The Golden Rule (Part 1 of 2)

The familiar with the golden rule one others as you would have them do unto you. We've all heard most of us upset.

It but do we really understand and are we living by. This is true for life weekend with Alistair Begg here is part one of a challenging message from Alister titled the golden rule.

In my defense returned to the sixth chapter of Luke's gospel when we resume our studies this morning on the 31st verse. When you reach the 31st verse, you will notice that we find ourselves at one of the most frequently quoted and misquoted statements in the whole of the Bible.

Here in the 31st verse of Luke six, we have what is referred to as the Golden rule prior to the time of Jesus.

This rule had been pronounced, but only in a negative form when you read it in the Old Testament, for example in the book of Leviticus is essentially something along these lines, what you do not want others to do to you, do not do to them in the Halal actually reads as follows. What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor as stated in a negative fashion. Jesus takes it and states it positively and I say the first thing that I want you to notice that when we consider this rule need to understand it as it is been given to us in this positive fashion. Jesus is making it clear that it is not simply enough for us to be passive or to be refraining from recrimination.

The children of God are to be those who are initiative takers in this matter of law.

Know the rule is not uniquely found in the New Testament as you will know in one form or another. It pops up all over the place you can find it in the writings of Plato and Aristotle of Seneca. You can even find it in the writings of Confucius, but in every other instance it is absent. The framework which is essential if we are to be able first to understand it and to apply it properly in order that we might do so I need to make clear to you that the antithesis to which some of us are perhaps prone, and which others of us delight to his spouse is false. What antithesis is that you say this one.

The idea that when we read the Old Testament we have all of these negative commands, and when we come to the New Testament, Jesus sets aside all that negative stuff as we hear people say, and he replaces it with a positive statement that is far more palatable and doable. Apparently, and he replaces it with the law of love or with the golden rule, so you will find people say well you know I'm not really into any of the Old Testament negativity. I am into the New Testament. Positive die mention as described here in Luke chapter 6 verse 31 it is a false dichotomy because Jesus himself makes clear that these negative prohibitions on the Old Testament find their fulfillment in the working out of this positive statement. For example, you take them as they come to mind. You shall not commit adultery shall not kill.

You shall not steal. You shall not covet all of that is summed up in this one positive die mention due to others as you would have them do to you know Paul actually uses the very terminology in Romans 13, where he is talking about our responsibilities within the framework of our citizenship and he's talking about indebtedness and not allowing debts to be outstanding and he is talking about the love for one another that fulfills the law and then he actually uses the terminology, the commandments, he says do not commit adultery, do not murder. Do not steal the narcotic and whatever other commandment. There may be, which is an interesting catchall phrase is not as if you didn't know the rest of the commandments are after he had gone through four he ran out of the other six whatever other commandment. There may be clearly didn't. He was a Pharisee of the Pharisees that all summed up in this one rule love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no harm to its neighbor.

Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law that he had interestingly and do this, understanding the present time, the hour has come for you to wake up from your slumber you writing to these Roman Christians and he says now listen fellas is really time that you gave yourself to shake and you waking up to this. I've been teaching you all of this doctrine. I've laid it down is fundamental here in these foundational elements of Christianity and now he says I've moved on these doctrinal indicative's to the moral imperatives and the moral imperatives which I now confront you with our grounded in all that I have laid down before and I want you. He says quite kindly to waken up and make sure that you are loving your neighbor as yourself.

So another words we need to understand the rule not only positively but we need to understand it precisely we need to see what it doesn't say as well as what it does say and it does not say treat others as they treat you. I only need to look down at your Bible is open to check whether that's accurate or not.

If you'd sit and listen to me, teach the Bible without your Bible open you do yourself a disservice because I'm saying things that you need to verify that I'm not infallible and therefore you can catch me out from time to time, provided your Bibles are open but I can stand up here and tell you that the golden rule says treat others as they treat you and you may be tempted to say and I think that's exactly right because that's what I hear people saying in the market.

That's what I hear people sitting in my office is a you know somebody does this do you do that you just read them the way they treat you and us know what it says Jesus is due to others as you would have them do to you don't treat them the way they treat you that give you a mandate for all kinds of behavior treat none in the way in which you would like to be treated by the followers of Jesus are to be distinctive in this regard. Now as you think about it in terms of precision.

It is also important to make sure that we do not view this statement here in verse 31 is simply a requirement which an individual is able to fulfill in their own strength. That is what people customarily believe the thing that you come to church and you can pretty well summarize it and give it to me in a sentence they say and if it is to be a sentence that it is going to be love your neighbor as yourself are doing to others as you would have them do view themselves. That is excellent. I'm going to go out and I'm a very good try and religious people are doing it all the time and you may have come here because you decided to turn over a new leaf and you decided to put it back into religion you're looking for somebody to summarize it for you as helpfully and concisely as possible so that you may go out and simply do it. Let me tell you, you cannot do it you can make an attempt at it, but you cannot achieve it because what Jesus calls for here is not the natural response of natural men and women. It is this supernatural response of ordinary men and women.

How then can I buy nature merely natural respond in a supernatural way answer I cannot unless of course I should be introduced to the power of God in the person of Christ, and that power may come and live with in me so that his love may flow from me out if I may call John Lennon which I have done for a while and Phuoc were coming on. Maybe I can make this clear. Take the song from way back we can work it out in all think of what I'm saying. Only time will tell if I am right or I am wrong and I have to keep on talking until I can go on life is very short and there's no time for fussing and fighting my friend to me.

Let's just be honest there's no time for all this fussing and fighting. He says that his wife were to his business colleague or to his member of the sports team or to his doubles partner in tennis and whatever else it is you know there's really no time for fussing and fighting, but we can work it. So let's just work your eyes will minimum nurse in all the time and we can work this and they can't.

Lennon couldn't and didn't nor can you.

So you see that's why religion as an external code of practice presented to well-meaning religious people Sunday after Sunday after Sunday is the most dreadful turning because the pastor then stands and says now go out and love your enemies, the people wanted to be jolly good people sick life" have a good try not to go out and have a miserable week to come back and say you know I never tried on and furthermore they think by doing that we actually make themselves the Sons of the most high God. So if I do this I will become your son is the absolute reverses will see what we conclude until I become his son or his daughter.

I cannot do. You cannot bear the family likeness until you become a member of the family and how do I become a member of the family as a result of God's goodness and grace to me in the person of his son as he comes to confront me with my inability to make me distinctly uncomfortable in order that I might know what it is when my heart accuses me to have the peace of God in my it will only be as God works it in that we can work it out. That's Philippians 212 and 13. Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, but it is God who works within you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Also, we need to understand that it is wrong for us thinking still in terms of the precision of the application of this rule is wrong for us to think of separating the rule of love for man from the commandment of love for God. Now this this is a broad all the time indeed for part of your homework do this for the next seven days. Listen for how many times you hear the golden rule in some of its forms. You will hear people saying this to you. You know well that all that really matters is that you know we we love our fellow man, isn't it, and is so often the kind of concluding statement when you've been having a serious conversation over a cup of coffee and you been trying to argue for the defense of the New Testament documents and the reality of Jesus in a pluralistic world, and so on and you think you been making great gains, and eventually the person says well I'll see you next Thursday and by the way, all that really matters is that we love our fellow man and you say, and seeing nothing and then five minutes later your car you go all I thought of something to say now too late they're gone and they left you dumbfounded before the golden rule. I see that's why were studying. And so the next time when families build to say something remotely helpful.

The golden rule is not a form of, for he's a Jolly good for you know that kind of thing that Christianity is about becoming a Jolly good fellow that there is not a Jolly or fellow who ever walked the streets of America and Jesus of Nazareth. He was a jolly fellow. And if you jolly well try your hardest you can be a jolly fellow to because after all, isn't that what he said. Jolly nice person is not what he said he did not distinguish separate love from God for love from our fellow man.

Now if you doubt this, you only need to go forward a couple of pages to chapter 10 and verse 25 and the story of the young man who is the testing agent here is to be don't know the age of the young man but he was an expert in the law, probably a young man. The older you get the less of an experience to become. I hope most older people and finger quite as expert as they used to think when they were in their 20s as a sign of not a onset of some senile dementia. That's the onset of humility which comes with time. But anyway, he stood up to test Jesus. That's why most was hoping we might grow a little older before we dive so that we might learn that humility. But anyway, he stood up to test Jesus and he said what must I do to inherit eternal life. Jesus is what is written in the law replied. I love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself is this absolute.

The point I'm making is simply this guy do not stand up and say some nation of the law is love your neighbor as yourself. Be a jolly good fellow know you said you love God with all your heart, mind, soul, strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

See humanism is very very happy with love your neighbor as yourself. So is Confucianism. So is Buddhism so is everybody else. Every person that is remotely interested in ecology or any kind of new age nonsense is quite happy with you not love your neighbor as yourself where they get off the boat is when it says you will love the guard in front of our Lord Jesus Christ with all your heart and all your mind and all your soul and all your strength and the commandment to love God is never separated from the commandment to love our fellow man was been more than enough time on that. I think they rule that is to be understood positively and it needs to be understood, precisely, otherwise we will fall foul of a lot of these clichés which are so easily baptized into orthodoxy. We need also to understand this rule practically which of course brings is now to the verses that follow, because Jesus begins to ask placate the significance of verse 31 by the question which comes in verse 3233 and 34 I think you would agree that this is an important question because Jesus acid three times and this question is, what credit is that to you, what credit is that to you if you simply allow your eyes to scan 32 to 34 you read it through just very briefly, and perhaps you will agree with me that Jesus is making clear one essential fact, namely, that the test of real love is that it should be unselfish that it is alive which is not focused upon reward aloud that is not driven by the anticipation of being paid back if you just read what he's saying there. I think if you're honest, you will agree that is exactly what he saying the love of which I'm speaking says Jesus is not driven by these things with which we are most familiar, which then of course, allows him to say on the strength of the reciprocal relationships which are so much a part of the fabric of the society that he addresses. If we love only in return for love received. Why would that ever be worthy of recognition some very loving horizon. We love him back more to where you want to walk around with a bumper sticker on the back your driver on the bumper sticker on the on the back your minivan on the strength of that environment. Honor students in the in the school of love. I love those who love me.

Jesus has big deal, what credit is that to you or if we do good only to those who do good to us. How would that distinguish us from the practice of anybody else around us is fairly common, fair, and if we operate financially on the basis of you scratch my back and I'll scratch yours and virtually no different at all from the culture which were living. I think this sounds Jesus is calling for a radical lifestyle that is dramatically different from the framework of the surrounding culture in his day and in our day credit is to use the sets you really think you can put your head on the pillow at night and see myself, you know, I'm so glad that I'm that I'm a member of the family of God, I'm so glad I am a son of the most high, because I've been loving those who love me had been doing good to those who do good to meet and I've been lending my money per provided I'm getting the right kind of percentage return on and at least as strong as something that I would get by from a certificate of deposit one, due to puts it like this. Of those people who are now listening to the sermon do not rise above such self-centered ethics, they cannot expect on special favor to rest on the staggering is do you grasp what Jesus is saying you want to do I grasp what Jesus is saying here listeners who live merely those who love them who do good only to those who do good to them and who are prepared to make loans that are safe aren't any better than the sinners. They like to look down upon see this distinction here is so classic, what credit is that to you. Even quotes. Sinners do that is interesting that sinners in your Bible will have two little gizmos around them. One of those things are even sinners do that even sinners lend to sinners, understand the way in which these people would be inclined to spit out the word sinners, because religious people are always so glad that they're not sinners you go forward again to Luke chapter 18 the story to which we refer with frequency because it is almost epigrammatic on the whole emphasis of the gospel of Luke.

The parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector and what was the Pharisees the Pharisee was in God.

I thank you and I am not like other men. I was his been claimed. I'm here and I have my roles. I'm here and I have all of my religious stuff. I've just come from a very good biblical conference and I've been listening to a number of sermons and of course my tithing is up to snuff, and I've been really fasting twice as much as anybody would be expected of fast and I am so glad that I'm not like that tax collector over there. I thank you that I'm not like her. Thank you that I'm different from him. Jesus okay fellas, listen to the end of the story. Saunders disciples is and will be a quiz at the end of this unfinished story.

There is another guy shows up and he simply says without lifting his eyes up to heaven, Lord, be merciful to me a sinner. Nice as yours acquits which of the two men went down to his house justified or accepted by God and the answer of religion is obviously I'm always going to be the man who is not like the other man who was a wretched sinner that had been the answer be given than they would've gotten it wrong. Fortunately the garden correctly said the guy who would lift up his eyes them Jesus, you're absolutely right. It's really too bad that there is so much of the spirit of the Pharisee that rises in my heart and I don't know about use. How I can take comfort in the fact that I am not like her or I didn't do what he did or I haven't been there might then and as if somehow or another that buying that sheer externalism on that I have now advanced my cause with God and simultaneously can then these poor souls to a dimension of life which is virtually hopelessness.

Jesus is listen. If you are tempted to play that game. Let me tell if you love those who love you if you do good to those who do good to you. If you land only safe loans and always with the prospect of getting a bucket the end of it that I want. I want you to understand this, you are actually no different from the very riffraff that you are condemning you are giving you no evidence he says of the radical difference is to mark the followers of Jesus Christ to listen to the words of Jesus without corresponding action is to simply show ourselves that we are in the same class as the others. You realize how crucial it says I hope you do that is Alastair big helping us understand the golden rule explaining what it means for us to live it out listing to Truth for Life weekend trip for life. We are passionate about teaching the Bible every day in a way that is clear and relevant for daily living. Our prayer is that God will use the messages on Truth for Life to convert unbelievers to root established believers more deeply in their faith and to encourage pastors and build up local churches, along with Alistair's messages. We recommend books to help every generation learn more about the Scriptures to grow closer to God to glorify him.

That includes the youngest members of your family and that's why were recommending a book called little pilgrims big journey. This is a wonderful book that presents the realities of the Christian life in language that young sons and daughters are able to understand. You'll be able to talk with your children or grandchildren about tough lessons like the importance of focusing on the greater reward of heaven rather than the opinions of others or the things of the world little pilgrims big journey even makes it easier to talk about sin or fear, even death in a way that's filled with hope, not fear. The book comes bundled with a coloring book with stickers with the map, but this is the last week and will be offering little pilgrims big journey. You can find out more about the book when you visit our website Truth for Life.Bob Lapine thanks for listening. Join us again next week and for part two of today's message will learn the evidences that Mark followers of Jesus, and it's more than attending church or doing religious activities Bible teaching of Alastair big is furnished by Truth for Life Learning is for Living