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Starting and Finishing with Grace

Words of Faith Final

Starting and Finishing with Grace
Words of Faith 12-12-2022
Dr. Jeffrey D. Hoy © 2022
Jeff.Hoy@faithfellowshipweb.com
Faith Fellowship Church - Melbourne, FL
www.faithfellowshipweb.com
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Exodus 20
[2] "I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

It is interesting that the Ten Commandments begin with a reminder of God's grace! Before the first "Thou Shalt" was uttered by God, He stared with "I am." I am the One who brought you out of slavery in Egypt. I am the Lord. I am Your God. Before I asked anything of you, I saved you. Before you thought about obedience, I snatched you from misery. My law is not "demanding." My law simply describes the response I desire from you after graciously setting you free.
How do we respond to the grace of God? The Ten Commandments at least partially describe our response. The Lord said through Moses and Jesus that our response to God's love is to love Him back with our whole heart, soul, and mind and then love our neighbor as ourselves. All of the precepts of the Law and Prophets hang upon the two positive commandments-- love God and love neighbor (Matthew 22:37-40).
At Sinai, the first four commandments concern the way we love God. The final six commandments concern the way we love our neighbors. We will even notice that commands 4 and 5 describe ways that we love ourselves since the Sabbath was made for man (Mark 2:27), and honoring our parents is a command that comes with a promise of life.
It is interesting to notice that eight of the ten commands are "negative" prohibitions-- "thou shalt not" statements. Only two are "positive"-- remember the Sabbath and honor your parents. It is the nature of law to draw a boundary that marks the extreme. Defining the positive can be difficult, while defining the negative is much more precise. Perhaps our fallen nature demands a limit. The great command is to love God, but God states how we avoid the extreme opposite-- No other gods, no idols, and don't misuse my name. Of all the things you do, don't have another god or idol or use my name in an empty way.
The second great command is to love your neighbor as yourself. How do you do that? Well, first and most of all, avoid the extremes! Don't murder, lie, steal, take another person's mate or even think about it. Those extremes mark the worst ways we don't love our neighbor. Of course, there are many positive ways to love.
The negative commands of God seem to describe a mountain path with a cliff on one side. Of course, the safe and wonderful part of the path is far from the edge! We are called to love God and the people around us, but the law describes the abyss we are to avoid by God's grace and strength. God describes the extreme so that we will avoid that abyss.
Of course, one of the problems with prohibitions is that they are enticing to our sin nature! There is something about a "speed limit" sign that makes us want to go just a little faster than the posted speed. Something about the boundary near the cliff's edge draws us close, if only to look over the edge.
Paul put it this way-- "I would not have known what sin was except through the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, 'Do not covet.' But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of covetous desire. For apart from law, sin is dead. Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death. For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death. So then, the law is holy, and the commandment is holy, righteous and good" (Romans 7:7-12).
"For in my inner being I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within my members. Who will save me from this body of death? Thank be to God-- through Jesus Christ our Lord!" (Romans 7:22-25).
So we are back to grace. The Law itself will not make in us a loving response to God and others. It is only the grace of God in Christ and His Spirit in us that can fly this flight plan. We begin with grace, and we end with grace.

Lord, I thank You for Your grace toward me. Thank You for snatching me out of the misery of Egypt and setting me free from the law of sin and death. Give me the grace and strength to love you with all my heart, mind, and soul. Give me the grace and strength to love those around me as myself. In Jesus' name.

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© Jeffrey D. Hoy 2022
Dr. Jeffrey D. Hoy - Faith Fellowship Church (EFCA)
2820 Business Center Blvd.
Melbourne, Florida 32940 (321)-259-7200
Jeff.Hoy@faithfellowshipweb.com
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The Words of Faith devotion is published five days a week by E-mail, excluding Federal holidays. Please feel free to forward this devotion to a friend who might be blessed by this devotion. Unless otherwise noted, all Scripture is quoted from the New International Version (R) of The Holy Bible. Copyright (c) 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Words of Faith (c) 1997, 2022 Jeffrey D. Hoy. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to forward this copyrighted material or use portions of it with appropriate notation of the source for non-profit purposes.