Episode Transcript
[00:00:03] All right, good morning.
[00:00:05] Well, we're gonna be in Exodus chapter 21 today. We're gonna be all the way through Exodus 23. So if you have your Bibles, go ahead and open up to Exodus chapter 21. But before we jump into our text, I just wanna kind of get us to a place where we're kind of caught up on where we are.
[00:00:21] Exodus is one of my favorite books. I remember growing up, I was reading Exodus. And you're like, what? You're reading Exodus? I was like, yeah. Have you ever seen the Prince of Egypt? Like, it was an aw.
[00:00:31] And so I wanted to learn more about Moses, and I wanted to learn more about what God was doing through Moses. And so what's happened over the last little bit here is that we've seen the Israelites. They have been enslaved for about 400 years under the Egyptians, and God has finally with Moses through Moses. And what he's done is bring the Israelites outside of Egypt. They are now in the wilderness. They've been with the Lord. They've been with him for a while. And as they've been walking in the wilderness, they've needed different things, like food in the morning, which God has provided manna. They needed water, which God has made no longer bitter.
[00:01:09] So there's been a lot that's happened up to this point. And just a couple weeks ago, God gave on stone to Moses the Ten Commandments.
[00:01:20] And so when we think about the Ten Commandments, like, these are eternal law. This is something that God has given to his people. These are the ways in which you should interact with, like, the first four commandments between man and God. This is how we should be in relationship with God himself. And then the next six commandments goes. This is how we should relate with one another and so on. Some of these you should not steal. For example, kids, you should honor your mother and father, right? Like, you shouldn't lie. You shouldn't lust. Like, these are commandments that have been given by God. And so today, we're gonna take some time, really. This is a lot of texts that we're covering. And these are all laws. So just buckle up. It's gonna be a day of justice, it's gonna be today kind of idea. Because God right here in our text is going to be giving laws to the Israel people. The people, by the way, who don't have courts, they don't have a rule in which they live by. They don't have any of these things. They've just been given the Ten Commandments not recently. Just a few weeks ago in Exodus 20 or 19.
[00:02:30] And so they've been given this, but they gotta learn how to live with one another. And so God is raising the Israel people to become a nation, a. A nation that reflects his glory amongst all creation and others. And so it's gonna be different than other nations. He's not just trying to establish a nation to be great. He's trying to establish a nation that reflects the Creator of the universe. That's what he's doing. And so in this, we're gonna see in these laws, he's gonna break down some of what we kind of got in the Ten Commandments. Like, for example, hey, thou shalt not steal.
[00:03:05] Okay, I agree, we shouldn't steal. But what happens if someone does?
[00:03:12] What are we supposed to do then?
[00:03:14] Well, in these chapters, in the next chapters, God's gonna give us like, case study or specific laws of going. If someone steals, for example, and we'll come back to it. Like, if someone steals an ox from you, I know you got oxes. Everyone has livestock, right? Okay, good.
[00:03:31] I like that.
[00:03:33] We're awake now. Cool.
[00:03:36] But if someone steals an ox from you, then you're to repay them with five oxes. Someone steals a sheep from you, you should repay them with four sheep. The idea here is that God is gonna be giving a specific law to his people to go. This is how you're interpreting these Ten Commandments. Ten Commandments are eternal. But this, in your culture, this is how you should operate. This is how you are loving one another well. This is how you're gonna be able to forgive your neighbor. This is how you're going to find. Find justice when it's hard to find.
[00:04:07] This is how you, as my people, should operate, as my nation that reflects my glory. That is what God is going to be saying over these next few chapters.
[00:04:17] And so in this, we are going to really ask the question that I think applies to a lot of us today.
[00:04:25] How do sinful people live with sinful people?
[00:04:30] Right?
[00:04:31] The Israelites, shocker. They're sinful and they had to live with each other. Right?
[00:04:38] Today we are under Christ if we put our faith and trust in Him. But guess what? We're still sinful. For all have fallen short of the glory of God. We are all sinful.
[00:04:49] So how do we. And that's the idea that I wanted to try and get in the call to worship. Like, Jesus has fulfilled the law, but he's given us one another passages, 50 of them in the New Testament. And these one another passages are Talking about how we should be with one another, how should we care for one another, love one another, serve one another. And so as we're walking through these laws today and as we talk about these things, I do think it applies to how we operate as the Church one, because of Christ being the head, we are trying our very best to reflect his glory to this world.
[00:05:22] And so how do we do that, even though we're sinful?
[00:05:26] And how do we do that, especially when someone in the same body as us sins against us?
[00:05:34] That's the question we're going to be exploring today.
[00:05:37] So the main point of our text as we've walked through it has to do with justice. It has to do with how God is going to establish his love, his mercy, his compassion through his law for his people.
[00:05:52] And so here's the four points that we're gonna pull from our pretty big text today is that God's justice is measured, God's justice is proportional, God's justice is compassionate, and God's justice is orderly.
[00:06:13] So let's pray as we dive into our text. Father, thank you for this morning. The time we get to dive into your word. God, I pray and I need your help. Lord, would you help make your word?
[00:06:24] Would you help us understand the law that you have given to you people of Israel and why you have given it? Lord, would we see much more than just the object and the point of what you have given to your people, but more importantly, God, would we see your character as you give your law to your people?
[00:06:43] Lord, would we be able to walk away going, I know that I serve and love a just God who forgives and is merciful and compassionate.
[00:06:51] And we can see that right here through the laws that he gives his people. So, Father, we need your help. Help us as we do this this morning. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.
[00:07:02] All right, so the first one says God's justice is measured. If you look at chapter 21, there's a little heading on each of these chapters. And so we're gonna kind of take some of this heading to give us an idea. This heading is really like kind of a summary of some of what's gonna be talked about. And I know when you read this first one, laws about Slaves, and you're like, okay, well, let's jump right into that, right? So we are. We're not going to avoid that. But before we go into it, because we all walk into a place with an idea of what slavery is, don't we? We all walk into places with definitions in Our minds and what we see in our culture today. And the slavery in which it was talked about in Exodus 21 is very different than the slavery that we refer to that's happened in our own country and it's happened across history for many, many years. And so what I want to do is I want to try and give a definition and some clarity to what this slavery was like and why it was that way. So the Gospel Coalition has an article that really helped me kind of get this definition. And so it talks about what does the Bible teach regarding slavery, specifically in the ancient near east, talking about Exodus 21. So let me read this excerpt real quick, and I think it's going to give us a lot of clarity before we go forward. It says slavery in the Bible thus had a constructive purpose.
[00:08:17] Both the servant and the master benefited.
[00:08:21] This was not the way slavery normally works. Usually the master gets his work done at the slave's, at his slave's expense. However, the purpose of slavery in Israel was to train men and women to become productive members of society.
[00:08:39] This could be due or often they had to sell themselves into slavery because of debt.
[00:08:45] This could be due to negligence or theft. In such cases, sin was the cause of their servitude. Instead of condemning such individuals to poverty for life, the law gave them an opportunity to improve their situation.
[00:09:01] So the reality is that this slavery that's gonna be discussed here in Exodus chapter 21 has a lot to do with being like an endangered servant. Basically you're saying, hey, if you, like, for example, if you stole an ox that we talked about earlier, I know you got them right, you would have to pay back 5. If you're stealing an ox in the first place, guess what? You don't have five oxes to give.
[00:09:24] So there's going to be a debt. Now the debt needs to be paid. How is that going to work? How's that going to work in a society? Right? We can't just sweep these things under the rug.
[00:09:34] Well, there was an opportunity of going, there's a debt that I cannot pay.
[00:09:39] I've tried and figured out every way that I can pay this debt, but I can't pay it. So guess what? There's an option, a dignifying option we're gonna learn in just a minute that I can come and I can serve and I can work for six years, and then on the seventh year, be free, debt free with a new skill and a more productive part of society.
[00:10:02] So let's look at exactly what that looks like. Let's dive in to 21. We're gonna look at verses two through four to get started.
[00:10:10] And so it says this.
[00:10:11] When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years. And in the seventh year, he shall go out free for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single. If he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out alone.
[00:10:34] So in this passage, we see a couple of things. Like one of the big questions that we're gonna kind of phrase as we walk through some of it's like, how do I love someone justly who owes me a debt, a debt that they can't pay? Well, it says here that you would serve six years. In the seventh year, you go free. But it's not just good for the master. The master, the one who was owed the debt, gets basically a restitution for what had happened to him. But the one who owes it, that also had dignity the whole time. If he walked in with the family, guess what? He walks out with a family.
[00:11:11] But he would work six days out of the week, and on the seventh day he would rest. And even in some of this, other chapters or not chapter, in this, later in the chapter, it talks about if the master mistreated his slave at the time.
[00:11:28] That it depends on what happens. Like if he knocked a tooth out, guess what, the debt had been paid and the slave goes free.
[00:11:35] There's no more any time of service.
[00:11:37] And so all of this is saying that God is establishing these laws not just to benefit the one who was wronged. He's trying to build a community that reflects his glory. And people were sinful. And he knows that. And so we need to have structured accountability. But he also brings in a time for us to be just in all of it.
[00:12:00] So it's not just this kind of idea of repayment logic.
[00:12:04] Not only does this law establish justice and freedom for both parties, but it protects the debtor's marriage and family status.
[00:12:14] So this kind of brings us to that next question. Like, we gotta be thinking about how do sinful people live with sinful people? Well, there's how you would deal with debt back in the. Under the law that he's giving, but also like, how do I love someone justly who has physically harmed me? How do I care for someone? So if you've gotten into fight or a quarrel, you're like, well, we don't fight. I don't know if You've been in middle school. But I have, and I've seen a lot of those. But in verse 18, let's read that together. Verses, chapter 21, it says, when men quarrel, or one strikes another with a stone or with his fist, and the man does not die, but takes to his bed. Then if a man rises again and walks outdoor with his staff, he who struck him shall be clear. Only he shall pay for the loss of time and shall have him thoroughly healed.
[00:13:08] So he's saying that like, okay, there's gonna be a measure. If you choose to get in a quarrel or a fight, then there's gonna be justice that takes place. And if someone goes and misses work, you're gonna have to pay for that. And so I don't know if you've ever heard. How many of you will have some fun, especially kids. How many of you have ever heard of the idea of an eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth? Can I see some hands? Okay, cool. I appreciate that. Thank you.
[00:13:32] I feel better.
[00:13:34] Did you know that that actually is a biblical idea? In verses 24 and 25, it actually goes into talking about an eye for an eye, tooth for tooth. But here's the difference. Before we dive into that verse, the difference is our society has taken an eye for an eye, a tooth for tooth, to mean that if you do something wrong to me, this is the very place we start.
[00:13:53] So if you have taken my eye, I'm gonna take your eye and hopefully take more. That's what our society says. But here in the law that God is giving, the Israel people, guess what he says?
[00:14:06] An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for hand, a foot for a foot, burn for a burn, wound for a wound, stripe for a stripe. Now, I don't know about you, that's tougher to memorize than eye for an eye or tooth for tooth.
[00:14:17] But here's what God's saying here, is that he's saying that this is actually the ceiling of restitution, not the beginning.
[00:14:26] Our society has taken it to mean, hey, this is the starting point. And God is saying to his people, this is the ceiling point. You don't go further than this.
[00:14:35] This is the top end of it.
[00:14:38] And so both here, we're seeing how justice is measured.
[00:14:42] God is very clear in how he's given his laws out. Like, it's a measured approach to his people. He wants his people to reflect Him. And he doesn't want just the one who was wrong to benefit. He wants the one who did the wrong to have structured accountability, to grow and then to be put back in society as a meaningful part of his nation.
[00:15:08] And so here's a couple things I want us to think about. Well, one, the one who is owed doesn't get unlimited license to extract from the one who owed them.
[00:15:21] So if a debt happened, it's not like they get to come and be his slave for all of eternity. There's a time limit on this. There's dignity in it as well. You don't just get to constantly extract just because someone did wrong to you.
[00:15:37] Second is that the one who owes has real structured accountability.
[00:15:47] There's gonna be a time where you're gonna have to work and provide and pay for your debt.
[00:15:54] In that time, though, you're not gonna be abused.
[00:15:59] There's gonna be honor, there's gonna be dignity.
[00:16:03] There's going to be training of a new skill so that you can learn from our sin and go back into society free in that seventh year, right?
[00:16:15] Ready to love the Lord and represent him.
[00:16:20] So God's justice, part of his character is that he's measured. He's really measured in the laws that he gives.
[00:16:28] Second, we see that God's justice is proportional. What we're doing is there's four sections in our passages that we're talking through. And so the first one was laws about slavery. That's where we see he's measured. The next one starts in verse 33, in chapter 21, and it talks about laws of restitution.
[00:16:45] Laws of restitution. So we see that God is gonna be proportional in his justice. So here's a question I want us to think of like, as we. As I read this passage and as we're reading through it, here's some of the questions that help us kind of understand what's happening.
[00:17:02] So, like this one. For here. How do I love someone justly who's been negligent, who's broken my trust or stolen from me?
[00:17:13] How do I love someone justly who's been negligent, broken my trust, or stolen from me?
[00:17:19] Well, let's look at chapter 22, verses 1 and, and verse 4. This is where you're going to get the ox. Example.
[00:17:27] If a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it, he shall repay five oxen for an ox or four sheep for a sheep. If the thief is found breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there shall be no blood guilt for him. But if the sun has risen on him, there shall be blood guilt for him. He shall surely pay. If he has nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. Verse 4. This is where we're going to kind of open some of this up. If the stolen beast is found alive in the possession, in his possession, the one who stole it, whether it is an ox or a donkey or a sheep, he shall repay double.
[00:18:07] Here's the idea. God has given a law, of course, to his people. I'm going to say this multiple times, that are going to establish his nation to show his glory to all the people in the world.
[00:18:17] In this, when we think about proportion, if I steal an ox, I should owe you an ox. That's just math, right?
[00:18:24] But here's the thing. And students, I want you to hear this because I think sometimes we think it's just a one for one deal.
[00:18:32] But when you steal from someone, you don't just take an object, you lose their trust, you harm the relationship.
[00:18:43] It's much deeper than just an object for an object.
[00:18:47] It's that you have harmed your brother or your sister, your neighbor, your friend, to a point where, yes, you've taken something valuable from them, but even more so than that, you've hurt their heart in their relationship with you.
[00:19:05] You have harmed the trust that they have in you.
[00:19:09] And so as God of course knew this because he deals with sinful people and he's given these laws, is that he's saying, well, yeah, if you take one, there's gonna be five owed, there's gonna be a greater owing back. Some of that's the hope that, hey, there's a relationship that, like, here's good faith, like I messed up, but here you go, here's gonna be the start of a reconciling relationship, right?
[00:19:34] But it should show that, hey, these are greater things than just one for one object.
[00:19:40] So restoring something intentionally comes with a price tag.
[00:19:46] But that is what he kind of begins to talk about here in chapter 22.
[00:19:52] He also goes into talking about how, like there's broken trust and stolen people, like there's gonna be repayment for that. And that should start a point of forgiveness and reconciliation. That's what all of these laws bring to.
[00:20:04] But what happens if someone's negligent, right?
[00:20:08] Or what happens if it's an accident?
[00:20:12] You know, because what we see here is God's going to be just and proportional. Is that right here in verses 35 and 36? It's going to talk about an ox biting against another ox and taking that ox's life and it being basically like on accident. I didn't really know it happened. I don't know how it happened. My ox has never been like this. It didn't have a bad behavior, but now it does.
[00:20:36] Like, what happens is that, okay, then you split the meat of the ox that was killed and you sell the ox that killed the other one, and then you split the price or whatever the proceed or the cost or whatever it was between each other. That's what happens if it's accidental. Because there's things that are accidental. But here's the question. What happens if you had an ox that had done this before and you chose to not keep it in a cage where it should be in order to protect the others, and you have allowed it to get out, and it does the same thing again?
[00:21:09] That's where negligence come in. In verse 36 here talks about how it shall be that it should this year, and the owner has not kept it in he shall repay ox for ox, and the dead beast shall be his. There's even greater proportion to your negligence compared to accidents.
[00:21:30] If it's an accident, we're gonna split this because we couldn't control it. But if it's your negligence, you're gonna repay for it wholly.
[00:21:37] So we see in this section how God is being proportional in his justice.
[00:21:45] And even as we go on further, how do I love someone justly who's wronged me? Right? Every one of us has been wronged in this room.
[00:21:53] Every one of us has had someone say something that's hurt us.
[00:21:59] But what happens whenever it's unclear or disputed, whenever the wrong is not black and white?
[00:22:11] Well, verses eight and nine, it says this in chapter 22, if a thief is not found, the owner of the house shall come near to God to show whether or not he shall put his hands to his neighbor's property. For every breach of trust, whether it's for an ox, for a donkey, for a sheep, for a cloak, or for any kind of lost thing of which one says, this is it the case of both parties shall come before God. The one who God condemns shall pay double to his neighbor.
[00:22:43] So in this right here, we're seeing God asking the why it happened before, what the penalty is. And there's another part of this. He's saying, look, when it's unclear, your job is not to rely on the law that I've given you.
[00:22:58] The law is not meant to replace God.
[00:23:02] It's an extension of us, of how to be his nation.
[00:23:06] But if it's unclear, we together are to come before God and allow God to be the One who is just.
[00:23:16] And so we come before him, we put it before him. And whoever God condemns, then they pay double.
[00:23:22] There's clarity there.
[00:23:24] But not only that, there's another one in verse 11. It talks about when there's no way to prove wrongdoing.
[00:23:31] What should we do?
[00:23:33] Well, what we're gonna see here is that we should extend trust rather than assume guilt.
[00:23:41] We should extend trust rather than to assume guilt. So here's four things when we think about God being proportionally just that come from this chapter 22, right up to right before 23.
[00:23:59] The wrong gets named and made right.
[00:24:04] It's not just swept under the rug.
[00:24:07] The second is the response is proportional to the actual harm, not maximum retaliation.
[00:24:17] Number three, intent and negligence matter.
[00:24:22] Not everything is equally culpable.
[00:24:26] And lastly, for God's justice being proportional, when guilt is unprovable, you extend the benefit of doubt rather than holding a grudge indefinitely.
[00:24:40] So we've seen two things right now.
[00:24:42] God's justice is measured. God's justice is proportional. The next section here talks about laws about social justice. Really. He's talking about laws on how do we build a healthy, loving community that reflects his glory.
[00:24:57] How do we do that? Well, this is where we're gonna see God's justice is compassionate. We're gonna see how his love, his care, his mercy and his forgiveness is flowing all through this passage.
[00:25:09] And so when we think about this in our lives today, how do I live and uphold my community justly?
[00:25:17] That's a question that God's answering here.
[00:25:20] He's answering it for the Israelites specifically.
[00:25:23] So let's read verses 21 through 24 in chapter 22 to see some of the guidance that he gives us for this.
[00:25:31] It says, you shall not wrong a sojourner or oppress him, for you are sojourners in the land of Egypt. You shall not mistreat any widow or fatherless child.
[00:25:41] If you do mistreat them and they cry out to me, I will surely hear their cry. This is God speaking here. And my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword. And your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless.
[00:25:58] It's a pretty intense passage, but here he's calling on his people, the Israelites, to remember, not long ago, you were under someone else's thumb, weren't you?
[00:26:11] The Egyptians, they didn't treat you well. Their type of slavery was not the type of slavery that is talked about here in the laws that have been given.
[00:26:21] Instead, they beat you, they hurt you, and you worked for them. And they won. They got the benefit. You didn't.
[00:26:31] Here as God's nation, he's saying you are going to be different than the rest of the world.
[00:26:39] You are going to stand up and you are going to protect the vulnerable.
[00:26:43] Remember how you were in Egypt, so that it draws compassion out of you to be compassionate with those who are sojourning in your land.
[00:26:52] He's also going to say how you are going to help protect the widow and the fatherless child.
[00:27:01] As you have prominence, you are to extend that, to be compassionate with those in your midst.
[00:27:11] He also goes on to say in this chapter here that we should have a respect for authority and integrity in what we do.
[00:27:20] And it's important here is that verse 28 talks about how you should not revile God, nor curse the ruler of your people. God, we see all throughout his nation, raises up leaders that are put in authority over us.
[00:27:35] We are to respect them.
[00:27:37] We're not to curse the rulers.
[00:27:40] We look at all the Old Testament. There are many leaders that he raises up to lead his people.
[00:27:47] All pointing of course to Jesus that would one day come his Son to earth.
[00:27:53] And so we need to have a respect for authority and have integrity. And true integrity is blind to status and not selectively kind.
[00:28:01] We don't get to just choose who we're kind to and who we're not.
[00:28:05] We extend the love that God has given us to all people.
[00:28:11] And so here's the thing with compassion. God's justice is compassionate. Compassion isn't just a soft add on to justice.
[00:28:26] It's stated that it's actually God's motive.
[00:28:30] In verse 27, I am compassionate.
[00:28:34] When we think of authority and integrity, we sometimes think that they're separate categories, but they're not. Authority and integrity are categories from compassion.
[00:28:46] They're how compassion gets structurally protected in community life.
[00:28:52] They're the ways in which it flows out.
[00:28:56] So God's justice is measured, proportionate, compassionate.
[00:29:03] And lastly, it's orderly.
[00:29:07] On this last section in chapter 23, verse 10 is where it starts, we see God's justice is orderly. What it talks about is really three big things. One is about the land.
[00:29:21] You shall work the land for six years. On the seventh year, you should give it rest. And for that rest, it's going to be good for those who are surgeon in your land. They're going to be able to feed off of it and use it for their good.
[00:29:32] You should also work six days in a week and you should have the seventh day for rest.
[00:29:37] Oh, and by the Way in your calendar. There are three festivals that you need to make sure on your calendar that bring all of the nation of Israel together to worship the God in which has organized them and structured them and really saved them, forgiven them, done so many amazing things for them so that they don't forget who their God is.
[00:29:57] What this section is, is for us to have a just community. What he's saying here, for us to be just and have a community and have a nation that reflects God and His glory.
[00:30:10] We are actually in need of rest because in order to actually do all of these laws that he's put out here for us, which means to basically be faithful to what he's called us to, we need rest.
[00:30:29] And here's the part that hit me hard this week.
[00:30:32] I'm still working through how to apply it even in my own life.
[00:30:37] But some of us included struggle to be faithful because we struggle to have order in our schedules that naturally bring about rest.
[00:30:50] Some of us struggle to be faithful because we struggle to have order in our schedules that naturally bring about rest.
[00:31:01] God knew his people needed rest in order to be faithful to what he called them to be and to do.
[00:31:10] And if they were faithful to do what he called them to do, guess what they would reflect the glory in which he was trying to establish in his world.
[00:31:21] So in conclusion, we learned a lot about laws today.
[00:31:27] Injustice.
[00:31:29] The question has to do with how do sinful people live with other sinful people.
[00:31:35] Not by throwing the book of law at them, but by being just, by being loving, by caring for them.
[00:31:45] And this was how God established His nation in the Old Testament.
[00:31:50] The reality for us is that we don't live in the Old Testament.
[00:31:54] We live in the kind of New Testament age here where Jesus has come, the perfect Son of God, fully man, fully God, lived an amazing life, fulfilled all the laws and prophets, died for our sins, forgave us, rose again on the third day, ascended into heaven, all for an opportunity for us to be reconciled back to the Father because of His Son, Jesus.
[00:32:19] Jesus was the image of the invisible God we see in Colossians.
[00:32:23] And you know that Jesus came to this world to establish his kingdom.
[00:32:29] And his kingdom happens to be the spiritual kingdom of the church.
[00:32:35] The church here, the believers coming together represent and even reflect his glory.
[00:32:43] So while some of these laws we're not going to be held to, there are 51 another passages in scripture that are given to us in the New Testament.
[00:32:55] When you think about these laws, one another's are pretty easy to connect.
[00:33:01] God is establishing his kingdom here on earth, his spiritual kingdom here.
[00:33:07] So when we think about how do we connect it to our lives today, how do we think about how we love one another, how do we care for one another, how do we serve one another?
[00:33:24] How are we just towards one another?
[00:33:29] For us to live in a community under Christ as his body, with many members to do that justly to reflect his glory, we need to love one another.
[00:33:47] Which means that if we have issues with one another, we got to deal with them.
[00:33:50] Because there's still a reality that sinful people part of the church, because we've all, we all are sinners, we fall short of the glory of God.
[00:34:02] So as we go throughout this week, my hope and my challenge is that we think about how we're going to love one another. Well, ultimately loving God first and other second.
[00:34:14] And when we do that, by loving one another and serving one another and caring for one another, holding one another accountable, we are reflecting the very glory that God wants the world to see.
[00:34:29] Let's pray.
[00:34:33] Father, I'm thankful for your word.
[00:34:36] The time that we've been able to dive into all the laws that you have given the people of Israel to become a nation.
[00:34:46] Father, as we think through how this applies in our life, God, we're sinful people living with other sinful people.
[00:34:52] God, would you help us learn and even call us to continue to love one another? Well, Lord, as you have sent your son and established your kingdom and that's why he came here to earth, God, would we be able to reflect your glory to those in our neighborhoods, to those in our city of Shreveport, to those in our state and to the world, but most importantly, God, we know that it starts in our home.
[00:35:27] So God, with your help, we can do it.
[00:35:33] Help us love one another well in our homes, in our work, in our church, in our city, for your glory in Jesus name, amen.
