Opening Prayer
Last Week
What was valuable, or what stuck with you from last week?
13:8-10
Do not owe anyone anything, except to love one another, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, Do not commit adultery; do not murder; do not steal; do not covet; and any other commandment, are summed up by this commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself. 10 Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Love, therefore, is the fulfillment of the law.
These are the last two usages of the word “law” in Romans.
It is significant that they are tied to love.
When Paul
speaks of law here, it is not a generic law – it is the Ten Commandments, which
sum up God’s natural order.
When Paul speaks of love here, it is the specific love – agape – which desires God’s blessings upon others and for them to know His love and peace (shalom)
Reminder: Review your Catechism!
Why?
The Commandments teach us what love looks like.
Deuteronomy 6:4-9 – “Listen,
Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. 5 Love
the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with
all your strength. 6 These words that I am giving
you today are to be in your heart. 7 Repeat them to
your children. Talk about them when you sit in your house and when you
walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Bind
them as a sign on your hand and let them be a symbol on your
forehead. 9 Write them on the doorposts of your
house and on your city gates.
Leviticus 19:17-18 – “Do
not harbor hatred against your brother. Rebuke your neighbor directly, and
you will not incur guilt because of him. 18 Do not
take revenge or bear a grudge against members of your community, but love
your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.
Matthew 22:37-40 – When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they came together. 35 And one of them, an expert in the law, asked a question to test him: 36 “Teacher, which command in the law is the greatest?” 37 He said to him, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. 38 This is the greatest and most important command. 39 The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. 40 All the Law and the Prophets depend on these two commands.”
The Catechism helps us to articulate what love does regarding
each Commandment through the following pattern.
Each roots
in the First Commandment – “We should fear and love God …”
Most[1]
turn to expressing the prohibition – “We should fear and love God so that we
would not …”
Then to the Commandment’s requirement with the simple preposition – “… , but …”
In this way the explanation places before us two truths:
1 – That we
love God by keeping His Commandments.[2]
2 – That we
love our neighbors by keeping these Commandments as well.
[1]
The Sixth Commandment is the exception as the explanation stays on the positive
requirements of the command, “You shall not commit adultery.” What does this
mean? We should fear and love God so that we lead a sexually pure and
decent life in what we say and do, and husband and wife love and honor each
other.
[2]
Jesus affirms the Commandments continue to operate in our lives in multiple
places. Here are two: Matthew 5:18, Mark 10:17-19.
Comments