Courtney Gilmore How do you feel about rules? Do you tend to be a rule follower or a rule breaker? Do rules make you feel comfortable and give you structure or do they feel burdensome or restrictive? Are you more apt to obey when you trust the person making the rules or you understand the reason behind them? Or, maybe you like making the rules but you don’t really like to follow them. Maybe you like to virtue signal and hold the rules over everyone’s head but it’s really all just for appearance.
When God gave the people the Ten Commandments, He told them that obeying them would be to their benefit. They would give them wisdom and understanding like no other nation and they would be blessed in the new land. By following His rules, they would be His witnesses to everyone around them.
Because His rules were so important, there would be consequences for the disobedient. He warned them to follow every single one and not just the ones they wanted to. He also warned them not to add their own rules to His, reasoning that they had a few good ideas too.
The Ten Commandments
Listen to the statutes and the rules that I am teaching you. Do them, that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, is giving you. You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it. For that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples. When they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’
Deuteronomy 4:1-2
For Wisdom and Understanding
Because God is the Creator of everything, this life works best when it is lived according to His rules and ways. We will be wise and have understanding when we obey Him.
To know wisdom and instruction and understand words of insight; to receive instruction in wise dealing, in righteousness, justice, and equity; give prudence to the simple, knowledge and discretion to the youth. Let the wise hear and increase in learning, and the one who understands obtain guidance, to understand a proverb and a saying in the words of the wise and their riddles. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, foods despise wisdom and understanding.
Proverbs 1:2-7
We Are His Witnesses
Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes will say, “Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.” For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon Him? What great nation is there, that has statures and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today?
Deuteronomy 4:7-8
When we obey Him, the rest of the world will see our lives and wonder what we have that they don’t. Then we will be able to tell them about our God.
In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.
Matthew 5:16
Light reflects and reveals. So we are supposed to reflect God’s ways to the world and reveal Him to them.
His Rules Are Important
God proclaimed the Ten Commandments from the mountaintop, wrote them down, then put them away for safe keeping in the most sacred place of His sanctuary. He could have just given these rules to Moses to relay to the people but He needed them to know how important they were. So, He delivered them Himself.
These words the Lord spoke to all your assembly out of the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick darkness, with a loud voice.
Deuteronomy 5:22
This was such a terrifying experience that the people were afraid if they heard the voice of the Lord any longer, the fire would come out and consume them and they would die.
Now when all the people saw the thunder and the flashes of lightning and the sound of the trumpet and the mountain smoking, the people were afraid and trembled, and they stood far off and said to Moses, “You speak to us, and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us, lest we die.”
Exodus 20:18-19
This is the reason God delivered them that way in the first place. He wanted the people to know how important they were and fear what would happen if they disobeyed Him.
The Lord said to me (Moses), ‘I have heard the words of this people, which they have spoken to you. They are right in all that they have spoken. Oh that they had such a heart as this always, to fear me and to keep all my commandments, that it might go well with them and with their descendants forever!
Deuteronomy 5:28-29
We Obey Out of Fear
So one reason we obey God is because we fear His wrath if we don’t. A father disciplines the children he loves.
“My son, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor be weary when reproved by him. For the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and chastises every son whom he receives.” It is for discipline that you have to endure. God is treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father does not discipline? If you are left without discipline, in which all have participated, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.
Besides this, we have had earthly fathers who disciplined us and we respected them. Shall we not much more be subject to the Father of spirits and live? For they disciplined us for a short time as it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.
Hebrews 12:6-11
Do Not Add or Take Away
Moses also warned them to follow God’s words exactly. They couldn’t pick and choose which ones they wanted to obey and they also didn’t need to add any others to them out of their own wisdom. Adding rules would only make them burdensome to the people and they would miss the intent completely. The rules were for their good and were not meant to be burdensome to them. The Pharisees were guilty of both of these.
They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on the people’s shoulders… They do all their deeds to be seen by others.
Matthew 23:4-5
They were the ultimate virtue signalers. They made extra rules and then when they followed them they looked good. But they held them over everyone else’s head and it made them a burden instead of a blessing.
Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others.
Matthew 23:23
They chose to obey the things that were easy for them but in making their lists, and checking them off, they forgot the intent behind them completely. The purpose of God’s laws was to make them wise, fair, merciful, and faithful. Instead, they made them self-righteous, harsh, and legalistic.
So, as this new year begins, seek to know and follow God’s laws so that you will be wise witnesses. Receive them as blessing and not burdens and place them on others in the same way. Don’t do good to look good but because you love your Creator and you trust Him.
Excerpt from Episode 101 “The Beneficial Wisdom of God” on Podcast and YouTube
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