Trinity 18
25 September 2016
Matthew 22. 34-40
Dear friends in Christ. In today’s Gospel Jesus gives us a nice clean summary of all of the holy Ten Commandments. When asked by an expert in the Jewish law which is the great commandment in the Law, [Jesus] said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.” Notice what Jesus does. He divides the Ten Commandments into two parts. We call it the two tables of the Law. The First Table of the Law is the first three commandments—what we owe God: to fear, love and trust Him above all things, to use His name rightly in prayer, praise and thanksgiving; to hold His name sacred and gladly hear and learn it. And this Jesus summarizes: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.
The Second Table of the Law is commandments four through ten. This is what we owe others, our neighbor. Here is where we honor our parents and other authorities, where we help our neighbor in every physical need, treasure marriage and spouse, help our neighbor to improve and protect and keep his possession and income. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Notice, this is the moral law that God has written on the heart of every person as they come into this world. Every person, whether they have heard of the holy Ten Commandments or not, instinctively knows there is a God to whom they are responsible, that it is wrong to kill or steal, etc. What does Jesus do? He reiterates this Law, the moral Law! The holy Ten Commandments stand. They are not done away with at the coming of Jesus. Instead, they are reaffirmed.
This is important because in the OT God gave three types of Law. The first is the Moral Law, the holy Ten Commandments, which Jesus here reaffirms.
The other law that God gave in the OT was the Ceremonial Law. This involved the sacrifices and worship in the temple—things that pointed forward to the coming Savior and were to remind the people of the once for all perfect sacrifice for sin that He would bring. But because Jesus, the Savior, had come they were no longer in effect; they had served their purpose. St. Paul writes [Col. 2.16,17]: Let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.
The third type of Law God gave in the OT was the Civil Law. This is the law by which the Jews were to govern themselves in the Promised Land. Obviously once they no longer governed themselves or ceased being a nation these laws were not in effect. This is important to keep in mind because often when we are talking with someone and bring up the Law—especially against a sin they are engaging in to call them to repentance—they will drag up some obscure part of the Civil Law out of Leviticus somewhere and since not even Christians follow that, they try to say that all the Law should be chucked; that none of the Law applies anymore; that we are only picking and choosing certain Laws to maintain and neglecting others. With that idiotic notion they think they justify their sin and are free from any law of God.
But again, the types of Law God gave in the OT must be distinguished. The civil law was for the Jews to govern themselves; the ceremonial law was to point forward to Jesus, and since He came, it is done with; it fulfilled its purpose. But the Moral Law remains and is affirmed by Jesus: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
So the question remains—can we fulfill the Law, the Moral Law, of God? After all, keeping the Law is not optional. Elsewhere [Lk 10.25-28] Jesus affirms precisely by the keeping of the Law—loving God above all things and neighbor as self—a person receives eternal life: do this and you will live. As we examine our text we will see the truth of what St. Paul writes [Rom. 13.10]: Love is the fulfillment of the Law—first from God’s side and then from our side.
1. The first thing that we have to recognize is that by ourselves and by our own strength we cannot keep the Law, the holy Ten Commandments; we cannot love the Lord [our] God with all [our] heart and with all [our] soul and with all [our] mind; we cannot love [our] neighbor as [ourself]. That’s because already from the get-go we are conceived and born in sin; our human nature is corrupted and riddled through with sin and weakness. In fact, St. Paul writes [Rm 8.3,4]: the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Before we are brought to faith and converted and given new spiritual life by the Holy Spirit in Baptism and the word, our mind is set on the flesh, that is, it is entirely evil, perverse, and hostile to God [FC SD II 17]; and after conversion, after the Holy Spirit has brought us to faith and given us spiritual life, we still have that old sinful nature in us and it fights against the new self, the Christian in us, the leading and guiding of the Holy Spirit. That’s why we have struggles of conscience—the Christian in us, created by God in baptism, is duking it out with our old sinful human nature. And so the result is that even as Christians we do what we don’t want to: we sin.
Notice, as well, from Jesus’ words how impossible it is for us frail sinners to keep from sinning. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” Not only is there an outward obedience to doing what God requires/ demands but there is an inner obedience. In other words, the Law is not just doing a few good things, but it is our whole life—and this doing everything is to flow from our heart. Total love toward God and neighbor! And to flip it around—whatever is not done from a willing spirit out of love of God to serve Him and our neighbor, is not a keeping but a transgression of the Law of God.
What an impossible position for us to be in! How impossible it is for us to keep the Law of God, His holy Ten Commandments! How impossible it is for us—even as Christians—to love God and neighbor perfectly!
But the fact remains, love is the fulfillment of the Law. This is good news for us—God, in love for us, has fulfilled His holy Law for us! What He asks/ demands of us, He has done for us. He knows that we are sinners who cannot keep His holy Law as He demands if we are to enter heaven and that an eternity in hell awaits us. But He loves us. He wants to save us/ rescue us from our sin. That’s why—in love—the Father sent the Son; that’s why—in love—the Son became also true man and put Himself under the Law to keep it for us. That’s why—in love—the Son endured on the cross all of the punishment for our sin. Love has fulfilled the Law of God—God’s love for us sinners led Him to keep/ fulfill His holy Law for us.
Jesus has and has shown that perfect love that God requires of us. “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.” That’s what we see as the Son of God perfectly obeyed His Father’s will and took on our human flesh and blood, coming into this world precisely to suffer and die. That perfect love is what we see as Jesus is in Gethsemane, on trial, as He goes to the cross, as He suffers and dies on the cross. There’s that perfect love of God Jesus has for His heavenly Father—even in the midst of greatest sufferings.
Here is also that greatest love of the neighbor: And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. In greatest love for us sinners Jesus came and endured all suffering, divine wrath and shame. The love of neighbor demands that we place the interest of others above our own. That’s precisely what Jesus did; that’s precisely what God the Father did as He gave up His only Son for us.
The marvelous thing is that this love of God for us sinners, Jesus’ love in placing Himself under the Law to keep it, His love for us in His suffering and dying on the cross for our sins is part and parcel of who God is. All of this was not an arbitrary act of God but grounded in His love. And precisely this love—from God’s side—fulfilled the Law. He fulfilled the Law for us; God’s holy Law of perfect love toward Him and the neighbor has been fulfilled—by Jesus, for us.
2. And now we, through faith in Jesus, have perfectly fulfilled the Law. It is through faith that we receive Jesus’ perfect keeping of the Law; through that Spirit worked faith we grab ahold of Jesus and His saving work and make it our own; through faith, Jesus’ perfect love toward God and neighbor is credited to us.
But this in no way means that we as Christians don’t love now; it doesn’t mean that we grow negligent in love. Instead, it means that as Christians we love God and our neighbor all the more fervently. That’s because the love of God and the neighbor increases where there is faith. In fact, love is the result of faith. If in Spirit worked faith we truly believe that God loves us and has in Christ rescued us from sin and damnation, how can we not love Him all the more and want to love Him and strive to do His will? The love that we show Him is a response to the love He has already shown us. St. John tells us [1 Jn 4.19]: We love Him because He first loved us. The more we ponder His great love for us, the more we love Him and want to do His will. And we cannot love God without loving our neighbor. What does Jesus say here about love of the neighbor? And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Just because love of neighbor is second does not mean it’s secondary in importance, but it is like it; also necessary.
Again, love is the daughter of faith. Faith receives the gifts and blessings from the Lord and loves Him and wants to do His will; and faith also recognizes and confesses that I am a poor sinful being, yet in spite of my sin and unworthiness God loves me and gave Himself for me. And here faith blossoms into love of neighbor—even though my neighbor is a sinner, even though my neighbor is seemingly unworthy of my love, so am I unworthy of God’s love and yet He loved me. How can I not show love to my neighbor—and also especially because it is the Lord’s will that I love my neighbor—even giving 7 commandments to that effect.
The love that we as Christians have as a result of Spirit worked faith is a love in which love for God and for neighbor are closely intertwined. We do not love God apart from our neighbor—that is, we can’t love God but not our neighbor—and we cannot love our neighbor apart from God. The love that we have of God and neighbor is a willing love. After all, where there is faith in Christ, then it has been worked by the Holy Spirit; and since the Holy Spirit is in us, then we willingly do the Law, loving God and neighbor.
The Christian’s greatest joy is to love God and our neighbor. That’s because we have Christ in us leading and guiding us. In the Christian, as a result of faith, we have the beginning/ imperfect as it may be of the fulfilling of the law of God. Where there is faith there is also true love of God and the neighbor, but it will never be perfect this side of eternity. But praise be to Christ, that where we sin He covers it with His forgiveness and righteousness; that where our love is imperfect, He covers it with His perfect love. Love is the fulfillment of the Law. INJ