You're listening to the teaching ministry of Harvest Fellowship Church in Boyertown, Pennsylvania. You can find out more about us on the web at www.harvestfellowshipchurch.org. We pray that through our teaching, we may present everyone mature in Christ. Father in heaven, thank you for the blessing of your word. the surety and the truth of your word and also the severity that you lovingly bring both conviction and joy to our hearts. Conviction where we know that we fall short but blessing to know that Christ is in us and giving us strength where we cannot do in our own human strength. We pray Lord that as we look to your word that you will give us wisdom and we pray this in the name of Jesus, amen. Teaching 21, we could call it just simply Preserve Life, or if you want a subtitle, From the Womb to the Grave. And of course, last week when Ron taught, we were on the fifth commandment, or the fifth word. And tonight we come to the sixth. It's the shortest. It's only four words. Even the other ones that come after it have the words and, so there's one that has five words, but this one has four. We'll get to that in a second. 17. But I want to begin tonight, as we consider commandment number six, by going to the beginning. Because this commandment has everything to do with life. And so we start, of course, with the creation, or we could say the foundation, of human life. And where do we find that? More specifically? Genesis 1. And of course, also Genesis 2. But why don't you turn to Genesis 1? It's good to frequently read foundational passages of God's Word. And we actually, as a family, had just recently started Genesis. Genesis 1, 26. This is the apex of creation here. Then God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God. He created him, male and female. He created them. It's quite a significant thing, and it's hard for us really to even grasp the absolute perfection of mankind in this moment. But when you get to chapter two, you kind of see a different view of creation, but man's not being created again. if you look in chapter 2 verse 7 it says, And there we see We could say the animation of mankind or the vivification. But he's formed from dust, but he has given life. He has breathed life into him. And of course, there's a great parallel or a great picture of them when you get to that statement with Jesus and Nicodemus. Unless a man is born again, unless he has spiritual life breathed into his soul by the spirit of God, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And then this is sort of prefaced here. So we see this creation or foundation of human life. Of course, it's divine. Man has nothing to do with this. And he is made in the image of God. And we've talked about that many times, the imago Dei. And so we're going to consider, we're going to keep that in our minds as we now look at these four words in Deuteronomy 517, which says, you shall not murder. You shall not murder. And of course, as I said, this is the Sixth Commandment. And very succinctly or basically, we could say that the Sixth Commandment prohibits taking innocent human life. But of course, there's a lot of context that we need to put around this. Now, where do we see the first, this is not really the first time we find in Scripture the prohibition, and I'm not thinking of Exodus, but we've already seen in Scripture before the Ten Commandments that God places a very high value on life. Where is that? Yes. Well, yeah, but he doesn't make any explicit statements about it there. Not the midwives. Yes? Genesis after Noah. Correct. Well, not after Noah. Noah's still alive. After the flood in chapter 9, and we see God placing a premium upon human life for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning this is after he told him they can't eat the blood but he says your lifeblood I will require a reckoning from every beast I will require it and from man from his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man whoever Sheds the blood of man by man shall his blood be shed for God made man in his own image So he makes it very explicit there that in this sort of recreated world, post-flood, that man is not to murder. It's not that this is new. Of course, Cain knew that it was wrong to murder. But here it's explicitly declared, and of course it was explicitly declared at Sinai, to the original, to the first generation in Exodus 20. And then we saw even in Exodus 21, well we didn't see it, but I know you know that it's there. Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death, that's Exodus 21, 12. Leviticus, which you probably got into chapter 24, since I know you've all been reading it this week. Whoever takes a human life shall surely be put to death, Leviticus 24, 17. And then we're going to get to this in a couple of years, but Deuteronomy 27, verses 24 and 25. And this is when God gives them all the things that they will be cursed for. There's two here. Cursed be anyone who strikes down his neighbor in secret, and all the people shall say amen. Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood, and all the people shall say amen. So my point is that we keep seeing over and over in scripture the re-emphasis here by God of the very high importance that he places upon human life. What story in the New Testament is told in, I believe, all three of the Synoptic Gospels, where Jesus quotes the Ten Commandments. Yes, Janet? Yeah. What happens, or who does Jesus interact with? Yes? Yes. Yes, the young man. And so I have Matthew 19. And remember, he calls him good. And Jesus said to him in Matthew 19, 18, why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments, he said to him, which ones? Jesus doesn't give him all the ceremonial things here. He says, you shall not murder. He goes right to this love for neighbor. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and mother. It's interesting how that comes at the end there. And summatively here, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. And we can derive then, not just from these four words, but from all of scripture, that human life is a gift from God. And not only is it a gift from God, but it belongs to God. The life that God gives you belongs to him, and the implication is that no human has the right to destroy the gift or to steal what belongs to God. And so the essence of it is, is when you violate this commandment, when you break this commandment, commandment number six, it's as if to attack God himself. Now think about this commandment though from the covenant perspective. Remember we've talked a lot about covenant. And this sixth commandment here is meant particularly for these people to protect them in this covenant community that they live in. It's to protect them from any danger. at the hands of even fellow covenant members, fellow community members, and that will enable them to experience something, and that's the blessing of God. What is the blessing that God has promised to them if they obey Him? It's long life in the promised land. And obviously, to murder somebody would cut short that blessing. Since each individual Israelite is bound to the Lord in covenant, their life lies in God's hands, God alone, is the one then who has the right to terminate life. So murder is to take away that which God has given and that which God alone can give, which is life itself. And so when we think about murder from that perspective, and it's a wicked sin, we can see that there's massive consequences to this sin. We could call it a perversion of divine justice. Now, I'm gonna be looking for some feedback from you. I want you to think about some explicit Six Commandment violators in the Bible. I have a list of, I don't know, maybe like 15 here. I'm gonna see if you can get them, or maybe you can even think of some that I don't have on the list here. So who are people who blatantly, and I realize we haven't put all the, Parameters around this commandment yet, but who blatantly violated commandments six yes, man When You know I spent a lot of time thinking about that today, and I'm still I'm still undecided honestly about whether that was Righteous or unrighteous the interesting thing is is when you get to that's in Exodus 2 and and you get to Exodus 3, and he never receives any type of verbal condemnation from God. And even, you know, that phrase where it says he looked to and fro, some people see that as like a premeditation, and other people just see it as an impulsive, righteous anger correcting a wrong. So, I don't know on that one. Robert. No, you'll give me one. Okay, yeah, he's on the list Saul said who will kill the the priests until I said I will I will murder them and he did and it was a lot Gary Yes You get a 50% if you don't know his name No. Close. Naboth. Yes. Naboth's Vineyard. Although I think we could lump Ahab in with that. Yes, Judith? Cain. Cain. And he murdered? Abel. OK. Olivia? Absalom. And who did he murder? Amnon. Yes. That was his half-brother, Amnon. Did I see your hand up? Judas, okay. I thought I had him on here. Yes, he is on here, yes. So yes, self-murder, which we're going to talk about. Who else in the Bible committed self-murder? Well, Saul sort of. There's debate about whether or not Saul killed himself or his armor bearer did. Well, he tripped. Yes. Yes. Well, she's directly answering the question that I asked. Did anybody else know that? Ahithophel? Right. Yeah. So he, he did not receive, well, David didn't take it. Absalom didn't take it. So he went, he set his house in order. He at least did the honorable thing. He cleaned up his house and then he hung himself. All right. Who else? Yes. Okay. Who did he kill? Right. Yes. Yes. Well, not technically her. We would attribute it to somebody else. Herod. And who did Herod kill? John the Baptist. All right, Robert. Two more. No, one, just one. David and Uriah the Hittite. OK. And again, and we'll talk about that type, because I'm going to give you 12 types of murders at the end. But yes, Uriah the Hittite. Uriah, yeah. Yes. The Pharisees. Killed. Jesus. OK. Does that count if you fight for somebody's murder? It's not them actually doing the murder. What did Peter tell him in Acts 2? He says, you killed him. Yes? Saul? Who did Saul kill? Saul before he came to Paul, and he killed lots of Christians in Acts. Oh, that's Saul. I didn't have him on the list. But he does come up in the 12 types of murders. I have an obscure one. Let's see it. Abner and Joab. Joab when he deceived Abner and then he killed him right there. You should start with the person who murdered. Joab murdered Abner. Yes. It's OK. How about pretty early in Genesis, do you remember the bold declaration by Lamech? Cain killed one, I have killed two. Or if you remember early on in Judges, remember the man named Abimelech who killed his 70 brothers? And there's probably some debate over this, although if you just take the literal reading of Jephthah fulfilling his vow, Jephthah's daughter, and then King Saul. Do you remember who was King Saul responsible for murdering? I'll give you a hint, it resulted in his sons dying. And the context was from the days of Joshua. Remember Joshua entered into a covenant with the deceptive Gibeonites and Saul broke that covenant and then God judged Israel, and David found out that it had to do with Saul, and so that's when seven of Saul's sons were killed, but it did not include Nephibosheth. Another murderer of infants, Herod the Great. So we've got the Bible starting in the Old Testament with Pharaoh doing that, and then Herod the Great in the New Testament doing that. Yes? Yes, I didn't have that, but you're right. We could also include with the Pharisees or the chief priests and also Pilate's soldiers, so the Roman soldiers who did also crucify Jesus, the Jews who physically stoned Stephen, and then the murderer who was let go, Barabbas, remember that? He was described as being a murderer. There's an obscure one for you, Bob. Ishmael, not Abraham's first son. Ishmael in Jeremiah 41 murdered a man named Gedaliah. And if you could, yes? They're in the debatable category as well. Because if you look at what Jacob, Jacob is angry with them because of what could happen from it. It doesn't seem to condemn them for actually taking an eye for an eye, so to speak. Yes, Levi and Simeon. Gary. He was angry with them, but then you're also going to have to make sense of why God gives such a prominent role to Levi to be the priest. Another obscure one, Zimri of the northern kingdom in 1 Kings 16, he murders his predecessor, Elah. And then one that came to my mind late, and I was wondering if you would get. He's described by Jesus in John 8. Yes. Yes. And how did he describe him? A murderer from the beginning. And as Thomas Watson wrote, he said that Satan envied our first parents robes of innocence and the glory of paradise and could not rest until he had procured their death. And of course, as soon as he was able to successfully get them to succumb to temptation, they brought about theirs and our death. All right, so let's look at this. Just think about this word murder here, murder to kill. And it is a good thing, I think, in our more modern translations that they give us the word murder instead of just kill. murder is more precise, to strike down, to slay human life, or we could use this word to refer to the deliberate killing, so this is not an accidental killing, there's a word for accidental killing, this is the deliberate killing of a human being by another human being, or by other human beings, and it does not refer to a judicial setting or a military setting. And this type of killing, or this type of striking down of human life, is something that the conscience knows to be wicked, because the Lord writes that upon the hearts of every one of His creatures. This is something that comes from evil human intentions, and as we'll see in the coming weeks, quite often it relates to violations of Commandments 7, 8, 9, and 10. How often are people murdered over adultery? or over stealing things, or anything like that. So it's quite often. What type of emotions might fuel people to murder? Jealousy. Jealousy. Anger. Greed. Anger. Greed. Hatred. Hatred. Pride. Pride. Revenge. Revenge. Rage. Lust. Self-preservation. How about even being embarrassed? People are like, you're not going to slander me like that. Rebellion? And ultimately, it all boils down to one thing, is that there is no fear of God. Because we talked about God's the one who gives life. And when the person does this, they believe that it's OK to take something that God has given. And people who participate in this type of lifestyle, the psalmist talks about in Psalm 55, 23. He says, but you, O God, will cast them down into the pit of destruction. Men of blood and treachery shall not live out half their days, but I will trust in you. And of course, it's often said of the guys in the wild, wild west, if you were a gunslinger, He didn't live very long. It didn't matter how fast you were, because there was always going to come along somebody faster or somebody who was just going to shoot you in the back of the head. But as we think about a few of the other categories that this doesn't include, we do see and we will see, I believe, later in Deuteronomy as well, that there is such a thing as unintentional murder. And God establishes cities of refuge. Now the one thing to remember, I was thinking about this today, is that these cities of refuge was not a guarantee that you were innocent. It just meant that you were going to get a trial and you weren't going to be hunted down by a posse and killed in your house, but you still very well may be guilty of murder and then punished. But unintentional murder and all sorts of examples that God gives are why there was going to be these six cities of refuge spread out all throughout the promised land. This command here also does not prohibit self-defense. And I put on here Exodus 22.2 for that. I didn't write it out. Exodus 22.2. If a thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no blood guilt for him. So God was the one who established castle doctrine. I think that's what it's called, right? Stand your ground. So there's times when that you need to protect your life in a sense, and you may need to use enough force to take another person's life to protect, or maybe to protect somebody else's life. And of course, this command here to not murder does not supersede what we talked about in Genesis 9, capital punishment, or what we would call just wars, wars that God would approve of. Now, that can get a little bit more complicated and even debatable about what constitutes a just war versus an unjust war, but basically, One thing you can say for sure, a just war, a defiant just war would be something that would go hand in hand with self-defense. Somebody is attacking your country. You are very well within your means from God to protect yourselves. But let's think about then some justifiable homicides, or we could say non-violators of Commandment 6 in the Bible. Yes? Yes Yes, yes What about vigilante stuff Are you giving me are you No, no. I'm looking for examples of justifiable homicides in the Bible. Yes. We can't, we can't. Right here. Yes. Okay. Simeon and Levi. And I did have them down here under justifiable homicides. Um, and we're going to talk about that in a little bit as well. The, uh, the concept of what is it called? Lex talionis. Lex talionis. What else? Janet? OK. Yeah. Reprobates. That God that God had told them to kill because they would destroy their way of life and cause them to turn after their gods. What else? Yes. Who did he kill? Eglon. So E and E. Yeah, but I'm looking for specific names. Very good. Yes. That was mentioned. Levi and Simeon. Were they just? I think they were. But they killed the man and his family. They didn't just... That's who they killed, right? Yeah. That's why it becomes debatable. You said that was justified. Levi and Simeon? I think it was justified to kill Shechem. I think once you get beyond the scope, then it's... Yeah, Susan. He had a name. And it was so commendable that God made a covenant with him. I think it was a covenant of salt. But his name was Phineas. Really bonus points if you know who he killed. Yeah, and there was a name that was given to the female, but I don't know if that's in the Bible or if that's sort of just Jewish tradition. You know the name? Oh, then don't have your hand raised. The man's name was Zimri. Yes. OK, go ahead. Yes, David and Goliath. Elijah and the 450 prophets at Mount Carmel, and maybe one that we don't think about quite often, but I believe this was when Josiah becomes king, that Jehoiada, the older priest, they took out Athaliah, and they killed her. And we have a very good example in the Bible, I think, of self-defense, and you had mentioned his name before, Baba Abner. when Joab's younger brother Asahel comes after him, he says, don't come after me, don't come after me, and he keeps coming, and so he kills him in self-defense, and of course that enraged Joab. So there are examples, obviously then, in the Bible of justifiable homicides, we could say non-violators of the Sixth Commandment. But as we think a little bit more about this law, we could add a few things on. that it condemns every act that endangers human life. And boy, doesn't that happen a lot in society. And that could be things that arise from carelessness. This is why when we get to Deuteronomy 22, we'll see the law about if you have a, if you have sort of like a, a second floor on your, you're going to have like a porch and people out there, you put a parapet around so that people don't fall off and die. Because you're responsible for that if they fall off and die. You're in violation of this command. Or even in Leviticus 19, it talks about putting a stumbling block before the blind, which is, in a sense, a violation of this law. And just a couple of verses after that, in Leviticus 19.17, it talks about how you may not have in your heart hatred for your neighbor. You may not have anger or revenge. It says that you are to reason frankly with your neighbor. And then, of course, right after that is what Jesus quotes, that you shall love your neighbor as yourself. But let's think then a little bit more deeply because, you know, we love rule keeping in a sense that we can just meet the letter of the law. I think our hearts are not often far from the Pharisees at times that Jesus had to explain the heart of the law, not necessarily the letter. But what is always bound up with intentional premeditated murder is hate. And I have to use this word here, because I never heard this word before. And this came from the one resource I was looking at. It says, murder is irrefragably bound up with hate. And yes, I had to go look up what the word irrefragable meant. And I'm not going to tell you, but you could probably figure it out. Has anybody heard that word before? It means it's not fragmented. That wasn't quite the definition, but. Indisputable. Yes, indisputable. But I like the word irrefragable. So there's hatred that's bound up with a type of intentional murder, a premeditated murder. And of course, today, that sense of it is often mankind tries to judge something. Oh, that was a hate crime. But mankind can't do that. Why? Because we can't judge the hearts. But even though we can't judge the hearts, God can. And God will. So God judges hatred, and that was what Jesus brings out in the Sermon on the Mount. In Matthew 5, verse 21, He says, You have heard, you know this, that it was said of old, You shall not murder. So He's reminding them of this law, and they're all thinking in their minds, check, I've never done this. And He says, And whoever murders will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, the same kind of judgment, the same wrath of God. Whoever insults his brother will be liable to the counsel, the divine counsel, and whoever says, you fool, will be liable to the hell of fire. And of course, we talked about that in great detail when we went through the Sermon on the Mount, but it really revealed the heart of God's law, is that where do these things come from? Where does this desire to take away life? It comes from hatred in the heart. And John follows that up in 1 John 3.15. He says, everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. And he goes on to say, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. He's not calling it an unpardonable sin, but he's talking about what's going on in the heart that would desire to do something so heinous. Give me some examples of people who were consumed with hatred in the Bible. Yes? And? And who else? Saul and his own son. He tried to pin him against the wall with a spear. Yes. Obviously, he was more consumed with his hatred for David. But once he found out that Jonathan supported David, he cursed him and tried to kill him. So he had a lot of hatred in him. Who else? Yes. Yes. Against the Christians. Foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog. Yes. Yes, I have them on the list here. Because they were hating him long before they were able to murder him in what they thought was their plan. How about in the book of Esther? He couldn't think straight because he was so hating Mordecai. Or as we saw near the end of Acts, remember those 40 Jews who took an oath that they would not eat or drink until Paul was dead? That comes from hatred. Jezebel, she wants to kill Elijah. I think there's some hatred going on there. They keep coming up. Yeah, I think there was a little bit of hatred going on when they said to their father, should he treat our sister like a prostitute? And that was the final word. But when you think about those brothers, though, probably more prolifically, how about Joseph's brothers toward him? They could not speak peaceably to him because they were filled with so much jealousy and hatred. And before that, yes? Yes, before that Esau causes Jacob to run for his life because he's filled with hatred to the point of where he promises murder. The Israelites became filled with so much hatred that they were ready to stone Moses to death. And then also Amnon. Amnon's so-called love toward his half-sister Tamar turned into an exceeding hatred for her. And so there is this sense of hatred, and that may be less foreign to us than the idea of physically murdering somebody, is this sense of being able to have hatred in your heart. And of course, we have modern-day examples, the Hatfields and McCoys, the never-ending feuds that go on between people that are fueled by hatred, and God calls that murder, murder of the heart. Now let's think more about this sense of from the womb to the grave. We've already said this, that human life belongs to God because he's the creator. And when you take human life anywhere, you're stealing God's property, God's valuable, we could say most valuable property, because man is the pinnacle of creation. And what has God endowed man with? He's endowed him uniquely with returning praise to God. Everyone who does not assemble in gathered worship on a regular basis is rejecting the purpose that God has made them for. He could not have clothed man with any higher dignity. And so we need to think about that as we think about man and his life, the life that's within mankind, his original dignity. Of course, he fell. in his dignity, but his original dignity as a creature of God, and quite wonderfully, our restoration to God in Christ. And when we look at those elements of mankind properly, then there's things to avoid, and there's two extremes, and one would be self-exaltation, which is pride, but the other one is self-abasement, Or at times even we could use the word depression. So, self-deification or depression, and those are two extremes to avoid. And even more pointedly, and we don't like to think about this, is that no Christian should be living in slavery to any vice that would bring about their sooner death. So we have an obligation before God with the bodies, with the lives that he's given to us, to not intentionally do things to our body that will shorten our life. On the contrary, every Christian should seek to preserve their body and, even more significantly, as Paul says, their soul. Remember, he says bodily exercise profits a little, so there is some profit to that. but that there's greater profit in nurturing and protecting our souls. And so it is with this love that we are to express for neighbors, which Paul says should be as great as the love that we have for ourselves, we ought to be respecting, preserving, and developing our neighbor's life. And we just have to think of that same question as the lawyer said, and who is my neighbor? And we know the answer to that. But as you think of that preserving life, then who specifically does that obligation fall upon in society is the magistrates. So the leaders, according to preserve life or to execute life, according to the capital punishment that God establishes in Genesis 9. And that's where we get that idea of lex talionis, or you could just think of the phrase an eye for an eye. You see that all throughout the law. If your ox gores something, there's going to be some type of recompense. All sorts of that, but that is most vividly displayed in Genesis 9. If you shed mankind's blood, if you violate Deuteronomy, the sixth commandment, then your blood is to be shed by organized society. Not by random people, but by organized society. So this idea then of capital punishment does not violate the Sixth Commandment, and it's also not inhumane or cruel. And of course, that is one of the downsides to not executing speedily. What do we often see? We see people who are in prison for 30, 40 years, and there gets to be quite a following by people after them, and they think, oh, look at this person has been changed, and shouldn't we just show them mercy? But that's not the just recompense that God calls for. It is to be life for life. Now, mankind's necessary refusal to take the life of another human being then, of course, includes the unborn, which is very important. I was reading something called the Apostolic Constitutions, which is roughly around like 8300 in the Syrian Antioch area. And they wrote, or they warned, thou shalt not slay the child by causing abortion, nor kill that which is begotten for everything that is shaped and has received a soul from God. If it be slain, shall be avenged as being unjustly destroyed. So the abolitionist movement is not new in our day and age. God's people have always You go back to the midwives in Exodus, there's always been a care and a concern because people understood this principle that even the unborn have a tremendous value of their life as well. And in the consideration of that then, these magistrates or these governors that God does appoint, according to Romans 13, that he will hold them responsible for whether or not they did what he appointed them to do. Did they promote good and did they punish the evildoers? And so we have to, in a sense, we have to obey God in that capacity. So it is not for us then to take matters into our own hands. And of course, people do that sometimes. They want to go do things like blow up an abortion clinic or anything that they feel like that is suddenly OK for them to, in a sense, violate the Sixth Commandment here. But that doesn't mean that we sit on our hands, though, either. So we should do everything that we can do to promote life, to defend the preservation of life and everything that is within our power, and even calling our magistrates to exercise what God has commanded them to do. But that's on the beginning part of life. This command also includes the aged and infirmed, and that is also something prevalent in our societies. There's no such thing, according to God, as compassionate euthanasia. There's no such thing as God approving of assisted suicide, because that is the intentional killing of an image bearer. Life is the basis of our human existence. It's also the reflection of God's image. And so killing a fellow image bearer is condemned, but so is self-murder or suicide. And that means that even asking God to kill you is sin. Who did that in the Bible? Elijah. He said, it is enough. Take me now, as if it was his decision. Who else? Jonah. Yes, Jonah. And also Job. You know, Job did reach a frustration level, too. But to ask God to take your life as sin, but consider this as well, and we live in a world thrill-seekers to intentionally place yourself into unnecessary danger is also treading perilously close to violating something like this. Even the sense of what the devil tempts Jesus, or tries to tempt Jesus to do. Throw yourself off of this. And we see a lot of people in today's society, they want to do things that are very foolhardy for the thrill of things. And a lot of them die in untimely deaths. And just for a trivia question here, do you know what the word is for the killing of your parent or parents? There's a word for it. What is that? I saw it as parasite, but unless they Maybe they missed the R turning into a T. So maybe parasite includes both. I don't know. But think about there are people who can be going through very difficult medical conditions. They may have been given a terminal diagnosis. And so these things weigh heavier upon them as the world tries to offer them what seems to be a solution, whether it's some type of euthanasia, but God is this unique giver of life at conception, and only he is free to remove it at death, not us. And if you go back to the early church, this is what the early church rejoiced in. They rejoiced that the keys of death were not in the hands of Rome, not in the people who wanted to execute them, but they rejoiced that they were in the hands of Jesus Christ. And they believed very wholeheartedly that they would not pass from this world into eternity until that moment that God had set for them. And of course, that is, throughout the centuries, what all Christians have rejoiced in that same certainty. And so it should be. And it's not easy, but it should be that when life circumstances become most difficult that we look with even greater trust to God. Hold on Bob, we've got to get through this here. Final considerations here. This law here by God, these four words, it forbids, and we talked about this in James, it forbids a lack of charity to those who are helpless and distressed. If you have the power and the means to save the life of another person, and maybe that's through giving them food or clothing or some type of sustenance, and you don't do it, in the sight of God, that is murder. We just saw them on Sunday. What does James call them in point number four? He says, you murderers. You defrauded these people and they're dying. You weren't necessarily pulling a trigger, but you defrauded them and maybe they starved to death or maybe they froze to death. Or the picture of sitting there at the side of a pool and watching somebody drown. I can't help them. Whereas this one commentator said, sending a ship out that's half manned and overloaded is really, he says, as a red-handed murderer. I'm going to give you these 12 ways that we murder. This came from Thomas Watson. So here they are. He says, we murder with the hand. That's probably the thing we think of the most. He says, we can murder with the mind. And that's really where hatred comes in. We can murder with the tongue. And he said we can murder with the pen. Of course, David fits that category. David murdered with the pen with the letter that he sends to Jeb saying, put Uriah right at the front of the battle. You can murder by plotting another person's death, even if you don't actively participate in it. You can murder by poison. I saw this, it was a short video of this wife bringing a cup of coffee to her husband, and I guess they had had a fight, and he told her he was sorry, and they kind of reconciled, and he went to drink the coffee, and she took it away from him, and she said, I'll bring you another cup. Poison. Witchcraft and sorcery. And then he even listed the idea of just the intention to kill, even if it doesn't come to fruition. And the example that he gave is, if you remember, Herod sends the Magi, and he says, when you find him, come back, because I want to go worship him. But he said that because he wanted to kill him. Number nine is consenting to another person's death. And that's where Saul, who becomes Paul, that's where he fits that category. It says Saul was consenting to Stephen's death. Number 10 is by not preventing a death that is within our power to stop. And how often do we see that now? People taking videos with their phones, and they're in the power to do what is right. By unmercifulness is number 11. And number 12 kind of hit me a little bit too, because we've been seeing this a lot. But the magistrate or the judge who does not execute capital punishment upon a capital offender, and then that person goes out and offends again, that culpability is upon that judge, that judicial leader who did not execute capital punishment as they should have. But as we think of this, we should think of how guilty we are before God with just this commandment. And then it should cause us to rejoice at how great God's mercy is to us in Jesus Christ. And you get to Revelation 21 and it talks about all those who do not inherit and listed in there are the murderers. Every single person in this room is a murderer. How great is the mercy of God for Christ to take that punishment of sin for our murder on the cross. But those who fail to repent, those who fail to trust in Jesus, in a sense, you could say, are murdering their own souls. And as we bask in that forgiveness, that story in Matthew 18 about the unmerciful servant. We don't want to be the unmerciful servant. We want to love our fellow man. And so what does that involve? That involves accepting that person as a fellow creature of God. If we murder them in any sense of the way, we are ignoring their created nature. We're ignoring their worth in the sight of God. And we are eliminating them for purely personal reasons. And again, we don't stop at that line of the negative prohibition. That's what jumps out at us. Do not murder. I'll just not do that. But we want to positively obey this rule. So we want to do it to the fullest extent. We don't want to injure another person's soul. We don't want to corrupt another person's soul through bad examples. We don't want to entice them to sin. We don't want to introduce them to bad company. So we see then, this is our final verse in Romans 13, where again the law is quoted, but Paul says in verse 8, O no one anything except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. For the commandments, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, and any other commandment are summed up in this word. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law. Now, of course, what Paul's saying there does not only apply to murder. These verses can be applied to every one of the coming laws, that it is with adultery, stealing, and coveting, and lying. None of those things are loving our neighbor. And it is hard at times. But the Lord gives us strength. The Lord reminds us of the hatred that we had toward him and how he removes that hatred and fills it with love. We see that in 1 John, that God's people have love one for another. By this you know that you have eternal life, that you have love for one another. And it's a supernatural love. because it takes and brings together people of all different classes and ethnicities, and it breaks down the barriers that nothing in this world can break down except for the mutual footing that we have at the cross of Jesus Christ. Four words to think about. but so many implications, and of course, many other scenarios and contexts that we couldn't pull into just one teaching. Those are good things to think about, or if you have questions to ask later, please do. But thank you for being here tonight, and we will close in a word of prayer. Father in heaven, we thank you for this night, and I thank you, Lord, for your word. I thank you how clear you are of the demands that you have for us, how good it is for us to see the perfect righteousness of Christ. And even where Adam one fails and his very firstborn son becomes a murderer, the true and greater Adam perfectly fulfills this law. And so what a joy to know that you owe Jesus, that you absorb the wrath of God that was purposed for our murdering, and that through your positive righteousness that is given to us in the great exchange, that we stand before you righteous, that we stand before you as non-never murderers because of your righteousness. As we consider that, O Lord, and as we go our way, let that propel our hearts to do good unto all the men, especially those who are of the household of faith. Bind our hearts, O Spirit of God, in true love toward one another, we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.