chapter 5 and I'd like to read the second giving of the Ten Commandments by God to the people of Israel as they were about to cross over the Jordan River and enter into the promised land. Moses had brought them thus far to the east side of the Jordan and now Joshua would cross the Jordan with the people and enter into the land to claim it as the land that God had given them. The second giving of the Ten Commandments also reveals something of the mind and heart of God when he gave it to them through Moses in this chapter. And so I would like us to read the entire chapter. and try to understand the purpose of the Ten Commandments as well as their meaning and the desire of God concerning the Ten Commandments for the people of Israel. Let's hear the Word of God, Deuteronomy chapter 5. Then Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the ordinances which I am speaking today in your hearing, that you may learn them and observe them carefully. The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Horeb. The Lord did not make this covenant with our fathers, but with us and with all those of us alive here today. The Lord spoke to you face to face at the mountain from the midst of the fire. While I was standing between the Lord and you at that time to declare to you the word of the Lord, for you were afraid because of the fire and did not go up the mountain. He said, I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. You shall not worship them or serve them. For I, the Lord, your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and on the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing loving kindness to thousands, to those who love me and keep my commandments. You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not leave him unpunished who takes his name in vain. Observe the Sabbath day to keep it holy as the Lord your God commanded you. Six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the Sabbath day is a Sabbath of the Lord your God. In it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant or your ox or your donkey or any of your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you, so that your male and your female servant may rest as well as you. And you shall remember that though you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out of there by a mighty hand and by an outstretched arm. Therefore, the Lord your God commanded you to observe the Sabbath day. Honor your father and your mother as the Lord your God has commanded you that your days may be prolonged and that it may go well with you on the land which the Lord your God gives you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor's wife, and you shall not desire your neighbor's house, his field, or his manservant, his ox, or his donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor. These words the Lord spoke to all your assembly at the mountain from the midst of the fire of the cloud and of the thick gloom with a great voice. And he added no more. And he wrote them on two tablets of stone and gave them to me. And it came about when you heard the voice from the midst of the darkness. while the mountain was burning with fire, that you came near to me, all the heads of your tribes and your elders, and you said, behold, the Lord our God has shown us his glory and his greatness. And we have heard his voice from the midst of the fire. We have seen today that God speaks with man, yet he lives. Now then, why should we die? For this great fire will consume us if we hear the voice of the Lord our God any longer than we shall die. For who is there of all flesh who has heard the voice of the living God speaking from the midst of the fire as we have and lived? Go near and hear all that the Lord our God says, then speak to us all that the Lord our God will speak to you and we will hear and do it. And the Lord heard the voice of your words when you spoke to me. And the Lord said to me, I have heard the voice of the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They have done well in all that they have spoken. Oh, that they had such a heart in them that they would fear me and keep all my commandments always. that it may go well with them and with their sons forever. Go say to them, return to your tents, but as for me, stand here by me that I may speak to you all the commandments and the statutes and the judgments which you shall teach them, that they may observe them in the land which I give them to possess. You shall observe to do just as the Lord your God has commanded you. You shall not turn aside to the right or to the left. You shall walk in all the way which the Lord your God has commanded you that you may live and that it may be well with you and that you may prolong your days in the land which you shall possess. Now, this is the commandment, the statutes and the judgments which the Lord your God has commanded me to teach you. that you might do them in the land where you're going over to possess it so that you and your son and your grandson might fear the Lord your God to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command you all the days of your life and that your days may be prolonged. Oh, Israel, you should listen and be careful to do it. that it may be well with you and that you may multiply greatly just as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has promised you in a land flowing with milk and honey. Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words which I am commanding you today shall be on your heart and you shall teach them diligently to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up and you shall bind them as a sign on your hand And they shall be as frontals on your forehead, and you shall write them on the doorpost of your house and your gates. Let's pray. We thank you for preserving these words of Moses, Father, all these millennia now, that we can sit here and read tonight what you said so long ago to the people of Israel, your people, as they were about to cross into the land of promise that you promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that you kept that promise while the people were in captivity in Egypt and did not allow them to be destroyed by Pharaoh, how you brought them out of Egypt by a mighty hand, through the wilderness, in spite of their sinfulness, to the very precipice of entering into the land. And we pray that you would help us to see that the most important thing upon your heart was that they would love you with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength, and keep your commandments. For we pray in Jesus' name, amen. As we come to try to summarize the Ten Commandments tonight with you. I admit I'm overwhelmed. I really am. I never finished one of the sermons that I brought to you on the Ten Commandments. I feel like there's so much I've left out, but I'd like to conclude it. The series tonight by speaking about not only the importance of them, but God's will about them. You'll notice in chapter five that he gave the Ten Commandments and then God himself cried out, Oh, that they had such a heart to keep them. And then in Deuteronomy six, where he gave the great commandment, the greatest, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. He tells Israel. that these words which he's commanding them today, and at that point it was the 10 commandments, they shall be on your heart. And you shall teach them diligently to your children. When they rise up in the morning, when you walk by the way in the day, and when you bring them to bed at night, you shall teach them the commandments of God, which includes the first and greatest. You shall love the Lord your God with all your soul. You all your might with all your strength. And of course, Jesus said, the second is like to it. The second greatest commandment, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love are the commandments of God. And he wanted the specific commandments of love. Detailed in the 10 commandments to be on the heart of his people. When we think about the fall of Adam and how he rebelled and sinned against God, and how God brought the curse that he promised upon Adam and his descendants of a world that has fallen in sin and human hearts that are born in sin, that God promised his son to come as the seed of Eve one day, to defeat Satan and the seed of Satan upon the earth, to be the Savior, the Redeemer of men and women and children. And all through the Old Testament, God was speaking of that Christ to come, that one, the one who would come and save us from our sins, but also all through the Old Testament, God's law was in force to obey him, love him and obey him in all that he commanded. Everyone in the Old Testament was born condemned in their sin from Adam. Even Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They had to hear the good news of a Messiah to come, a Savior to come. They had to learn in the sacrifices that blood must be shed for the redemption of man's soul. But also all the way through the Old Testament, God's moral law to love him with all your heart and to love your neighbor as yourself was in force. And we find that there were people like Noah, and Abraham and Moses and Joshua and David and Hezekiah who loved God and loved His law. It was written on their hearts, on their minds, in the way they think. It was on their consciences in terms of their relationship to God. and it was on their words and how they spoke to others. God has always had his law for men. Since the fall of Adam, he has been revealing that if a man sheds another man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed. That murder is a sin. That stealing is a sin. False witness is a sin. Worshipping false gods is a sin. And we find all of the commandments of God at work in the Old Testament before Mount Sinai. Why indeed did men celebrate seven day weeks? And that the word seven means at the end of the days. So the law of God is the nature of God. And we've studied how God himself wrote it on tablets of stone because it was out of his heart. Out of his heart, he calls Israel to put it on their heart, to be like him. And we cannot throw that law away under the new covenant of the Lord Jesus Christ. because the Lord Jesus suffered on the cross to atone for the violations of that very law. Having kept it perfectly himself in thought, word, and deed as a man, he was qualified to be the spotless sacrifice upon the cross without blemish that could atone for even one of the sins of one person. But being fully God as well as fully man, he was able to atone for all the sins of his people. But for what end? Just to bring them to heaven? A place where there's no one who breaks God's law? Where all is love to God and one another? Well, that's wonderful. But he also died to make us good. And it is the teaching of the Bible that it was always God's will for the new covenant people of God to love him and love his law in order to be like God, like Jesus, and to love one another on earth. We've covered so much on the 10 commandments. My head spins when I think about it and what I'm going to say in this last message to you. But when I studied the Bible, there's something that's missing in our churches today. And look at the churches and read the books. Listen to even conference messages of, of good men. And that is that the Lord Jesus Christ came not only to atone for our sins, but also to inscribe God's law upon our hearts. As God intended Adam to be as he called Israel to be. And now he is by his grace and by his son and by the power of the Holy Spirit called us to be. So I want to emphasize that tonight in this last message and ask a couple of questions. There's often a. A controversy about the relationship of law and love. both in biblical studies and in our society. And there are many that say, well, love has nothing to do with the law. And the law has nothing to do with love. They are completely separated one from the other. And in a biblical sense, that's true. That the law cannot save. And your obedience to it cannot make you righteous with God. It only condemns us from our sins. But because of Christ's incarnation, where he himself said, Lo, I have come to do thy will, O God, thy law is upon my heart. He died a death to bring us to God and to change us internally into the image of God again. of people who love him and keep his commandments. That's missing. It's missing in such a huge way that it shouts all over the world. When people talk about becoming a Christian, being under grace and saved by grace, we believe that and that we're justified by faith alone in Christ alone. But to what end? And the teaching of the Old Testament and the New Covenant is the end to have a people who love God and keep his commandments. What is a Christian? Those who keep his commandments and their faith in Jesus, God said in Revelation. The imprint of Christ and his atonement and grace toward us should be first upon our minds at all time. We should love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. And we are to always be thinking of love as the great thrust of our life, the great goal of our life, loving our neighbor as ourself. Paul told Timothy, the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith. Some just don't understand that you cannot have love without law. And so I want us to look at that just for a moment, and then we'll talk about the issue of what it means to love God's law. So what's the connection, first of all, between the law and love in Scripture? Well, as I've already said, the two great commandments are to love God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself. These are the two supreme commandments that God has given us. But I want you to turn with Matthew to Matthew 22 with me and see what our Lord actually said about that. Matthew 22. In verse 34, when the Pharisees heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they gathered themselves together And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, testing him. Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law? And he said, 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 foremost commandment. And a second is like to it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend the whole law and the prophets. In other words, the entire Old Testament on these two commandments hang, not just depend, but it's as if the law and the prophets hang upon this stake that is driven into the wall. Everything about the Old Testament is loving God with all your heart and loving your neighbor as yourself. He made Adam and Eve to do that. They didn't. The rest of the Old Testament is God's promise to fix the problem of our hearts and to change us back into those that love God and love our neighbor. But you cannot teach love without the commandments, without the law. Turn with me to Matthew chapter 5. Our Lord Jesus Christ is teaching in verse 43, this perversion that the Pharisees taught of God's law. The two great commandments, love God, love your neighbor. And he takes their teaching on love your neighbor as yourself. And he says, you have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies. and pray for those who persecute you. In order that you may be sons of your father who is in heaven, for he causes his son to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax gatherers do the same? And if you greet your brothers only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Therefore, you are to be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. God loves his enemies. That's why if you're a Christian, you're here tonight. For it was while we were yet enemies, God saved us. Not just ignorant people walking around fuzzy in their thoughts, and God just had pity, and He sent His Son and His Spirit into our hearts and saved us, but actively the enemies of God, refusing to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, refusing to love our neighbor as ourselves. Selfish. Self-centered. Rebellious. Angry. But the Lord sent His Son, who suffered upon the cross for not loving God as we should, for not loving our neighbor as we should, that the Lord Jesus might come and teach us how to love our enemy again. Love, that's what the commandments are about. The two great commandments, obviously, you shall love, you shall love. But turn with me to the book of Romans, And I want us to see again, as we did last week, we look briefly at this passage, chapter 13. I'm not going to take the time again to go through the entire book of Romans and show that it's very clear that the two words, the law are used several times distinctively describing the 10 commandments. as the distinct moral law of God that Christians still are called to obey. But if you look in Romans chapter 13 verse 8, God says through Paul, owe nothing to anyone except to love one another, even your enemy. For he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. You see, there is a connection between love and law. But what is it? For this, you shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder. You shall not steal. You shall not covet. And if there's any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Love, therefore, is the fulfillment of the law. And there are some who would say today that the Ten Commandments do not apply to the Christian as the moral law of God. But the problem with that is that God always defined love to himself and to his neighbor in terms of that very moral law. And when Paul says that If there's any other commandment, it's summed up in this saying, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. It doesn't mean just love your neighbor and set aside concern or thinking or studying or learning these other laws. And that's the way it's taught sometimes. If love your neighbor as yourself sums up all of these commandments, then those commandments define what loving your neighbor is. You say, well, as long as I just have love in my heart for someone, I'm keeping this commandment, not according to Paul here. Because he very specifically says love does no wrong to his neighbor. not just positively loving him and caring for him. And if he's hungry to feed him, if he's thirsty to give him a drink, but also you have to think not to do wrong to your neighbor, to love him. And that wrong that we're to avoid with our neighbor is you shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder. You shall not steal. You shall not covet. And if there's any other commandment, it is summed up in the great commandment of love. But the definition of love in that commandment is by the specific commandments of God in the 10 words. As a Christian, again, when we think about our nation and Christian churches and perhaps many that you might know, how often do they explain that Jesus died to atone for our law breakings, to change our hearts and make us new men and women and children in Christ that love him and keep his commandments. That keep the 10 commandments and the other commandments that Jesus taught. See, that's what holiness is. The work of the Spirit in our hearts under the new covenant is to change our hearts that we will love God and love our neighbor and keep his 10 commandments. Turn with me to Jeremiah chapter 31 this evening. I know that you've heard this from us for years and years from Brother Bill and to myself and others that have come, Brother Tom and Mitch. But I want to stress something here. Our forefathers understood this passage as I'm about to teach you. But very few Bible teachers today understand what I'm about to say to you. In verse 31, God promises, by prophecy through Jeremiah, when Judah and Jerusalem were being taken captivity into Babylon, behold, days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not like the covenant, which I made with their fathers in the day. I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt and stop right there. There are some who seem to read that and just stop in their tracks. And they say the new covenant is not like the mosaic covenant, the Sinai covenant. Therefore, the idea of God's commandments being important and central in the life of God's believing people is different under the new covenant. And then they continue. My covenant, which they broke, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord. Now, how did they break that covenant? They did not keep God's commandments. God called them to put them on their heart, to write them on their heart, to memorize them. And if you remember Deuteronomy six, he even used the, uh, the, uh, uh, illustration or the figure, but actually literally that they were to bind them on their hands, these 10 words and, and that they were, to wear them on their forehead in a little box that had the 10 words on it. And they were to write them on the doorpost of their house so that every time they went into their house or came out of their house, they would see the 10 words. That this is what it means to love God with all your heart and love your neighbor as yourself. And they broke that covenant. They specifically broke it, and when you read through the prophets of Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel and Daniel, the minor prophets as well, what you see coming up over and over and over again is that Israel broke the Ten Commandments. Specifically, you shall have no other gods before me, And secondly, you shall not make unto thee any graven images and bow down and serve them. It was the Ten Commandments which God punished Israel for breaking. Yes, the priests were many times worldly men who served in their priesthood for money and to enrich themselves. They were called the Sadducees. But God called the Sadducees to teach the law. And they didn't. And so the people would give themselves over to idol worship. And then in giving themselves over to idol worship, they broke these commandments. You shall not murder your children. You shall not steal from God and give to idols. You shall not bear false witness that you are a believer in the God of Israel while you bow down to the immoral worship of the false gods, the mother earth goddess who brings the fields to grow and bear fruit and her male consort, So that the pagan worship was all about immorality in order to please the God to bring food from the fields, even if you pass your children through the fires of Molech and kill them and offer them up in sacrifice, burning before you. People will do anything to get God to make them wealthy and rich and safe. So what did they do? they broke the Ten Commandments as a people. And God told them that if you keep the commandments as a people, I will bless you in the land to which you're going. And he kept his word about that. Joshua himself said in Joshua 22 through 24 to the people that they had they had done everything that they were supposed to do for God and God had fulfilled all his promises to give them the land. But having been given the land, with God being good to fulfill his promises under Joshua, they then gave themselves to the idols again and the false worship and broke God's moral law. That was what the prophets were preaching. When Christ came under his new covenant, the goal of our Lord Jesus Christ to redeem and save his people from their sins, and by the power of the Holy Spirit to change their hearts into a people that love God with all their heart, their neighbor as themselves, according to the Ten Commandments. To leave that out of Christian teaching, is to violate God's law and word. Now look again at Jeremiah 31, 33, not like the covenant, verse 32, which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt. My covenant, which they broke, though I was a husband to them, declares the Lord." He had chosen them to be his bride. He had chosen them to be his people. He redeemed them, not because of the worthiness of their heart. And he told them that. It's not because you were righteous that I saved you, but just because I had mercy, according to the promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And he brought them out of the land of Egypt. To the precipice of going into the land of promise. But they came into the land and they broke the covenant over and over and over until God says my covenant you broke. Though I was a husband to you declares the Lord. Well, obviously they broke the 10 commandments. Obviously they did not keep the ceremonial laws of worship at the temple as they should. Nor did they perform justice under the civil laws of the Mosaic Covenant. They did not defend the widows and the orphans. They were not honest in business practices, one with each other. They broke the Sabbath over and over again. So what's going to be new about a new covenant? Well, according to some, The law would change. But here's what it says in verse 33. But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days declares the Lord. I will put my law within them. And on their heart, I will write it. And I will be their God and they shall be my people. And they shall not teach again each man his neighbor, and each man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they shall all know me. From the least of them to the greatest of them, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more. This is the new covenant, the covenant When it says, I will make a new covenant, it means I will cut a new covenant just as the sacrifices were cut and the blood was shed before God in atonement. So God will cut a new covenant with blood. And that new covenant is to be a different covenant than the covenant of Sinai and what we find. is that at Sinai, God gave his 10 commandments. He mourned, oh, that they had such a heart in them to keep my commandments. And then he calls them. You shall put these commandments on your heart. But they didn't. Now, in the promise of this new covenant to come, this new covenant is different this way. God will change their hearts. himself, because they could not change their own hearts. And God will write the same words that he wrote on tablets of stone for the people of Israel to put upon their hearts, and this time he will write those words on their heart. The Lord Jesus said in Psalm 40, Lo, I have come to do thy will, O God, Thy law is within my heart. If you want to know what a Christian is to look like, you look at Jesus Christ. He loved God and kept his commandments. He loved God's law. The definition of love is defined by God in the scriptures, according to his 10 words that tell us how to love God and love our neighbor as ourselves. But the question is, Do you love that law? Now, if God is going to write that law upon their hearts of the new covenant member by the power of the Holy Spirit, says Ezekiel 36 verses 27, 26 and 27. If God is going to take out the heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh and cause you to walk in his statutes by the power of the spirit, Do you love God's law tonight? That's what I'm really asking. Turn with me to the book of Psalms, Psalm 119. And as I said earlier, this is the longest psalm in the Bible, and people debate over who wrote it, and I believe it's very possible that David did write it because of its meter, because of its poetry, It's organization. There are. Paragraphs for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet through this Psalm. And the theme of this Psalm is loving God and his law. Of trusting in God and his law. Psalm 11997 Oh how I love thy law. It is my meditation all the day. Thy commandments make me wiser than my enemies. They are forever. They are ever mind. I have more insight than all my teachers for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the aged because I have observed thy precepts. I have restrained my feet from every evil way, that's the negative side of God's law, that I may keep thy word, that is, love God and love my neighbor. I have not turned aside from thine ordinances, for thou thyself has taught me. How sweeter thy words to my taste, yes, sweeter than honey to my mouth. From thy precepts I get understanding, therefore I hate every false way. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path. I have sworn, and I will confirm it, that I will keep thy righteous ordinances. I am exceedingly afflicted. Revive me, O Lord, according to thy word. Oh, accept the freewill offerings of my mouth, O Lord. That is a believer. who is right with God by faith alone. And then he says, teach me thine ordinances. My life is continually in thy hand, yet I do not forget thy law. The wicked have laid a snare for me, yet I have not gone astray from thy precepts, you see. The believer is not influenced by the behavior of others to break God's commandments. If we do it, we do it on our own. The wicked have laid a snare for me, yet I've not gone astray from that precepts. I've inherited that testimonies forever, for they are the joy of my heart. Are they the joy of your heart? See? You say, well, that's the Old Testament believer, and this is hyperbole. That he's just trying to somehow say that he's righteous and he's earning his way to heaven. So he says, thy testimonies are a joy to my heart or the joy of my heart. But that is not, that's not what the Bible teaches. Hezekiah and David were both singled out and it was declared that they were men whose heart was like the heart of God. And they loved and kept his commandments. I have inclined my heart to perform thy statutes forever, even to the end. You see what he's saying? I have inclined and continually inclined my heart to think, to meditate, to remember God's statutes forever to the end. The thought processes of an Old Testament believer, like Samuel, like David, was to think of God's goodness and grace, that God is good and does good, says David. That they are saved by the grace of God through faith in the Messiah to come and God gave them a heart to love him and keep his commandments. That's the character of an Old Testament believer. It's also the character of a New Testament believer. I will put my laws in their mind, God said, my law, and upon their hearts, I will write it. The only other writing God did in the Bible was the 10 words on tablets of stone. Under the new covenant, he writes it on human hearts because that's what love to God is. That's what love to our neighbor is. That's what holiness is. That's what Christ likeness is. And not only do we as individuals love God and seek to keep his commandments in our individual lives, but in Ephesians chapter four, Paul said that God has given pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, to the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain to the measure of the stature of Christ himself. That the whole body of believers love God and love his commandments. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. We think of the commandments when we meet one another. when we meet our neighbor next door, when we go to work. Love does no wrong to a neighbor, but rather it loves our neighbor as ourself. And when we awaken in the morning and we know that there's a busy week, a busy day, there may be issues or problems in the family, irritations, tension, disagreements, even sin, But the Christian awakens in the morning and remembers Jesus Christ risen from the dead and that God has first loved him or her. And they are called to love one another. The new covenant of Jesus Christ is the promise not only to atone for the sins of his people, but also to make them all over again to love God and to love his neighbor as himself, herself, according to what love means. And so I'm asking, do you love God's law? Now there's some people that love law. They love to be right. They love to appear right. And that's not anything of what I'm talking about. I'm asking, do you love God's law because you first love him? Now turn with me to 1 John in closing tonight and Again, this has been the burden of my ministry when God showed me that he has given directions how to live. He has told us how to love. He has told us how to love himself and to love our neighbor, and especially how to love one another as Christians, as Christ loved us first. But when we look in the New Testament, we see over and over and over again that God calls us to love Him and keep His commands. 1 John 2, verse 3. By this, we know that we have come to know him if we keep his commandments. And that word keep in the Old Testament and the New Testament does not mean keep specifically perfectly in every way. The word in the Old Testament actually means to guard and to watch and to put a hedge around like you're guarding your fields or you're guarding a building. You're watching. And the same word, or a different Greek word, but the same definition in the New Testament is here in 1 John chapter 2. By this we know that we've come to know him. If we keep his commandments, that is, they are on our thoughts all the time. We're watching them. We're thinking about them continually. as a Christian, to be transformed by the renewing of our mind, that we may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect, his righteousness. And so he says, by this we know that we've come to know him if we keep, if we watch, if we're guarding and protecting his commandments, The one who says, I've come to know him and does not keep guard, protect his commandments is a liar. And the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps his word in him, the love of God has truly been perfected. How do you know if you love God, you keep his commandments. That's how, you know, by this, we know that we are in him. The one who says he abides in him ought himself to walk in the same manner as Jesus walked. Jesus loved his father and kept his commandments. That's what a Christian is. And in 1 John 5, the last verses we'll look at tonight, verse 3 says, for this is the love of God In other words, this is what it means if we love God. This is what it means to love God. For this is the love of God that we keep His commandments. And His commandments, the law of the Lord, are not burdensome. Why are they not burdensome? Because He sent His Son. To suffer on the cross to atone for the condemnation of his law against every human being that he died for upon that cross to save. That his commandments are not burdensome because Jesus said. Come unto me all you that are weary and laden and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Now we are free from the condemnation of the law to keep them in order to keep God off our back. Now we keep them because God has first loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Now we love him and we love everything he says. And we love every one of his laws. And the point that I'm making is if you don't love God's law, something is wrong with your relationship to him and your life. Because under the new covenant, he puts his law in the minds of his people. He writes it upon their heart. And their will is to do his will. to conform their life to what he says is right and wrong, but to love him for first loving them. So that Jesus said, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. This is the Christian life. It's not something you study sometimes, and that's good to know. Now you go study the second coming. That's good to know. Everything else is under this. This is it. to be amazed at the grace that God has given us in Christ, that we are justified by faith alone from the condemnation of the law and granted the gift of eternal life and a new heart that is willing to do God's will. Having been saved by grace, the heart of a believer is to say to God, thy will be done. And they look to the law of God to restructure their life after God's culture, not the one they live in. What does God say about loving God? What does God say about loving man? What does God say is right and wrong? What did Jesus look like? What did he think like? And what did he die to do in people like us? The goal of our instruction is love. From a pure heart on which God has written his law. A good conscience where we live in consistency with what God has commanded. And a sincere faith that loves him and loves his law. Well, I have to stop. But this is not the end. This is the heart of the message of the Bible. That God made people in his image to be like him and to live and think like he lives and thinks. We send and rebelled against that plan. And instead of sending us all to hell, which he could. He sent his son to suffer upon the tree for our offenses and bear our sins in his body upon the tree. But not just to take us to heaven, but that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. For by his stripes, we are healed from what we were. And he has made us now people that want to love him and keep his commandments. Is that the way you love God's law? The good thing about the gospel is Jesus said, all who come to me I will in no wise cast out. And if you need to repent of going your own way, of thinking of other things than loving God and keeping his commandments, he will forgive you. Jesus died for that too, ignoring God's law. His grace is amazing. His blood is sufficient. And his spirit is able to take people whose mind has been set on themselves and doing their own will and not caring what God or anybody else thinks to a people who become loving to God and loving their neighbor as themselves. It would change the world if all came to Christ that way. But for us tonight, the question is, are we being changed? And the solution is to go to Christ and bow the knee and say, thy will be done. Let's pray.