You Shall Not Murder

Well, good morning. It's good to have you all. We're going to continue our series in the Ten Commandments. And the commandment for today is the Sixth Commandment. You shall not murder. And I believe that if we were to go through all the commandments, this might be one of the easiest ones for us to feel like we've got this one. You know, I'm sure most of us are aware enough to think, well, in the Sermon on the Mount, you know, the Lord talks about getting angry and how that is like unto murder. But, you know, overall, if you were to think about them, murder is one that seems fairly far off. It can be somewhat of a simplistic, maybe, or the easiest commandment for us to apply. Don't murder. We should be good, right? Well, no.

The act of physically murdering someone is a start of what's commanded here, but it is not all of what's commanded here. As with all of the commandments, the commandments are sort of given to us in a concentrated form. And there's ten of them. You have ten fingers. You could assign one commandment to each finger and easily memorize them. So God has done us this great favor by distilling his law into ten words so that they're easy for us to teach to our children so that we can remember them and that our children can remember them. However, I don't know if when you were little you ever had those little, you'd get from the dollar store, you'd get these little tiny pellets that you would put in water and then the plastic would dissolve and it would grow into this big sponge.

Well, it's like these commandments are concentrated. They're in this very small package. But as you meditate on them and think about them, they bloom and they grow and you realize that we could spend ages developing and thinking about what God is commanding us in just one of these commandments. Westminster Confession says, the whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for our own glory, man's salvation, faith, and life is either expressly set down in Scripture or by good and necessary consequence can be deduced from Scripture. And all that's saying is that when God gives us a command, the opposite of the command is true. and that we can meditate on what the command is and all the things that would link to it, and then those things are also true. And if it's a good and a necessary consequence of the command, then it is as much of a command as the command that is written down. And so today, we're going to meditate on and work through the meaning of you shall not murder. If you would, please stand.

And we'll read our text today. It's a very short text, but it is nonetheless still the word of God. And the length of the text does not imply its importance or lack of importance. And so we still stand to honor the word of God. This is God's word and it's eternally true and it's given for us today. You shall not murder. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. So, you shall not murder. In the Bible, there are many places where God commands people to be put to death. We read in Deuteronomy, our last week's sermon, right? We saw men, women, and children all put to death by the word and the command of God. Now we see here, you shall not murder.

They might seem contradictory. The reason they're not contradictory is because killing and murder are not the same thing. Killing does not equal murder. You may have learned, you shall not kill, or you may have a translation that says, you shall not kill. That's not actually a very good translation because the Hebrew word here is ratsach. This word is used 40 times in the Old Testament. And it's never used in the context of battle or capital punishment. This word is used strictly in the context of an accidental killing or in a premeditated killing. Most of the uses of the word are actually in the book of Deuteronomy, or the book of Numbers, when Moses gives all the laws, and there's these long sections dealing with cities of refuge. So one of the examples that is there is...

If you were out in the woods working on wood with another man and you were swinging your axe and the head flew off and killed the other man with you, that was an accident. It wasn't premeditated. You could flee to one of these cities of refuge and the blood avenger would not be able to seek out vengeance upon you for this accidental killing. This word is also used in all the contexts where, and also in Deuteronomy, you see all the cases of why else you might put someone to death. It deals with cases when a man plans to kill someone. So the idea of the word that's used here, though, is for murder and for the accidental killing of someone. Now, murder is not self-defense. In Exodus 22, 2 through 3, we read, if a thief is caught while breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there will be no blood guiltiness on his account. But if the sun has risen on him, there will be blood guiltiness on his account. He shall surely make restitution if he owns nothing, then he shall be sold for his theft. This is a really interesting verse because we have someone who's breaking into another person's house. And if it's done at night,

The idea is you don't know what he's up to. Why are they in the house? Are they there to harm you? Are they there to harm your wife or your children? Why are they in the house? We don't know, and it's dark. So we don't even have any clues as to what their intent is. But we can assume, safely, that because they broke into your house at night, that they have ill intent. And so if you put a stop to their intrusion and you kill them, that is not murder. There's no guiltiness in that death. That changes if it's daylight. Because if they come into your house and you can see they're there to get your TV and leave, their life, even though they're sinning and they're wrong, their life is more valuable than the goods that they are taking.

and you're not allowed to just kill them. And so we see there's this distinction, because if you were to kill them over them stealing stuff, then there would be blood guiltiness assessed for killing that person. So we see that there's a distinction here between self-defense and protecting of your property, even between day and night, when you can discern more the intent or lack of intent. Murder is also not killing in the context of war. at least a just war. The government, God has given the sword to wield, to bring about justice, to protect. We also see capital punishment established in scripture. And again, the sword is given to the government to protect the righteous and to defend them against the unrighteous, to suppress wickedness and to encourage righteousness.

And so in general, obviously this could be violated by a government, but in general, capital punishment would not be the same thing as murder. It is killing, and we'll talk a little bit more about that as we go on. Now, when we think about murder, do you know anyone who would say that they are pro-murder? If you were to go out and use, you know, sort of the Ray Comfort does the evangelism, he asks the Ten Commandments, right? And you ask someone, have you murdered someone? That's probably one of the commandments that everyone's going to be like, you don't got me on that one. Murder tends to be something that is sort of far away from us, right? It's something that is relegated to the shady parts of town that we might enjoy reading in a book or we see in our movies, but it's not like, in our minds, a day-to-day reality. However, it's actually much closer than we might think about at first. And it is an area in which our culture is very, very confused. When we talk about murder, most of us in this room, probably the first thing that comes to our mind is abortion. It's so prevalent in our society. And there are different kinds of abortion.

We have chemical abortion, which you're taking a pill or chemicals to kill the child. There's also surgical abortions, where you're using instruments to kill the baby. And so in that, we have a more blatant and obvious form of killing a child, which would be murder. It's sort of easier to understand. But there's more ways. Abortion can get even more complicated because there are things like IUDs in hormonal birth control. And our presbytery has written a book called Abortion in the Church. And if you haven't read it, go to the website. You can read it free. There's a PDF there or buy the book. And there's much more detail than we're going to get into today.

Sort of the bird's eye view is that with birth control and with IUDs, there's a fail-safe mechanism built in. It's supposed to suppress ovulation, but there's a fail-safe, and that fail-safe is that it makes the uterus inhospitable for a fertilized egg so that the egg will not implant. So life begins at conception. You have a sperm and an egg, and separate. They're not anything. They're the components. But as soon as that sperm implants into the egg, you have a new life. It is a person. And so if you intentionally or unintentionally, through the use of this, kill that life, you killed a life, which is murder. And so when you have birth control, hormonal birth control, or an IUD that causes the uterus to be inhospitable to a fertilized egg, whether it does it the first time or the second time, over the course of time, it will murder children. And you could say, well, the chances seem low. But over the course of years of using this, you will.

We are not allowed to be flippant with life. If you're out hunting and you see a bush moving and you think, well, it could be my friend who's out here hunting with me or it could be a deer, I'm going to shoot it and find out. We don't take chances like that, right? And so we are not allowed to be flippant about life where life is concerned and just say, well, it's a chance, it's a risk, it might, it might not. Well, then you're not allowed to do it. And obviously, this is an area where our culture hates life and is pro-murder. And we're seeing that again and again, right? Where politicians are changing their voice. While that row has been overturned, and praise the Lord that it was, but now that it's been given to the states, again and again, pro-life legislation has been failing. And part of that is because we realize that we are...

the people of our nation are not as pro-life as what we think we might be. Though everyone immediately would say, oh no, I don't believe in murder, I wouldn't murder. When we start digging down, we see our culture isn't as pro-life as what we might want. Another area in which our culture hates life is with euthanasia. Euthanasia is EU, which is good, and thanatos, which is death. It's a good death. It is a radically misnamed idea. Whether it's doctor-assisted suicide or whether it's children choosing to put to death their parents, it's something that's growing in our world. It's something that's more and more relevant because as healthcare costs rise and older people cost more than young people and we're ambivalent towards Our infants. Why do you think we would care about our elders? And if it's costly to keep them on life support and to give them medical care, then why not just remove it? This is one of the dangers of a publicly funded health care system, is that the people on the ends of life tend to cost the most. So if you're trying to save money, and what value does an old person bring anyways?

is what our secular culture might ask because they don't see value in life itself. It's a utilitarian perspective. And so euthanasia can come in the form of starving patients, refusing to give them food or water. It can be caused by drugging them, by slowly increasing the morphine until they go to sleep and all their organs and their whole body just shuts itself down. And this is something we need to be aware of. As we have parents who might be getting older, or relatives, if you're a power of attorney for someone, you must be considering this. Because if you have doctors who do not have your view, the biblical view of life and of murder, then they may be steering you and guiding you towards murder. But they're not going to tell you that.

They're complicated issues. And if what you're being told doesn't seem right or make sense, then you better ask questions. And you better seek counsel and get help because you do not want to be an accomplice to murder or approve of it, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Remember, in the cities of refuge, the cities of refuge were not for people who had premeditatedly murdered someone. Those people were to be put to death, but they were for someone who had accidentally murdered someone. And if you did that, you had to flee. You should see the importance that Scripture places on life, that even an accidental killing could put your own life in jeopardy. It's a serious deal. And we'll get into that more in a minute. Now, these are hard circumstances when you consider euthanasia.

And I want to say that there is a great difference between a sickness or a disease killing someone and the doctors drugging or starving them to death. We all will die. And there may be a point where you do not pursue medical treatment. But in not pursuing it, the disease or the sickness is what they die from. Not you not pursuing treatment. That's very different than just starving someone to death. or continuing to give them drugs until they die. We also have suicide. This is another area in our culture where we actually show that we don't have much of a problem with murder. There are TV shows that have glamorized suicide. There are celebrities that have committed suicide, and we've celebrated them. And we've not talked about the awfulness.

of what they did and how it's inspired and pressured other people, especially younger children, to pursue suicide. And so suicide is a form of self-murder. But it's worse than that in that it's actually a murdering of all men. It's saying that not only is my life supposedly not worth living, but no one else is worth living for. It's a completely self-focused act. We all know someone who's committed suicide. There's been people that we've probably been close to, or we have a friend of a friend. Suicide is shaking your fist at God. And in essence, it's both saying, I will take my fate into my own hand and blot out all men at the same time.

Our culture is very confused. We support abortion. We promote euthanasia. We don't stigmatize suicide. And yet at the same time, what do we promote? Well, we're all about prioritizing plants and animals. You know, there's people and views that talk about humans as if they're a cancer and a blight to the earth. We call our pets fur babies. Right? And you drive around and you see all the little stick figures and then all the animals and how many, I'm a German shepherd mom and whatever on the backs of all these vehicles. Right? And it's in the news. And so it's like while we allow and permit abortion and we encourage that, we promote.

The life and health of animals. And spend thousands of dollars taking them to vets. We have these nature preserves. Dave and I were talking about the difference between a conservation and a nature preserve. These preserves are not gardens. They're just let the wild be wild. Versus a conservation where man allows the wild to be, but he cultivates it. It's... fulfilling the creation mandate to take dominion. And so you control factors going on and have an abundance of life there. One question for us is, do you feel more repulsion about the killing of animals than about euthanasia or about abortion or suicide? Think about this. Have you seen all the memes in the movies where, like, They make jokes about how when someone dies versus when the dog dies in the movie or when Hedwig dies, right? And they're all like, oh, the animal died. What a grief. And then they're just like all's normal as the men or women in the movie get slaughtered. You see how backwards we have this. And it's not that animal lives are not important. Man was too.

take care of them. He wasn't supposed to go and slaughter them. Noah was to take all the animals on the ark and care for them. It's not that we don't care and treat them. It's that there is a quantitative difference between the life of an animal and the life of a human. And so what we see is we have it backwards, which shouldn't surprise us because isn't this what Satan always does? Did God really say, We're always getting God's commands backwards. And so it shouldn't be any surprise to us that we want to promote the health of the planet and we want to promote the lives of animals and give drastic fines for harming an animal or animal's habitat while being destructive to the life of man. That we would promote one and denigrate the other. Well, it makes sense because it's in direct contradiction to the word of God.

We're subverting and twisting God's design. It's not that our world just hates life. They actually prioritize the wrong life. And here's the thing. You'll lose it all by doing that. Because for the world to have order and be sustained, you need man. Because the world is supposed to be a garden. And so if you destroy man, you will not have paradise. The world's red in tooth and claw, right? You will not get paradise by removing man. Now, we must ask ourselves, why? Why is it so wrong to murder? Luke 12.25 says, And which of you, by worrying, can add a single hour to his lifespan? And in Job 14.5 it says, Since his days are determined, the number of his months is with you, and his limits you have set, so that none can pass.

The Bible clearly teaches that a man's days are determined by God. To try and determine the length of your days is an attack on God's sovereignty, and it demonstrates a lack of trust in him. To say, I will take this authority into my own hands. That life and death are determined by God. It's not for man to determine. But the ultimate reason is found in Genesis. The creation story is beautiful. There's nothing. And God says, let there be light. And there's light. And God says, let there be darkness. Let there be dry land. Let there be sea. Let there be fish in the sea. And land animals and plants. The host of heaven he creates. And all of these are almost, you could say, impersonal. It's just speaking them and poof, they're there. Out of nothing. And then.

And then you have this very intimate creation where God comes down and he holds a little council amongst the members of the Trinity. And it says that God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him. Male and female, he created them. The man and woman were formed by God out of the dust of the earth. They weren't just spoken into existence. God crafted them and made them. And it's hands-on. It's beautiful. And in Genesis 9, 6, we read that whoever sheds man's blood, by man his blood shall be shed, for in the image of God he made man. This is astonishing. This should knock your socks off. It should blow your mind. God spent all this time creating all this vast and intricate creation, which we still haven't plumbed the depths of, right?

Scientists still don't understand the world. We're trying and we're studying, and yet all of that is nothing compared to he creates man in his own image. He forms him. He makes him. Have you ever pondered about that? You can write books on what it means to be made in the image of God. Set that aside. You're in the image of God. Look around. Look, every person you see here is made in the image of God. Think about the reality and the weight of what that means. You are made in God's image. You represent God. Shouldn't that affect how we interact with one another? Though the image is marred by the fall and each one of us is still in God's image, it's been distorted but not removed.

If you don't think that's incredible enough, think about this. Jesus in the incarnation takes on our likeness. Jesus Christ became a man. He took on a human body and a soul. This is incredible. By doing this, he elevates the status of all mankind. Jesus has only taken on the flesh of man. He's never taken on any other kind of physical body, and he never will. This should raise the status of every single person you see in your mind. What an incredible honor and glory that God himself was incarnate. C.S. Lewis says that you have never met an ordinary person or a mere mortal. They are all of us made in God's image.

There is no mere human being that you're interacting with. Jesus became a man. He took on our flesh to save you and the person next to you. Everyone you see is made in God's image. How can you bear to treat each other so poorly when we are of that kind of value, when we are to represent God to each other? Every person reflects both God and each other. We're clothed in the same flesh. This commandment, you shall not murder, should alert us to the fact that there is a unity to all mankind. Doesn't matter what country you're from. Doesn't matter what skin color you are. Doesn't matter any of that. You are a person made in the image of God. And every other person you meet is a person made in the image of God who are clothed in the same flesh that Jesus Christ himself clothed himself in.

To murder, to take someone's life is an offense against God and against all other mankind. It is to strike at the unity and the fellowship that all men should have with each other. Now you think about the death penalty then and how serious it is to put someone to death. How serious that offense must be that God says that you should be put to death for having murdered another image bearer. legitimate killing of someone is a high bar to clear, and it must be done in the service and the protection of life and removing of a greater evil. So what are some of the implications of you shall not murder? Well, as we look a little bit at the broader meaning of this commandment, we are thinking about the spirit of the law. These violations of the sixth commandment are ways that we strike at life though it may not be physically in the middle of the larger catechism question it has this phrase it's very striking it says that one of the ways that we are to keep the sixth commandment is by patiently bearing the hand of god and

I think that can help us understand the broad ways or the intricacies of how this applies. Because how much of our troubles in life are because we have no patience for what God has dealt us. And we're unhappy with the circumstances in our life. And so we treat other people poorly and we take out our anger and frustrations on them because we're actually unhappy with... The situation in which God has placed us. The providences of God. And so since we can't strike at God, what do we do? We strike at the closest thing. Those who are in God's image. That's what Satan did. Satan was kicked out of heaven. And he couldn't reach God. He couldn't climb back into the heavens to attack God. So what he said is, man is the closest thing because he's in God's image. So I will bring down man. And that's how I will spite God.

And so when we do that to each other, when we despise one another and get angry, we are following in the footsteps of Satan. We are getting the closest we can to strike at God because we have no ability to strike him ourselves. What dangerous wickedness. So if you think about you shall not murder, what is man? Well, We think about the physical life of man. We're not to take away his physical life. But what other life do we have? We all have souls, don't we? And the command to not murder applies just as much to your soul as it does to your physical body. And so you must ask yourself, are you taking care of your soul and the souls of those around you? Your soul is eternal.

Are you living in such a way that you are going to send your soul to eternal death or eternal life? Do you feed on the word of God or do you starve yourself? Starving yourself is a violation of the sixth commandment. Not spending time in the word of God and starving your soul is just as much of a violation. What kind of company do we keep? Are we keeping company that promotes us? that promotes righteousness, that spurs us on to good works? Are we keeping destructive company? Are you making provision for the flesh? Because if you're making provision of the flesh, you are pursuing death, which is the opposite of you shall not murder. Do you make provision for sin or for holiness? I just mentioned the New Testament and the Sermon on the Mount. Anger is murder. Anger is hatred of someone.

And when you give in to anger, you are pursuing death. What is the opposite of murder? A murder is taking away someone's life, right? So if we think about the opposite of murder, murder is to shorten someone's life, to kill him, to harm it. Then the opposite of that would be promoting life, sustaining life, caring for life, cherishing life. This means we ought to think carefully about our food, our drink, our sleep, our medicine, our work, and our recreations. Because how we eat either promotes good health in life or destroys it and tears it down. Whether you have a good sleep pattern or not affects your life. How you work affects your life.

Are you working in such a way that you promote health and life? Are you working in such a way that it denigrates and tears it down? The sixth commandment has implications in all of these areas. Are you reckless in your driving? Do you text and drive? Do you speed and cut people off and drive crazy? That's a violation of this commandment. My boys and I were talking about this. You know, what's a good risk and what's a bad risk? Because there are some risks that would be violations of this and others that aren't. Some of that has to do with the purpose for which you're taking the risk, whether that risk can succeed. Like, there's all sorts of implications, and you have to think through these things with wisdom. But being foolish and reckless, as young men are often prone to do, can turn into a violation of this commandment.

of actually hating life, of tempting death. Self-harm, cutting yourself, mutilation, is diametrically opposed to the sixth commandment. You're striking at life. You are made in the image of God. If you are striking yourself, cutting yourself, it's on the path to murder, self-murder, which is a direct attack on God. We must not harm ourselves. You are in the image of God. Do not follow after Satan and attacking the image of God. We have to be so careful about our words. You realize gossip, how we talk about our husbands, how we complain about our wives, is tearing down their lives. It tears them down in front of other people and harms their reputation. It's destructive of life.

It's wicked. It's a violation of God's commands. And as we talk about this, we can talk about that under thou shalt not bear false witness. And so as you begin to break these commandments down, we see how interconnected they are. That when you violate one, you're violating all of them. Calvin says, we are accordingly commanded if we find anything of use. to us in saving our neighbors' lives faithfully to employ it. And if there is anything that makes for peace, to see it. And if anything harmful, to ward it off. If they are in danger, to lend a helping hand. Think about it. The command to not murder is a command to live with love amongst each other. To love life. To help and support and sustain one another. Being neutral is not good.

We cannot simply say, I do not kill someone and think that we have somehow fulfilled the sixth commandment. Christians need to proactively love life and it should be evident in every aspect of our lives. And think about what Jesus says in Matthew. He says, he's talking about the judgment day. And on judgment day, the sheep and the goats stand before him and he separates them to his right and to his left. And as he's talking to them, the goats say, but Lord, when did we see you naked? When were you in prison and we didn't visit you? And you know what's interesting is the sheep asked the same question. And what Jesus says is, and as much as you did it to the least of these, you did it unto me.

How can God appropriate the good and wonderful works of the saints as done unto himself? Because we do it because God loved us, so we love him, and we go and love his image bearers. And when we do that, God takes it as done unto himself and rewards us. We must evangelize one another. We must evangelize the lost. You know, Ezekiel says that the watchman who stands on the tower and sees the danger and doesn't say anything is guilty of the blood of all those who are destroyed by his lack of warning. But if he warns and he points to the danger and says, you will die if you don't repent, and they still don't repent, well, he's not guilty of their blood.

They're guilty of their own blood. And so if we would not violate this commandment, we must be evangelizing and speaking to the truth to all those around us because we do not want to have their blood on our hands. What they choose to do with the truth is in their court. But let us not be guilty of their blood. You older siblings, you watch your younger siblings and you protect them. When you go outside and you're playing with your younger siblings, not only are you helping by keeping an eye on them, but you're actually proactively fulfilling this commandment by loving your siblings and making sure they aren't running in the street, by teaching them to be safe, by teaching them to follow and listen to instruction and to obey. You're actively obeying this commandment by loving them, by caring for them, by protecting them.

We have children, right? And as mothers, so much of your life is given over to the care and the nurture of them. It's such a sacrifice. And yet, what are you doing but positively fulfilling this commandment by loving life and by giving yourself over to the care and the nurture of your children? What a beautiful thing. By having children, we are actively fulfilling this commandment. We're showing a love of life by raising and teaching and disciplining them. We are fulfilling what God has commanded us here. And so there's much more that we could say, right? There's all sorts of areas that we can think about this. Our culture has got it wrong. They hate life. We cannot be like that. We need to learn to see each other as image bearers.

and to treat each other and love each other as men and women who reflect God. We're children of God. What a high and amazing calling that is. Let's pray.