sin before it was written down? Yes. All Moses did was codify the will of God that's been in existence through eternity. Let me see if I can explain it this way.

If you were to sum up God with one word, what's the word the Bible gives us? God is love. The first four commandments deal with our love relationship with God. You might even say the first four and a half commandments because "honor your father and mother." He's also our father in heaven. The church is sort of like the bride of Christ, the mother. So you could argue that's kind of a halfway commandment, but it transitions then to the last six commandments that deal with our love for our fellow man.

By the way, the Lord's Prayer is divided the same way. First three petitions, we're talking about God, God's will, God's name, God's kingdom. The last: "Feed us, deliver us." So it is divided the same way. The first four commandments talk about loving God. If we love God, we're not going to use his name in vain. We're not going to worship other gods. We're not going to break the Sabbath. And we're not going to worship idols and belittle his image. The last six commandments deal with our love for our fellow man, right? We're going to honor our father and mother. We're not going to commit adultery. We're not going to steal. We're not going to lie. We're not going to murder. And we're not going to covet.

So if you love, Paul says, "Love is the fulfilling of the law." God is love. Jesus said the whole purpose of man is summed up in two commandments: love the Lord with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength; love your neighbor as yourself. You know what your purpose in life is? How many of you are breathing right now? Only two or three. I was wondering. Some of you look like you—how many of your hearts are beating right now? You're alive. You want to know why? So you can learn to love God and love your neighbor.

The principal purpose of life—we have love problems. We need to learn to love God. We need to learn to love each other. And it's loving God and sharing his love, loving one another and sharing that love. That's what God tries to teach us with all that you go through every day. God is trying to teach you to trust and love him and to love each other. It's all about love. So the Ten Commandments are a summary of God's character in his nature of love. Look at this next slide, and this will help bear that out. When you look at the definitions of God in the Bible and then you look at what the scriptures say about the law of God, you'll find they're the exact same thing.

The Bible says, for example, "God is good," Luke 18:19. The Bible says "the law is good," Romans 7:12. The Bible says "God is holy," in Isaiah 5:16. It says "the law is holy." "God is just," Deuteronomy 32:4. "The law is just." I don't have time to read you all the scriptures. They're in your lesson. But let me just go through. God and the law are good, holy, just, perfect, love—I'm not done—truth, pure, spiritual, unchangeable, and eternal. When you look at the definitions of God in the Bible, you'll find the same definitions for his law.

So if you are trying to get rid of the law, you're trying to get rid of who? God. The devil hates the law of God because the law of God helps us recognize that we are sinners and we need a savior. And so the devil, even among Christians, is trying to downplay the importance of being obedient. We are not saved by the law, but we need the law because it shows us our need of God. Number six: a Christian is ultimately what? A follower of Christ. You still with me? Did Jesus keep the Ten Commandments? That ought to settle it. He says, "I have kept my Father's commandments." That's as clear as it can be.

And some people say, "Well, Jesus kept the Ten Commandments. That was the Father's commandments. But then you've got the laws of Jesus," as though Jesus and the Father have two different laws. Jesus said, "I and my Father are one." And all things that were made were made by him. Who? Jesus. Jesus said, "In the beginning was the Word, the Word was God, the Word was with God. All things that were made were made by him." Would that include the Ten Commandments? Of course. Jesus and the Father do not have two opposing laws. They are united. When he said, "I've kept my Father's commandments," that includes the ones that he spoke to the whole nation and wrote with his finger in stone.

So he wants us to not just be hearers but doers of his word. The Bible says he committed no sin. Sin is a transgression of the law. Jesus kept all the commandments. But, Pastor Doug, his enemies said that he was a wine-bibber. That's right; they accused him of that. Jesus was not a drunk. They said he was a glutton. That's true; they did accuse him of that. He was not. They also said he was demon-possessed. Was Jesus demon-possessed? They said he was a Samaritan. He was not. They called him Beelzebub. They called him a false prophet. They said all kinds of things about Jesus that just were not true.

He kept his Father's commandments. Jesus did not sin. If he did, how could he be the sacrifice for our sins? He perfectly obeyed all of the Ten Commandments as a model for us. The Bible says he has given us an example that we should walk even as he walked. Can you say amen? If God's law could be changed, it would not have been necessary for Jesus to die on the cross. Because God's law is unchangeable, he prayed in the garden, "Father, if there is any other way, let this cup pass from me." Father said, "There is no other way. I cannot change my law."

You read in the book of Daniel, chapter 6, and the king wrote a law according to the Medes and the Persians which cannot change. King Herod spoke and made a promise that if his stepdaughter would dance, he'd give anything she wanted up to half this kingdom. She wanted the head of John the Baptist. He could not change his law. Ahasuerus made a law that all the Jews should be attacked on a certain day. Then he found out Esther, his wife, was a Jew. He could not change his law. He just made another law that gave them permission to preemptively attack their enemies.

But kings could not change their law. How much less can the King of the universe change his law? And God did everything he could do to show its permanence. He gathered the whole nation. He said, "You all take a bath, prepare your hearts, pray, come before me. I will speak audibly for the whole nation my Ten Commandments. And then I'll write it in stone with my own finger. I'm not going to have Moses write this part," to prove its unchanging eternal nature.

Are New Testament Christians required to keep the Ten Commandments? Here's the big question. What does the Bible say? This is all New Testament. Matthew 19:17, Christ said, "If you would enter into life, keep the commandments." If that's clear, say amen. John 14:15, "If you love me, keep my commandments." Revelation 14:12, "Here is the patience of the saints," speaking of the redeemed, "Here are those who keep the commandments of God." I don't have time to read you all the scriptures that say this. The Bible says James 1:23, "For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he's like a man observing his natural face in a mirror, for he observes himself and he goes away and immediately forgets what kind of man he was."

You ought to consider what you see when you look into God's law. If you look in the law of God and you say, "I'm a sinner," then you must go to Christ for repentance, conversion, and forgiveness. "But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty"—what does he call it?—the law is not to restrict us; it's to give us liberty. He who continues in the law of liberty and continues in it is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work. This one will be blessed in what he does. By the way, James then mentions two of the Ten Commandments in the same passage. There's no question what he's talking about.

Blessed are those who do his commandments. It's not a curse, friends. The reason the Bible calls it a law of liberty is because it is liberating to keep his law. You came here tonight with freedom. Why? Because you're not under arrest. The law that puts criminals in jail gives you freedom, right? How many of you remember Zig Ziglar? He was a great motivational speaker and a good Christian. He said, "I don't know why they call red lights stoplights. They're really go-lights. If all the red lights stopped working, you'd find out that nobody goes anywhere."

We need traffic signals. We need the law of God to keep us free. Psalm 119, verses 44 and 45: "So I will walk at liberty forever and ever because I keep your precepts." It's a law of liberty, friends. The Bible speaks of our day by saying, "It's a time for you to act, O Lord, because they have disregarded your law. If the foundations fail, what shall the righteous do?" "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." One of my favorite stories, Mark chapter five, tells about this demoniac. He is the most lost man in the Bible. He's filled with a legion of demons.

He's running around naked, lives in a cemetery, surrounded by pigs. In the Jewish mind, this man is unclean, unclean, unclean. He's lost. But he comes to Jesus just like he is with all his sin. Christ forgives him, sets him free, clothes him, and gives him a work to do. If he can save that man, he can save anybody here, friends. Amen? Just such a wonderful story in the Bible of God's liberation. "Being confident of this thing, that he that began a good work in you, God will finish the work that he started in your life. He will perform it; he will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ," Philippians 1:6.

Number eight: what's the difference between the old and the new covenant? All right, very simply, the Bible tells us Deuteronomy 4:13, "So he declared to you his covenant that he commanded you to perform, the Ten Commandments." That is the old covenant. And he wrote them on two tables of stone. Are we living now under the old covenant or the new covenant? Don't hesitate. New covenant. This last half of the Bible is called the New Testament; that means the new covenant. So yeah, we're saved by the new covenant. You know what the new covenant is? It's the same law written in a different place.

God says, "A new covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days," says the Lord, "I will write my law in their hearts," Jeremiah 31. The new covenant is the same law, but it's now written in the heart. People who say, "I'm under the new covenant now; I can go steal." That's crazy. Of course not. Jesus said it's not just the action; it's the attitude. "I'll write my law in their hearts." By the way, can you show me a place in the Bible where God makes the new covenant with Gentiles? "A new covenant I will make after those days with the house of Israel and the house of Judah."

The new covenant is made with the Jews. We are grafted into the stock of Israel. It is the Ten Commandments now written on the heart. And you find it first in the Old Testament. When God spoke the Ten Commandments and the people said, "All the Lord has said we will do," that was the old covenant. While Moses is getting the Ten Commandments, they make a golden calf and they break all ten in one wild party. And the Bible says in Hebrews, "What was the problem? Finding fault with them." What was the fault with the old covenant? The covenant or the people?

"Finding fault with them," he said, "I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. I will put my law in their hearts." That's what God wants for us, friends. Have you ever wondered, where are the Ten Commandments today? Well, I'll give you a little tip. You know, Raiders of the Lost Ark says they're in Egypt, and there's some Ethiopians that say, "We've got them," that Solomon sold it to the Queen of Sheba and it's now in Ethiopia. But if you read your Bible, it tells us the Ten Commandments were still in Israel up until the Babylonian captivity.

Jeremiah and the priests knew that Nebuchadnezzar was going to destroy the temple. This is all in the Bible. And they no doubt they hid it in one of the many caves that honeycomb Jerusalem, and it has been sealed and hidden from that day to this day. It's still there. Wouldn't it be cool to find the ark of the covenant? Well, you know, the cool thing is not the golden box; the cool thing is the rocks in the box. And if you want to know where the treasure is in the ark of the covenant, it's in your lap if you have a Bible. Because the ark of the covenant contained the Ten Commandments, and the words of the Ten Commandments are in our hands.

Moses said, "It's not far from you. You don't have to go to heaven or the bottom of the ocean to find it. The word is near you." The law of God is right there in your hands. We don't need to go hunt for a golden box, even though that would be a great artifact. "The temple of God was open in heaven, and the ark of his covenant was seen in his temple." This is telling us that before the Lord comes back, there'll be a revival of truth regarding his law and his people having the law in their hearts. Number nine: what is it called when we are converted and given a new heart?

You must be born again. God wants us to have his law written in our heart. That is the new birth. I don't want to do anything that displeases him. I not only want to be a hearer; I want to be a doer. You know, if you love the Lord more, it'd be easier to obey. How many of you are aware that there is a law in Texas that you cannot murder your children? How many know that? Some of you never raise your hands no matter what I say, right? In case you didn't know, there is such a law. How many of you don't kill your children because there's a law?

Does the law have anything to do with the reason you don't kill your children? Don't raise your hand. You don't kill your children because you love them. There is a law, but you don't think about the law because you love them. Wouldn't you like to love the Lord so much that you wanted to keep his law? I don't think about committing adultery because I love my wife. Amen. And the more that you love, love is the fulfilling of a law, the easier it is to obey. When we're born again, and the more we know about the Lord, the better you love him, the more you love him, the better you'll obey him and you'll share him.

Number ten: what must I do to be forgiven and cleansed from sin? Repent and be converted that your sins might be blotted out. Ask God to give you a new heart. Repent of your sins. If you don't feel like it, say, "Lord, help me to choose. Give me a willingness." Whatever it is you're lacking to be saved, God will supply, even if it's the willingness of the heart. "As I live," says the Lord, Ezekiel 33:11, "I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked would turn from his evil way and live. Turn ye, turn ye. Why will you die?"

If we confess our sins—we repent, get alone with the Lord, say, "Lord, I am guilty of these things." You know what your sins are. Just look at the Ten Commandments and repent. Your sins have cost the life of the Son of God. It's not a cheap altar call where you say, "Hey, thanks, Lord, for saving me" and walk away. It ought to be heartfelt. We need to spend some time maybe weeping at the feet of Jesus knowing he died for our sins. He suffered for our sins because he loves you that much. He will forgive us. Repentance is both a sorrow for sin and a willingness to turn away. And God will give you the power and he will give you the will.

Who enters the heart of a born-again Christian, and what does he do? The spirit of truth. And you know him, for he dwells with you and he will be in you. Both to will and to do his good pleasure. He will change your will. It'll go from "my way" to "his way." Lord, I want to do the things that please you. Number twelve: why did God make such a fantastic sacrifice for us, and how do we accept it? "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." You know, as a pastor, I've done a lot of funerals. And I remember one funeral: thirteen-year-old boy had a heart problem, died in the shower, just—

And I was there, the pastor after the funeral, you stand by the casket as the family comes by. And the last one out is the family. And this family, the mother in particular, grabbed the casket and they had to peel her hands off. She would not let go. And she was wailing with a broken heart and saying, "We loved you so. We loved you so." And you know, I can't read John 3:16 anymore, that two-letter word "so." I can't read it the same way anymore. For God so loved the world that he gave his son.

He must really love us in that he loves us more than we love our children. Karen and I lost a son twenty years ago. Handsome, healthy young man, died in a construction accident. I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. Losing a child. And then I realize God loves his children infinitely more than I love my children. And he gave his son for you and you who are watching. Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved. Believe it's true, friends. He adopts you into his family. You become his children. Is anyone saved by keeping the law? No.

We are saved, the Bible says, by grace through faith. It's the grace of God through faith. But when we are saved by grace, we want to be doers of his word because we love him. Number fourteen: isn't it true that once we're saved by grace, it's no longer necessary to keep the law? No. "Do we then make void," Paul says, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid. We establish the law." God came to earth 2,000 years ago in the form of a man. His name was Jesus. He came for three reasons: to show us what God is like, to show us how to live, and finally to die for our sins that we might be forgiven.

But this only works if you choose to accept him as your personal savior, confess you're sorry for your sins, and invite him to be the Lord of your life. His arms are open wide. Why don't you ask him now?