6 March 2007
(This post may be considered a follow-up to This Holy Tide of Christmas which I posted on December 25, 2006.)
Once the Incarnation occurred, it should have been obvious that Old Testament ethics were insufficient. It’s not that there’s anything actually wrong with the morality God gave his people under Moses. I’m not saying a word against the 10 Commandments (any more than Lee Irons was, but that’s a post for another time). But the ethical substance of the Decalogue tells us only of our duty. It outlines our obligations–the good deeds that God requires–and leaves the matter there.
The Incarnation introduces a new element to the discussion. And this new element makes it impossible to discuss the ethics of God’s people in terms of mere obligation.
The ethical core of the 10 Commandments expresses God’s unchanging character. The rules could not be otherwise. Worshiping other gods is something God must condemn. If he did not, he would not be God. Nor could God make creatures in his image and then tell them–contrary to that very image–that it is ok to murder or commit adultery or steal or lie. The Decalogue is one summary (there are others) of what the rules must be because of who God is and what he must require. God himself is obligated by these rules. And that statement does not compromise God’s freedom. It simply means that God is who he is and does not change. God who is supreme, always just, faithful, and true cannot suddenly become God who is one among many, unjust, breaking his oath, a liar. Nor can he permit his creatures to behave in that way without retribution.
In short, God must be good.
But the Incarnation involves a whole different sort of goodness–a goodness to which God was not obligated. He didn’t have to do it. Of course, if the eternal son of God had not become man, we could never be saved, But then God had no ethical duty to save us.
Consider the angels. Some angels rebelled against God so he ejected them from heaven. Now the fallen agnels await their final judgment with dread. For them, there is no Savior. And that reflects no injustice on God’s part. God did with the angels what was right and good. He did, in a manner of speaking, his duty. For God must punish sin or be unjust. He who is holy cannot dwell with those who are unholy. That is contrary to his nature.
That much we can learn from the ethics of the 10 Commandments.
If God had treated us according to those ethics (as he did the fallen angels) we would have no cause for complaint. When Adam and his wife sinned, God could have judged them then and there with a final, irreversible judgment. Or he could have ejected them from the garden to await, without hope, their final condemnation. Just as he ejected the angels from heaven.
Then, just like the fallen angels, we would have no legitimate accusation against God. Adam and all his descendants could have been condemned to hell and the unfallen angels would sing unceasingly in praise of God’s goodness. Indeed the Decalogue–as an insight into God’s moral character–gives us no reason to expect a different outcome.
But we did get a different outcome. The eternal Son of God became a man to save his people from their sins. Truly this even springs from the goodness of God, but it is a goodness beyond any ethical obligation. God did not have to save us, yet he did. The Father owed us nothing but wrath. Yet he gave us his Son.
In doing this, God transcended the old ethics of obligation in a way that puts its stamp on everyone who belongs to him. How can we any longer speak of mere duty when God went so far beyond duty to save us?
If the Incarnation fails to persuade us that a new morality is afoot, surely the Crucifixion will awaken our dead hearts. In the Incarnation, God gave us his Son, humbled more than we can possibly conceive. At the Crucifixion, God put that Son to death.
How can we, who have benefited immeasurably from this extravagant, gratuitous, unrequired goodness speak any more of mere duty?
This is what’s behind Jesus’ teaching in Luke 17:7-10 where the servants who do only what was commanded cry out “We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty”. That seems a strange thing to say when judging by the old morality. But looked at in the light of the Incarnation and the Cross, it makes perfect sense.
There’s a new ethic in town. It’s an ethic that calls us to be as extravagant with one another as God has been with us. The Law can tell me to love my neighbor as I love myself. Only the Gospel–far transcending the Law–can move me to esteem you better than myself (Philippians 2:3). Moses commands us not to defraud. Only the Spirit of Christ could have made the churches in Macedonia give “beyond their means” (2 Corinthians 8:3). The Decalogue can order me not to murder. Only the love of Christ can compel me to lay down my life for the brethren (1 John 3:16).
This is the newness of the new commandment that Jesus gives in John 13. We are to love one another in the same way Christ has love us–humbling ourselves to the utmost as he did at his Incarnation, laying down our lives as he did at the cross. Moses never issued such a command. He couldn’t. The Law lacks that kind of moral authority.
The new commandment isn’t just another commandment to add to the list. The new commandment differs fundamentally, qualitatively, from all the old ones. The old commandments tell us of our obligation, of our duty. They push us to do right. The new commandment draws us forward to do more than mere duty. It calls us by the love of Christ to freely and cheerfully go beyond all commands. Anyone who seeks to fulfill the new commandment will naturally fulfill the old, and more besides. Anyone who pursues the old commandments will not even fulfill those.
(For a follow-up to this post, see Implications of the New Ethic.)
7 March 2007 at 7:22 pm
This is really helpful, Bill.
There is so much unpacking to do on this point in thinking of the revelation of God’s moral will prior to the Incarnation. I can see why that describes our life now but only in part. Our life now, if it is to be an expression of our life in communion with the risen Christ, has to be pushed all the way to that new commandment introduced by Christ himself. And it is grounded in and empowered by this new, surprising work by God. It is the ongoing accomplishment of that which the Law itself could not do, i.e. actually producing the fulfillment of the righteous requirement of the Law in God’s people.
This gets me thinking about whether we can find a progressive prefigurement of this new ethic within Old Testament revelation. To love one another as Jesus Christ the righteous loved the unrighteous, putting sinners’ interests ahead of his own. What kinds of stories or characters or events could we look to, if any, and say, This is the sort of love and character which prefigures what Christ has now explicitly patterned for us? I suppose there is not much to turn to because without the revelation of the Incarnation that sort of ethic would not make sense.
That is a radical thought… the life of the saint before the Incarnation was not informed by this new ethic? Their lives were informed by grace but grace revealed in ways different and relatively muted compared to the blazing meteor of grace in the Incarnation. Hm
j
8 March 2007 at 11:07 am
Joe,
I think the closest traces of the new covenant ethic will be found in those OT eras where the principle of theocracy was not in force. Abraham offering Lot the better land, Abraham praying for the city of Sodom, Daniel showing mercy to the pagan priests instead of calling for their deaths all come to mind.
Peace,
Todd Bordow
8 March 2007 at 6:18 pm
Thanks Todd. I was actually thinking of Abraham and racking my brains on which episodes might be illuminating. It makes sense that we can see that kind of grace on display in events like the ones you mention.
In light of this I’d really like to see a good study on Hebrews 11, such that helps tie this idea in with how the Hebrews author explains various OT saints’ deeds done by faith. The knee jerk reaction has been to find direct application and imitation in the Hebrew 11 persons and events, but it doesn’t really make sense to go that route. All we can grasp on is that each of these persons believed the Word of God concerning things to come, and so must we. But God’s promises and speech at that time concerning things to come shaped their deeds radically differently than how our deeds are shaped. Noah’s faith enabled him to implement the theocracy principle via building the Ark and he “condemned the world”.
After all the examples of “by faith” are given, the author concludes that they did not receive what was promised and God provided “something better” for us. That something better (the Incarnation?) shapes our deeds now according the new ethic.
just thinking aloud
j
9 March 2007 at 8:09 am
Todd and Joe - could we also not add Joseph into that ethic - Personally serves his brothers after he reveals himself - even his overall respone of mercy and grace as he served his brothers from the right hand of Pharoah.
9 March 2007 at 4:47 pm
Brad,
Yes, Joseph is a great example. Even within the theocracy the saints often demonstrate NC like ethics, like David allowing Shimei to curse him, in a sense blessing those who curse him.
Todd
15 March 2007 at 9:21 am
I have a comment or more an elaboration on Bill’s statement in the first paragraph, “But the ethical substance of the Decalogue tells us only of our duty. It outlines our obligations–the good deeds that God requires–and leaves the matter there.” The proverbs clarify the case in a surprising and vivid way. We know that Proverbs addresses the matters of the heart all the time. “Let your heart keep my commandments” (3:1); “Let your heart hold fast my words” (4:4) etc. Such proverbs could lead one, at first glance, to challenge Bill’s point about mere “duty” and “good-deeds” and “leav(ing) the matter there”; especially as he draws things out in his last paragraph. But that challenge would not stand because the Proverbs are firmly preoccupied with external good-deeds required by the Decalogue, even when they command the heart. Obedience from the heart in Proverbs serves the goal of either (1) exacting obedience to the outward duty of the law (i.e. Prov. 4:23) or (2) securing earthly blessings in the land (i.e. Prov. 3:1, 2). Interestingly, this movement between heart and duty plays out in poetic parallelism in a number of the proverbs, “Those of crooked heart are an abomination to the LORD, but those of blameless way are his delight” (Prov. 11:20 “heart” and “way” are synonymns).
Proverbs 6:25 addressing the sin of adultery says, “Do not desire her beauty in your heart, and do not let her capture you with her eyelashes.” Things clearly begin with the heart, what one must not desire from the heart, namely the adulterous woman. One could easily make the mistake of thinking that Jesus said the same thing, “everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Matthew 5:28). But that would be a mistake. What interest does the proverb have in heart obedience? It is exclusively interested in ensuring that the man does not commit adultery. So verse 29 warns, “none who touches her will go unpunished.” Protecting the heart from desire is nothing more than a first line of defense against the outward act of adultery. Jesus in the kingdom of heaven moves from adultery to the heart, while the proverbs move from the heart to adultery. Jesus is exclusively concerned with heart obedience because his disciples stand before the judgment seat of God in heaven while Proverbs is exclusively concerned with Decalogue obedience because Israel stands before the earthly judgment of the law. One reflects heavenly ethics while the other reflects earthly ethics. Proverbs makes Bill’s last paragraph very clear by its approach to the question of heart obedience.
15 March 2007 at 9:36 am
Thanks, Jody. This is one of the major questions about the Sermon on the Mount. When Jesus tells us lust is adultery in the heart, is he saying something new or merely developing the implications of the Law?
I think most Reformed people would say that he’s doing the latter–developing the implications of the Law. I’m sympathetic to that view and think it may even have some truth. But the context of the Sermon on the Mount suggests to me that Jesus is saying something new. He’s offering a new ethic for a new covenant.
But even if that’s not the case with the Sermon on the Mount in particular, obviously I think it’s true overall. The ethic of the Cross transcends the Mosaic ethic.