The One Law

Trinity Presbyterian Church of Bethesda
10.26.08; Rev. David Williams

Scripture Lesson: Matthew 22:34-46

There’s a reason there are so many lawyers in America. No, it has very little to do with the fact that many parents view it as the only acceptable alternative after you don’t manage to make it into medical school.

There are so many lawyers because there are just so many laws.

Let’s take the United States Code as an example. I can’t claim to fully understand it, but here’s what little I managed to pluck off the internet this last week. Every law passed by Congress gets plugged into one of 50 “Titles,” which logically sort American laws into different categories. Those titles are divided into subtitles, which are divided into chapters, which are divided into subchapters, which are divided into parts, which are divided into sections.

As a Presbyterian, I find that all strangely exciting.

For example, Title 26 has to do with revenue and taxation, so if you had this deep and burning desire to know when you have to file a special return, you could look to Title 26, Subtitle F, Chapter 61, Subchapter A, Part I, Section 6001, which tells you everything you need to know. Or is that Section 6002? I always muddle those two.

How many laws are there? Well, Title 26...which is one of the 50 Titles...is about 7,500 pages long. Fortunately, it’s a page turner. When you get to Title 26, Subtitle V, Chapter 37, Subchapter B, Part I, Sec. 7042, you’re just not going to believe the plot twist it serves up. Man. I was shaking my head after that one. Never saw it coming. It seriously sets you up for the sequel in Title 27. Don’t worry. I won’t ruin the ending.

The sheer volume of American law is truly dizzying. Hundreds of thousands of pages of code are simply more than any one human being...or even a roomful of human beings...can come to terms with.

I know they say that ignorance of the law is no excuse, but you couldn’t be aware of the fullness of the laws that govern our country if you spent your entire lifetime studying them and every single neuron in your brain was dedicated to learning them, including the neurons that you currently use to figure out how to eat, breathe, and use most universal remotes. When regulations and requirements reach that level of complexity, it becomes harder and harder for us to know how we relate to them. It becomes harder for us to know how to apply them to our lives.

For the ancient Hebrews, the law was also a big deal, although it was considerably less complex. As the scholars of Torah figured it, there were 613 total laws. 248 of them were things you had to do, and 365 of them were things you were supposed to not do. Compared to the United States Code, this was a cakewalk.

Still, though, the complexities of Torah were such that they consumed the thoughts of those who took it seriously. In the time of Jesus, those folks were called the Pharisees, and today we hear about how one of them asks him a question. It’s a lawyer, but by “lawyer,” we need to understand that Matthew means someone who would be more like a bible scholar ...challenges Jesus to make a judgement call about the law. It’s an interesting question: “Which is the greatest commandment in the law?”

Jesus, of course, knows his stuff. He responds with a quotation from Deuteronomy 6:5...”You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all of your soul, and with all of your mind.” It’s a good answer, as that verse is the second part of the Shema, the holiest prayer of the Jewish people. So...that’s the commandment, right?

Jesus doesn’t stop there, though. Sure, he’s given the guy his “greatest commandment.” But he’s not finished with his response. While this is the first and greatest commandment in his book, he feels compelled to take it a step further. He makes sure to add in a second commandment, which he pulls from another book of the Torah...the book of Leviticus. From Leviticus 19:18, he says: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Having presented his questioner with this reply, he makes it clear...both of these commandments seem to be part of one single law. When he declares that the two laws are similar, he’s not really setting one up as above the other. They are to be understood as somehow part of the same single unitary thing. It is on the combination of both of these that the entire law...meaning the law given to the Jewish people by God...finds its foundation.

Our lives are not simple things. We have to figure out how to make moral choices in countless different situations. How do we act in the workplace? How do we respond to those around us in school? How do we deal with our families, and our friends? How do we deal with that annoying neighbor who cranks his music up at 3 in the morning when we’ve got important things to do the next day?

If you’re living your life in accordance with the faith that Christ brought to us, the answer to that question does not lie in having memorized a whole slew of different laws, each one designed to deal with every single specialized circumstance. You don’t need to dig down to find exactly which chapter and subchapter and part and section speaks directly to where you find yourself at that very moment.

Those things are very useful for organizing a society, and for trying to make sure things go more-or-less smoothly as we human beings bump and jostle against one another in the world. But faith governs us very differently. Faith is not about nattering over each tiny detail. Faith is about purpose. Faith is about direction. Faith is the thing that gives life depth and meaning.

For that reason, followers of Jesus Christ have a single law that gives just that sense of purpose. It is a remarkably simple thing. It is a thing that most of us can grasp without having to spend our entire lives studying some highly complicated ethics. Yet if we look hard at how most Christians seem to live their lives, it is something that we seem to struggle to come to terms with. We’d almost rather lose ourselves in studying and legalistic dickering over tiny little details. We’d almost rather throw up our arms and declare that it’s just all too much for us to possibly understand.

When there are laws enough to fill a thousand books, it’s hard to grasp them all. But when there is just one law, it is harder for us still. How can we find a way to apply that law to everything we do? How is it even possible?

Christ wants all of us to spend the rest of our lives finding that out.