by CCW | 29 April 2012 17:30
The Ten Commandments are given to us both in the Book of Exodus and in the Book of Deuteronomy. In Exodus, of course, they are given to us twice because of the idolatry of Israel in making the molten calf which resulted in the tablets of the Law being smashed; only in the mercy of God are they remade, and while they are not recounted in their fullness the second time in Exodus; nevertheless, we are given to understand that they are exactly and precisely the same words. But, really, what are we to make of this evening’s readings about the Law in its fundamental aspect as the Ten Commandments in Deuteronomy and the wonderful vision of the City of God in Revelation? What do they have to do with the joys and the delights of the Easter season of the Resurrection?
A whole lot. The Law is not eclipsed and passed over by the Resurrection. The Resurrection and our hope of the Resurrection is not a solitary affair. The holy city Jerusalem is the city of our redeemed humanity, the apostolic city symbolized in the twelve gates with “the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel”, the city with twelve foundations and “on them the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb”. The heavenly city is the place of our union with Christ in his life with the Father in the Spirit. “Come, I will show you the Bride, the wife of the Lamb.”
The wonderful imagery of the passage from Revelation signals the nature of redemption and the fuller meaning of the Resurrection. It is about the redemption of our humanity. Thus, there is this wonderful affirmation of the Law rather than its overcoming and there is this wonderful sense of the unity of our humanity signaled in the double references to the twelve tribes of Israel and the twelve apostles of the Lamb. The Lamb, of course, is Christ.
The conjunction of Law and the glory of the heavenly community here is suggestive and significant. Christians are not freed from the Law by virtue of Christ’s victory over sin and death. And salvation is not a private affair. It would be truer to say that we are freed to the Law as fulfilled in Christ and as constituting the true nature of the spiritual community where the Law is both within us as well as around us; it is no longer simply external to us. It has been fulfilled and realized in Jesus Christ and in the spiritual community to which we belong and are joined. The strong nature of our spiritual freedom is set before us in these readings, a freedom that is not about a kind of antinomianism, that is to say, a spirit of lawless freedom. No. There is a sense of completion and fulfillment. The Law is embraced as belonging to our love of God and to his love at work in us.
Marilyn reminded me of a little joke. Moses comes down from the mountain and addresses the people of Israel. “First, the good news, and then the bad news. They are down to ten but adultery is still in.” It speaks pretty directly to the concerns of our world and age, I am afraid.
“Love God and do what you will”, Augustine famously said, but he didn’t mean what the joke suggests. Far from being a kind of libertarian free-for-all, what Augustine means is simply that if you love God, you can only want what God wants and wills for you. Which is exactly where the Law, especially in the form of the Ten Commandments, comes in with all its fullness. In the light of the Cross, there is forgiveness and new life. We are not called to judgmentalism but to the forgiveness of sins, for us and for one another, I might add.
There is something quite wonderful about reading Deuteronomy in the season of Easter. For the Resurrection is about a renewing of our hearts and minds in the life-giving and life-restoring truth and love of God. The Law of Moses is not abrogated and tossed aside but affirmed and celebrated with an even greater sense of joy and delight because in Christ we can say with Paul that “love is the fulfilling of the law”. It places us in the true meaning of a spiritual community which lives by the Law of the Spirit and the Word seen in perfect harmony with one another. In our prayers and praises we are again a people of the Law, a people of the Word, who live in the grace of that spiritual fellowship and communion which is “the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God.” It is what we have been shown by Word and Spirit.
Fr. David Curry
Choral Evensong
April 29th, 2012
Source URL: https://christchurchwindsor.ca/2012/04/29/sermon-for-the-third-sunday-after-easter-choral-evensong/
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