Sealed by the
Sacrifice
Exodus 24:1-8
Hebrews 19:11-22
Tomorrow is
Memorial Day. For some it is just a
three-day weekend. Its meaning begins
and ends with a trip to the beach and hot dogs cooking on the grill. There is no memorial in the day. There is no
remembering of anything. For others, meaning is marked with a flags planted on
veteran graves and draped in the memories of those who sacrificed to the last
full measure so that this nation might live free. Some still squeeze into old
uniforms and limp down small town streets in parades that are attended by fewer
every year. When they see the flag
through cataract eyes, they stand tall as they are able, and offer a salute,
because for them it still stands for freedom.
They know more than most that freedom,
in a sinful world, is never free. There
will always be those who hate freedom so much they are willing to drive
airplanes into office buildings. There is always a price to be paid, and often
that price is paid in blood. The truth of this is found in our texts
today. There is power in the blood. Let us prepare ourselves in prayer:
Almighty God, give us wisdom to
perceive you, wisdom to understand you, diligence to seek you, patience to wait
for you, eyes to behold you, a heart to meditate upon you and life to proclaim
you, through the power of the Spirit of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.[1]
Benedict 480-543
In the nineteenth chapter of
Exodus, the Hebrew people camp in the shadow of Mt. Sinai. And Moses went up to God, and God called
to Moses from the mountain and said, “If you obey my voice and keep my
covenant, you shall be my treasured possession.”[2] Obedience
is intertwined with their relationship with God. They can’t have one without the other. The
terms of this covenant or contract will follow.
But, before the Laws is given the people need to appreciate the
seriousness of what is being offered.
So, there is a time of preparation and consecration. God said to Moses, “you shall set limits
for the people all around, saying, “Be careful not to go up the mountain or to
touch the edge of it.”[3]
What is the purpose of these
limits? Why are some actions and
attitudes declared out-of-bounds? Why,
in fact, does God give any commandments at all that will define our relationship
with him? What is the purpose of the
Law? I believe one of the reasons for
these limits and laws is to establish respect.
In fact, each one of the Ten Commandments defines the ways in which
people are to show their respect for God and each other. It is why we are forbidden to take the Lord’s
name in vain, dishonor parents, or commit adultery. Every commandment broken breaks relationship
with God or another person because the other has been treated with a lack of
respect. Dignity and integrity have been
betrayed. No relationship can last long
when disrespect dominates. Treat God or
others badly and the relationship will go badly.
If America ever falls, it will be
because of the increasing disregard for personal responsibility. It will be because of an uncaring attitude and
civil amnesia. That’s why I sometimes
wince, when I stroll by the monuments on the Mall in Washington D.C. and see
them treated as little more than jungle gyms by people who have no concept
about who these forefathers were and what they represent. It is why I cringe
when I see the flag treated like a rag. It is why remembering has been taken
out of Memorial Day for many Americans.
They do not take seriously the sacrifice that was made, nor understand
the foundation of their freedom.
In America limits are not much
respected anymore. People don’t want to
hear about anything that might restrict them in what they want to do; and
that’s why they want to remove these commandments from Memorial parks and
courthouses. If God can’t tell you what
to do or how to live, then no one can.
The result of godless living though, is obviously life without God. Life without God leaves little more than
passing pleasures and a limited future.
Eternity without God becomes too scary to think about, so we don’t think
about it. That’s why our relationship
with the Lord is so important. It helps us think bigger. There is a larger picture than the one we sit
in front of at the end of the day.
God said before we begin any kind
of relationship together, before you can see the bigger picture, the ground
rules must be set and the limits must be respected. This was a serious thing, and to show the
children of Israel how serious this was the Bible says, “On the morning of
the third day (of preparation and consecration), there was thunder and
lightning, as well as a thick cloud on the mountain, and a blast of a trumpet
so loud that all the people who were in the camp trembled.”[4]
God got their attention. No one was yawning or looking at their
watches or sharing favorite recipes during this worship service. All eyes were on Moses. So, when Moses went
up to the mountain there was great expectation they he would come down the
mountain with something big. And he
did.
That brings us to this morning’s
text. In verse three, Moses came and
told the people all the words of the Lord.
What words are these? They are the Ten Commandments found in chapter
twenty and the laws contained in the Book of the Covenant in chapters
twenty-one through twenty-three.
When Moses was through telling them
what limits God set to show respect to him to and to each other, all the people
answered with one voice, “All the words which the Lord has spoken we will
do.”[5] They signed the bottom line. It won’t be long before they break the second
commandment with their construction and worship of a golden calf, but the
important thing to note here is not that they so quickly broke the covenant,
but that they so quickly entered into it.[6] They agreed to follow it before they had any
of their lawyers read it over to add any articles and amendments and
stipulations. They didn’t try to whittle it down from 10 to five. There were no, “what ifs” or “even
though”. There was no negotiation. God said it and they agreed to follow it
no questions asked.
Their questions would come later,
but my question is, “why did they agree so quickly?” Did they consent to follow God’s Law out of
gratitude to God for their liberation from slavery in Egypt? Possibly.
Did they concur to this covenant out of fear because they had witnessed
the power of God in the thunder and lightning and the drowning of the Egyptian
army in the Red Sea and were afraid they might be next? Maybe some did. Or maybe some agreed to this covenant because
they recognized the difference between freedom born of lawlessness and freedom
enjoyed when the law provides for respect and equal treatment for all. They had seen how cruel people could be to
people. They had experienced oppression
first hand when the law was arbitrary and decided by only one person. They knew that power corrupts and absolute
power corrupts absolutely because they experienced Pharaoh’s subjective
whims. They had felt his whip upon their
backs for no reason other than his pleasure.
When Moses recited God’s Law that
respected the rights of the individual and protected equality, the children of
Israel signed up immediately because they wanted to be treated fairly and with
respect. They wanted to live free from
the fear of living under the thumb of someone else. They had been there and done that and they
didn’t want to do it again.
When Moses spoke the word from the
Lord, and then wrote it down, he gave to them God’s Law unchanging, codified in
the written word. Writing it down
insured that whether you were rich or poor, well connected or not connected at
all, everyone is to be treated the same in the sight of God’s law. The words of
the Law were carved in rock by the finger of God.[7]
Race or gender or position or politic don’t figure at all into the Ten
Commandments. “Thou shall not kill”
applies to everyone, president or pauper.
You don’t get a pass in the sight of God because you are important and
the victim was not. God did not say,
“Thou shall not bear false witness” unless you have a really good reason, and
there are extenuating circumstances.
John Adams, the second President of
the United States made this same observation:
If “Thou shalt not covet” and
“Thou shalt not steal” were not commandments of heaven, they must be made
inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized and made free.”[8]
When he and the rest of our
forefathers affirmed in the Declaration of Independence, “We hold these
truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are
endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights”, they drew from
this principle that was established through God’s Law at Sinai. The Law is supposed to treat everyone the
same.
They knew, as Moses
knew, that in a sinful world these rights and freedoms do not come cheap. That’s why they concluded this Declaration
with the words, “with a firm reliance on the protection of divine
Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our
sacred honor.” When they put their
names beneath those words they knew these were not idle words. They knew that they might have to make a
sacrifice because of their signature.
Many of them did, some of them paid with their own blood. Freedom is not cheap and easy. Treat it that way and you will lose it in no
time. There will always be someone who
wants to take your freedom away.
Moses understood that, so, a
sacrifice was made to remind them of the cost of freedom. He gathered the blood
of the animals that were sacrificed.
Half he splattered on the Book of the Covenant and half he splattered on
the people themselves. They had signed
the dotted line of this covenant, and the blood now served as their notary
public.
In that action he emphasized the
importance of the written word and the importance of the sacrifice they make.
He got their attention. I know he
did because I know you would long remember any worship service I led that
involved me splattering you with blood from a bucket. Long after I’d been asked to leave this
church, you’d remember that day. That
kind of thing always makes an impression.
When the writer to the Hebrews
looked back on this Exodus event through the life, death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ he saw a connection between this sacrifice and the sacrifice made
by Jesus. His blood covers our sin in
the same way the blood of Moses’ sacrifice literally covered that people. The point of this is purification. It is to make things right. In fact he wrote, “under the law almost
everything is purified with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is
no forgiveness of sins.”[9]
For many today, this Biblical
emphasis on the blood of the sacrifice is difficult to grasp. It’s just too
messy. We don’t understand the reason
for it. We don’t see the connection between the sacrifice and the sanctification.
Louis Evans, the former pastor of
the National Presbyterian Church, described a conversation he had with another
church leader who rejected the theological emphasis on the blood of
Christ. He derisively called it “slaughterhouse
religion.” He said, “I don’t
believe in blood sacrifice; we don’t do it anymore.”
Louis replied,
“We don’t do it anymore? In the
twentieth century more people were killed in various wars than in the preceding
eight centuries. During World War II we
saw the waves on Tarawa washing over the bodies of forty thousand young
Americans. He said, I walked
through the city of Dresden, where, in one night of bombing three hundred
thousand lost their lives. Millions have
died in Cambodia and Viet Nam. The sin
of humanity’s inhumanity is costing us more human lives than we are willing to
admit. Sin is costly and still demands
the blood sacrifice. What do you mean we
don’t do it anymore? Either we proclaim
the One perfect sacrifice and the blood that was shed to cleanse humanity of
its mindless stupidity as well as its ignorance or we shall continue to pay for
our sins by our own blood sacrifices that can never take away sin, but only
reproduce them in uncontrollable numbers.
O that we had eyes to see and accept God’s great act of redeeming love in
the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.”[10]
The cross of Jesus Christ is more
than a memorial. It is more than a
symbol that just reminds us of something that happened a long time ago. It is the means of grace that God uses to
redeem and purify those who have broken the covenant he established through his
Law. It recognizes how quickly we
sacrifice our birthright of freedom for a bowl of porridge.[11] God understands that though the “spirit is
willing, the flesh is weak.”[12] God knew that he needed to make an impression
upon the soul, and believed that the sacrifice of his own son was the only way
to do that.
For those of us upon whom this
impression has been made, the cost of discipleship is not seen as being cheap
and easy. Sin requires a serious
sacrifice. It requires your whole life,
but how do we do that? What does that
really mean?
In our response the “Assurance of
God’s Grace” earlier in our worship service we sang the fourth verse of the
Battle Hymn of the Republic. You sang
the verse that is written in most modern hymnbooks, “As He (Christ) died
to make men holy, let us live to make men free.”
That was not what Julia Ward Howe
original intent. She wrote, “As He (Christ) died to make men holy, let us die
to make men free” because that is exactly what people were doing in 1862
when she penned these words. In the
middle of the Civil War people were dying to set others free, and they were
dying in great numbers. There was no other
way to purify this nation from slavery than with the sacrifice of blood. Memorial Day has its origins in that time.
In the 1960’s though many began to
re-think this notion of “dying to make men free”. They were thinking in terms of killing as
well as dying. They thought living in a
way that respected the freedom and equality of others might go just as far as
dying or killing. After considerable
debate, the word “die” was changed to “live”. Both variations are accepted
today.
The best memorial we can offer then
for those who have died to make men free is to live in a way that respects the
freedom and dignity and integrity of others.
The Apostle Paul put it this way:
“For freedom Christ has set us
free; stand fast therefore, and do not submit to a yoke of slavery. For you were called to freedom, only do not
use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, for the flesh, but
through love be servants of one another.” [13]
In one of the last scenes of Steven
Spielberg’s D-day movie, “Saving Private Ryan”, the captain played by
Tom Hanks lay dying from his wounds. He
and his men had been assigned the task of saving one soldier, whose three
brothers had already been killed in other battles. Instead of one dying to save many, many died
to save one. Looking around at the
carnage from the battle, the last thing Tom Hanks said to Private Ryan before
his life ebbed away was, “Earn this!”
By that he meant, live in such a way that the sacrifice he and so many
others made was not in vain. Make your
life count for something.
As disciples of Jesus Christ, we do
not earn our salvation. It has been
freely given to us by his sacrifice.
But, we are to live in such a way that his sacrifice for us was not made
in vain. We are to make our lives count
for something. Sometimes that means we
die to make men free. More often it
means we live to make men free respecting the freedom and equality of all God’s
children. We are to love and serve one
another. We are to share the good news
of Jesus Christ with the words of our mouths and the actions of our hands and
the attitudes of our hearts. That is the
way we glorify God. That is the way His
truth is marching on. Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Let us pray:
Our father’s God, to Thee,
Author of liberty,
To thee we sing:
Long may our land be bright,
With freedom’s holy light;
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God our King.[14]
Amen.
[1] Adam,
David: Forward to Freedom, From
Exodus to Easter. Upper Room,
Nashville. 2001. pg 157.
[2] Exodus
19:3,5
[3] Exodus
19:12
[4] Exodus
19:16
[5] Exodus
19:3
[6] Exodus
32
[7] Exodus
31:18
[9] Hebrews
9:22
[10] Evans,
Louis: Hebrews, The Communicator’s Commentary. Word Publishing, Texas, 1985. p. 166.
[11] Genesis
25:34
[12] Matthew
26:41
[13] Galatians
5:1,13
[14] My
Country ‘Tis of Thee. Verse 4.
