A Complicated Commandment

Berean Baptist on November 5, 2018

Exodus 20:12

The fifth commandment may be the least understood of God’s Ten Commandments. It seems direct without much room for interpretation—simply do this—respect your father and mother. However, the commandment is much deeper than appears on the surface. A careful study of its placement as the hinge-pin connecting the first and second divisions of the law reveals the mystery of its complexity.

God is the father of all life which provides the strongest argument for the insistence of obedience to all the commandments, especially the first four which are revelations of His transcendence. Respect is due Him as He is God alone and worshipping Him because of His divine favor in granting us life flows from this. Providential wisdom juxtaposed these thoughts to the commandment to honor our parents who are secondarily responsible for giving us life. These two spheres are linked in the fifth commandment which produces a perpetual duty to respect the highest authorities in both spheres of influence.

Secondly, the commandment stands at the head of all human relationships. The next four commandments proceed with directions for the treatment of our fellow man. Thus, as Ezekiel Hopkins describes, we have the basis for handling all spheres of influence, that is the relationship to those in authority, the relationship of those in authority to their inferiors, and the lateral relationships of those who are our equals. The fifth commandment reflects the first sphere, namely, how do we respond to those in authority?

The command is more complex than imagined because it encompasses all authorities, not just the authority of parents. The scope is broad starting with God who gave the commandment, down to every relationship of every kind in which others are placed over us in the societal order. The command is difficult because of our natural resistance to authority. This begins with the resistance of man against God, as men do not like to retain God in their knowledge (Rom. 1:28). The rejection of God filters down into reluctant submission to all authorities. For this reason, children must be trained to respect their parents. If we fail here in the second greatest level of authority, there is no hope for the final commandments to be obeyed.

The fifth commandment produces an explosion of theological implications making the exposition of it a journey into some of the most important doctrinal concepts in scripture. This short list of statements caused Jesus to preach His most important sermon, the Sermon on the Mount, which relates the law of the Kingdom to the hope of eternal life.

We need to take time with this commandment as its concepts are woven throughout many Bible passages. Thomas Watson wrote, “By the first table, we walk religiously toward God; by the second, we walk religiously toward man. He cannot be good in the first table that is bad in the second.” This tells us there is no way to rest secure because we are through with the severity of judgment for our disobedience to the first table. The way becomes harder because of 1 John 4:20: “…he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?” Perhaps you thought you could escape extreme scrutiny because God is invisible leading us to subconsciously believe no one really knows if our heart is right towards Him. Oh, no—the image of God is in the person you curse and treat badly. The recesses of your heart are cracked open and made visible each day in regards to your treatment of every human being. Learn these complications or miss obedience to all the commandments.

 

Pastor V. Mark Smith

Living in Wisdom

Berean Baptist on February 5, 2018

It is impossible for the natural man to choose a holy and righteous life, or essentially the things that will make him healthy and wholesome. The health I am speaking of is not necessarily physical although many of us have a very difficult time making the right choices in that area. I am speaking of choosing health for the soul—the ability to come to Christ in salvation and to begin a course of living for God.

Righteousness eludes every person who does not know Christ. Our fallen nature prevents us from choosing godliness which is the reason we need the Lord to change our hearts. Jesus said we must be born again. This infers the old life must be replaced with the new life that only He can give. Until the Holy Spirit opens our eyes to this truth, we remain carnally minded and cannot please God (Romans 8:6-8).

In regeneration, God changes the disposition of the mind and gives the ability to choose the right path instead of repeating the frequent failures of the past. However, this new capability does not mean we possess immediate wisdom to use it. As we well know, there is a sanctifying process in which good choices are cultivated by prayer, study, and practical experience. Wisdom in this case is not a sudden miraculous endowment as God gave Solomon. This wisdom is best described as discernment achieved through repetitive training. In fact, it is wisdom that will never show itself unless great care is taken to work on it daily. When we indulge sin on a regular basis without being cautious to protect ourselves from it, the heart grows cold and calloused and strongly resists correction. The spiritual man can become a couch potato that never heeds the call to work out our salvation (work out your own salvation—Phil. 2:12).

The first way the Bible tells us to discern properly is in our moral choices. Because the moral character of a Christian is changed, it is possible to choose ways of living that are consistent with the Bible’s commandments. Many of these ways we never thought of before and were never bothered because we did the opposite. With the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, comes the ability to see sin differently, and rather than enjoy its pleasures, we are grieved in our heart and broken by it.

The second area of discernment concerns doctrinal distinctions. All right choices whether moral or theological are governed by our doctrine. For example, the Gnosticism of the first century led to very immoral lifestyles because the doctrine of the body/soul relationship was wrong. We should recognize that every false doctrine leads to unbiblical thinking. Wrong thinking leads to wrong practice and to compromise which in turn becomes bad lifestyle choices.

There are moral and doctrinal distinctions that must be made. We do not have the option of ignoring them. The best place you can learn how to make right choices is to attend church and sit under good doctrinal preaching. Living in wisdom is not mystical. It is to follow the objective truth of God’s word.

 

Pastor V. Mark Smith

My God Is Real

Berean Baptist on May 29, 2017

The heavens are thine, the earth also is thine: as for the world and the fulness thereof, thou hast founded them. (Psalms 89:11) 

(Note: This article was originally posted in 2015 for our congregation)

As I write this article three weeks before you read it, CNN has just released a story about NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft. Launched about nine years ago, the spacecraft is nearing the planet (?) Pluto which is the farthest outpost of our solar system. When I say “nearing” I do not mean “near” as in Rohnert Park is near Santa Rosa. This is “near” in the vastness of space terms as in 126 million miles near. The spacecraft traveled about 3 billion miles from earth when it woke up and started to take its first pictures of Pluto. From the time I wrote this to the time you are reading it, about 16 million more miles have been traversed which adds a little more clarity to the pictures. These first pictures were of two small moons that are orbiting the dwarf planet.

The mission of New Horizons is to get better pictures than those of the Hubble Telescope of the planets and territory beyond our solar system. In the coming months, scientists expect to learn more about the mysteries of the universe. While I believe the greatest truths of the universe are lost on scientists, each of these amazing pictures ought to remind us of the immensity of God. Without looking at the heavenly bodies, just the measurement of distances is mind boggling.

The elliptical orbits of the planets makes nailing down a distance figure difficult, therefore average distances are used. The distance from earth to Pluto averages a little less than 4 billion miles (less as in 10,000 times around the earth) and the speed of the spacecraft is now about 31,000 miles per hour. This is just slightly less than I was clocked by the CHP south of Novato about a year ago. At this speed, it takes about 45 seconds to get to LA, but actually a little longer coming back because you have to stop for the toll. So, the spacecraft would take 45 seconds to get to LA but about 14 years to get to Pluto. Thankfully, they shifted into fifth gear part of the way because they made it in 9 years. I keep telling my wife such things are possible if you do not stop at the rest areas.

What are we learning from these adventures? I would say we learn more about God than anything. We learn the Bible is true that no one but God could have laid the foundation of the world. We learn no one but God has the power to uphold all things by the word of His power. We learn that impersonal forces could never make all this work. But more surprisingly, we learn how gracious God is that in the vastness of the universe He cares what happens on this tiny speck of space dust called earth.

Scientists are on their quest to prove how the universe began. They have spent years developing the technology and spent billions of dollars to make the trip, when all they needed to do is read Genesis 1 or Psalm 19 or 89 or Romans 1 or Colossians 1. If they would just read a $3.50 King James Bible they would have discovered they do not have to leave earth to prove it was God who did it all. The heavens declare the glory of God—just the visible parts seen with the naked eye and without telescopes and spacecraft. Does God exist? Ask a housefly with two compound eyes of 4000 lenses each that can see in all directions—a fly that its practically impossible to swat—if God created him. Isn’t an annoying fly enough to tell you this stuff does not happen by accident?

The universe with its immensity and the creature with his complexities are proof of the immeasurable wisdom and knowledge of God. Yet the more evidence we see, the dumber we get. If there is one point I would argue with God, it is this—man is a rational being. Every day at school our children are taught to be irrational. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if every NASA image was captioned: “More proof our God is real?” I know He is without seeing the photos. He is real in my heart, which is the most rational thought I ever had.

 

Pastor V. Mark Smith