The Ten Commandments

These three passages are linked together by the common thought that human life is perfectly conditioned when it is governed by the words that proceed from the mouth of God.

Deuteronomy records the last messages of Moses to the children of Israel. In this particular passage he states the meaning of the varied circumstances through which God has permitted them to pass. “He humbled thee, suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna.” To what purpose? ‘That He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread alone, but

r by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the

Lord.”

Isaiah is the messenger of God to a people, who, through disobedience, have passed into captivity. Chapter Iv. records one of the messages in which he contrasts their state of life in captivity with the blessedness and joy experienced when living in perpetual obedience to Divine law. It is of this law he speaks when he says, “So shall My word be that goeth forth out of My mouth.”

In the New Testament we see Jesus, God’s perfect man, passing through the severest temptation. Replying to the first suggestion of the enemy, He reveals the realm in which He lives when He says, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”

Let the passages which indicate the common thought be lifted from their setting.

i. “Every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord.”

ii. “My word that goeth forth out of My mouth.”

Hi. “Every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.”

Thus is revealed the supreme verity upon which the Mosaic, Prophetic, and Christian economies were based. The methods have been different and progressive; the purpose has been ever the same. The creation of the Hebrew nation, its preservation, and all its magnificent ritual and organization were directed to the end of giving expression to the first divine intention of the blessedness of man, receiving his law from the mouth of God, and yielding unquestioning obedience to it.

The prophetic office was that of forthtelling this Word of God principally to those who were disobedient. Its exercise was ever characterized by fierce denunciation of rebellion, glowing descriptions of the glory of the Divine Kingship, and passionate appeals to a return to loyalty.

Jesus, the author of Christian faith, lived from beginning to end without deviation or exception by the words proceeding from the mouth of God. In His passion-baptism He bore the penalty of the disobedience of the race, and in His resurrection took again His life, that He might communicate it to sinful men, that in its energy they also might obey the law of God.

Evidently, therefore, according to the consistent teaching of Scripture, man only understands the possibility of his being as he becomes acquainted with the law of God; and only realizes this possibility as he lives by the words proceeding from the mouth of God.

The reason for this is found in the fact that within the Divine intention, every human life moves through present probation to future purpose. Men are born, not merely for to-day, but for God’s to-morrow. Issue and consummation are out of sight, and are perfectly known to the Creator alone. The trouble is that so many live as though the whole purpose of life were Realized in the little day on earth. Yet men know that lt IS not so, that this passing life is preparatory and probationary. To-day men sow, to-morrow they reap.

The reaping depends upon the sowing. If the ultimate end is to be in harmony with the will of the eternal love, they must obey the law proceeding from that love: they must live by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.

THE SUPREME DUTY OF MAN.

The supreme duty of every man is that he should discover and obey these words. If he live from day to day, from week to week, from month to month, and from year to year without reference to that law, hoping that after being regardless of, if not rebellious against it, he will at last slip into some happy state, then surely he must indeed be blind and foolish.

In the close of the Book of Ecclesiastes, the preacher says, “This is the end of the matter; all hath been; heard: fear God, and keep His commandments; for I this is the whole of man” (xii. 13). Not “the whole duty of man,” as it was in the Authorized Version, but the “whole of man.” That is to say, if a man fear God and keep His commandments, he is a whole man. Judged by this standard, how many there are that are not whole men. This very book of Ecclesiastes reveals the fact. “Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher; all is vanity.” That is the sum total of life lived “under the sun,” among things material and transient; life in a hemisphere. The whole man is realized when man “fears God and keeps His commandments.” That is, when both hemispheres are recognized. He who lives without reference to the law of God fails to fulfil the possibilities of his own being. He is not a man until

he lives by the words that proceed from the mouth of God.

In the Epistle of James is found a word of deep significance. “Whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is become guilty of all,” (ii. lo). Placing this side by side with the passage already referred to in Ecclesiastes, there are two phrases with a common denominator, “the whole”: “the whole man,” “the whole law.^” Herein lies the explanation of the apparent severity of Jameses utterance. Men are apt to think that if there be ten commandments, of which they obey nine, such obedience will be put to their credit, even though they break the tenth. That, however, is to misunderstand God’s purpose of perfection for man, and the consequent perfection of His law. The ten words of Sinai were not ten separate commandments, having no reference to each other. They were ten sides of the one law of God. The teaching of Jesus reveals the fact that these commandments are so inter-related that if a man offend in one point he breaks the unity of the law, and, therefore, of his own manhood. It is by “every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God doth man Kve.”

If these positions are established there need be no apology for a frank and honest facing of the Ten Commandments. They were the comprehensive words of God, uttered for the government of a people whose distinctive glory lay in the fact that they were a theocracy, under the immediate Kingship of the Most High, and whose recurring shame lay in their revolt from that authority. These words embody a perfect law of life tor probationary days. They presuppose human failure and sin; and, therefore, they will have no place in the government of God in heaven. Not that man will do the forbidden things there, but the glorified nature of man will have put the committing of such things beyond the realm of possibility. In some measure the Christian dispensation antedates the heavenly state, for its whole genius lies in the fact that newborn souls share by that new birth in the motives and impulses of God.

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