Covenants and Contracts

Exodus 20:1–17 Tanakh

God spoke all these words, saying: I the Lord am your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, the house of bondage: You shall have no other gods besides Me. You shall not make for yourself a sculptured image, or any likeness of what is in the heavens above, or on the earth below, or in the waters under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them. For I the Lord your God am an impassioned God, visiting the guilt of the parents upon the children, upon the third and upon the fourth generations of those who reject Me, but showing kindness to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep My commandments. You shall not swear falsely by the name of the Lord your God; for the Lord will not clear one who swears falsely by His name. Remember the sabbath day and keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God: you shall not do any work—you, your son or daughter, your male or female slave, or your cattle, or the stranger who is within your settlements. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth and sea, and all that is in them, and He rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and hallowed it. Honor your father and your mother, that you may long endure on the land that the Lord your God is assigning to you. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. You shall not covet your neighbor’s house: you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female slave, or his ox or his ass, or anything that is your neighbor’s.

There are some scriptures that need no introduction. John 3.16, Genesis 1.1, Romans 3.23, and many others. Today’s scripture is one that needs no real introduction, but I will try.

The ten commandments are very well known to most people. Or at least there is the notion of knowing them. There is one survey that showed that more people knew the ingredients of a Big Mac better than they knew the commandments. This same survey relayed that people knew the characters of the Brady Bunch better than the ten commandments. But these are texts that are foundational to many of our church documents. One cannot read a catechism without studying the ten commandments at one point. So, this news of how little is known of the commandments is distressing to say the least. It shows that we have a lot of work to do regarding the teachings of our churches.

Now there may be some who will grouse about how this is why we are in the state of morality in this country and the world. And there would be others who state that these commandments are not even applicable to today’s society. There was even one writer who suggested that the commandments be rewritten in a way that shows the love and mercy of God. To all of these, I say that there is a better way.

You may have noticed that I have been speaking of covenants that past couple of weeks. As a series through Lent, I will be dealing with covenants that God has made with humanity. Whether that be with Noah, Abraham, the children of Israel or with us as Christians, covenants are integral to our lives as children of God.

There is a difference between covenants and contracts. A covenant is a formal agreement between two parties that establishes a relationship in which duties and responsibilities between the two are enacted. Now this may sound like a contract but it is not the same. In contrast, a covenant is made between two parties that are not equal. The more powerful party takes care of the less powerful party and make sure the terms of the covenant are fulfilled. There may be specifications of what each party is to do, but there is always a relationship that is developed and cared for so that both parties benefit. A contract on the other hand is between two assenting parties. Both know what they are getting and what they are giving. The primary beneficiary is the person who puts into the most into what they want to get out of it. One can see this in loans or in employment contracts.

So, what is the covenant here that these ten words (this is the Hebrew designation of what we call the ten commandments) begins? It is a covenant between God and the children of Israel. The covenant is one that God initiates and gives to the Israelites without their being a part of the discussion. The covenant is grace given to them from God. God did not have to make the covenant with the Israelites when they had nothing to offer. But God did and there is the grace.

The ten words begin with the statement that God was the one who brought the children of Israel out of bondage in Egypt. The Israelites did nothing of their own to end their slavery. They could not have done anything and yet, here they are at the mountain of God, free from their servitude in Egypt. And God begins to tell them the covenant of which they are to be a part.

Now there are, as we know, ten words. These are broken into two parts. I will not go into depth for each of them, but I want to cover them all broadly. The first four deal with how one is to be in relationship with God. They are to have no other gods but God. They are to not make any images that would be worshiped. They are not to use God’s name flippantly or to swear falsely by God’s name. Lastly, they are to keep a sabbath as God did when creating the earth. These are the first words. Notice that they do not have punishments listed. Obedience is not motivated by fear of punishment, but by the authority of God and the desire of the people to live in harmony with God’s will. All too often today we use the ten words as a club to frighten people into following God. As if God is standing with a clipboard tracking whether or not we are following the rules. That is not grace. That is legalism. Should we follow the words? Yes, of course we should. But we should follow them not because God is “gonna get us” if we don’t, but because we recognize the grace of God and we want to give thanks for that.

The last six of the words are how we are to live in relationship with those around us. Not just friends and family, but with everyone. We are called to honor our parents, not just as children (this was always stressed when I was growing up) but also as adults. The next four are pretty straight forward. We are not to murder, commit adultery, steal, or lie about someone else. Last is not to covet. This may seem easy, but how many of us have looked at a neighbor’s sweet new car and wanted more than anything than to take our older car and trade it in on something similar, but a whole lot nicer? It is easy to say that we have never coveted someone’s donkey or ox, but how hard is it to say that we have not wanted what someone else had?

So, how did you do when listening to these ten words? How many have you kept and how many have you not kept? I am willing to venture that we all have not followed all these words. Sure, we have kept some or maybe even most, but to say we have kept them all would be lying to ourselves and to God.

But what can we do? We know that trying harder really gets us nowhere. Do we just toss the ten words and go about our lives saying that it is impossible? No. We rely on God’s grace and assurance that if we ask, God will forgive. See, a covenant with God is not a contract. It is something that God will continue to uphold even when we don’t meet expectations. If God had used this as a contract then God would have started over somewhere else a long time ago. But there is grace with God and forgiveness.

The Heidelberg Catechism says this about the ten words in Question 115: Q. Since no one in this life can obey the Ten Commandments perfectly, why does God want them preached so pointedly?

A. First, so that the longer we live the more we may come to know our sinfulness and the more eagerly look to Christ for forgiveness of sins and righteousness. Second, so that, we may never stop striving, and never stop praying to God for the grace of the Holy Spirit, to be renewed more and more after God’s image, until after this life we reach our goal: perfection.

When we see these ten words as the beginning of grace then we lose our fear of them and of God. We then understand that the words are there for our benefit and that the one who gave them is worthy of our worship and thanks. May we always strive to fulfill the words, but may we even more rely on the grace that gave them to us in the first place. Amen.