THE TORAH

Sermon Summary (9/1017) “The Bible that Jesus Knew: The Torah” (Ge 37:1-4; Ex 20:3; Deut 6:4-5; Lev 19:17-18)

We were starting a new sermon series, “The Bible that Jesus Knew” until I got distracted.  Have you ever been distracted? Started for the garage and ended up in the kitchen?  Here’s the verse that distracted me: “You shall have no other gods before me.”  This is the verse that we violate each and every day.  We place other things before God every day and that’s sin!  And that’s good news!  Stay tuned.

Last week we spoke of Jesus coming along side two disciples on the Road to Emmaus, “And beginning with the Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all of scripture.” (Lk 24:27)  That’s where we were going, the Bible Jesus knew, this week the Law of Moses, the Torah—until I got distracted.

We know many of these stories, the pre-historical creation, the call of Abraham to place him at the crossroads of the world so that his descendants could be a light to the nations, the birth of Isaac, of Jacob, the father of the twelve tribes, the Joseph story.  In Exodus, we find tribes in Egypt where they are slaves. God calls Moses out of a burning bush.  

Then guidelines for living in Exodus and Leviticus.  Here’s where we find Ex 20:3, “You shall have no other gods before me.”  And in Leviticus, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The Bible Jesus knew.

In Numbers they are poised to enter the Promised Land.  Finally, Deuteronomy, Moses’ sermon to prepare them, the second reading of the Law and the prayer that echoes to this day, “Hear O Israel, the Lord your God is One, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”  Where have we heard that?  It’s from the Bible Jesus knew.

But what I was distracted to tell you was “You shall have no other gods before me.” Our universal sin.  But the good news is that we can be forgiven.  We can enter the process of repentance and we can be forgiven.  And we need to enter that process every day.

Other sins come and go.  If we are doing something bad we need to stop, but this sin we need to repent of each day.  We have a God-shaped hole in our hearts and we try to fill it with family, with job, with things.  We put them before God.  All good things.  Not bad things, good things.  But the problem is that we make good things, ultimate things.  Then the next thing is that we create our identity around them, around family, around job, around things.  And when they fail, we fail.  Even worse, we wrap our egos around our identity, we compare.  Soon our families are better than others, our things are better, then we are better, our race is better.  We destroy the fabric of our communities. 

But the good news is we can repent every day.  We can be forgiven!