Why Are the Ten Commandments So Negative?
by R. Amos Glenn
Type of Event: Worship Service: Sermon only
Date Recorded: 19 Nov, 2006
Location: Pittsburgh, PA
Topics:
"From these considerations it is clearly manifest that so far as a man shuns evils, so far is he with the Lord and in the Lord; and so far as he is in the Lord, so far he does good, not from himself but from the Lord. Hence results this general law: SO FAR AS ANY ONE SHUNS EVILS, SO FAR HE DOES WHAT IS GOOD. "(Doctrine of Life 21) When we turn away from hell, which way are we facing? We often think of the Ten Commandments as a list of "Thou Shalt Not"s - the Lord telling us, like parents tell their children, all the things they are not allowed to do. But as we have learned over the past weeks, the Ten Commandments are not about limiting our freedom or making us suffer. So why are they so negative? The Doctrine of Life, which is drawn directly from the Ten Commandments, teaches that everyone in this world is suspended between heaven above and hell below. We are kept this way so we can freely choose which direction we want to turn. By birth we would naturally turn towards hell, but the Lord maintains our freedom and equilibrium and then educates us on how to turn towards heaven. We would assume that we would therefore be taught about how to do good. But in the 10 Commandments, we're not taught how to do good, but how to not do evil. Why? Good and evil are opposites and destroy each other when they meet. Since we are born with an inclination to evil, we cannot do good right away because the evil within us would destroy it. So our first job is to get rid of the evil. And as we shun those evils as sins, the Lord replaces them with good. We cannot do good without first shunning evil. The amazing result is turning toward heaven, not because we are choosing to turn towards heaven, but because we are turning away from hell. If we choose to not look down at the ground, we can't help but look at the sky. Obeying the Ten Commandments by shunning evils as sins against the Lord is the surest way to reach heaven. To see that this is true, first read Doctrine of Life 53, Isaiah 1:10-20, and Doctrine of Life 18-21, then listen to the full audio version of this sermon, and, finally, try practicing it for a week. This is the tenth and final sermon in our Journey series, celebrating the Ten Commandments. It is archived at www.PittsburghNewChurch.org.
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1Why Are the Ten Commandments So Negative? (Amos Glenn) - Life 21 (Nov 19, 2006)20m 33s
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