Lent 3 (Year B) - 19th March 2006
There is a programme on Sky 3 on Monday evenings called Brainiac - History Abuse. This, as the name implies, is a not very serious look at history. One programme recently decided to find out which was the best for jousting - a shopping trolley, a chopper bike, some new kind of wheelie thing or a skateboard. They gave them to a couple of knights with their jousting sticks and stood back to see who was left standing. In case you’re wondering, the shopping trolley was the runaway winner.
Any way, each week they take a look at laws from the past which if they hadn’t been repealed would still be in force today. Things we take for granted are exposed as being illegal in the past. So, following that logic, where would you put the 10 Commandments? Are they still relevant or is it time that they were torn out of the bible and we invented something much more to taste for the 21st century?
The giving of the 10 commandments is set in the wilderness. The Israelite people have made a run for it from the Egyptians, who were treating them very harshly as slaves. Moses pops up and demands that they are set free and send packing. A series of weird events - plagues of frogs, locusts and deaths - and some persistent pestering persuades Pharaoh to let them go. They don’t hang about, not even long enough for the dough to rise in their bread, and make a run for it that night. Unleavened bread has a deep significance with this event and the urgency of liberation. Pharaoh regrets his decision and decides to go after them with his chariots to cut them down. This is an attempted genocide and we’ve seen similar horrors in recent years.
They manage to get across the Sea of Reeds, a better translation than the Red Sea. The area is a Wadi, a particularly dangerous place because water can rush through it like a wall and catch out the unprepared with disastrous consequences. The result is that Pharaoh and his troops perish.
The people carry on wandering, moaning and groaning, trying Moses’ patience all the time. They get quails and Manna to eat and their response is not particularly gracious or thankful. They arrive at Mount Sinai and Moses goes off up the mountain to have a chat with God. They clearly need some kind of order if chaos is not going to reign, as all social groups do. Social cohesion brings responsibilities with the rights. So there has to be some kind of common code.
Did Moses really come down a mountain carrying stone tablets carved by God? I very much doubt it. I don’t think that is how this passage is supposed to be read. What it is is a saga, an ancient way of telling a story that gets the message across. The point to sit up and take notice of is that this list is important and has crucial things to say to us.
We could have a series of sermons on each of the commandments. So this is going to be very brief. The first three: ‘No other gods’; ‘not worshipping idols’; not making wrong use of the name of God’ are about looking to the ultimate and taking that seriously. God is God and we find ourselves truly when we are in a proper relationship with God. Not something that is a pale imitation - be it churchy stuff or material stuff, but a real spirituality that taps into the source of everything that there is. This comes first, because it sets our horizon for everything else.
The Sabbath means that we make space for God. We don’t give God the time that we can’t think of something better to do with. There are 6 days for shopping; there are 6 days for working. If we are really going to give God proper time we will make social space for him. Oh dear. I have a problem here. I work on Sundays, so if I take this one literally… bye, see you later!
But there is a serious point. If we are truly going to honour God, to respect the ultimate, then we need to make space and time for nurturing our faith. I also believe that society needs time off. The 24/7 culture is fundamentally unsustainable and dehumanising. We need a Sabbath day. A question that we have to think through is how we achieve that in a multicultural and cosmopolitan context where our weekend could extend from Friday, through Saturday, to Sunday. Perhaps there needs to be protection for Sabbath observance enshrined in employment law?
Honouring parents is also problematic. Great if you are blessed with loving and caring parents who try their best for you and try hard to set you on firm foundations. Not so hot if they are abusive, manipulative and have generated dysfunctional ways of behaving. Deep down though, even those who have struggled to break free know that there is something not right about that relationship, and in the New Testament parents are told not to drive their children so round the bend that they will hate them! So there is balance. We need to know who we are and where we come from. We need to know our genetic history and make provision for proper care of the vulnerable: young and old. Honouring means not treating with contempt and not driving to distraction; the responsibility is shared here.
We then get a list of moral ways of behaving. Murder breaks the sanctity of life. All are created in the image of God and no one is worthless or to be treated as mattering less or disposable.
Adultery breaks trust in a massively deep way. It destabilises so much. Married relationships are not supposed to be throw away - they are life long and when that breaks down it is serious. The emotional consequences are very deep indeed. When I conduct what are called further marriages, the marriage of people who have been divorced, I recognise this by coming into the church privately with the couple. We acknowledge that vows have been made and not lasted before affirming God’s grace to move on. There is a spiritual dimension that needs acknowledging and this can be a very power moment for the couple.
Steeling threatens security. If you have ever been burgled you will know that there is part of you that always feels vulnerable and violated. When I had my bank card copied just before Christmas it felt like an assault and a very personal act of aggression and hatred from someone I didn’t know and who didn’t know me.
Linked with stealing, just going out of order here, is coveting. This is where we want what someone else has got and are prepared to do anything we can to get it for ourselves. At its most extreme it becomes envy, where we try to destroy it, dog in a manger like - if I can’t have it no one can. The difficulty comes when you don’t have enough to live on and see others throwing away more than you have. So coveting could be linked to a call for justice. Coveting points us to the danger of being consumed by jealousy and injustice; it is the precursor to steeling and possibly even murder. It is the ‘and don’t even think about it’ commandment.
Finally, is the commandment that we break daily. It is about not bearing false witness - malicious gossip to give it another name. This is when we make up what we don’t know or can’t see and think the worst. We treat the person with contempt and don’t think twice about bad mouthing them. It is contagious and there is an industry built on it - it is called journalism. It can destroy self worth and people can be blighted by it for decades. The latest example was the accusation that Tessa Jowell had separated from her husband to save her career - an awful thing to suggest without proof.
So the 10 Commandments have turned out to be more relevant today than we might have thought. Just repeating them parrot fashion doesn’t really get us very far. But living them deeply with their respect for God, their space for God and ourselves, their advocacy of trust and respect for all people, they become life enhancing in amazing and surprising ways.
© Ian Black 2006