The Law of Liberty - Part 1

I do not think that word means what you think it means

Does the name Inigo Montoya mean anything to you?

Added to my pantheon of greatest movies of all time - such as Independence Day and Twister - is the movie, The Princess Bride.

I caution you about reading the book - it ends differently that the movie and that’s not a good thing.

If you like happily ever after endings.

In that movie, there are three outlaws and a man named Vizzini is the ringleader.

Vizzini thinks very highly of his abilities, as most outlaws do.

So when his plans don’t go as he expects, he always exclaim, “Inconceivable.”

After a multitude of “Inconceivable-s,” Inigo Montoya says to Vizzini, “You keep using that word. I do not think that word means what you think it means.”

Now here’s the deal.

A lot of times I hear people say things that in my head I hear Inigo say, “I do not think that word means what you think it means.”

And James 2:8-13 has such a word in it.

In James 2:12 “So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty.”

The “law of liberty.”

And there is Inigo, “I do not think that word means what you think it means.”

So before we study James 2:8-13 next week, we’ve got to go somewhere else this week.

That somewhere else is the Old Testament.

We’ll go to several places but the one I want to ask you to look up is Leviticus 19:9-16.

That’s what was on James’ mind as he wrote his letter.

Chuck McCuen did a great job last week and he did excellent job explaining who James was.

James was Jesus brother, a devout Jew - obviously respected in the community.

He had grown up hearing the Torah - the Jewish Law - the first five books of our Old Testament - he grew up hearing it read over and over and over again.

He respected and believed it.

But, James had a complication.

He was Jesus’ brother.

While Jesus was alive, he opposed Jesus.

When Jesus was resurrected, he worshipped Jesus.

And that changed the way he understood the Old Testament law.

He saw, looking back, what Jesus meant when He said, Matthew 5:17

Matthew 5:17 ESV

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

He wants us to understand that too - that we are free to live like Jesus.

So, today we’ll end up in Leviticus 19:9-16 after we are reminded of a few things.

Go ahead and turn in your Bibles to Leviticus 19:9-16.

If you are at home watching via live stream or video, welcome, we are glad you are joining us.

Pull your Bibles out too and follow along with us.

You’ll be glad you did.

So what are we reading in Leviticus?

Leviticus is the third book in the Bible.

It’s a part of the law of Moses given by God at Mt. Sinai after the Exodus.

Remember the phrase now, the “law of liberty.”

That’s how James interprets the law in light of Jesus.

What does that mean?

Today is a family worship day, we have our children in the sanctuary with us.

Ms. Hannah has put together some things to help the kiddos follow the message and it’s time to grab the first one.

Children, look for a picture of people working very hard.

You’ll want to make sure you can see them sweat because a lot of times when you work real hard, you seriously sweat.

So guys, let’s get started on those.

And adults, question number 1.

Where does liberty come from?

Or, to put it another way, how did we get free?

The story of the Exodus explains that - it’s why even in Acts, you hear the apostles preach the Exodus.

Exodus 3:7-8 “Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians... You might be thinking, we’ve been here a lot lately, and we have.

It’s pretty surprising how much of the New Testament has its foundation in the Old Testament.

You remember Moses - the Lord came to Moses in a burning bush.

The Lord told Moses that “I have surely seen the affliction of my people.”

That phrase, “I have surely seen,” means that God had been watching intently.

And God heard every cry of their pain.

He heard every time a taskmaster abused them.

Every lash of the whip, every intimate violation, every cry of pain - God heard.

Listen - He still hears.

That’s what part of what James understands - God still hears.

What happened in the Exodus is still God’s M.O. today.

He hasn’t changed - He hears our cries, He sees our afflictions.

And when we feel helpless and hopeless, the Lord has already made up His mind to deliver us.

“Come, I will send you to Pharoah that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of [bondage].

Now in verse 12, God makes Moses a promise.

Exodus 3:12 “He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.””

Here’s your sign - you will know I have done what I promised, when you are standing in this very place, with 1.2 million people standing with you.

You remember this day.

Exodus 6:6-7 “Say therefore to the people of Israel, ‘I am the Lord, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment. I will take you to be my people, and I will be your God, and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who has brought you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians.”

Exodus 6:9 “Moses spoke thus to the people of Israel, but they did not listen to Moses, because of their broken spirit and harsh slavery.”

God told them He would deliver them.

But they didn’t listen.

Their bondage was so deep and so hard ; they didn’t see a way out.

You hear Jesus, right?

Romans 5:8

Romans 5:8 ESV

but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

You see the parallel with the Exodus right?

While we were so blinded by our bondage that we weren’t even thinking about God, God delivered us.

And listen, God wants us to know that it was Him that delivered us.

When you read Exodus and Leviticus you can’t help but notice, God keeps signing His name.

I am the Lord; I am the Lord; I am the Lord; I am the Lord.

Make no mistake.

You are not free from bondage because you think correctly.

It’s not your good fortune, a lucky break, being in the right place at the right time, coincidence or karma.

You are free because the Lord Himself has chosen to make you free.

We are free today because the Lord chose to send Jesus to lead us to freedom

Where does liberty come from?

Liberty comes from the Lord; He makes us free.

Ok, children, can you hold up your pictures so I can see them? Great Job.

Now parents, help them to find the picture of Moses and the Israelites standing at the foot of the mountain.

Children, the cloud on the mountain should look like fire, Ok?

That's what God looked like to them - so do your best work.

So adults, just like the Lord told Moses he would do, He delivered His people out of slavery.

Remember Moses measure of success, on the very spot where Moses met the Lord the first time in the burning bush, Moses stood there with 1.2 million people, worshipping the Lord at the mountain.

Just as God said he would do if God was faithful.

And at that place, God spoke to them.

Exodus 20:1 ESV

And God spoke all these words, saying,

This is the picture of our salvation.

We became free from sin and death because the Lord Himself made us free from our bondage to sin and death.

We are no longer in bondage.

We have liberty.

We are free.

But, I do not think that word means what you think it means.

What does it mean to be free?

At Mt. Sinai, the Lord started to define grace for us.

It was grace that established how we live as free people.

Live as the Lord said and joy and contentment will follow.

Stray outside the boundary, and the horror of bondage returns - guaranteed.

In essence, God is saying, “This is how I live and I am perfectly free and perfectly content.

“I’ve delivered you from slavery so that you can live this way too and you can be free and content.”

“I am taking you from the worst life has to offer and I am delivering you to the best life has to offer.

I saw you in your darkest times.

I heard you.

I intently saw your suffering.

And Church, I delivered you.

Your being here right now is evidence that the Lord was faithful to you.

That makes you feel some kind of somehow, doesn’t it?

For when people have received the wonders of God’s grace in redemption, will they not, in gratitude, want to know how to live so as to please the God who has poured his grace upon them? The point is of such importance that it is worth stating it over again. In the Bible, the obedience we render to his law is not meritorious obedience but responsive obedience. We obey, not as those who are trying to merit salvation, but as those who have already received salvation and wish to respond by giving their whole lives up to God their Saviour. D.A. Carson

James understood all of this - and now so do we.

Leviticus 19 is a part of that Law the Lord gave at Mt. Sinai.

And in that Law, the Lord said, “…but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”

For years I thought Jesus came up with that - Matthew 22:37-39

Matthew 22:37–39 ESV

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. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.

Jesus didn’t come up with it.

Jesus fulfilled it.

Jesus set us free.

And being free means we are free to love our neighbor.

We are not bound to hate or covet or be jealous.

We are free to love our neighbor - so how do we do it?

How do we love our neighbor?

Ok kids, let me see the pictures of Moses and the people before God - great job.

Now, here is the last picture.

Parents, help your child find the picture of people helping people.

Kids, make them all look happy because God tells us to be cheerful givers.

And adults, let’s answer the question, what does Jesus mean when he says to love our neighbors as we love ourselves?

The word love has morphed in meaning simply to have some kind of warm and fuzzy desire inside of us for a particular person, place or thing.

Love comes and it goes.

People fall into love, people fall out of love.

That’s what we say it means now.

But in the Bible, love is both emotion and deed.

Think of this - in a world of arranged marriages where you might not meet your spouse until your wedding day.

Are you telling me that every meeting was “love at first sight?”

Are you saying that a bride or groom never thought, “this is the best mom and dad could do?”

But because of their deeply ingrained morality, that a vow before God and man was inviolable, the bride and groom immediately began to act in love.

They did loving deeds and the loving deeds would give birth to loving emotions.

Love your neighbor doesn’t mean you have the warm fuzzies for everyone.

But it does mean, you live love towards everyone.

And Leviticus 19 breaks the freedom to love down into easy to understand parts.

We are free to care for our unfortunate neighbor

Leviticus 19:9-10 ““When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge, neither shall you gather the gleanings after your harvest. And you shall not strip your vineyard bare, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner: I am the Lord your God.”

They were an agrarian society, so the more wealthy you were, the more land you cultivated.

Verses 9 and 10 tells anyone with a garden that they are not to reap every last ounce of what you planted.

You are not to pick every last berry off the vine.

You are not to pick up every ripe berry that fall off of the vine.

The Lord says to leave them to the poor.

Let poor people who don’t have what you have to come to your property and harvest your excess.

The Lord signs His name to that: I am the Lord.

What does that mean?

It means that we are free to plan our expenses in such a way that every penny we receive does not have an attached expense.

If there is no room in our budget for our tithe and to help folks who need help, we are not living free.

We are once again in a self imposed bondage.

And we aren’t free to love our neighbor.

We really can’t dress that up.

If we are living at our means or above our means, we have used our money to put us back into bondage.

The very bondage Christ freed us from.

Being free to love means being free to do - and we can’t do if every penny in has a place for every penny out.

We are free to have integrity

Leviticus 19:11-12 ““You shall not steal; you shall not deal falsely; you shall not lie to one another. You shall not swear by my name falsely, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord.”

We are free to be Christians in the work place.

Treat your boss fairly.

We are free to be Christian business people.

You are free to treat your employees and your customers fairly.

Do not “swear by my name falsely.”

In other words, don’t trumpet that you are a Christian and then treat others with partiality - that’s profaning the name of God.

We are free to have compassion

Leviticus 19:13-14 ““You shall not oppress your neighbor or rob him. The wages of a hired worker shall not remain with you all night until the morning. You shall not curse the deaf or put a stumbling block before the blind, but you shall fear your God: I am the Lord.”

AT&T violated this principle.

When AT&T bought Bellsouth and merged all of their systems, they transitioned management from being paid twice a month to being paid every other week.

They were kind enough to tell us what they were going to do but that didn’t help a whole lot.

What they did was they held a week’s salary back - kind of like we were all new hires.

So instead of getting paid 2 weeks past the last pay date, we were paid 3 weeks later.

But only for 2 weeks.

They explained how it was all on the up and up but I promise, I never could make their math work.

But what choice did I have?

We are free to pay our workers what we contract to pay them.

We are not free to try to find ways to not pay what we owe.

And God adds a curious thing here: we are free to be compassionate to the deaf and the blind.

Remember, God created them as they are for His purpose - and He is free to use you for His purpose as well.

God signed His name to that.

We are free to never show partiality

Chuck McCuen did a great job talking about this from James 2:1-7 last week.

Leviticus 19:15-16 ““You shall do no injustice in court. You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor. You shall not go around as a slanderer among your people, and you shall not stand up against the life of your neighbor: I am the Lord.”

Some of the three strikes and you are out laws that were popularly passed in the 90’s aren’t good laws.

People have been incarcerated for long periods of time for offenses that don’t measure up to that harsh of treatment.

Rich people can get away with anything it seems.

Poor people who do the same thing as the rich get sent away for years.

As Christians, we are free to speak out about injustice.

We aren’t being woke.

We’re not espousing CRT.

We are free to treat all people as image bearers just like we are.

And notice something else - we are free to not be partial to the poor or defer to the great.

The defense of, “Well, he had an impoverished upbringing...”

Ok, fine, many people have horrible upbringing.

But following God isn’t contingent on our social status.

Rich or poor, the Lord is the Lord.

The Lord signed His name to this.

We are free to love our neighbors as ourselves

Leviticus 19:17-18 ““You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason frankly with your neighbor, lest you incur sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”

Notice that no where in any of this does God say to learn to love yourself first so you can then love your neighbor.

That’s really just psycho-babble.

Everyone loves themselves.

J.A. Motyer nailed it.

When we catch sight of our faces in the mirror first thing in the morning, the word ‘Ugh’ comes spontaneously to the lips; yet at once we take that revolting face to the bathroom, we wash it and tend it and make it as presentable as nature will allow. And so it goes on through the day: loving ourselves means providing loving care and attention. This is the model on which we are to base our relationships to all to whom we owe neighborly duty. J.A. Motyer

And we are free to do these things.

We are free because we have been delivered from bondage.

We are free to be countercultural.

We are free to follow a man who did it all right.

We are free to do things for our neighbors who are still in bondage because we want them to be free too.

Liberty doesn’t mean we act every which way.

Liberty means we are free to follow Jesus.

Because, while we are still sinners, Christ died for the ungodly.

He died for me.

When I didn’t even know I needed it.

Jesus was free to love whomever He chose - and He chose you and me.

And now He’s made us free to love Him and love each other.

Matthew 22:37-39 “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. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

You are free to do that.

Let no one tell you that you aren’t.