Hidden Devotion: Part 4

So this year we've been going through the Sermon on the Mount, right? We're looking at how Jesus goes beyond the letter of the law and he, He looks at the heart of the law.

He goes beyond a box-ticking exercise, and He fills the law to the fullest extent.

He explains what the law was always meant to be.

And Harry told us, uh, the Israelites celebrated Pentecost, uh, the Festival of Pentecost, to remember when God gave them the law, because they believed that the law was a blessing, it was a gift from God, and God's commandments are good.

So today I thought we would, uh, talk a bit about that and explore the heart of God, the one who gave us this good gift of the law, and some of the reasons why it is a good gift.

So when we talk about the law of the Bible, we can mean many different things.

The first five books of the Bible are referred to as the law, the, the Torah, right? And there are 613 individual commandments in the Torah.

And people often break these down into three different categories.

There's the moral, the civil, and the ceremonial law.

And it's, like, actually a lot of overlap between these different categories.

Like, you know, some laws can have moral and civil aspects to them.

Uh, but as Christians, we tend to believe that, like, the civil and ceremonial laws, they were kind of for Israel and when, you know, when they had a, uh, a temple and a sacrificial system and all that, like.

And so what applies to us now is the moral law.

Um, and so what I, when I refer to the law today, what I'm talking about is the moral law, like the Ten Commandments, right? Um, and whatever sort of eternal moral principles we can derive from the other laws.

So that's what we're gonna talk about today.

So let me just pray and we'll get into it.

So Lord, thank you for this day.

Lord, let me just thank you for your good gifts, and we thank you that you are a good God.

I pray that you'll just show each of us today more of how good you are and how good your gifts are, Lord.

And I pray, Lord, that my words would fall away, Lord, and that, Holy Spirit, be your words that would reach the ears and the hearts of everyone here today, Lord.

Lord, that my failings would not obscure your brilliance, Lord.

Amen.