Golden Rule

The Golden Rule is presented as "summing up the Law and the Prophets", which Jesus also says about the Greatest Commandments. God's law is an example of fully informed, fully empathetic, fully loving guardrails for human life together. This is a very practical application of love in the real world, not a trite justification of what we already want to do. Neither does this translate to: "do whatever people want." We should be engaged in regular humble, empathetic and imaginative work to "do to others" in light of Christ's gift and revelation of righteousness.

Shock Collar Training

Anyone know what this thing is?

Possibly an unpopular opinion. But I have this and I use it to help train my dog. Positive and negative feedback. Even when I put it on the dog, I almost never have to actually press the button. She straightens up and pays attention.

And if I have to press the button, there’s a little vibrate one that doesn’t shock at all and that does the trick.

And if I need to, there’s a little dial and you can dial in the right level of electric shock.

Now, I have a rule… and before I used it on the dog, what did I do?

Used it on myself.

Worse… before I let any of the kids use it with Vin and help with dog training in that way… what did they have to do? Use it on themselves. Full power. Good times.

Hear me… they used it on themselves… I take no responsibility, I am not advocating obedience collars on children.

That just seemed right and fair, that I should experience it, and be willing to go through it, before inflicting it on anyone else. This idea of “fairness” and “reciprocity” is baked pretty deep in us, and today we get to the most powerful expression of it in all of history.

It is the climax of the Sermon of the Mount, it is the moment we’ve all been waiting for… it is the Golden Rule!

Matthew 7:12 ESV

12 “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

That underplays the far reach here of Jesus’ first words. In ALL the things, In Everything

Matthew 7:12 NASB95

12 “In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

This is all encompassing. In EVERYTHING.

But it also, as we saw last week, has the therefore. This is the conclusion, certainly of what Jesus has been saying in Matthew 7 so far, letting go of judgment and condemnation, not pushing pearls on pigs, not shoving good things at people not ready to hear… but instead asking, seeking, and knocking. Curious, persistent, pressing respectfully at barriers, bringing and offering the treasures of the Kingdom.

In summary of that… therefore...

But ALSO, in summary of the entire sermon so far. This is the grand conclusion. The bolded sentence that Jesus is going to say three times and put up on the slide. Remember this!

And indeed, people have. This is one of the go-to most famous, most remembered statements of Jesus. We call it the “Golden Rule.” This is a POWERFUL summary of ethical life, a foundation for moral living, a guide to action.

And… a whole lot more.

This is the Golden Rule. There are many like it.

The Silver Rule(s)

Or Confucius:

“Do not do to others what you would not have them do to you”

Zoroastrianism, Confucianism, Buddhist literature, ancient Indian literature, Greek literature from the time of Herodotus, and Jewish sources at least from the time of the Letter of Aristeas and of the Greek version of Sirach.

There was a negative version of this floating around with the Pharisees:

‘What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbour: that is the whole Torah, while the rest is commentary thereon; go and learn it’. - Hillel

In fact, across many many cultures, this is an ethical principle. It is a principle of reciprocity, of empathy. I think that too comes from God. All truth is God’s truth… this is a distorted message of the Word. What’s distorted about it?

Sounds familiar… but not quite. This is just about not hurting the other guy.

You could conceivably obey this simply by doing nothing.

Jesus goes beyond that to a positive expression. Not just “don’t hurt them” but actively, “what would you want?” What would you wish? You can’t obey that by doing nothing.

The positive expression is a powerful call to action, to active and intentional love.

So this isn’t just “don’t punch the dude” it’s “man, I could really go for an ice cream cone… here.”

Law and the Prophets

But Hillel does echo Jesus in something remarkable. “That is the whole Torah”.

Jesus says

In fact, there’s another thing Jesus says “sum up the Law and Prophets”.

Matthew 22:35–40 ESV

35 And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him. 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40 On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

Depend or “hang”. And again, back in Matt 7:12

Matthew 7:12 ESV

12 “So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets.

So, if all the Law and Prophets hang on “Love God, Love Others” AND is the “Golden Rule...” what can we conclude?

These are the same thing.

The Golden Rule is an equivalent expression, it is Love put into motion, put into action… it is a very practical expression of the actual inner experience of loving others (especially), but it applies to loving God too.

And this says something truly remarkable.

It certainly says that the heart of the Law and God’s Word through the Prophets instructs us in how to do this. We can unpack that.

By living the Golden Rule, we live the Two Greatest Commandments, we obey the Law and the Prophets.

And, likewise, by rightly keeping the commandments, in correct interpretation and application and all that, by rightly keeping the commandments of God we live out the Two Great Commandments… and we live out the Golden Rule.

If there is equivalence here, it works through lens. Each serves as an interpretive lens for the other.

God's law is an example of fully informed, fully empathetic, fully loving guardrails for human life together.

God's law is an example of fully informed, fully empathetic, fully loving guardrails for human life together.

Human flourishing.

But I think it also says that God was always all about this, always doing this for us Himself. As in, the very giving of the Law, the sending of the Prophets, every move and every action of the Triune God, was an act of love, adherent in every way to the Golden Rule… and God is instructing us how to love Him even as He is instructing how to love each other EVEN AS shows us immeasurable love.

Going Deeper

First Order Thinking

Okay. First order thinking.

I wish everyone would leave me alone! So I leave everyone alone! Done, Golden Rule fulfilled!

Or… I like ice cream. Prailines and Cream from Baskin Robbin. That’s my favorite. I like ice cream and I would like some ice cream… so I will get ice cream, my favorite, and give it to you.

Law fulfilled? No? Why?

You might not like ice cream. In fact, if I offer that to Drew it’s a threat on his life! It could be dangerous to him.

Second Order Thinking

I don’t wish that other people would shove things in my face that they like regardless of what I want or need.

I wish that other people would consider my preferences, needs, safety when offering me things. So, with a little thought and maturity, I consider the preferences, the favorite flavors, the safety of others.

How do I discover those things? Jesus gave us a method. Ask. Seek. Knock. Ask. Seek. Knock. Just like Jesus does.

Hey… would you like some ice cream? What’s your favorite flavor?

Hey… would you like to talk? Let’s grab coffee, I’d love to hear what’s going on in your life.

Third Order Thinking

The world would LOVE to leave this here. This is thoughtful empathy… and the world would be a better and kinder place if we all did this well. Full stop.

Most philosophers reflecting on morality and ethics would agree with this and may well stop here as the absolute best that can be done.

What rules the day in this scenario? The desire of the human heart. The preferences, the desires, the “felt” needs of the other. That’s better than just not caring what other people think and feel… but the heart is wicked and full of deceit.

The parents who give their children everything they ever want do damage to that child. We call it “spoiled.” Isn’t that an awful phrase, like milk left out for a week. Ewww, I can smell it now. Gross.

In 2006, the American Cancer Society and other plaintiffs won a major court case against Big Tobacco, with Judge Gladys Kessler finding that tobacco companies had lied to the public about the deadly effects of cigarettes and secondhand smoke. As a result, tobacco companies were required to run an extensive television and newspaper advertising campaign admitting the truth about their products.

They have lost lawsuits (plural) in the millions and tens of billions of dollars… because they knew something was damaging and dangerous, and they lied about and gave it to people anyway.

And we hate and punish them for it. We know that’s wrong.

And yet, there are things that we KNOW are wrong because God told us so… and we want them anyway. We desire them. God says that it is a cancer upon us, it is killing us in body and soul. Pick your favorite sin.

If we got to the end of days and discovered God had been hiding how bad that sin was for us… we’d sue! (or try). We’d be ticked!

Instead, He tells us, He writes it on Creation, He writes it in the law, He announces through His Prophets, He convicts us through the Holy Spirit, He teaches and counsels us in the Way of Righteousness, in the Way of Human Flourishing.

So… what do we do when we know something that someone wants is not good for them or dangerous for them?

We don’t give it to them.

Patronizing Platitudes

Now, this is dangerous.

How easily can this become pushing pearls on pigs again.

You are a terrible Holy Spirit! Conviction belongs to the Holy Spirit, and him alone. The only time it should come from you to “them” is as a word of prophecy as directed and inspired by the Spirit of God. And treat that with all the fear and trembling it deserves, the Bible has some radical things to say about false prophets.

It isn’t enough that what you say is true. The holy things thrown at dogs are holy… it just isn’t the right time, the right place, the right audience, and you’re clearly not the right person. At God’s direction, at the appointed time, when God sends you to Nineveh, when God gives you the opportunity and the words, that’s when you speak.

And the VAST majority of the time, that encounter is going to look like “Ask, Seek, Knock” and VERY rarely will it look like Jonah shouting on the street corner in Nineveh. Just count how many Jonah’s there are in the Bible.

How easily this can become “I know better than you” and lead right back into a judgmental Spirit. This is a trap the enemy will set for us, set for the church, especially when it comes into power dynamics like politics. If nobody is listening but you feel self-righteous because you are shouting TRUTH… there’s nothing holy or righteous or loving taking place at all.

For example, this is the kind of opportunity people took to justify chattel slavery in the name of Jesus. “They don’t know any better, we do, so we will teach them

Here’s what there is place for:

With all the humility in the world, as a sinner at the foot of the cross, when the Holy Spirit uses a broken vessel like me to speak a word of truth into a broken vessel like you.

“I think God has something to say about marriage. About sex. About addiction. About gluttony.”

Or maybe “God convicted and healed me of some brokenness in that area… maybe He’s calling you to something, here?”

An Impossible Challenge

Anyone feeling like this is an impossible challenge? If this is a command to perfect performance… it absolutely is.

And there’s no question, some of that is intended by Jesus in his command here, the very next statement is “Enter by the narrow gate… the way is hard that leads to life.” People heard this as hard words.

But again, these are not new laws for the Christian. That isn’t what Jesus is doing.

This is a revelation of what Righteousness looks like. And what it has always looked like. The Golden Rule was always the Law and Prophets and vica versa. It was always about love.

But this is not an impossible challenge.

It is, again, an invitation of Jesus into His perfect righteousness.

He has already lived this life. He has already accomplished this kind of love. He has given you this righteousness. He has supernaturally empowered you to love like this.

This is possible only in Christ.

And this is possible only as Christ Himself did this.

How did Jesus do this?

How does Jesus do this?

The incarnation is the Golden Rule.

While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Even the best of us, Job, knew his need and cried out for a Redeemer.

God knew from before the Fall what we needed to be rescued. The Messianic Prophecy comes right alongside the consequences of sin.

This is God, the Triune God, understanding, knowing what we truly and most deeply and desperately need, and making a way. Reorienting all of Creation, and even the Unity of the Godhead itself towards it.

Did Jesus run around frantically finding everyone at the same time and CARE-BEAR-STARE loving them, Golden Rule Ju-Jitsu everyone all the time!

Sounds exhausting and awful. “Oh, I could use a rest, I bet that means Brandon could use a rest, I better go over to Brandon’s house and offer him a rest.”

No, that isn’t what this looks like. That isn’t what Jesus did at all. He honored his God given human limits. He honored seasons of rest and restoration, food and fellowship. He served as God directed, as the Holy Spirit led and empowered, and that only.

This heart of love for others didn’t drive him to frantic and endless activity… but every action and inaction was shaped by love and obedience to God and others.

This is God making us a vessel for His love. For His peace. For His grace and kindness to others.

As we love Him, He teaches us to love others… and it is going to look like us laying down our agenda and our “rightness” and “self-righteousness...”

The Golden Rule is presented as "summing up the Law and the Prophets", which Jesus also says about the Greatest Commandments. This is a very practical application of love in the real world, not a trite justification of what we already want to do. Neither does this translate to: "do whatever people want."

Let us be engaged in regular humble, empathetic and imaginative work to "do to others" in light of Christ's gift and revelation of righteousness.

Make me a vessel of your love.